I subscribe to many many magazines and I love them all. I was recently very disappointed to learn that I had missed two issues of The New York Review of Books.
My problem is that magazines send me multiple renewal notices. Being a busy guy, or at least an inattentive guy, I don’t know if I have already renewed. Or I fear I will renew yet again a week later when the next notice comes.
So I get a renewal notice and I am suspicious. Should I send in a check? Should I wait? I know I’ll get another one.
No, I’m not willing to type the information into my iPhone. I want an optimal rule for deciding "on the fly." I’m still trying to figure out a) their optimal sending policy, b) my optimal response policy, and c) what the market equilibrium looks like.
It would work if they would credibly signal to send renewal notices no more frequently than every five weeks. Then I could always renew. I would never get a multiple notice because they would have processed my check already. But they send more frequently than that. Plus infrequent notices would mean that a multiplicity of notices would have to start truly early in the subscription cycle, and that might cause readers to dismiss the value of such notices altogether.
Another part of the problem is that many people are uncertain renewers. So every renewal notice must be breathless, even though I require only simple reminders and a scream only toward the end, when an actual subscription lapse is approaching.
I would describe my current strategy as "write a check only if their current plea really really makes it sound like this is the last minute before expiration." This cannot be a stable solution over time and indeed it is why the market has brought such an inflation of warning signs.
I believe that many acquaintances face similar problems in trying to maintain their friendly relationships.
Here is my previous post The Tennis Ball Problem.
As a humble operator of a fry-a-lator, I am on a modest budget but also enjoy periodicals for both their insight into current events and for their utility as non-slip matts at my station.
The easy answer is to pick a month and renew all your periodicals then. If on a food-service budget, use the wholesalers on Ebay.
There, you can get the Economist for 50 bucks a year and similar savings on almost everything. (Science News is the only magazine I subscribe to where I could not find it significantly cheaper there) You gotta give them a month or two lead time, so don’t wait till the last minute. They work out great, the only problem I have ever had was a bit of confusion when I ordered several from the same vendor (one was forgotten).
I think this problem is much like the Moroccan guide from your book: nothing to be done but go with it.
a good idea, senor flipper. alternatively, you can just write down whenever you send the check in on a spreadsheet, or set a reminder in outlook/gcal/apple calendar with yearly repeat.then, reminder pops up, you (snooze if necessary for a day, then) go online, renew subscription…
the dishes are done.
I have the same problem, and while many magazines carry an expiration date on the label, if they do not I periodically simply let the subscription expire just to see when it will actually run out. That only really works though because I am willing to miss an issue or two (or read them at Borders).
Like Shawn, I pay by check and put the expiration date as a note in my financial program, so I don’t have to dig up a copy to find the expiration date on the address block – at least one computer mag I get seems to send your copy out in a plastic bag you’re likely to throw away concurrently with renewal notices months or years before your subscription expires. Another thing to try: become a new subscriber, rather than renewing your old subscription – I was able to get three years with one financial magazine for the price of their one year renewal rate by becoming a new subscriber (actually, my cat is the new subscriber, but you get the idea). This method also insulates you against the third party renewal scam Bill speaks of, though those are pretty easy to spot given the obscenely high renewal price.
There desperately needs to be direct debit auto-rebill for magazine subscriptions in the US, just like there is for web-site subscriptions.
I agree that magazines should auto update subscriptions. Every one else does so why not the print media types. Keep it coming until I tell you not to. It is probably better for them as far as readerships. And it can all be done with plastic. Who uses checks anymore?
On the other hand, you can count your time as valuable and the time value of low amounts of money as basically worthless, and take the time now to renew all your favorite magazine for say 5 years. Then just ignore them all for the few years.
That way you’ll save scarce time and attention
As some people said, you can find the expiry date somewhere. So make a rule that you renew when you get a renewal letter and the expiry date is, say, 2-4 weeks in the future. If you then get a renewal letter with an expiry date less than 2 weeks in the future, assume you forgot to renew according to the rule and renew.
