We’ve got a new culture in Sweden where you’re happy to be charged many times for the same thing, subscriptions have taken off on a broad front and you can easily get big monthly expenses with all the subscriptions that you bought once but don’t really have a clue about.
One trick is to avoid subscriptions, but when the only option is to turn off automatic invoicing, then you get a message every time it is due and can decide whether you have use for it or not.
Avoid subscriptions by buying disposable or used items where available. One such is the Office package, which today costs over SEK 1,000 a year, just a few years ago Microsoft sold one-time licenses without an end date and these can be bought today, the latest is Office 2021. Smart businessmen have started buying up these licenses cheaply from companies that have upgraded or have unsold licenses, then they are sold on to private individuals for a few hundred Swedish kroner as a one-off fee. There are both operating systems and fully functional Office programs such as Word and Excel, and Microsoft cannot do anything about this business. An example of such a merchant is the Software expert .
When it comes to PCs, old computers that have become very sluggish, there are ways around this. A reinstall usually does the trick, then avoid reinstalling antivirus programs that take a lot of power and are not really needed today as Windows has a perfectly good security built-in. If it’s still sluggish, you can speed it up by replacing your old mechanical hard drive with a new electronic one (SSD) for a few hundred Swedish kroner.
With Mac (Apple) they are more locked and Apple says that they do not support computers that are older than 7 years, which is a bit strange as I have seen twice as old Macs that work perfectly. The problem is that software updates nowadays occur all the time with the Internet, and there Apple also stops upgrades after 5-7 years, which causes other programs such as Chrome, Safari or Office to stop working. There’s a cure here too, you don’t have to throw away a fully functional Mac if it’s just not older than 15 years. For Macs from 2008 onwards, there is software that allows you to install the latest operating system on your Mac. It is of course not supported by Apple but it works well, the name of the project is Open Core Legacy patcher OCLP and it is run by the Internet Community GitHub with over 100 million participants.
The last tip is about Teleoperators and the Internet. After all, you have to have a subscription to get on the Internet, the traditional way with modems on copper wires is starting to disappear and lots of sales people are calling around and scaring people that the Internet will stop working. It’s not like that, what happens is that Telia, who owns the network, stops maintaining it, but copper lines that have been in the ground for a hundred years don’t stop working all of a sudden, but if they break, there is no support. The modem parks will be gradually dismantled, but since they generate income, it will not be fast and the contract will be terminated in good time. So no rush whatever the seller says.
However, there is reason to review your broadband contract, the prices are open to competition and the entry prices are currently a few hundred Norwegian kroner per month, but it is rising slowly but surely and after a few years is closer to the thousand Norwegian kroner. It is very easy to switch so avoid fixed contracts and switch often to keep the price low. On the Bredbandsval website , you can see what prices you can get today for your address. Wireless (mobile) is generally cheaper but it’s as good as fiber with the new 5G technology, just make sure it’s unlimited volume or it can be expensive. You can normally get by with 100 Mbit down (to you) and a few Mbit up (from you)
Good luck with a new budget!
