It has been suggested that some might be interested to hear about how we will save over $300 over the next year due to what happened yesterday. I feel blessed that it worked out this way.
We currently get DirecTV bundled with Qwest, which gives us a $5.00 a month discount for bundling. We have been thinking about switching from Qwest to be able to get faster internet and using Voice over IP (internet phone calling) to save money on our phone bill. [Side note - that's probably not going to happen now as I'm hearing that the internet provider I was thinking of using is not the most reliable, and phone service has to be reliable.]
So, here comes the math!
Current DirecTV bill ~ $72
Current Qwest price ~ $67
We had an offer to upgrade our hardware for free from DirecTV if we extended our contract with them for 2 years. I've heard ads on the radio for satellite installers to set us up with a new account that would save us $23 a month on the bill but cost us $100 for the equipment. To skip all the gory details, I called DirecTV and told them what I could save with the local companies, and here is what they did for me.
1) Cancel unneeded protection plan. Savings ~ $5 a month forever, or $60 a year.
2) Give me $10 off per month for the next year. Savings = $120 for the next year.
3) Give me ~$80 lump credit right now to get my average savings up. Savings ~ $80 for the next year.
4) Give me a $20 credit for switching to billing via email rather than paper, even though I ended up not being able to switch since I'm with Qwest. Savings = $20 for the next year.
5) Give me a $200 equipment upgrade with a $200 equipment fee waiver, plus charge me $19.99 for the install. Savings = -$20 for the year, but $80 over going with a local company.
So, here's what it looks like now.
$60 + $120 + $80 + $20 = $280 in savings over the next year. $60 will continue after that. If we take the $19.99 away for the new equipment, that goes to $260 for the year. If we count the $80 saved by not switching, that goes to $360 for the year.
$280 divided by 12 = $23.33 a month, more than what the local companies could provide for the year, plus I still get the Qwest $5 discount. $360 divided by 12 = $30 a month in savings. :)
I expect that, if I could put all of our savings into a monthly bill instead of some of the lump sum credits we are getting, our monthly bill with the Qwest savings would be about $44. Instead, we'll have one month where we don't pay anything, one month where we'll pay about $27 to $47, and then the rest of the year the bill should be around $52.
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