Latest / Making Cents / Get Ready For ‘Excuse-flation’ - That’s About To Drive Up Cost Of Living Even Further

Transcript

Get Ready For ‘Excuse-flation’ - That’s About To Drive Up Cost Of Living Even Further · Making Cents

• 0:00
  You think inflation and the cost of living is bad.
• 0:03
  Now get ready for excuseflation.
• 0:06
  It's the secret force making your life more expensive than it needs to be.
• 0:10
  And it's getting worse.
• 0:13
  Dramatic way to start an episode.
• 0:15
  Maybe.
• 0:16
  But I do stand by this.
• 0:18
  I have done the deepest dive into what's driving prices up.
• 0:22
  This episode actually made me pretty mad.
• 0:24
  And it all comes back to Excuse me.
• 0:28
  And I actually first came across this term a few years ago.
• 0:30
  It has been in my head ever since.
• 0:33
  It makes so many things start to make sense.
• 0:38
  I'm telling you about it now for a couple of reasons.
• 0:41
  One, once you see it, you will start to see it everywhere.
• 0:46
  But two, once you see it, you can also start to fight back.
• 0:51
  And that, my friends, is.
• 0:53
  Is what I want for all of us.
• 0:54
  I am sick of these prices because I was driving the other day, I just had the radio on, I was heading to a meeting and this ad came on and I immediately thought, there it is, Excuseflation.
• 1:07
  Just this chirpy, cheerful voice with an ad for a big tech retailer.
• 1:14
  And this ad was basically, prices are only going up.
• 1:19
  Go buy a new TV now before it costs you even more.
• 1:23
  And as soon as I heard this, it really just wound me up so much because that's not an ad for a tv, that's an ad for Fear.
• 1:32
  It's not telling you the TV is good.
• 1:35
  It's not even telling you the TV is cheap.
• 1:38
  It's not even telling you, TV looks nice.
• 1:42
  It's just telling you to be afraid of the future and to convert that fear into a purchase today at the price that they've set.
• 1:52
  Okay, so later that day, I then fall into a bit of a scroll hole.
• 1:55
  I'm on my phone, flicking through social media while I waited for coffee and up popped an ad for furniture.
• 2:03
  Same thing.
• 2:05
  It basically read, oil prices are going up.
• 2:08
  Our prices haven't changed yet.
• 2:12
  Secure our furniture at today's prices while they last.
• 2:17
  And I just thought, there it is again, twice in one day.
• 2:21
  Fear and headlines to strong arm you.
• 2:25
  And these two ads are a window into the dark side of inflation, where real things that are really happening can then be used as an excuse to jack up prices elsewhere.
• 2:43
  That when oil, petrol and power are truly going up in price and often causing the price of related goods to go up, then other companies can look at this and say, oh, interesting.
• 3:01
  Is this a way for me to make some extra money with a convenient excuse?
• 3:06
  An oh yes it is.
• 3:09
  So today, where inflation really is and the number inside the number that changes the whole story.
• 3:17
  Why some prices come back down, but some never, ever do.
• 3:21
  Stirring the humble block of butter.
• 3:23
  What the Reserve bank just discovered about how some businesses set prices.
• 3:28
  And it's more manipulative than I expected.
• 3:32
  And then the bit that matters, how you spot the tricks and how you fight back.
• 3:38
  So welcome to Making Sense.
• 3:39
  It's the podcast for people who want financial freedom without giving up their coffee.
• 3:43
  I'm Frances Cook, a financial journalist and fellow financial freedom seeker who makes money simple for you today.
• 3:50
  The nonsense that is Excuseflation and how we beat it.
• 3:54
  I want to help as many people as possible reach financial freedom by taking control of their money.
• 3:59
  And you can help me in that mission two really easy ways.
• 4:02
  First, hit subscribe wherever you like to listen, YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or any other podcast player.
• 4:09
  Then send this episode to a friend so we can all level up our money together.
• 4:13
  Then the show grows and I can keep giving you the money info that makes a difference to your life.
