Comments on: Money Saving Tip: Check Your Account Statements

By: Lawrence at CRB

Lawrence at CRB — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 09:42:17 +0000

I see this a lot with people that come into my office for a consultation. Many of them have been given lip service and then taken advantage of by some type of creditor. As a consumer, you have to be very conscience of what’s going on in your statement.

By: Midnight Meanderings - Down 14 Pounds by No Credit Needed

Midnight Meanderings - Down 14 Pounds by No Credit Needed — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 03:17:35 +0000

[...] Frugal Dad – Remember To Check Your Statements [...]

By: Sam Li

Sam Li — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 23:32:13 +0000

Way to go Rob!
Here is a free 2007 Excel file you can download it and use as you want.
http://www.householdstatement.com/post/2008/11/02/Household-Budget-v100-tools-for-budget.aspx

By: Rob in Madrid

Rob in Madrid — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 20:26:14 +0000

Back on track, I want to second the point of paying attention to your bills. I was always lazy about keeping on top of thing, inspired by several blogs I started paying closer attention to my statements. I was quite horrified to find that over a 4 month period my balance went sideways. I had missed a payment or two, was late in getting payments made etc.

After that I set up a spreadsheet and made sure I got the payments on time!

By: Lazy Man Politics Policy (and personal finance links)

Lazy Man Politics Policy (and personal finance links) — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 03:35:13 +0000

[...] Check out this post- Money Saving Tip: Check Your Account Statements by Frugal [...]

By: Frugal Dad

Frugal Dad — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 02:31:34 +0000

@Rob: No problem, we’re still friends. I second your call to get out of “election mode!” Frankly, I tired of politics in general after our 20 month election cycle. Before you know it, they’ll be cranking up for 2012!

By: Rob in Madrid

Rob in Madrid — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 15:28:24 +0000

BTW I didn’t mean to imply you’ve never made any mistakes, you wouldn’t have a frugal living blog if you didn’t. Sorry about that. Rob

By: Rob in Madrid

Rob in Madrid — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 15:22:23 +0000

I supposed now that the election is we should all get out of election mode

I should clarify my point slightly. I agree totally with those who say that you should take responsibility for your actions. (as an aside I can tell you bankruptcy and consideration loans don’t work). If you get in debt you need to get out of debt, best way is to pay it off.

My main point in all of this is that the field has been tilted to much in the favour of the companies and sometimes peoples comments don’t reflect that.

Unfortunately in comment fields sometimes things come across differently than before.

By: Frugal Dad

Frugal Dad — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 01:07:43 +0000

@Rob: I appreciate your comments. I won’t try to respond to each of your points. After all, I doubt there is anything I could say that would persuade you one way or another. In fact, I won’t even try, because that’s what makes this blog fun–if we all agreed on every point it would get pretty boring!

The only thing I take exception to is your assumption that I’ve never done anything stupid like make impulse purchases or taken on more debt than I should. I readily admit to doing stupid (with zeros), and do so often here on the blog. I am continuing to pay for those past mistakes. But, I have sacrificed to pay for those mistakes. I’ve worked weekends; I’ve built a profitable side business with $20; I work about 60 hours a week, and we pay over half our income on debt while living frugal to make it on the rest. I never blamed anyone other than myself, and I never asked for anyone to bail me out.

Yes, credit card companies do sometimes cheat, and when they do they should be punished (especially in your example of holding payments, etc.). That, we can definitely agree on!

By: Rob in Madrid

Rob in Madrid — Sat, 08 Nov 2008 21:39:05 +0000

“It is unfortunate but it seems we have to save people from themselves.”Yes blame the victim, it works every time.

Frugal Dad please don’t take this personally as I really like your blog, but postings and comments like this (and the election one) are a good reason why the GOP lost the Presidency, the House and Senate and GOP Ideology has been thoroughly discredited.

NeoCons all said “Government is Bad, get rid of Government” and proceeded to tilt the field firmly in favour of business and then blamed the victim. Who’s fault is it when someone in good faith makes there payments each month only to have the CC company hold the payment in order load the card up with fees.

Who’s fault is it when CC companies entice students (often by lying) into taking why more debt than can ever possibly pay back, making them into indentured servants with the only hope of ever escaping the debt is to leave the country. Whose fault is it that bankruptcy laws were re-written to make lending to recently bankrupts the profitable form of lending.

You love to blame the victim conveniently ignoring the fact that the very regulations that protect the innocent (and stupid) from being taken advantage of were gutted in name of Free Markets. Regulations that you all love to trash aren’t designed to prevent you from doing stupid things but to prevent people from being cheated. THERE IS A DIFFERENCE.

Let me guess, FD you’ve never done stupid like making impulse purchases or taking on more debt than you really should. If Obama does a left turn you have only yourselves to blame.