{"id":1022,"date":"2009-06-08T05:15:10","date_gmt":"2009-06-08T11:15:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ncnblog.com\/?p=2452"},"modified":"2010-01-15T19:14:55","modified_gmt":"2010-01-16T01:14:55","slug":"free-trials","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.coolchecks.net\/blog\/finance\/free-trials.html","title":{"rendered":"Dealing With Trial Periods"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Let\u2019s face it, we live busy lives. I\u2019m pretty sure that most companies are aware of this. I\u2019m also pretty sure that that\u2019s why many companies entice customers with <em>trial periods<\/em>. Think about it. <strong>How many times have you signed up for a service because it was <em>free for 3 months<\/em>, with the real intention of canceling said service at the end of the trial period, only to forget to call and actually cancel the service?<\/strong> Having figured out that many customers will forget to call and cancel, companies can afford these trial periods, banking on the busyness of the average consumer.<\/p>\n<p>Personally, I\u2019m very busy. So, when I\u2019m offered a trial period, especially one that requires a phone call in order to cancel a service, I\u2019m vary wary. <strong>In most cases, I simply decline the service<\/strong>. This is by far the easiest way to deal with most of these types of offers.<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Bill organizers\" href=\"http:\/\/www.coolchecks.net\/organizers.php\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-3734\" title=\"bill-organizer\" src=\"http:\/\/www.coolchecks.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/06\/bill-organizer.jpg\" alt=\"Bill Organizer - Reminders Tell You When Your Bills are Due\" width=\"300\" height=\"208\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Once in a while, however, I\u2019ll actually get an offer to try a service that I\u2019m actually wanting to check out. For instance, I recently switched satellite television providers, and enjoyed three months of free premium movie channels. Just last night, I called my provider, just as the free trial period ran out, and canceled the channels. It was fun to have the channels, but I really do not need them.<\/p>\n<p>If, like me, you struggle to stay organized, but you still want to take advantage of these <em>trial periods<\/em>, consider setting up a <em>reminder system<\/em>. Personally, I use the iCal program on my computer, and make a simple note, reminding myself of when to call and cancel a particular service. I also know folks who use websites like <a rel=\"nofollow\" href=\"http:\/\/www.futureme.org\/\">FutureMe<\/a>, a website that will allow you to schedule a reminder email, and send it to yourself at a specific time in the future. Pretty rad.<\/p>\n<p>Remember, before signing up for any free <em>trial period<\/em>, be sure that you know <strong>exactly<\/strong> how to cancel the service. This is especially true for services offered by credit card companies and credit reporting services. Taking the time once a month to take care of these pesky little phone calls can, in the long-term, save you a lot of money.<\/p>\n<p>Follow me via <a rel=\"nofollow\" href=\"http:\/\/twitter.com\/NCN\">Twitter<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Let#8217;s face it, we live busy lives. I#8217;m pretty sure that most companies are aware of this. I#8217;m also pretty sure that that#8217;s why many companies entice customers with trial periods. Think about it. How many times have you signed up for a service because it was free for 3 months, with the real intention [&#8230;]pFollow me via a rel=nofollow target=_blank href=http:\/\/twitter.com\/NCNTwitter\/a\/p<br \/>\npa rel=nofollow target=_blank href=http:\/\/www.ncnblog.com\/2009\/06\/08\/dealing-with-trial-periods\/Dealing With Trial Periods\/a\/p<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[207],"tags":[661],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.coolchecks.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1022"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.coolchecks.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.coolchecks.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.coolchecks.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.coolchecks.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1022"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.coolchecks.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1022\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.coolchecks.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1022"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.coolchecks.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1022"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.coolchecks.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1022"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}