All the sneaky ways you can be overcharged or hit with surprise bills

Daily Mirror

15-06-2025

MoneyMagpie Editor and financial expert Vicky Parry shares her checklist to get on top of your life administration and make sure you don't end up overpaying for things
Forgotten trials, insurance auto-renews, and out-of-date documents: these can all cost you thousands over a lifetime.
This is especially true if you don't keep a regular household budget of expenses, as it can be easy to miss things that aren't part of your weekly spending.
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Use this checklist to get on top of your life administration and make sure you don't end up overpaying for things simply because you forgot!
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Check your subscriptions
This one can save you a lot of cash for just a couple of hours' work. Go through your PayPal, credit cards, and bank statements for the last year. Write down anything that is a repeat subscription and how much it costs. You need to go back through the last 12 months of statements to make sure you don't miss things that are billed annually!
Now, take stock of the list. Do you use the subscriptions? If you use something regularly but pay monthly, switching to an annual plan could save you cash. But if you signed up to something a while ago but you don't use it enough – cancel it.
Update your address
Missing important letters is easy when you move house. Set up Royal Mail Redirect for a year when you move, to ensure you don't miss anything. But make sure you update your address on everything in a timely manner, too.
This includes on your car V5 (which could land you a £1,000 fine if you forget), your bank and credit cards, PayPal and other payment platforms, and the electoral roll. Even if you move within the same local authority and you've updated your address with the council, make sure you also update the electoral roll ASAP as it can impact your credit score.
Renew your driving licence
You need to renew a photocard driving licence every ten years. It's easy to do online and costs £14. When you're aged 70 years old and above, this renewal rate changes to every three years.
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If you drive without a valid licence, you face a fine up to £1000. But if you drive without a licence and cause an accident, you could be prosecuted as well as fined.
Apply for your Blue Badge renewal
Blue Badges are provided for a limited time, and it can be easy to forget to reapply before it runs out. However, using an out-of-date badge could land you a hefty fine up to £1000. If you don't need it anymore, you need to return it to your local council, too.
Blue Badges are issued by your local authority, so check your local council's website to find out how to renew in time.
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Sign up for MOT reminders
If you drive without a valid MOT, you're facing a fine of £1000 – rising to £2500 if your car is deemed 'dangerous' based on an MOT check.
The handy thing you can do is sign up for an MOT reminder. You'll get a reminder one month before your MOT is due, which gives you enough time for the maintenance and checks to ensure it passes and time to arrange your MOT before it runs out.
Update your passport
If you're travelling abroad and your passport has less than six months' validity on it, you could be refused entry. This could waste your entire expenditure on your holiday, as insurance and booking refund policies will not cover errors that could be avoided, such as not having a valid passport.
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Renew your passport online for the fastest and cheapest service.
You don't need to update your passport immediately if you've changed your name, such as when you get married. All you need to do is make sure your tickets are booked in the name in your passport. However, unexpired visas in your passport may become invalid if you change your name which could cost you a lot in fines and fees.
Turn off insurance auto-renew
Your car, home, and contents insurance probably have auto-renew set to 'on' as standard. This means when your annual policy ends, you could have a price hike in your policy that is automatically deducted from your bank account.
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Turn off auto-renew now. Set reminders in your calendar a few weeks before the policy ends, and use a comparison service to find a better quote. If you like your provider, you can take a cheaper like-for-like quote to them when it's time to renew and ask them to better (or match) it.
Switch bank accounts
If you haven't moved your savings around in recent years, or looked at what your current account includes for a fee, you're not making your money work hard enough for you.
Many savings accounts have a great introductory interest rate, which then drops after the first year. You're missing out on free money by not keeping track of the end of these offer rates! Shop around for better savings rates on a regular basis to ensure your money is growing as fast as it can.
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When it comes to current accounts, if you have a fee for yours, make sure you're getting the best rate. Packaged current accounts that cost a monthly fee can often include benefits you don't use, such as travel or contents insurance cover.
Assess your pension funds
Many of us just keep the workplace pension fund our employer chooses to pay into. But just because it's convenient for your employer doesn't mean it's the best place for your money. Do not opt out of your workplace pension!
Instead, shop around to find a pension provider that suits your goals and needs. You can regularly transfer funds from your workplace account into your chosen fund, to make sure you're not missing out on employer contributions while also putting your money where it aligns best with your goals.
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Check your credit report
Not checking your credit report could cost you thousands if there is fraudulent activity you haven't spotted. People can open lines of credit in your name, and untangling the fallout from that can be costly and time-consuming.
Even if there is no fraudulent activity, you could be accidentally missing out on better interest rates for credit, or not be able to even get it, because of a mistake on your report.
This can sometimes happen if a default or non-payment is recorded when you did pay on time, or when a previously financially linked person's account still shows. Or, when an account you thought was closed is still reported as being open. You can add corrections to your report to make sure you're not losing out on credit or borrowing because of them.
Check your credit report with all three providers at Equifax, TransUnion (Credit Karma), and Experian. It's free to do so and easy to check errors. It's important to check all three because they each hold slightly different information, so there could be a mistake on one that doesn't show on the others.
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