How to file your taxes online for free. Why pay fees?

Here's one for those of you who are paying big dollars to H&R Block Taxcut, TurboTax, and others.

The IRS has a list of ways that people earning under $56,000 can file their Federal Taxes for free.

Read the fine print at each offer, some programs will file only the Federal for free, then hit you with a charge for the state. Others are totally free.

Link to IRS E-File

Pass along any good results to me, I'd like to hear 'em..

Switch your Natural Fuel Provider and Save Money.

This one turned out to be an absolute no brainer for me, and a home run as well. Thanks to utility deregulation, consumers are now free to purchase their natural gas and electric supply from any company that they choose.

If you are buying your Natural Fuel, or Electricity from the gas company or the electric company then you are paying "retail" so to speak for your utility.

This has brought many companies into the market, most of these companies will save you money, but are for profit companies. Off the top of my head, in the local Buffalo, NY market, there is a gas station called Noco that has been running ads to switch your supply to them to save money.

I did a serious cost analysis on their program, and decided to pass. They wanted to lock you into a certain price rate for an entire year, when we all know that the price of natural gas changes every month. Their electric offering was even stranger, saving you dollars at off peak hours, and charging more during on peak hours.

After doing some digging, I decided to go with a not for profit company to provide my natural gas and electricity. This company is the Energy Cooperative of New York.

The signup process was simple, just sign up online, and provide them with your account information for your utilities. The process was seamless, National Fuel still sends me a bill, but the supply comes from ECNY. National Fuel still reads my meter, and provides any service that I may need. Same deal with my Electric company, National Grid.

The only difference is that I am saving huge on the supply portion of my utility bill. When you get a electric or gas bill, there are two charges on there. One is for delivery, one for the actual supply of the electricity or gas.

The chart above will show the actual savings using ECNY versus buying retail from the gas company. Last month I saved 17.6%, which translated to be about 18 bucks in a month for my little 1100 sq foot apartment in my duplex...

Imagine the savings if you have a large gas bill already.

Right now the electric savings has been a wash, I only have a 60 dollar bill on average for electricity, so the savings is less than 5 dollars per month..