Do you know how you spend every dollar each month? Are you still paying for services you no longer use? If you answer to either of these questions is no or maybe, you can benefit from Trim Financial Manager. This free chatbot can save you money by analyzing your bank and credit card accounts for money-saving opportunities by canceling subscriptions, fighting bank fees, and activating shopping coupons for select credit card purchases.
What is Trim Financial Manager?
First and foremost, Trim Financial Manager isn’t an app. Trim is a chatbot that works through Facebook Messenger or text message. The service is free to use and has saved users over $8 million.
It was started after Trim’s founders had noticed they were still paying for rental insurance for an apartment they no longer lived in and video subscription plans that they no longer used. All over the country, people continue to pay for subscriptions that they thought they canceled long ago or are simply too busy to cancel the subscription.
Cancel Subscriptions
When you first sign-up for Trim, you will have to link a bank account. You can also link your credit cards. After your accounts are linked, Trim Financial Manager will automatically analyze your activity looking for subscriptions ranging from magazines, streaming plans, insurance policies, and gym memberships.
After analyzing your spending activity, Trim will send you a line-item message with all the subscriptions from your linked accounts. If you want to cancel a plan, you simply respond “Cancel ______” with the name of the subscription provider in the blank space.
Trim will instantly start trying to cancel that subscription on your behalf for free. They will send a template e-mail or call the retailer to cancel your account. If the business requires a certified letter, Trim will even send that for free!
Even if Trim doesn’t find any subscriptions that you are ready to cancel at this time, they will still continue to monitor your accounts and send an alert when a new subscription is activated. This can help prevent fraud or remind you to cancel an account when the free trial period ends and you are billed the first monthly installment.
Renegotiate Cable Bills
The Trim Financial Manager is also partnering with select service providers to save you additional money by finding discounts and promotions to prevent you from overpaying each month. For example, Trim will analyze your Comcast cable bill to see if they can lower it and still keep your same plan.
This feature does come with a slight fee as Trim will keep 25% of your first month’s savings. It is the only “paid” feature and you still save money long-term. Plus, Trim won’t keep a commission from this feature unless you activate the discounts or promotions.
Amazon Price Protection
If you regularly buy from Amazon, Trim will analyze your Amazon purchase history and see if any product prices have dropped. If so, Trim will automatically submit the price protection forms to Amazon and you will receive a cash credit from your credit card provider.
Check Account Balances
You can also use the Trim Financial Manager to monitor your bank accounts and Uber balance. If you are prone to paying overdraft fees, Trim will send you an alert when you are about to spend more money than you currently have in your bank account. And, Trim will fight bank fees that you might have been charged in error.
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Trim Savings
In addition to helping you save money by cleaning up your spending accounts. Trim Financial Manager also has a second side to save you money if you use a Visa credit card.
Trim Savings will automatically apply featured discounts when you link your Visa credit card to Trim. It’s possible to save money on groceries, dining, and retail shopping. You will also receive a $10 coupon on your next grocery store visit just for enrolling in Trim Savings.
Each week, Trim will also send you offers for different stores or retailers to save money when you shop there. You do have to activate these offers. Once you accomplish the offer’s spending requirements, Trim will pay you the rewards in a statement credit.
Will Trim Always Be Free?
Yes. The current docket of Trim’s services, Trim Financial Manager and Trim Savings, will always be free according to their website. Trim does plan on rolling out a personal advisor service in the future that will be a premium service.
Also, Trim doesn’t sell or rent your information. And none of your financial information is stored on their servers.
Summary
Trim Financial Manager is a free and easy way to analyze your spending for “hidden” costs. Many working families simply don’t take the time to look at their monthly banking and credit card statements to see if they are paying for services they no longer use. Being able to lower bills or get refunds and shopping discounts is also a very nice touch that can help you save money even if you don’t have any subscriptions to cancel.
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