• 4:19
  Okay, part one, the number inside the number.
• 4:23
  Give me a moment here, because I think what makes this all make sense is when we do just a little bit getting into the fine print.
• 4:31
  So stick with me on this.
• 4:33
  The big headline number that you'll see around is inflation, and that is the average cost of everything.
• 4:42
  And that is going up right now.
• 4:43
  The cost of living is up.
• 4:45
  So inflation for the June quarter, that is the most recent release, not good.
• 4:51
  It hit 4.1%.
• 4:54
  And the Reserve bank gets upset when that happens.
• 4:57
  They like to keep things between 1 to 3%.
• 5:00
  And it might not sound horrendous, but when we had that recent period of really bad inflation, everyone was screaming about the really big price increases.
• 5:12
  That was when we hit around the 7% mark.
• 5:16
  So those percentages can be deceiving.
• 5:18
  A little change in them actually feels huge.
• 5:23
  It's also partly because it's an average number, right?
• 5:27
  It's taking all these different prices and saying, this is what's happening overall.
• 5:33
  But what about when we go inside that number?
• 5:36
  Because there's something interesting there.
• 5:39
  So Stats nz, in that most recent release, they found petrol itself up 27.5% on a year ago, diesel went up 71%.
• 5:53
  That is huge.
• 5:55
  A really big unavoidable cost for a lot of people.
• 5:58
  Oil is the whole problem here.
• 6:01
  Fuel alone is about a quarter of that bigger inflation number.
• 6:07
  If you take fuel out, inflation goes down.
• 6:10
  So from that 4.1% down to 2.9%, which tells us, okay, the underlying economy is warm, but not on fire.
• 6:22
  The scary part of the number is one thing, oil.
• 6:26
  There is another interesting part of this number though, because here is where I think we're seeing us get exploited.
• 6:34
  The Reserve bank surveys what people expect inflation to do as well.
• 6:40
  And those expectations are climbing 5%.
• 6:46
  That's the highest in years.
• 6:48
  And it's actually higher than what's happening in reality.
• 6:52
  4.1% inflation.
• 6:54
  Yes, that's high expectation of 5%.
• 6:58
  So what we've got there, the fear is running out of the facts.
• 7:02
  And that gap between the two, some people are trying to monetize it.
• 7:07
  Because when everyone is expecting prices to go up, well, then you can put prices up, can't you?
• 7:14
  Because everyone knows that prices are going up.
• 7:18
  So you see prices going up and, well, we all know that life is just more expensive now.
• 7:22
  What can you do?
• 7:23
  And sometimes that is just a convenient cover.
• 7:27
  So let's dig into whether all of the price increases are actually fair enough.
• 7:33
  That means we're stepping onto the oil roller coaster.
• 7:36
  Okay, so I said oil was the problem here and the heart of this.
• 7:40
  Let's start there.
• 7:41
  Then late February, war kicks off.
• 7:44
  The Strait of Hormuz closes.
• 7:46
  That's the shipping lane that carries about a fifth of the world's oil.
• 7:51
  Oil prices, of course, then have one of the biggest jumps ever recorded here at home.
• 7:57
  91 petrol blows past $3.60.
• 8:00
  Diesel jumped from 43% in a single month.
• 8:05
  Ferries add surcharges.
• 8:07
  Airlines put on their airfares going up.
• 8:11
  Everyone with a truck adds a line to the invoice.
• 8:15
  Then we get ceasefire negotiations.
• 8:17
  The Strait of Hormuz reopens.
• 8:19
  And then by early July, we've got the price of crude oil coming back down.
• 8:24
  It was pretty close to where it started.
• 8:27
  Complete round trip, problem solved, right?
• 8:31
  No, it's 2026.
• 8:33
  No stability for you then.
• 8:35
  We had just a few weeks until the ceasefire fell apart.
• 8:39
  And the Strait of Hormuz is apparently now considered contested.
• 8:43
  Iran says that it is shut.
• 8:45
  The US says it is open.
• 8:47
  Honestly, that might even be different by the time that this video comes out.