A friend of mine recently discovered a nice way of managing his magazine subscriptions: let Amazon do it. If you subscribe to a magazine through Amazon, they send you an email when your sub is nearly up, you 1-click to re-up, and you’re done.
Like so much else in the world, this is partly a tax thing. Publishers (unlike most taxpayers) don’t have to include subscription payments in income until the publications are sent. So when you prepay, they get to use the tax portion of the payment for a while. It’s like an interest-free loan from the government to them. This gives them an incentive to get you to subscribe early.
Tyler
You clearly have too much time on your hands if you have time to think about magazine subscription renewals, let alone write about same. Come to think of it, have time to even read the stuff you receive.
Which brings me to: Given the massive volume of reading you profess to, I am repeatedly amazed by what this says for the amount of “free” time professors have, by extension how little time is spent actually teaching (yes yes I know all about the imperatives of research), and what this implies for the cost escalation to the end user.
An interesting topic for you would be an examination of how the University system might be remade, for the benefit of students. I am assuming here that greatest portion of benefits today are delivered to the institution in the first place (branding and power being standard institutional goals) and secondly the tenured professorship.
My first thought, why not organize it more like High School, where teachers ostensibly are paid to teach students. These new college teachers can stay current by having ample paid time to continue study with researchers – most of today’s University professors.
Perhaps this is just the dreaded TA system that no one likes.
It does raise the question though as to why a University education at all. There must be more to it than the signaling factor. At least I would envision something that aspires to more than that.
The NRA does this too. Getting plea after plea to renew my membership, even just 5 months into the year, made me ignore them entirely and my membership lapsed. USPSA on the other hand send me just a simple postcard once a year a month before my membership is set to expire, upon receipt of which I send in my renewal.
At some point in the past I bought 3 years of Reason magazine and have since disregarded all renewal notices. I don’t even know when it’s set to expire. I have an inkling it might even have passed already and they just keep sending it…
My policy: wait until the subscription has expired and they call me on the phone to negotiate a renewal rate. it works wonderfully. and no, no one has yet noticed that I do this every year.
Surprised no one has commented on the price discrimination involved here. Every renewal offer I get drops in price as the final deadline approaches. After the deadline, you can generally renew at the teaser rates used to lure new customers. I’ve always assumed the multiple notices aren’t desperation but a way to separate out the highly-committed/price-insensitive people who are afraid to miss an issue. The early renewers do even worse if you consider the value of the option they are sacrificing.
I wonder how many of the people with low teaser rate mortgages were playing the same game: always refi at the last possible moment, as long as housing prices were stable enough to allow the refi.
I have a folder in my files for each subscription. I save the stub each time I actually pay and write the expected expiration date on it. When I get on of these mailers, I peek at the file to see when my current subscription ends, and discard if it’s still too far off, or pay and save if I judge that to be the best option. I like to delay the decision to renew as long as possible in case I decide against it. I don’t like automatic renewals as they require action to discontinue, perhaps including a dreaded phone call. The Amazon system sounds nicer.
Solution: Pick one month every year (I use January) to renew. Keep one renewel notice from each and renew them all on the same day in January.
Problem: Entertainment Weekly offers 40 issue subscripiton. Work around: Do without EW after Thanksgiving. I’m too busy to go to the movies anyway.
This sounds as though auto-renewing subscriptions for magazines are illegal in the US. Is that so?
At our office, we use a subscription service called Canebsco (I live in Canada)which sends us one bill yearly for all of our magazines that we receive. The magazines still send out their renewal notices, but we can ignore them without peril. They have access to most any magazine that we’ve requested, usually at significantly lower prices. One bill, no renewal notices – very efficient.
I totally agree. But ofcourse, that really depends on the magazine company that you’re subscribed to. There are others that are just fine in sending renewal/offer letters.
I have just created a website where you can set up your own email magazine reminders. The service is free and is intended to allow you to be able to ignore the annoying magazine subscription reminders that you get in the mail. Once you create your reminders, you can just renew your magazine subscriptions when you get the email from yourself. The site is:
http://www.magazinereminders.com
If you have any questions, you can reach me at fred.jonas@magazinereminders.com
Thanks.
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