What things used to be free?

July 15, 2009 9:23 PM

What are some things that were once free but now require us to pay for them?

I was thinking today about some things which were once offered at no charge but aren't any longer. Examples include using another bank's ATM, checking luggage on a flight and filling using the air pump to fill up your tire at the gas station.

What are some other things that were free in the last 20 years but which now require some payment?

posted by tomwheeler to work & money (45 comments total)

Extra sauce packets at some fast food places. It's bull!
posted by Arbac at 9:25 PM on July 15

Plastic bags at grocery stores.
posted by fantasticninety at 9:30 PM on July 15

(Tap) ice water at some restaurants.
posted by thebrokedown at 9:31 PM on July 15 [1 favorite]

Music downloading? Not 20 years, but.
posted by unknowncommand at 9:32 PM on July 15

Plastic utensils at grocery stores.
posted by furtive at 9:33 PM on July 15

Certain libraries charge for the lending of "premium" material like DVDs or best-sellers.
Public restrooms pretty much used to be free to use.
Tampons and pads were often free in women's rooms, in dispensers.
Condoms are/were often free at health care places.
posted by jessamyn at 9:33 PM on July 15

Airplane meals
posted by mazienh at 9:36 PM on July 15

I've seen restaurants charge for water.
posted by delmoi at 9:40 PM on July 15

Water? Payment not really required, but water was always free until bottled water showed up in the 80s.
posted by csimpkins at 9:40 PM on July 15

29 things that used to be free
posted by csimpkins at 9:42 PM on July 15

It's been a long time now, but roadmaps were often free. A lot of businesses charge for their catalogs (while yet others send endless ones you don't need, go figure). Parking in state parks.
posted by maxwelton at 9:42 PM on July 15

Luggage carts at airports (sometimes still free if you return it to a station properly).
Sometimes, soda refills, usually where the self-dispenser is being abused by local kids or whatever.
Full-service gas stations.
National Park camping and entrance fees.
Backcountry hiking.
Mountain and other rescues.
posted by dhartung at 9:42 PM on July 15

metafilter accounts.
posted by ffej at 9:56 PM on July 15 [21 favorites]

Keeping your money in the bank - there didn't used to be account keeping fees.
Taking your money out of the bank - banks didn't used to charge you for taking money out and now most ATMs charge a fee.
QANTAS recently announced it now charges extra to sit in an exit row seat on international flights.
posted by girlgenius at 9:59 PM on July 15 [2 favorites]

copies of bank statements, vital records (certified birth certificate, etc)
replacement social security cards are still free, but you're now limited to 3/year and 10/lifetime.
posted by ffej at 10:03 PM on July 15

oh, and believe it or not internet domain names used to be free, back-in-the-day.
posted by ffej at 10:05 PM on July 15 [1 favorite]

Packaged pats of butter. (At least at IKEA's cafeteria.)
Plastic containers for food.
posted by armage at 10:26 PM on July 15

Waste oil (from automobile oil changes) went from something service stations would have to pay to get rid of through something they would just give away to something they sell.

Fryer grease/oil is going the same way.

BC Forest service campsites.
posted by Mitheral at 10:36 PM on July 15

Some dupes probably, but...

• Local phone calls (we all caved and now pay for "minutes" with cell phones)
• 411-type information calls.
• bank services in general, not just ATM fees (even $20 accounts used to earn interest, now they incur fees)
• grocery bags (sometimes)
• "a glass of water" from some restaurants
• "extra cheese" (or whatever) from pizzarias or sub shops
• many national parks / tourist attractions ($30 to stand on top of your building? really?)
• airplane food and drinks
• shopping at this guy's store.
• parking, almost anywhere

posted by rokusan at 10:38 PM on July 15

Health Insurance was free when I went to college in the 80s, now it's $900/yr. Heck, back in the mid-80s UC was essentially free, $432/qtr, now reg fees are $2750/qtr, decidedly not-free.

The biggest degradation in my daily life has to be the institution of vended air & water at gas stations.

Oh, calling 411 used to be free.
posted by @troy at 10:42 PM on July 15

Museums and art galleries. BBQs in parks - still some free ones around, but a lot are now coin operated.
posted by Lolie at 10:43 PM on July 15

Autographs
posted by JohnnyGunn at 10:49 PM on July 15

QANTAS recently announced it now charges extra to sit in an exit row
seat on international flights.

Off-topic: And how's that working out for them? It sounds like an
incentive not to be there when the door needs opening.

On-topic: maybe not quite what you meant, but there are now napping
stores so office workers in loud cities far away from home can still
have a quiet, comfortable siesta.
posted by d. z. wang at 11:02 PM on July 15

Sex. Drugs. Live Rock 'n Roll.
posted by torquemaniac at 11:03 PM on July 15

Telephone technical support with a live human.

Health Insurance was free when I went to college in the 80s

It wasn't free, it was just much less expensive and included as a minor part of your student fees. The same thing applies to these colleges now where "everybody gets a free laptop!" It's not free, you're just paying for it with fees in some form.