• 8:54
  Because who knows these days Anyway, the crude price of oil went over a hundred dollars US a barrel for a period of time.
• 9:01
  It's dipped back below that now again, by the time this episode comes out, that might have all changed again.
• 9:08
  It is changing so fast all the time.
• 9:11
  But this is the general pattern we have been following.
• 9:15
  However, in those precious few weeks when oil went down again and it went down in price by about a third for those barrels of crude oil so what happened to your bills?
• 9:27
  Petrol did budge downwards, but by about 6%.
• 9:31
  Not that full third, not a 30% six.
• 9:35
  It was walking down the stairs, it had just sprinted up and it hadn't even reached the landing before the next spike hit.
• 9:43
  So economists have a fun little phrase for this not so fun situation.
• 9:48
  Rockets and feathers.
• 9:49
  So prices go shooting up like a rocket, then they come floating on down gently like a feather.
• 9:57
  And this winter we got the rocket, then the feather and then a second rocket, all in a fast series of events.
• 10:06
  Isn't that just so fun for us?
• 10:08
  And we catch the sting in the tail here.
• 10:11
  The second spike is not starting from the same bottom point, it's starting from a higher bump up.
• 10:19
  Petrol never came back down to that original point because it was busy feathering.
• 10:23
  So then we get another shoot back up from a different higher point.
• 10:28
  The second crisis builds on top of the first one.
• 10:33
  And Petrel was kind of the good example here because we were all watching it and companies were put on notice.
• 10:43
  They were publicly warned that they were being watched.
• 10:47
  So.
• 10:47
  So there was that downward pressure on prices and they did have to account for what was going on.
• 10:53
  What about all the other prices that weren't being watched as closely?
• 10:58
  All the places that had said, oh, we use a lot of petrol or diesel and so our prices have to go up too.
• 11:05
  Let's talk about butter.
• 11:06
  So I said before, when prices go up, they rocket.
• 11:10
  When they come back down, they float on slowly down like a feather.
• 11:14
  But sometimes they don't even do that.
• 11:17
  Sometimes they just rocket up and stay up.
• 11:21
  Sometimes a shock pushes up a price and then the shock passes or goes and the price just stays the new normal.
• 11:31
  It's now base camp for the next climb.
• 11:35
  Good old butter is unfortunately an example of this.
• 11:39
  So late 2023, global butter prices ripped upwards.
• 11:43
  Up 74% in less than two years.
• 11:46
  All the numbers I'm about to give you are from Global Dairy Trade auction results.
• 11:51
  Right.
• 11:52
  So your 500 gram block of butter went from around $6 to $8.60.
• 11:59
  And then last year the global price turned down a full third from its peak.
• 12:06
  So the block came down a third too.
• 12:10
  Right?
• 12:11
  Well, it did go down from $8.60 to $8.58.
• 12:18
  Great.
• 12:20
  RNZ literally ran a headline of why butter prices might not fall as fast as they rose.
• 12:28
  We're just saying it now.
• 12:30
  And the reasons given in that article quite illuminating.
• 12:33
  So contracts had been apparently locked in earlier and now continued.
• 12:39
  Okay, maybe fair then there was old stock to clear, apparently produced at previous prices.
• 12:47
  Okay, maybe fair.
• 12:51
  But then my favorite slash, not favorite, but interesting moment from Informetrics economist Brad Olson.
• 12:58
  You'll remember him from previous episodes of the podcast.
• 13:00
  He's great.
• 13:01
  He monitors all of this stuff really carefully.
• 13:03
  And he pointed out that shoppers had become accustomed to the higher price.
• 13:08
  It sets a new normal for what people are willing to buy.
• 13:12
  And that right there is the big problem.
• 13:15
  The price didn't necessarily stay high because costs were high.
• 13:19
  The price stayed high because we stopped fighting it, because we were like, oh, that's what butter costs now.
• 13:26
  And we started to see it as normal.
• 13:28
  And then the third act.
• 13:29
  What did I say before about setting a new base camp for the next climb?
