Money-saving moves every KZN local should know
From visa delays to hidden delivery costs, tricky return policies and balloon payments, this week’s Consumer Hacks keep you clued up and in control. Stay savvy, save money, and know your rights.
1. Planning to visit Ireland? If you have an SA passport, prepare for a bumpy ride
That’s thanks to ongoing visa processing delays.
Last September, Irish visa processing company VFS was telling would-be visitors to Ireland to apply six to eight weeks before departure, and it was mandatory to have proof of booked flights.
Now the Irish government is advising South Africans to apply three months in advance of their planned departure, and not to book their flights until they have an approved visa in hand.
In other words, the goalposts keep moving, prejudicing many applicants hugely, both financially and emotionally.
Air tickets bought shortly before departure cost a lot more than those bought many months in advance.
2. How to deflate that balloon payment
If you financed your car with one final, very large balloon payment due after, say, six years of “normal repayments” - as a means of reducing your monthly repayment amount, there is a way to make that balloon smaller as you go along.
You can make extra payments, separate from the monthly instalment stipulated in your contract.
But here’s what you need to know about that:
You must explicitly request that those extra payments be used to offset the balloon amount. Otherwise, those amounts will be directed towards the main debt and have no impact on the balloon payment whatsoever.
3. Setting the record straight on cooling-off periods
Heather was upset when a Durban schoolwear retailer refused to exchange unworn socks because the label was detached. She believed a 14-day cooling-off period applied, saying she heard me saying that on ECR!
But you only get to change your mind and take back a non-defective purchase with seven days under very specific circumstances: direct marketing (such as someone phoning you to sell you something) or when you buy online and can’t inspect goods beforehand.
In physical stores, where you can engage with products before buying them, you have no legal right to a refund - or even an exchange - for simply changing your mind.
Some stores do take back your “I-changed-my-mind” purchases as a courtesy, but it’s not guaranteed.
So always check a store’s return policy before buying, especially when it’s for someone else.
4. Hey Big (Fast Food) Spender!
Food delivery apps such as Mr D and Uber Eats make fast food convenient, but Standard Bank warns that South Africans are overspending on takeaways, averaging R775 monthly, which excludes groceries.
This leaves many with no emergency savings: 45% of the bank’s clients, including over a third of those earning R25,000–R58,000 a month, have none. Customers in their late 20s and mid-30s spend the most, with higher earners splurging more.
Frequent orders - plus the higher app menu prices and delivery fees - add up, eroding funds for emergencies.
The advice? Track your takeaway spending, cut back, and redirect those savings to build a financial buffer for life’s rainy days.
5. Online shopping: check out the returns policy before committing
Kim wrote: “I am about to place an online order with Duck Apparel. A promotional discount has been automatically applied to my purchase. And the Ts and Cs state that items bought on sale or part of a promotion cannot be refunded.
So if the item doesn’t fit me, I can’t return it?”
Many online retailers have that clause in their returns policies, but there is no legal justification for it.
The Electronic Communications & Transactions Act gives consumers who buy online a cooling-off period of seven days in which to change their mind and return the item - at their cost.
This applies to items on sale or promotion as well.
If it did not, then all an online retailer would to do to deny their customers the right of return is claim that everything on their site is discounted.
When I pointed that out to Duck Apparel, it responded by updating its returns policy to state that its customers are entitled to return any item, including sale and promotional items, within seven days of receiving their order, provided it’s in its original condition.
Good move!
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