Make Bill Payments Easier on your Wallet

Summary: A smarter choice in products and a change in habits can bring a smile on your face when paying bills.

If your power, water and mobile phone bills have of late been drilling a hole in your wallet, then realise that you can still take control by reducing your usage wisely. Often, it takes only simple steps to make a significant difference to your utility bills. Even if you are happy with your bills at the moment, integrating these cost-saving measures into your life helps you identify areas where you have been wasting money.

Simple Steps to Slash your Electricity Bills:

• Follow the classic guideline of switching off appliances and fixtures when not needed. Check for any running appliance or fixture before going to sleep at night.
• Replace filters in appliances such as air conditioners and heating or cooling systems, as and when needed. The cost that you are reluctant to spend on a new filter gets added to your electricity bill. With an inefficient filter, the appliance not only consumes more electricity to complete its task, but also gets degraded gradually.
• Reduce usage of appliances that generate heat, during summer. Using household appliances such as ovens, heaters, dishwashers and dryers, in the mornings when the sun is blazing, forces your air conditioner to work more to generate a cooling effect.
• Go for energy-saving models when shopping for appliances as they generate lower levels of heat comparatively. Choose models that have a higher efficiency rating.
• Use your refrigerator wisely as it consumes more electricity than other kitchen appliances. Avoid opening refrigerator doors often as it lets cold air out and pushes the appliance to work harder to cool the interiors again and again. Refrigerate hot foods only after they have cooled down, to prevent high power consumption by refrigerator motors to cool such foods.

Easy Tips to Reduce your Water Bills:
If you are using a water meter, you can adopt a number of ways to reduce water consumption at home:

•  Check taps for leaks regularly. Leaks can result in loss of several gallons of water and you could end up paying more for water that you did not use.
• Stop spending too much time under the shower. Close the tap immediately after a task, say shaving or cleaning vegetables, instead of letting water run till you finish it.
•  Fit your shower heads and faucets with water flow controllers available in the market. These devices control water flow so you don’t end up using more water than you actually require for a task.
•  Recycle water wherever possible. For example, you could use water remaining after cleaning vegetables for your plants.
• Calculate your water bill yourself by reading the water meter. Water billing officials may sometimes make mistakes in reading the meter and end up giving a wrong bill amount. Keep yourself up-to-date about charges per unit for water consumption to make your calculation.

Simple Ways to Save on Mobile Phone Bills:

• Choose plans that go with your calling, messaging, internet and multimedia needs. For example, if you call abroad often, you could go with a customised plan that offers comparatively lower rates for such calls as against more generic plans.
• Make use of free call benefits provided by your mobile network operator. Several carrier services allow free calls within a group using the same network; add members that you most talk to or send messages to, to such plans.
• Use alternative web-based communication channels such as Skype and Google Talk to make calls. You can talk to other callers with accounts on these platforms for free. Get your friends or family open an account with such services. Opening accounts is usually free.
• Consider using prepaid call plans if you are not an overly cell phone person.

Consider practising these tips on a daily basis, even if you get to incorporate only a few of them at the onset.