• 13:33
  This year, global butter prices surged again, up more than 30% since December.
• 13:39
  And retail was conveniently still parked at that previous peak, ready to just climb up again from there.
• 13:48
  They'd set a new normal, and then when there were costs increasing again, they could just ratchet those prices back up again.
• 13:56
  So we come back to Excuseflation.
• 13:59
  What is that?
• 14:00
  How does it see me?
• 14:01
  Getting weird couch ads, expensive petrol, and terrible butter prices.
• 14:06
  Here's the idea.
• 14:08
  In normal times, raising your prices as a business is kind of scary.
• 14:13
  Customers notice, they complain, some will walk, and the first business to move often loses.
• 14:21
  If they move alone, very often they'll lose.
• 14:25
  But when the headlines are wall to wall with war oil, cost of living, cost of living, cost of living, cost of living.
• 14:35
  Inflation is up.
• 14:36
  Well, then you've got good cover, because every business knows that every other business is about to move.
• 14:43
  Every customer is braced.
• 14:45
  And it's hard to tell a justified increase from a cheeky one because things are getting a bit panicky and foggy.
• 14:55
  Everyone's saying that prices are going up.
• 14:58
  So I mean, of course now prices are going up.
• 15:01
  But did all of them need to?
• 15:05
  And we don't have to guess that some executives think in this way because they say it out loud, publicly to their shareholders, on the record.
• 15:18
  This is another one of my sort of favorite moments.
• 15:21
  That's not a favorite moment.
• 15:23
  It's partly the quote, it's partly a really interesting moment.
• 15:26
  But it's also the guy who said it is called William Meaney.
• 15:31
  He is literally Mr.
• 15:32
  Meaney.
• 15:34
  I had to double check this one because I was like, is this a joke?
• 15:36
  No, it's real.
• 15:37
  Incredible.
• 15:37
  Anyway, that big old meanie, he ran Iron Mountain.
• 15:41
  It's a big US firm.
• 15:43
  They do data storage, records management, that sort of thing.
• 15:47
  And they're listed on the New York Stock Exchange.
• 15:49
  So as part of that, you he's in touch with shareholders.
• 15:52
  So Whip, back to 2018, when inflation was low and boring.
• 15:58
  And Mr.
• 15:58
  Meaney said on an earnings call that he prays for inflation every day because, quote, every point of inflation expands our margins.
• 16:10
  He said he did rain dances for inflation because it was great coverage to increase profits.
• 16:17
  And then his prayers got answered.
• 16:19
  So Fast forward to 2022, a big investor event right in the thick of the cost of living crisis.
• 16:27
  And Mr.
• 16:28
  Meaney tells his shareholders that the dance has worked and the company had been pushing through price increases well above inflation.
• 16:37
  And he described Iron Mountain as, quote, more of a price giver than a price taker.
• 16:44
  And then the line that really gets me on the record to investors, he says, quote, I wish I didn't do quite such a good rain dance.
• 16:54
  This guy is wild.
• 16:56
  It's incredible that he's just so confident that he'll say it out loud.
• 17:03
  But thank you, I guess, for saying the quiet part out loud.
• 17:07
  Now, does that happen here?
• 17:09
  Well, the Reserve bank has some numbers that are mildly disturbing.
• 17:15
  Quick interruption to say.
• 17:16
  If you're enjoying this episode, you'll love the Market Memo, my weekly newsletter where I teach you how to actually invest.
• 17:23
  No jargon, no spreadsheets, just real talk about shares and how to make your money work for you.
• 17:29
  It's the thing I wish I'd had when I was starting out.
• 17:32
  You can sign up for free at Francisco Cook Co NZ Invest.
• 17:37
  That's Francisco Co NZ Invest.
• 17:40
  But don't worry, I'll put the link in the show notes and the description of this podcast.
• 17:45
  All right, back to it.
• 17:48
  So what has the Reserve bank found?
• 17:51
  Okay, so most of us know the Reserve bank as the guys who set interest rates and try to control inflation.
• 17:58
  As part of that, though, they also do a bunch of their own research.
