Subscription creep:
the quietest leak.

a 20-minute audit that pays like a raise · a 4-minute read

A subscription is an impulse purchase with a photocopier. You decided once, in 2023, slightly drunk on a free trial — and it has been re-deciding for you every month since. The average household pays for multiple subscriptions it doesn't use. Yours are hiding right now.

The 20-minute audit

1. Get the real list. Not from memory — from evidence: bank statement, app store subscriptions page, PayPal pre-approved payments, Amazon Subscribe & Save. Memory finds half.
2. Price each one per year. £7.99/month is invisible; £96/year is a decision. Multiply everything by twelve before judging it.
3. Apply the resubscribe test. For each: if it vanished today, would you go and sign up again this week? Not "do I use it" — "would I re-choose it". Anything that fails dies.
4. Pause the maybes. Most services let you pause. If you don't miss it in a month, it finishes the job of cancelling itself.

Stopping the re-creep

• Calendar every free trial's end date the minute you start it. The business model is your forgetfulness; be a bad customer.
• One-in, one-out. New streaming service? An old one goes. The cap does the arguing for you.
• Do the audit twice a year. Creep is seasonal — sign-up spikes follow big TV releases and January resolutions, cancellation never follows anything.

The money is not small. Three dead subscriptions at £10–15 a month is £400–500 a year — redirected at a real goal, that's a deposit accelerator you found down the back of the sofa.

More field guides: How to Save for a House Deposit Faster (By Plugging the Leaks) · The Low-Buy Year · Why Budgeting Apps Don't Stop Overspending · all 26 guides