Inflation 2023, reflected in my household expenses | Page 2 | Your stories | Discussion forum

For my situation, I don't keep detailed data on spending, however definitely grocery costs went up by double digits. Mainly this is because I was playing the points/sales flyer/volume buying deals for non-perishables &/or within best before dates "game" before this year, so I had less to gain by changing habits.

I did concentrate more on it than before which helped, sometimes changing brands in response to, IMO, obscene predatory practices. A prime example is Becel, where their prices after taking into account their shrinkflation trick rose 84% in a single year. This is comparing common sale prices by volume.

The main reason for posting though is to remind that the taxes on our greatly increased interest earnings are going to reflect on net household expense changes but with a delay effect, a large increase for 2023 and more in future years, especially 2024 for those of us who bought 1 year high rate GICs.

We tend to patronize local butchers and grocers and get the canned stuff from Walmart. So no loyalty points beyond credit card. Can’t say I am despondent about losing out on having to mess with the points.

savemoresaveoften said

Do u have the app ? That is the easiest way to see personalized deal every week. Regular I see banana, broccoli, bread etc, which are btw 10%-20% points rebate equivalent. I collect on average 500k pts each year which is $500. Most of my purchases are on sale items too. For example I regularly gets 4k pts per $15 purchase on ready to eat meal. And lots of 50% off available in the morning. Also when NF has buy 4 get 4k pts on veggie and broccoli at 1.99 per, that makes it 0.99 per when buy 4!
Mind you loblaws is only 5mins from my house so I go regularly.

I don’t even use their PCO cc as my card gives me 4% rebate which is better.

Agree no pt to buy stuff at reg price just to get pts. But if you shift your purchase, you can accumulate pts quickly.

Check out the personalized offer, that’s what u need.  

For the years 2019-2022, I collected and redeemed ~$1K/yr in PC MC & PC Opt pts. This year, I upped the shopping game a bit ... ~$1.5k collected, ~$1.7k redeemed.

So, playing the sales/flyers/points game can pay off nicely

savemoresaveoften said

Do u have the app ? That is the easiest way to see personalized deal every week. Regular I see banana, broccoli, bread etc, which are btw 10%-20% points rebate equivalent.

I don’t even use their PCO cc as my card gives me 4% rebate which is better.

Agree no pt to buy stuff at reg price just to get pts. But if you shift your purchase, you can accumulate pts quickly.

Check out the personalized offer, that’s what u need.  

You don't even have to use the app, you can just use their website. As long as you check your offers before you shop, they become activated, whether you do that online through your phone or through a computer.

We save $10 every few months at these stores by doing what you do. I stopped using the PC card after they downgraded me because I wasn't spending 15k a year on their elite with 2% back. Now I just tap the other card with only 1% back and use a different card with higher return to pay.

We only buy things we would buy anyways. We don't have our buying pattern shaped like a lot of other people do.

Of course, you are selling them all your data by doing this and I used to resist rewards programs for this reason, but with AI, big data, they know everything about you by extrapolating everyone elses data, so at this point I think you're right to push this sort of behaviour as it's one of the few ways to get a little back for what they already have now anyways.

Alexandre said

mordko said

I am pretty bad at tracking expenditure anyway. Know my income to a cent...

I do track all expenses and income, and for many years.*
I can tell you exactly how much my household spent on groceries in 2013, for example.

------------------------------------------------------
* “Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen nineteen and six , result happiness.
Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery”
― Charles Dickens, David Copperfield  

Its a good thing to do for sure. I used to do this when the family was young and money was tight. Used Microsoft Money. Right now it just feels like not really worth it,except for curiosity. I know rough total annual expenditure and every few years do a check by category which gives an idea. Obviously we know expenses on the business side. We don’t tend to throw money around anyway and there is always a cushion.