• 18:03
  They've been asking New Zealand businesses about their pricing since 1963.
• 18:09
  So we've got a solid 62 years of answers there.
• 18:12
  Good work, team.
• 18:13
  And we've got a fresh drop of info on that.
• 18:17
  Just a few weeks ago I read it, so you don't have to.
• 18:20
  And there's three big things that I took from it.
• 18:24
  One, prices keep heading up.
• 18:26
  They don't often head down.
• 18:28
  And it is getting worse.
• 18:30
  When inflation is running hot and a business's costs and demand are both rising, the chances that that business puts its price up is about 85%, which, sure, fair enough, cover your costs.
• 18:46
  I get that.
• 18:47
  Now, flip everything if inflation is still going up.
• 18:53
  But this business's Costs are falling.
• 18:56
  That can happen.
• 18:57
  And its customers are drying up.
• 19:00
  So they have every reason to drop prices.
• 19:05
  Will they?
• 19:07
  Yes, but only 9% of the time, which is very small amount.
• 19:15
  That's about 1 in 10 businesses in that situation will drop their prices less than so 85% if the conditions are right, will put their prices up versus 9% putting prices down when the conditions say to.
• 19:33
  And a few decades ago that gap was much smaller.
• 19:37
  You would see 61% raise prices and 37% would cut.
• 19:44
  So yes, this is getting worse.
• 19:46
  Go and have a look at all this yourself if you want.
• 19:49
  All you have to do is look up reserve bank discussion paper from May.
• 19:52
  It's called Inflation and the changing nature of firm price Adjustments.
• 19:58
  But basically New Zealand prices have become more likely to go up, less likely to go down and the central bank has the receipts on this.
• 20:07
  Two, we're the target.
• 20:09
  And by we I mean customers, not other businesses.
• 20:13
  Which I think is actually a far more important point than you might think at first glance.
• 20:19
  Now this happens mostly from businesses that sell to you, to me, to customers, to individual people.
• 20:28
  Firms selling to other businesses didn't change their behavior.
• 20:33
  That's a really marked difference between how individual people and customers are treated versus businesses.
• 20:40
  We'll come back to this one because I think that is actually a key part of how we fight back on this.
• 20:47
  But first, why?
• 20:49
  Well, think about it a little bit.
• 20:52
  When one business buys from another, checking the invoice is literally someone's job.
• 21:00
  When you build a house, you audit every line but the weekly shop with 40 small items.
• 21:08
  You're so tired you just want to get out of there.
• 21:11
  The kids are hungry.
• 21:12
  People don't audit the trolley as carefully.
• 21:17
  So a lot of this targets whoever isn't looking.
• 21:22
  Coming back to that point soon.
• 21:23
  But next three, the nothing happened test.
• 21:27
  The true test of excuseflation saw a red flag.
• 21:32
  So the researchers asked a brutally simple question.
• 21:36
  Take the business when nothing happened.
• 21:40
  Costs flat, demand flat, no change, no reason to touch a single price.
• 21:47
  But they're in an environment where things are happening around them.
• 21:52
  Headlines of inflation.
• 21:55
  They just happen to not be touched by it.
• 21:58
  How likely are those businesses to report rising profits?
• 22:03
  And there's been a very recent change here that now when inflation goes up, these nothing happened businesses are increasing their profits.
• 22:15
  And once again it is showing up in the businesses selling to households, to people.
• 22:21
  And why is all of this happening?
• 22:23
  What's the reason the researchers think is behind it?
• 22:27
  Because we have less attention than we used to.
• 22:30
  And so in simple terms, they can get away with it.
• 22:35
  People work longer hours now.
• 22:37
  Often if you're in a partnership, both people are going to work.
• 22:42
  There's no one in a household with the time to audit prices regularly.
• 22:49
  Think about a 10 cent rise on the cost of butter.
• 22:53
  If you don't notice this, then the business loses nothing.
• 22:58
  Now think about a 10 cent cut.
• 23:01
  And if you don't notice, the business also gains nothing.
