Do You Know What You're Spending on Subscriptions? Many Americans Don't

Money has gotten tight for a lot of people these days due to inflation. So if your credit card bills are higher than usual, it may be because you're spending more money to buy groceries, use electricity, and put a roof over your head.

But another reason for those sky-high credit card bills may be that you're paying for services you don't use and don't even realize you have. A recent report from C+R Research found that 42% of Americans have forgotten about a recurring subscription and, as a result, kept paying for one they weren't using.

Not only that, but Americans seem to be grossly underestimating their subscription costs. Consumers thought they were spending an average of $86 a month on subscription services in the aforementioned report. But after doing more digging, the average monthly spend on subscriptions came to more like $219. Yikes.

If you're having a hard enough time paying your bills, then it definitely makes sense to see if you're paying for subscriptions you don't use. Canceling them could free up a world of cash.

It's time for a subscription audit

It's easy enough to sign up for a free trial of a streaming service only to forget to cancel it once your initial two weeks or 30 days run out. But at a time when everything is costing more due to inflation and so many people are raiding their savings accounts just to stay afloat, it's not good to be paying for services you aren't getting use out of.

As such, take some time to comb through your credit card bills from the past year and see what subscriptions you're signed up for. The reason it's good to look back on 12 months' worth of statements is that some of your subscriptions might renew annually. So it may be that you signed up for something you've since forgotten about a year ago and didn't realize it because you paid in one fell swoop. That might give you the heads-up to cancel before your credit card is billed again.

Once you've made your list of subscriptions you're paying for, cancel those you aren't using immediately. From there, assess the ones you knew about.

It may be that you were aware that you've been paying for Netflix. But if you can't remember the last time you watched it for more than an hour in the course of a month, then it's probably something you can do without.

Plus, it could pay to see if there's a better subscription service out there than one you're paying for. You might find a way to get access to content at a lower cost, for example.

Don't waste your money

A lot of subscription services let you cancel and then reactivate as you wish. Since there's generally no penalty for going this route, it pays to err on the side of canceling services you're not sure you need or want. But either way, definitely break the pattern of paying for services you never use. That's akin to tossing your money in the trash.