I kinda like that businesses know my habits and can advertise things I might actually like. This allows small businesses to compete against Amazons of this world by spending their ad budgets in a very efficient way. But I am probably the only one in Canada who holds this opinion.

mordko said
I kinda like that businesses know my habits and can advertise things I might actually like. This allows small businesses to compete against Amazons of this world by spending their ad budgets in a very efficient way. But I am probably the only one in Canada who holds this opinion.  

The issue is its not just a two way information relationship between buyer and seller or business and customer. The information gets sold to many third parties and used in ways we dont anticipate.

If you personally have not been negatively affected by this business practice, then you would might think its beneficial. Understand that many individuals experience negative consequences from personal info being collected, sold and analysed. Below are two instances of negative impacts on individuals. There are numerous examples.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2012/02/16/how-target-figured-out-a-teen-girl-was-pregnant-before-her-father-did/?sh=4516113d6668

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/women-affected-by-miscarriage-and-infertility-are-being-targeted-with-baby-ads-on-facebook_uk_5d7f7c42e4b00d69059bd88a

To bring this back to loyalty cards, discounts from using loyalty cards for groceries etc., this is why individuals like me are hesitant to use them as they enable micro tracking of purchase data. The few hundred dollars of savings are not worth the risks.

althisa said

The issue is its not just a two way information relationship between buyer and seller or business and customer. The information gets sold to many third parties and used in ways we dont anticipate.

If you personally have not been negatively affected by this business practice, then you would might think its beneficial. Understand that many individuals experience negative consequences from personal info being collected, sold and analysed. Below are two instances of negative impacts on individuals. There are numerous examples.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2012/02/16/how-target-figured-out-a-teen-girl-was-pregnant-before-her-father-did/?sh=4516113d6668

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/women-affected-by-miscarriage-and-infertility-are-being-targeted-with-baby-ads-on-facebook_uk_5d7f7c42e4b00d69059bd88a

To bring this back to loyalty cards, discounts from using loyalty cards for groceries etc., this is why individuals like me are hesitant to use them as they enable micro tracking of purchase data. The few hundred dollars of savings are not worth the risks.  

To me, the concerns expressed in both your links are underwhelming. Who cares the shop knows someone is pregnant? Like you say, if it weirdly bothers you, don’t give them your address and don’t use loyalty cards so they won’t send coupons.

And if the lady was freaked out by baby pictures she could have found out how to click on the top right corner to stop it showing. I know it, clearly not a secret. Surely its less effort to google and spend 1 min reading than going to a journalist to complain? Worst case, she really does not HAVE to use the hated free product called Facebook. Nobody is forcing her.

mordko said
..if it weirdly bothers you, don’t give them your address and don’t use loyalty cards so they won’t send coupons.  

Why does someones preferences different from yours have to be weird?

RetirEd said
mordko: If that little local business uses your info to buy on-line ads from Amazon, they are feeding the beast that's eating their lunch!

Personal tracking can cost the buyer a lot if it results in loss of insurance, higher premiums or lower coverage. Or denial of insurance claims. Or loan denial or higher rates. Think of how The Donald faked his financial numbers to get cheaper loans, putting the lenders at risk.

On-line tracking can affect the price you're offered on purchases, especially travel or leasing.

Web users who use Apple computers are offered worse deals on some web sites, which consider them foolish with their money.

Gambling sites can gouge and screw people struggling to get the bet monkey off their backs.

Purchases can attract the attention of law enforcement or foreign government intervention - such as blackmail.

There are a LOT of ways targeting can damage users! I was happy to use the old Air Miles card, but not the newer Scene Plus, which is more closely tied into info gathering and sale.  

Are you saying that people should be able to lie when taking out insurance like Trump did without any consequences? And that they should be able to make fraudulent claims without being investigated and caught?

With regards to purchases from an Apple computers being more expensive on some sites, this is different from businesses like Target or FB tracking habits to target advertising… but could you provide a reference?

Agree re “feeding the beast” if small vendors use Amazon. Was referring to them using targeted Google or FB ads, which I think is a great service.