• 23:06
  So if you have a busy, distracted customer base, the winning strategy is frequent small increases and to never bother with decreases.
• 23:19
  So how do you tell if this is what they're up to?
• 23:22
  Excuseflation relies on you not looking closely.
• 23:26
  It relies on you just shrugging and accepting that this is the way things are and carrying on.
• 23:34
  So the first thing I want you to do is to just start a conversation with your friends about this.
• 23:38
  Even send them this podcast episode.
• 23:41
  Because once you see it, you will start to see this everywhere.
• 23:47
  And then there's the red flag parade of how to tell when it's excuseflation, not real inflation.
• 23:55
  So these are the questions to ask when a price goes up.
• 24:00
  1.
• 24:01
  Can they name the cost?
• 24:03
  A genuine increase is often pretty specific.
• 24:06
  Diesel is up 40% or freight is a chunk of our costs.
• 24:11
  There's a 3% surcharge now.
• 24:14
  But excuseflation speaks in foggy terms like due to rising costs or in the current environment.
• 24:24
  What do you mean, which cost?
• 24:27
  How much?
• 24:28
  And if they can't say, then maybe we should be treating these increases as a choice, not a necessity.
• 24:35
  The Commerce Commission is already telling businesses that these surcharges must be accurate and justified.
• 24:43
  The regulator says show you're working.
• 24:47
  So I think the rest of us are entitled to ask too.
• 24:50
  And actually if enough of us ask, it's going to carry a lot of weight now.
• 24:54
  2.
• 24:55
  Does this business even buy the thing that it is Blaming you?
• 25:00
  You might be shocked how often this happens.
• 25:02
  So a courier blaming oil prices?
• 25:05
  I probably believe them.
• 25:07
  They're on the road a lot.
• 25:08
  But an app, a gym, a software subscription?
• 25:13
  Blaming cost of living pressures?
• 25:16
  Hang on.
• 25:17
  Your costs didn't double because a shipping lane closed.
• 25:21
  If the business doesn't actually use the thing it's blaming, then we've got a headline.
• 25:26
  Doing a lot of work here.
• 25:28
  3.
• 25:29
  The round trip test.
• 25:30
  That's a big one.
• 25:31
  When the cost comes back down, do the prices that you're paying follow?
• 25:37
  This is a running test right now.
• 25:40
  Oil fell by a third and then spiked again.
• 25:42
  Which makes every fuel surcharge this year a two part question.
• 25:47
  Did it come down during the weeks when its justification vanished?
• 25:52
  And does the fresh spike now get stacked on top of a surcharge that never left?
• 25:58
  Watch those prices.
• 26:00
  You'll be amazed what you notice.
• 26:02
  4.
• 26:03
  Did everyone move at once?
• 26:06
  Real cost shocks hit businesses unevenly.
• 26:10
  So honest increases are usually pretty ragged.
• 26:13
  They're different sizes, they have different timings, a whole sector moving together, same price, same same excuse.
• 26:24
  It's a worrying sign.
• 26:27
  It's often not costs, it's the fog doing the coordinating and businesses pretty quickly copying each other.
• 26:35
  Perfect unison, big red flag.
• 26:39
  So now what?
• 26:40
  What is the solution?
• 26:42
  And I think we all know it's not going to be some easy silver bullet, right?
• 26:45
  Because we've got things like the grocery commissioner, and that doesn't seem to have done much.
• 26:51
  But there are ways that we can push back on this and it's really important that we do because otherwise this will keep going.
• 26:59
  It's not easy, but it is simple.
• 27:02
  So much of this comes back to that, and that's what we're getting into now.
• 27:06
  Here's the biggest weapon that you've got from the research I've put into this.
• 27:11
  It sounds small, but it's really not.
• 27:15
  It's shopping around.
• 27:17
  If you turn around and say that's too small to work, then congratulations, you are playing the game that they want you to play.
• 27:25
  They want you to give up.
• 27:27
  They want you to say, oh, I'll only save a couple of hundred bucks.
• 27:30
  That is what they want.
