Find what you actually pay to be online, and cancel safely

Your online costs arrive in pieces: domain renewal, website plan, mailbox seats, booking add-ons, and a trial that became a subscription. A statement search finds what you paid. A renewal audit finds what you are about to pay. You need both before deciding what can go.

Set aside a first session to build the list. Complicated account ownership or migrations may take longer; do not rush a cancellation to finish the audit in one hour.

Download the business workflow workbook and use its Bills tab for renewal amounts and dates. Use Subscriptions when preparing a cancellation, and Launch budget to compare cash timing and owner hours. The examples are fictional; replace them before entering real decisions. Keep unknown amounts blank and enter an explicit zero only when a cost is genuinely zero.

Step 1: Search the bills

Review at least the last twelve months of business bank and card statements. Search provider names and words such as renewal, domain, hosting, web, site, DNS, email, and SSL. Also inspect repeated charges you cannot explain.

Record the provider, account owner, product, actual charge, currency, billing frequency, and purpose. Include expenses paid by another card or reimbursed to a helper. Keep the statement or invoice reference so a mystery charge can be investigated.

Canada: report in CAD if that is your budget currency. Keep the supplier’s original currency and the actual CAD debit; a card conversion fee may be included in the debit or shown separately, so check both without counting it twice.United States: use USD for a USD budget, and keep the original currency plus conversion/card fees for any foreign-currency charge. For a future renewal, label tax or conversion estimates rather than treating an old statement as the next quote.

Step 2: Check future renewals

Log in through the provider’s known website, not a surprise renewal letter. Open billing/subscriptions and record:

• Exact product and account reference, recent usage, and features that overlap another service.
• Current renewal amount, currency, and payable term.
• Renewal date and any earlier charge or cancellation deadline.
• Auto-renew status and the payment method.
• Who can change or recover the account.
• What stops if the service expires.

Leave an unknown renewal amount marked unknown. A launch discount is not a renewal quote. A multi-year service may not appear in the last twelve months of statements at all.

Use the ownership checklist to retain account information and renewal reminders. Keep core domain recovery and renewal reliable while you investigate extras. See the expired-domain guide for the consequences of losing the domain.

Step 3: Separate annual cost from cash due

For comparison, divide a multi-year renewal by its term in years and multiply a monthly bill by twelve. This creates an annual equivalent. It does not turn the supplier’s upfront charge into monthly payments.

Keep a second figure: the actual cash due next, with its date. A low annual equivalent can still mean a large near-term payment. Include mandatory fees and the applicable taxes/conversion in your own payable-cost estimate, with uncertainties visible.

Canada: do not infer zero tax merely because the seller is abroad; CRA’s digital-economy guidance covers relevant cross-border supplies.United States: do not apply one nationwide software-tax assumption; New York’s guidance is one example of state/local tax on certain software. Use the actual invoice and applicable billing details for either country. This is a cash audit: possible tax credits or deductions belong in the bookkeeping review, not in an assumed reduction of the bill due now.

Do not add together CAD and USD figures. Pick a reporting currency and document any conversion assumptions, or show separate currency subtotals. The workbook deliberately does not invent an exchange rate for you.

Now use the calculator to compare services that a different setup would actually replace. Keep paid mailbox or booking costs that you would retain. The online setup cost guide explains how the companion worksheets separate cash timing, recurring costs, and owner hours.

Step 4: Keep, replace, or investigate

Keep: the service performs work you need, and its renewal terms remain reasonable.

Replace: another route completes that work at a better total cost. Build and test it first. Hosting, QR codes, forms, and analytics are candidates, not automatic cancellations.

Investigate: nobody can explain the charge, the account is inaccessible, or a dependency is uncertain. Ask the provider and whoever set it up. “We don’t know what this does” is a reason to investigate, not proof that nothing will break.

For a maintenance retainer, request the scope, recent completed work, access arrangements, cancellation terms, and what happens after termination. Judge the work and risk, not merely the product label.

Step 5: Complete the safe-cancellation worksheet

Use the workbook’s Subscriptions tab. Before cancelling:

1. Identify dependencies. Check the website, domain/DNS, mailbox, forwarding, forms, booking, payments, stored files, and accounts that use this email address for login or recovery.
2. Preserve records. Export needed data and open it somewhere independent. Include attachments, approvals, and other records outside the basic CSV. Keep required bookkeeping records.
3. Test the replacement where needed. Try the real customer workflow and owner access. A homepage that loads is not a successful mailbox, form, or payment migration.
4. Read the cancellation terms. Check notice requirements, refunds, end-of-access timing, and separate product subscriptions. Record trial deadlines before a charge is taken.
5. Decide and act. Cancel the identified product through the provider’s current process. Save confirmation and the effective date. Removing a card alone is not a reliable cancellation method.
6. Check afterwards. Verify the customer route and access again after the effective end, then review the next statement for the expected charge or absence of renewal. If the paid term is still running, schedule that later check rather than marking it finished today. Follow up with the provider if the evidence does not match.

The worksheet’s “Review cancellation” status means the preparation fields are complete. It does not press a cancellation button or prove that you have discovered every dependency. Record the actual decision yourself.

Wix’s cancellation guidance illustrates why the exact product matters: website plans, domains, business email, and other services can have separate subscriptions. Its charge timing and refund/access rules also depend on the situation. Follow the current account instructions rather than assuming every product ends on the same date.

For business mail, Google Workspace’s cancellation guidance explains why exports and access changes must happen before cancellation. Check logins and recovery addresses that depend on that mailbox as well as the mail itself. A plan billed monthly can still have an annual/fixed-term commitment; confirm any remaining contractual balance instead of counting all future instalments as savings.

For both Canadian and US business purchases, keep the supplier’s cancellation evidence and applicable agreement. A consumer refund rule is not automatically a business contract rule. The lifetime-deal guide explains that distinction using Ontario and US federal examples; other provincial, territorial, or state rules may matter to your transaction.

Repeat before the next decision

Put a reminder ahead of major renewals and trial deadlines, plus a yearly full audit. Include enough time for any notice or migration, not just the renewal date. Price changes, extra seats, and overlapping tools are easier to catch when you know what each service does.

You are finished when: the cost list has known terms or visible unknowns, every proposed cancellation has a dependency and export check, and confirmation matches what actually stops and when.