Interloper View

Introduction I remember reading sometime ago of a bad experience of somebody buying a computer from Best Buy and then her mouse broke. She tried to claim on the warranty but was given the runaround. Finally, when she convinced the shop to fix the mouse, it took more than 6 months to get it "fixed". This story shows that we should not waste money on unnecessary warranty. However, from my own experience, I found warranty and extended warranty to save me on several occasions. Warranty saved my butt I bought an Axim x50v a couple of years back and had extended the warranty to 3 years. The PDA died within days after its 1 year anniversary. However, with the warranty, I was able to get a replacement. The unit cost me RM 2K/- at the time. In another case, I bought a Samsung LCD monitor. At the time, they had a promotion and came with 3 year warranty. Again, a few days after its first year anniversary, it just went black. This time the distributor claimed it was out of warranty. Luck...

I have been debating which is a better model to manage expenses. The following are two which I have been trying: JIT - Just in Time purchasing. Which means only purchase items only when we need it. BH - Bargain Stocking/Hunting. Which is to stock up items when they are on sale. To help better explain the model, let us go through some scenarios: Junk Food For those with children, one of the things we usually buy are ice cream and candies. In the case of JIT, you will only buy the individual ice cream cone or bar when they request. So you will go to places like 7-Eleven, McDonalds etc. Same with lolly pop and candies. In the case of BH, you will purchase the tub of ice cream or even the multi pack from the supermarket. In the case of lolly pop and candies, you will buy party packs. Pro for JIT: From experience this actually reduces the consumption of the ice cream and candies since they will only request when the urge strikes or when they see other consuming it. The candy and ...