Exhausting Day....

Today I spent a good part of the late afternoon and evening doing grocery shopping. I find it pretty exhausting to shop with a budget. Although it would be much easier to just shop on the go, I am trying to curb my monthly grocery bill by developing more conscientious spending habits. One problem I have with budgeting is that sometimes you end up spending a lot of time and energy keeping track of what you spend and how much you have left.

This is why I thought to myself whether gift cards or prepaid visa/master cards could come in handy in tracking spending. I don't really purchase GCs that often, so I read up on the risks associated with gift card purchase (see gift card fraud on scambusters.org).

"If you buy Gift Cards from a display rack that has various store cards you may become a victim of theft. Crooks are now jotting down the card numbers in the store and then wait a few days and call to see how much of a balance they have on the card. Once they find the card is "activated," they go online and start shopping. You may want to purchase your card from a customer service person, where they do not have the Gift Cards viewable to the public."

Although prepaid cards like Visa/Mastercards are safer to use. There are drawbacks as well, mainly a monthly maintenance fee associated with the prepaid cards ( prepaidcardguide.com). You get charged for using the card to make ATM withdrawals as well. Good news is if you lose the card they will replace it for you for free, which is good if your card gets stolen. But protection level may vary with different cards.

So I guess the GC/prepaid card idea is out. For the time being, I'll stick with my BOA MyAccess debit card. It's free and since I am enrolled in Keep the Change program, every transaction get rounded up to whole dollar values and the extra funds automatically transfer to my Savings Account. BOA then matches the amount transfered to savings dollar for dollar (100%) at the end of the year for transfers made in the first 3 months. After 3 months, the match amount drops to 5% . I guess it's not too bad although I am sure they're still making money off of me. Considering their savings interest rate is so low, this is probably the only way for them to get me to put my money in their savings account as oppose to putting it in FNBO savings (their interest rate just went from 5% to 4.5%). Oh well, you can't win in everything and even if you do, nothing good lasts forever.

As to time management, my goal is to strive to make as few trips to the grocery store as possible next month. Grocery shopping here in El Paso is such a hassle. No matter where you go (supermarket, drug store, post office...) and what time of the day you go, there is always a line. You can bet on it. When DH comes, we will make one trip to SuperTarget on the East side and do all the shopping in one day. Fewer trips means less headache and less time wasted staring at tabloid magazines and overpriced chewing gums. And as an added bonus, this also means fewer transactions to track and easier budgeting.