There is a common problem going around lately and it’s not the covid virus. People are stuck paying too much money for monthly recurring charges that they probably rarely ever use. Have you taken a look at your monthly charges on your bank account recently?
If you have not then you might be shocked how many recurring payments take money out of your account. Subscription fees to networks such as Netflix, HBO, Hulu, and so on may be fairly small but being subscribed to all of them can prove to be costly.
A new app, Truebill aims to solve the issue of unattended monthly payments and helps to get your finances into a functional state. The app shows your recurring fees and gives the total as well as points out charges you may not even remember signing up for.
If the large companies want to nickel and dime you then Truebill gives you the power to return the favor.
Truebill has a diverse team of professionals from all industries such as chefs, musicians, pizza enthusiasts, and so on who are passionate about improving the lives of everyday people. Together they collaborate to create the best services that optimize your financial health.
Truebill has over 2 million members worldwide that have collectively canceled over 1 million subscriptions and saved over 100 million dollars for everyday people.
How Does Truebill work?
To start benefitting from Truebill’s resources You will have to begin by downloading the app onto your smartphone.
Once you've created an account you will need to link your bank accounts, and credit cards through the app to give Truebill access to your bank records.
After the initial sign-up phase is complete, Truebill will search for any automatic payments leaving your account each month, identify them for you, and get you to review them and make a decision.
With the click of a button, you can get Truebill to cancel or negotiate the price of any of these subscription services or bills. If Truebill searches your account and does not find anything, then you are free of recurring charges and don't need to do anything else.
Security
Whenever it comes to your own personal bank records the utmost caution is always recommended. Many folks will be hesitant to allow Truebill access to their bank statements for security purposes.
Truebill however, is heavily invested in making sure the platform uses the most up-to-date industry protocols for storing your data which includes bank-level 256-bit encryption.
Truebill has partnered with Plaid to securely connect to more than 15,000 financial institutions across the United States.
When first signing up during the registration process, you are asked to enter your online banking credentials which never touch Truebill servers, nor are they stored by Truebill in any way.
Plaid handles all credentials through your bank or credit card provider and then sends an encrypted token to Truebill that provides read-only access to your transaction data. This token can be revoked by unlinking your account at any point in time.
Pricing
Before jumping into the detailed features Truebill offers, I wanted to go over how their pricing system is structured. The Truebill app offers a free-to-download version but you will have to deal with ads and a limited set of features. T
he full version of the app costs $3 - $12 per month depending on services or a yearly upfront cost of $36-48$. The full version gives access to cancellations, balances syncs, help services, chat, spending categories, budgeting tools, and more that would otherwise be unavailable in the free version.
Bill negotiations are priced in a different manner entirely. Truebill charges 40% of your first year’s savings upfront. An example of what this looks like is if Truebill helped negotiate your internet bill down from $125 to $75 then you would save 600$ over the course of 1 year.
($125 - $75 = $50) ($50 x 12 months = $600/yr) This scenario means Truebill would as for 40% of that 600$ upfront which comes to $240. There are payment plans for paying this fee as well that can be paid over the course of 6 months.
Features
Now that we have the nitty-gritty details out of the way, we can take a closer look at some of the features that make Truebill such a useful end money-saving tool.
Truebill offers a variety of services to help get your finances in order such as Managing your Subscriptions, Insights on your spending, Bill negotiation, Budgeting.
Manage Subscriptions
Having canceled over 1 million subscriptions for users, Truebill has a lot of experience and background with what they do. Their primary service is to help manage your subscriptions better by identifying subscriptions you may no longer need.
If you identify these subscriptions and are bothered by having to go through the process of canceling them yourself, you can get Truebill to do it for you using the premium version of the app.
Spending Insights
Truebill gets you an effortless breakdown of your finances to see where your money is going, allowing you to improve your spending habits and save even more!
Linking your bank account to the app instantly identifies and creates your top spending categories.
Real-time alerts will notify you about upcoming charges or when your balance is low to help avoid overdraft and late fees.
Bill Negotiation
Truebill Automatically scans your bills to find savings through the use of bill negotiation. Alternatively, you can upload or connect and let Truebill’s team of negotiators do that work for you.
This service is perfect for saving a ton of money on cell phone, cable, and internet bills. Truebill identifies a lot more than just utility and telecom bills, hence why they work with industry professionals to help best identify solutions.
Truebill also helps you get your overdraft and late fees back by walking you through the steps to getting your refund.
This service even works for car insurance. Simply connect your current insurance and you will be presented with your best alternatives. It is a wonderful solution for those who hate searching for the best rates website after website.
Budgeting
Truebill offers an easy and simple way to set up a budget that will automatically monitor your spending by category.
This is a great way to help those who require a little motivation to stay on track.
Having it all in one place makes life a lot easier for those who tend to be a bit scattered or disorganized.
Being able to pull up the information on your app at any time is also a fantastic way to help you decide whether you really can afford to make a luxury purchase on not.
The budgeting software allows you to calculate your spending allowance per month by intelligently analyzing your transactions and breaking down your costs.
You can create custom categories for improving your spending using the built-in goal trackers. The app shows you your historical spending patterns which make it easy to set goals for improving specific spending habits, such as eating too much fast food.
To solve this the app can send you alerts on certain spending habits to help reach your goals.
Autopilot savings
The built-in smart savings account can help make saving money easier by helping you save at the right moments. Truebill smart savings analyzes your accounts to determine the optimal time to put money aside.
You can set your savings goal in as fast as 1 minute and rest assured as the money is FDIC Insured. The assets are housed in your account at FDIC-insured banking partners. You always maintain control over your money and can edit, pause, withdraw, or close your account at any moment you wish.
Credit scores
Whether you like it or not your credit score has a large impact on your life. The ability to secure loans, new lines of credit, superior interest rates, and even car loans are all affected by it.
Truebill offers access to your entire credit report and history as well as monitoring for important changes. The app does a good job of breaking down what it all means so it is easier for everybody to follow the occasionally complicated financial language.
Truebill offers identity theft monitoring on your accounts and protection for up to $1M. In case of an incident of identity theft, the 24/7 concierge will guide you through all the necessary steps to getting back on track.
Pay advance
In the case of emergencies, Truebill can get you out of a bind with up to a $100 Cash advance. This can be sent directly to your checking account within seconds with the added bonus of being interest-free.
It may not seem like a whole lot but it is a perfect amount for being able to avoid overdraft fees when in a pinch.
Our Opinion
Truebill is a very interesting and unique app that solves the problem by going directly to the source, your bank account.
By linking it together with your bank account and credit card provider, Truebill offers an incredible amount of information and services that are bound to save you money and keep you informed, however, there is one large downside.
The cost of the services is included in a monthly or yearly charge but the bill negotiations aspect of the service has its own additional pricing scheme, and it’s not cheap. Truebill wants 40% of what you would save yearly on your bills upfront or over a 6-month payment plan.
This is a fairly win-win situation but we find 40% to be a bit steep and upfront costs can get to be very expensive. We advise that those facing some financial hardships avoid using this feature as the upfront cost of the service can be too risky to put down all at once.
Apart from the large upfront cost of bill negotiations, the services offered by Truebill are extremely useful and insightful. They are of great help in building a proper budget and attempting to improve spending habits by reaching certain goals tracked right on the app.
The added benefit of a full Credit Score and monitoring service is worth the monthly cost of the app alone, not to mention the money saved from properly managed subscriptions.
We highly recommended Truebill to anybody looking to plug any leaks in their bank or credit accounts. Truebill’s services will create a watertight seal around your money and help you start saving and growing your funds for what YOU want.
