The Wall Street Journal has a good article about how to save money by negotiating with your telephone and cable company to get your rates down. They have found you can drastically cut your monthly cost on these bills with just a phone call. There is a lot of negotiating going on these days for all types of services. They give an example of someone reducing his monthly cable bill by $67. If you can take $20 a month off of each of your cable and telephone bills, you just found yourself another $500 a year.
Putting it in perspective, since these types of bills are usually paid with after tax dollars, that’s like getting an extra $700 to $900 in income (depending upon your tax bracket.) It’s probably easier to call the cable company than ask your boss for a raise right now.