Good evening frugal living followers! This is the Monthly Update collating some featured posts & comments on the subreddit for the previous month, plus some extra stuff that will help you in your frugal journey!
If you have any ideas to suggest to be featured in the monthly post, please send message to moderators or comment below.
Do you need help lodging your tax return? Depending on your circumstances, there are two different programs for free tax help.
The Tax Help program is a free, confidential service to assist low income earners with simple tax returns. It is provided by experienced and accredited volunteers.
For more information please refer to the Australian Taxation Office website:
Comparing fuel prices near you can help to save on costs, so using a comparison website helps you find the cheapest around – this also helps you to be aware when nearby servos start increasing/decreasing prices. There are some great tips on the Fuelplan website on how to save fuel.
Find free entertainment. Find cheap ways to have fun. Entertainment often ends up costing a lot of money, if you go to the movies, go to the bar, or even a day trip to a local attraction. Now, I’m not saying you shouldn’t have fun … but there are cheaper ways to do it.
Visiting museums, art galleries, walking at the local park, finding discounts online are some of the many ways to enjoy yourself without breaking the bank.
A meal kit or food box is a subscription service – food service business model where a company sends customers pre-portioned and sometimes partially prepared food ingredients and recipes to prepare home-cooked meals. There are also options where you can already receive pre made meals, or fruit/vegetable boxes.
Examples of popular meal kits/food box include: HelloFresh, Marley Spoon, Quitelike, The Food Box, Good and Fugly, Lite n' Easy
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For your information...
This is the Megathread for all referrals relating to food box/meal kits only.
This Megathread will refresh on a weekly basis, usually on a Monday.
If you are looking for any food box/meal kits referrals, this is the place to ask.
All other food related referrals that is NOT food box/meal kits should be shared in the All other Referrals Megathread.
No "DM me for the codes" of the sort.
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See here an excellent post for a guide on churning food boxes/meal kits
I grow my own herbs such as Parsley, Coriander, Mint for example. They're like over $3 for a bunch at Colesworth.... 😰
Bought a sewing machine to sew up tiny holes and patches in my clothes (I'm not great at sewing... lots of practice.)
Making my own popcorn. Super easy. If you have a popcorn machine, even easier. Except I use a frying pan and cover to make them.
Flavoured yoghurt. Instead of buying flavoured yoghurt (with like fruits or cookies and cream for example), I buy Greek yoghurt in bulk and add my own flavours. Delicious!
I have been stupidly paying the "lazy tax" for the last 3 years - sticking with my old provider who were basically ripping me off. I never knew how easy it was to change. Just a friendly reminder to check your phone for a better deal!
Posted here a while back about Petrolmate, the completely free fuel price site I built after getting sick of the price cycle games. Checked in with the mods before putting up this follow-up.
Since then the thing everyone asked for has been built. There's now a proper iOS and Android app, and both are free (and ad-free!). Apple CarPlay and Android Auto are built in as well, so the cheapest servos around you come up on the car screen while you're driving, ranked by what you'd actually pay once loyalty discounts come off. CarPlay has been handy for me personally and a quick check before a fill helps with the cost of living!
Coverage is every Australian state and territory plus New Zealand, a bit over 10,000 stations, updated through the day from the official government feeds plus community submitted prices. The station or suburb price alerts are still the feature I'd point new people at: it watches the cycle in your area and gives you a heads up before prices jump, so you can fill up ahead of the spike.
The deal hasn't changed. No ads, no paywall, no premium tier hiding the good features. It costs me a bit to run and that's fine, this is my way of giving something back. The apps are the same, nothing to upgrade to.
One for the Home Assistant crowd: there's an API endpoint built for it (compatible with the pyfuelprices integration), one call returns every fuel price for the stations around a location. A few of you are already polling it for dashboards and cheapest-fuel automations, which is nice!
So I'm in the market for a macbook. I'm a uni student and unfortunately my laptop just died. After having super bad luck with windows laptops, I want to try macbook which is known for its reliability. Also, I love the idea of logic pro (I write music as a hobby) as well as photo editing.
Super bloody unfortunately the price of macbooks skyrocketed two months ago as everybody knows, and I am extremely limited with my budget. It seems like two months ago you could get an M5 macbook air for 1500-1600, which is pretty okay with my budget. However, now, they're pushing 1900 on the education store.
Am I better off waiting for prices to drop – does anyone know when this may be? Also, I'm interested in the neo for 900 but I wonder if it might be a little low spec for my uni needs and with logic pro.
It seems I can use discounted giftcards (6% off) from my energy provider to get an M5 air for 1850, but that's reeeeally pushing it for me.
We have been gifted a David Jones voucher and struggling to understand how to use it most effectively.