• 27:32
  Do not give in to this.
• 27:35
  The Reserve Bank's research has found businesses now watch and monitor how willing you are to stick with them when prices go up.
• 27:45
  They watch their customers and their price tolerance more than they watch what their competitors are up to.
• 27:54
  Which means the biggest impact on prices in this country is no longer what the shop across the road is doing and the good old capitalism, competition between different providers.
• 28:07
  It's what you will put up with.
• 28:10
  Your tolerance is the price control.
• 28:14
  You switching, complaining, noticing.
• 28:19
  That is the punishment for them.
• 28:21
  That is the enforcement mechanism.
• 28:23
  We are now somewhat of the regulator.
• 28:26
  Businesses with price sensitive customers literally change prices less often.
• 28:32
  Complaining customers slow the machine and the machine will always go up a bit, sure, but it's the speed of it, it's the rate of it.
• 28:40
  And slowing the machine is what we need.
• 28:43
  So we've talked about it on other episodes of the show before, but frankly, even I didn't realize quite how important this had become.
• 28:52
  We've now got an economy that is running on how much can we charge our most loyal customers before they notice they're betting you won't check, so now you really need to.
• 29:05
  So powerswitch.orgnz or billy.gov.nz for your power bills.
• 29:10
  Food use apps like Grocer or Price Pulse to compare prices.
• 29:16
  Insurance.
• 29:16
  Get fresh quotes every year, chuck it in your phone, get a reminder and quote as a new customer because that's who gets the good price.
• 29:25
  Broadband and mobile ring up and threaten to leave if you can't get the best deal.
• 29:31
  Retention teams exist because it works.
• 29:34
  You will almost always get a better deal that way.
• 29:38
  Fuel apps like Gaspee some places around the country have as big of a difference as 40 cents a litre between competing petrol stations.
• 29:48
  The impact of one afternoon of switching on your main bills will beat a whole year of skipping coffees.
• 29:57
  And unlike skipping coffees, it punishes exactly the businesses that are trying to take advantage of you.
• 30:04
  Other types of businesses.
• 30:05
  Sometimes you need to ask for itemization on an invoice.
• 30:11
  A surcharge that can't be explained in writing can often be waived and just refuse the panic purchase.
• 30:18
  If you need a couch, buy the couch by all means.
• 30:21
  But if an ad is trying to make you anxious, put it down.
• 30:26
  Do not reward them because now you know the fear is running ahead of the facts.
• 30:33
  Inflation is sure at a certain level, but people are expecting and bracing themselves for more.
• 30:42
  And that fear is worth money and businesses know it.
• 30:48
  Some spend it honestly, some don't.
• 30:52
  And the Reserve bank just told us the quiet part and for some reason nobody is paying attention to it, that this is a growing problem.
• 31:01
  It's aimed at households and inflation is being used as a cover for just yanking up prices because they can and they get away with it because we're all too busy to look.
• 31:15
  But there is a silver lining here that the fix is actually free attention yours.
• 31:24
  An afternoon of switching, of finding the best price and then rewarding that more honest business with your money when you sense something is off.
• 31:36
  Finding the best provider and rewarding them, not giving your loyalty to someone who is betting on them being able to rip you off because you're busy.
• 31:46
  You can't really opt out of inflation, but you can absolutely refuse to be the easiest customer in the room.
• 31:54
  And when we all put pressure on them, then they do have to back down.
• 31:58
  They're actually watching you.
• 32:00
  They just think you're not watching them.
• 32:03
  Don't be an easy mark.
• 32:04
  Fight back.
• 32:06
  And tell your friends to fight back too.
• 32:08
  That is really the only way we can push back on this.
• 32:12
  That's it for today.
• 32:13
  If this episode was helpful to you.
• 32:14
  Send it to a friend so we can all level up with our money together.
• 32:17
  Until next time, have a great day.
• 32:20
  This podcast can only give you general information about how things work in most situations.
• 32:26
  It's not individual financial advice.
• 32:28
  If you're after that, a financial advisor is always the best bet.