Tips to Avoid Common Junk Fees - Money Tip Tuesday

Junk fees are those unexpected, often hidden charges that can turn a seemingly good deal into a costly affair. Whether you’re booking a flight, renting a car, or signing up for a new service, these fees can sneak up on you, adding significant costs to your final bill. Fortunately, there are ways to recognize and avoid many common junk fees if you know where to look first.

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Transcript:

Welcome to Money Tip Tuesday from the Making Money Personal podcast.  

Junk fees are known as hidden or unsuspected fees that pop up at the final checkout point raising the final price of the product or service.  

If you’re looking for a practical way to cut down on the number of junk fees you pay or avoid paying them entirely, then it’s worth it to recognize the most common types of junk fees. 

Some of the more common fees people end up paying are as follows:  

• Service charges for event tickets  

• Resort fees at hotels 

• Late payment fees 

• Overdraft fees 

• Termination fees 

• Out of network ATM fees 

So how does one avoid paying additional junk fees when purchasing a product or service? 

When it comes to purchasing items like event tickets, there aren’t too many ways to avoid service charges and fees. The best thing to do is to make sure you’re aware of the cost of the fees beforehand so you won’t be surprised at checkout.  

When it comes to resort or hotel fees, make sure you explore the listing before you purchase and read all the booking information. Get a good understanding of what’s included and what’s not. Will you need to pay extra for wifi, breakfast, certain amenities? Make sure that you’ve reviewed all the information when you purchase so you’re fully aware of all the additional charges you might have to pay when booking. 

For late payment fees, the most important way to avoid paying them is to, you guessed it, avoid missing payments altogether.  The best way to make sure you no longer miss payments is to stay organized and set up automatic payments. With online and mobile banking you can use bill pay tools to easily automate payments to different payees. Setting this up will ensure your payment will be sent on time every month and you won’t get slammed with additional fees. It’ll also help your credit score!  

An overdraft fee is a charge imposed by a bank when you spend more money than you have in your account, causing your balance to go negative. This fee compensates the bank for covering the shortfall and allows the transaction to proceed. To avoid overdraft fees, set up overdraft protection with your financial institution so the missing funds will be drawn from another one of your accounts. Also, set up account balance notifications that will send an automatic message to alert you when your account balance dips below a set dollar amount of your choice so you always know your account balance before initiating a transaction. 

Termination fees are another way people get charged extra in ways they didn’t quite expect. Some companies like gym memberships, phone services, internet and more have written contracts where they charge you a fee to cancel your subscription before the contract ends. The best ways to avoid paying too much to cancel a membership is to make sure to review the FAQs and fine print cancellation policy before signing up to learn how much the company will charge to cancel the service.  

And our final fee is one you may encounter when getting cash from ATM. ATM transaction fees are common but can easily be avoided with a little planning. Try to find and use ATM locations that don’t charge fees like ones at your banks branch location or others that might be part of an ATM co-op. If you’re a credit union member, your institution likely participates in a co-op system that allows any credit union member to use another credit union’s ATM fee free. You can also check your institutions’ website for a list or map of fee free ATM locations in your area like some gas station chains and other locations. 

When it comes to paying junk fees it’s important to stay vigilant and informed on the most common types of junk fees so you can take measured actions to reduce their impact on your finances.  

Have you recently encountered junk fees? Do you have a special strategy you use to avoid them? Feel free to share your thoughts with us and other listeners on our social media and podcast pages! 

If there are any other tips or topics you’d like us to cover, let us know at tcupodcast@trianglecu.org.  Like and follow our Making Money Personal FB and IG page, and look for our sponsor, Triangle Credit Union, on social media to share your thoughts.   

Thanks for listening to today’s Money Tip Tuesday. Check out our other tips and episodes on the Making Money Personal podcast.   

Have a great day!