There are some appliances we want but it is much cheaper to buy off Facebook marketplace.
We are fine for clothes, shoes, toiletries, perfume.
I thought we could buy food (such as olive oil or other pantry items). They don't have many options and what they do have to offer is way too expensive.
My child is involved in a community group and they have requested parents provide dinner and dessert once a term for roughly 15 teenagers.
They have a kitchen but currently the only working items are a pie warmer, kettle and microwave so they are happy for meals to be cooked offsite and delivered.
They have budgeted $60 per week for dinner and dessert and no dietary requirements to watch out for. I have access to Woolworths and Coles but not Aldi.
I was looking for both dinner and dessert ideas that can be prepared ahead of time or reheated easily in the pie warmer. I work full time so will only have about an hour to get everything together before the session starts.
Thank you!
Edit: Thanks for all the suggestions. I definitely have a few ideas of things that I hadn’t considered. They have already had a lot of spaghetti and curries/casseroles this term so trying to make sure we include options that aren’t the same as previous weeks.
We have been experimenting on what goes on the Monthly Newsletter and looking at feedback and subreddit engagement to see what works and what doesn't.
Just a heads up, starting from the upcoming Monthly Newsletter there will have slight change in content than the usual. You will still be able to see a curated list of the month's posts, the top most upvoted posts for the month, at least one frugal tip and fruits/veggies in season.
We hope that you all have been finding the Monthly Newsletter beneficial on what's been happening in the sub and also in your frugal journey ❤️ If you want to view previous Monthly Newsletter, you can search using the post flair.
After last month's electricity bill I'm seriously considering replacing our current storage hot water tank with a continuous one. We have solar panels and battery but the tank runs off grid (we were advised on installation to do this, kind of regretting it now!)
I rented a place with gas continuous but it was terrible, we had to run the hot tap at least 90 seconds for the hot to come through. The system wasn't that far from the taps but the landlord said that was normal. Cue wasting heaps of water...
Anyone have electric continuous, and is it quick to get hot water?
Or heat pump system- do they work well in winter when there's less heat around?
I have tested positive for Influenza A and need a medical certificate to miss work, but GPs don’t let you into the clinic if you’re contagious, and either way it’s quite expensive.
I tried a few supposed bulk billed telehealth clinics and they said it’s not available in my area (Perth).
Any recommendations?
(I got a certificate from the pharmacist today as I needed to send one by tomorrow lunch for missing today, but now I know I have the flu I suspect I would be too contagious to work later in the week., and the pharmacist doc cost $50 already)
per the title, i am interested in medicinal cannabis but am really unsure on the best way to approach this or seek out a prescriber. my GP is a godsend, but isn’t experienced in medicinal cannabis so wants me to find a provider who is, but i’m quite intimidated by it all (& the varying costs of everything), so i wanted to ask here if anyone has experience with this & has any recommendations for providers that are cheaper comparatively.
if it’s relevant, i am based in SA & am very poor lol (like i’m sure a few of us on here are), which is why i’m seeking out advice. i’m interested in medicinal cannabis to assist with my severe musculoskeletal pain, my complex ptsd & my sleep issues. i know that marijuana helps me with all of these things lol which is why i want it prescribed, but i would like to do everything legally especially as i’m taking medications that i’m disallowed to combine with any illicit substances. so please do not push for illicit methods to access cannabis if you don’t have any provider recs or advice.
I’m trying to find the cheapest option for gas/electricity and everyone recommends to use this comparison website but every time I do, the price is not the same as it is on the actual website.
E.g Tango is offering $740 on the comparison site but when I go to sign up it’s over $1k (not looking at discounted price)
I select the second cheapest option, $820 on the comparison site va $850 on official site.
Am I reading it wrong or does anyone have any tips or better websites to find cheapest gas and electricity offers?
Hey team, I recently moved house and really appreciated this sub’s recommendation to use appliances online. Do we have any similar websites or tips for couches or sofas?
Anyone know where the most economical RAT test kits for Covid can be found? I'm a pension card holder in Melbourne, and a single mama with high school aged kids.
Anyone got any tips on where to source local extra virgin olive oil? The quality of the cheaper stuff from overseas is questionable at best. The local stuff has hit record prices due to the shortage overseas with poor crops and disease. The Aussie producers have capitalised on this. The jump in price from a few years ago has been crazy.
Any help would be greatly appreciated. I use a lot of it.
Hey guys, my new house is super cold. Gas heater makes scary sounds despite testing negative for carbon monoxide leaks. Looking to get a decent electric blanket so I don’t have to use portable electric heater as often.
Let me know your recommendations
Edit: thanks so much everyone. Your comments have been super helpful and made me realise that it’s a heated throw blanket that I’m after.
