Subscription Audit for Canadians: Cut Streaming, Apps, and Free Trials That Aren't Free

A Canadian household can pass $100 a month on streaming and apps without anyone noticing, because the charges do not arrive on one bill. Netflix might be on a credit card, Crave on a Bell or Rogers add-on, a kids’ app on Apple, and a cloud plan on a statement line that says PAYPAL. The audit is a method: export every recurring charge, score it, cancel in the place that actually bills you, and put the next renewal on a calendar seven days early.

This page is the household pass. Rotating Netflix, Disney+, and Crave is its own guide. Free-trial proof is its own checklist. Warehouse membership math stays on the Costco membership guide. Whether Ignite TV is cheaper than a streaming stack stays on the Ignite TV comparison. Cancelling an auto policy mid-term is a short-rate calculation on the insurance guide, not a subscription button.

Export every recurring charge: bank, credit card, Apple, Google Play, Amazon, and telecom add-ons

Open a blank sheet with one row per charge. Columns that earn their keep: service name, who in the house uses it, biller, amount in Canadian dollars, whether tax is included, last charge date, next renewal, and a blank for the decision. Do not start by cancelling the first logo you dislike. You will miss the $7.99 that has no logo.

Pull at least 90 days from every chequing account and every credit card the household uses, including a partner’s card and a teen’s supplemental card. Filter for repeats: the same merchant, about the same amount, about every month. Annual charges hide in a 90-day window, so if the bank lets you export 12 months, do that too and star anything that posted once. Known descriptors to type into search: APPLE.COM/BILL, GOOGLE, AMZN, PAYPAL, NETFLIX, DISNEY, CRAVE, ADOBE, and the gym’s name. A processor name you do not recognise still gets a row. The statement hunt is the longer version of this export.

Then leave the bank and open the wallets that bill through it. On an iPhone: Settings, your name, Subscriptions. On Google Play: the subscriptions list at play.google.com, signed into the Google Account that owns the phone. On Amazon.ca: Memberships and Subscriptions, which is where Prime, channels, and Subscribe & Save sit. Prime’s annual-versus-monthly math is the Prime break-even, not a guess during this export. On the Rogers, Bell, Telus, Videotron, or other carrier app: add-ons and subscriptions, separate from the plan price. A Crave or Disney+ credit on a mobility bill will not appear as “Crave” on the Visa.

Grocery delivery passes and meal-kit renewals belong on the sheet as charges. Whether a meal-kit trial beats cooking is the meal-kit decision. PC Express pass math is the pickup-and-delivery guide. Here you only record the amount, the renewal, and whether anyone still places an order.

Score each service: used in last 30 days, replaceable by library/Kanopy/Hoopla, or seasonal only

Three scores, written in the sheet, not debated in the group chat. Used means someone opened it in the last 30 days for something they meant to watch or do. Continue-watching and last-login beat “we might.” Library means a public-library card already covers that job through Kanopy, Hoopla, or the library’s own streaming. Ticket counts are set by your library, not by a national rule. Check the library’s Kanopy or Hoopla page before you assume the cap. Seasonal means you want it for a defined run: a sports stretch, a show’s new season, kids’ March break, tax-season software. Seasonal services get an end date. They do not get a permanent row.

If two adults disagree, the person who pays does not automatically win, and the person who “might use it on a plane” does not either. The 30-day test does. A service nobody opened is a cancel even if it was a gift. A service one person uses every week is a keep even if the other person never opens it.

Apply one-in-one-out: add a streamer only after cancelling another

One in, one out is a rule for video services you pay for. Before anyone starts a new streamer, the sheet shows a cancel confirmation for another one, with an end date. “We’ll cancel Netflix after we finish the show” is how three logos stay on the card. Finish the show inside the period you already paid, then cancel. The next join waits until that confirmation email is in the folder.

The rule has two honest exceptions. A free trial that you have already calendared to die before it bills can overlap the service you are about to cancel, for that trial window only. A bundle line you cannot split, such as Crave included with a TV package you are keeping on purpose, counts as the one service. It does not give you permission to add Netflix and Disney+ “because Crave was free.” If the TV package is the question, price it on the cord-cutting guide. This page only counts the streaming charges.

Apps follow the same rule when they are entertainment or duplicates: two meditation apps, two cloud photo plans, two password managers. Utilities you actually use, such as the one cloud backup that holds the family photos, are keeps. They are not traded against Netflix.

Map who bills where—direct vs App Store vs Rogers/Bell bundle—so you cancel the right place

Cancelling in the wrong place is the usual failure. The app still opens, the charge still posts, and the household thinks it is done. Match the receipt, not the icon.

• Apple. The email says Apple, or the statement says APPLE.COM/BILL. Cancel in Settings, your name, Subscriptions. Apple’s Canadian support page, published 14 Sep 2026, says a trial must be cancelled at least 24 hours before it ends. Deleting the app leaves the subscription.
• Google Play. The receipt is from Google. Cancel at play.google.com under the Google Account that paid. Google’s help page states that uninstalling the app does not cancel the subscription.
• Direct. Netflix, amazon.ca, Adobe, and most gyms bill you themselves. Cancel on that site, signed into the email that receives the invoice. Netflix’s help centre says signing out or deleting the app does not end the membership, and that a membership billed by a payment partner has to be cancelled with that partner.
• Carrier add-on. If Crave, Disney+, or Netflix is a line on a Rogers, Bell, or other telecom bill, cancelling inside the streamer may not remove the add-on, and leaving the bundle can turn direct billing back on. Read that pause before you drop TV. Steps for the trial itself are the trial checklist.

Write the biller in the sheet in those four words: Apple, Google, direct, or carrier. The cancel step is then obvious. If a family member’s Apple Account owns the subscription, only that account can cancel it. Apple says so on the same support page.

Build a 12-month rotation calendar instead of stacking Netflix + Disney+ + Crave year-round

Stacking is the default because each service is “only” a few dollars and the shows do not arrive in the same month. Put the year on one page. Pick one always-on service. Give every other video service a month range and a cancel date at the end of that range. Library digital fills the gaps. The month-by-month version, including ad-tier prices checked for this draft, is the rotation guide.

A calendar that says “Disney+ in November and December, Crave for the season you named, Netflix all year, nothing else” is a plan. A calendar that says “all three, we’ll see” is the stack you already have. Review the calendar when you do the quarterly statement pass, not when a trailer autoplays.

Set renewal reminders 7 days before annual charges and free-trial end dates

Seven days is the household rule because annual charges and trials both fail on the morning they renew. Create a calendar event titled with the service, the amount, and the biller: “Disney+ annual, check CAD price, Apple, cancel if unused.” Set it seven days before the renewal or the trial end. For an Apple trial, that reminder must still leave you 24 hours, which seven days does. Do not move the reminder to the renewal morning.

Put the events on a calendar both adults can see. A reminder that lives in one person’s head is how the charge posts. When the alert fires, open the sheet, check the 30-day score, and either confirm the renewal on purpose or cancel that day. Save the confirmation in the same folder as the sheet. Then book the next quarterly audit: new trials show up constantly, which is why the pass repeats. The quarterly hunt is that repeat.