How to track your subscriptions (without linking your bank)

Most people can name five or six things they pay for every month. The real number is usually closer to ten or twelve, and the gap is where the money goes. Subscriptions are easy to start, charge on different days, and are priced to feel small. Tracking them is not hard, but it does need a method. Here is one that takes about an hour the first time and ten minutes a quarter after that.

Why subscriptions are hard to keep in your head

Three things work against you.

• They charge on different days. A monthly charge on the 3rd, a yearly one in March, a weekly one on Fridays. Nothing lines up, so no single statement shows the whole picture.
• They are priced to feel small. $4.99 is nothing. Twelve of them is $720 a year.
• Trials turn into charges silently. A 30-day trial becomes a paid plan on day 31 with no message, because the message was the sign-up page a month ago.

A list fixes all three, as long as it holds the right four facts for each subscription.

Step 1: make the list

Set aside half an hour and gather everything in one place. Look in these spots, because no single one has it all:

• Your card and bank statements for the last three months. Monthly charges show up three times, which makes them easy to spot. Note any you don't recognise; the descriptor is often an abbreviation like "ADOBE CC" or "GOOGLE YouTube".
• The App Store and Google Play subscription pages. On an iPhone, Settings, then your name, then Subscriptions. On Android, the Play Store, your profile picture, then Payments and subscriptions. Subscriptions bought through the stores show up here even when they are missing from the service's own website.
• PayPal's automatic payments page, if you use PayPal.
• Your email. Search for "receipt", "your subscription", "renewal" and "trial".
• Yearly charges. Look at one statement from the same month last year. Domains, insurance, software licences and memberships often renew yearly and hide between statements.

Our guide to where forgotten subscriptions hide goes through each of these in more detail.

Step 2: write down four facts for each one

For every subscription you need exactly four things:

1. The name.
2. The price, in the currency it's charged in.
3. How often it charges: weekly, monthly, every three months, yearly.
4. The next charge date. Not the day you signed up, the day the next charge lands.

That last one matters more than it looks. If you know the next date and how often it charges, you can work out every future date. If a free trial is involved, the next charge date is the day the trial ends.

You don't need the card it's on, the login, or the plan name. Those are nice to have and most people never look at them again.

Step 3: turn it into one monthly number

Convert everything to a monthly figure so it can be added up:

• Yearly price divided by 12.
• Weekly price multiplied by 52, then divided by 12 (about 4.33 weeks a month).
• Every-three-months price divided by 3.

If some of your subscriptions are in other currencies, convert them at today's rate so the total means something. The total will be higher than you guessed. That isn't a problem to fix today; it is the number you needed to see. The yearly figure is the one that changes decisions.

Step 4: set a reminder before each renewal

A list you check once is a snapshot. What keeps it useful is hearing about each charge before it happens, so you can decide while deciding is still free.

A good default is a reminder three days before each renewal, in the morning, plus one the day before a trial ends. Three days is enough time to cancel, pause, or move money, and not so early that you forget again. For yearly renewals, a week's notice is better: those are the ones worth a proper think.

Put the reminders wherever you will actually see them: a calendar, a reminders app, or a subscription tracker that does this for you.

Step 5: review it once a quarter

Every three months, read the list top to bottom and ask one question about each line: did I use this in the last month? Three answers:

• Yes, often. Keep it.
• Sometimes. Pause it if the service allows, or switch to paying monthly instead of yearly so the next decision is cheaper.
• No. Cancel it, and mark it cancelled on the list so the record stays. Our guide to where the cancel button hides covers the common services.

Ten minutes, four times a year. That is the whole job.

Why not just connect my bank?

Some apps will read your transactions and find subscriptions for you. For some people that is the right trade. It has costs that are worth knowing about:

• You hand over read access to every transaction, not just the subscriptions.
• Bank data arrives late and messy. A charge appears after it happens, which is the opposite of a reminder.
• Free trials are invisible until they turn into money.
• Subscriptions through the App Store, Google Play or a partner's account don't show up as what they are.
• In many countries it simply doesn't work.

A list you keep yourself has none of those problems, and with a catalog of common services it takes seconds per subscription to build.

Doing this with Renewbird

Renewbird is the list above, kept for you. You tap the services you pay for from a catalog (or type your own), give each a price and a next date, and it works out the monthly and yearly total in your currency, puts every charge on a calendar, and reminds you before each renewal and trial end, at the hour you choose. It never asks for a bank login or a card number. It's free to start, on the web and Android today, with the iPhone app on the way.