Local phone calls (we all caved and now pay for "minutes" with cell phones)

It wasn't free, it was just a flat rate instead of being metered.
posted by Rhomboid at 11:06 PM on July 15

An older friend of mine tells me that when cable television first appeared, it didn't have commercials. The thinking was that because you were paying for it, you got to sidestep them.
posted by Sully at 11:10 PM on July 15 [2 favorites]

Love.
posted by rokusan at 11:20 PM on July 15

University fees.
posted by tellurian at 11:59 PM on July 15

USPS change of address - now done online, at $1.00 per name.
Cigar boxes.
Clothing alterations - this one isn't totally gone, but far fewer places offer it, especially for free.
Converting your container of spare change into dollars: any bank would do it.
Fill dirt.
Air for tires.
Photocopies at the library.
posted by faineant at 12:01 AM on July 16

TV before cable (I'm not counting showing ads as costing anything), and a very good K-12 education in California.
posted by tula at 1:24 AM on July 16

Perhaps you'd like a non-US perspective. Some of the things mentioned above that are still free in the UK:

using bank ATMs (mostly still free)
keeping money in the bank (the normal kind of account is free in the UK, not so in much of the rest of Europe)
filling tyre with air at petrol station (usually free)
Checking in luggage on a proper airline (the no-frills ones are starting to charge for this)
Converting spare change into pounds (most banks will take a limited number of bags of coins per customer per day)
Tap water in cafes/restaurants
Plastic utensils at the supermarket/grocery place
posted by altolinguistic at 4:50 AM on July 16

Some of the things mentioned above that are still free in the UK:

Well, to be clear, it seems like people are listing things they've ever seen someone charge for. Which is fair, but I'm in the US and I don't pay for any of the things in your list except maybe the luggage.
posted by smackfu at 5:51 AM on July 16

USPS change of address - now done online, at $1.00 per name.

Still free if you do it the traditional way. You're paying $1 for the convenience of not having to leave your computer chair.
posted by bunnycup at 5:58 AM on July 16 [1 favorite]

Some of this must depend on where you live, because about half the gas stations here have free air and water (and some of them have dump stations for your RV toilet water, too, also free), the grocery stores have free plastic utensils at the deli counters, and I've never been charged for tap water.

Friends with children tell me that a lot of school activities are now fee-based, including sports teams; when I was in school those things were supported by taxes.

Around here, pets are required to be licensed (for a yearly fee, of course); in the "good old days" the animals roamed free and untagged.

Oversight of and fees for trash dumping have gone way up, from the days when you casually burned a pile of plastic in the back yard and dumped your waste oil in the stream to now.
posted by Forktine at 6:05 AM on July 16

Apple's .Mac used to be free (Now called Mobile Me or .me). It was included in OSX 10.3 and when 10.4 came out they started charging for it whether you upgraded to 10.4 or not. FApple!
posted by Gungho at 6:07 AM on July 16

Gungho: Apple's .Mac used to be free

.Mac was never free for the full version. There was, once upon a time, a pretty useless subset you could get for free (email address, some pittance of online storage).

altolinguistic: Tap water in cafes/restaurants

Seriously? There are full-service restaurants in the US that do this now? Where?
posted by mkultra at 7:49 AM on July 16

Rice at Chinese restaurants. It makes me sad.
posted by snickerdoodle at 9:15 AM on July 16

The City University of New York (CUNY) used to be tuition free for residents until the mid-1970s.
posted by Calloused_Foot at 9:52 AM on July 16

Oh, and my broker charges for paper statements and confirmations (online of course is free).
posted by Calloused_Foot at 9:56 AM on July 16

The Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago used to be free. Now it's $13.
posted by parakeetdog at 10:27 AM on July 16

USPS change of address - now done online, at $1.00 per name.

Still free if you do it the traditional way. You're paying $1 for the convenience of not having to leave your computer chair.

The credit/debit card charge also fights fraud as the website makes sure that the address for the card account matches either the new or old address.
posted by sideshow at 11:51 AM on July 16

One of the public library systems in my area began charging $1 per item to reserve materials online (although this changed recently - it's free again). As with the USPS change of address process mentioned above, you could still reserve materials without a fee if done in person or over the phone.
posted by vespertine at 1:50 PM on July 16

It occurs to me that almost all of this stuff was never "free". It was part of the main charge. I prefer a world where I don't have to subsidize the freeloaders via higher prices.

Question: what kind of store gave out free plastic utensils? For what? Like, a plastic scooper for the potato salad? I've never heard of that.

A couple of realities:

1-the cup costs more than the fountain beverage going into it.
2-banking is free if you don't screw up. Banks make very little money, if not an outright loss, on consumer accounts; they give you checking so you will purchase their other products. Basically a loss leader. I'm not *that* old, but I can't remember a time when going under a balance limit or overdrafting or whatnot didn't cost something. I am old enough to have seen the roll-out of ATMs. They were "free" in that if you were on the same network as another bank, you could often use the ATM for free. But if you weren't on the same network, you were SOL. Your card simply didn't work. To gain the convenience of being able to use anything, they started charging. Which makes sense- you are not their customer. You are using their facilities for your convenience.
3-I also don't remember a time when 411 was free. Could have been at some point, but at the time, a phone line was relatively much more expensive.

4- Restaurants charging for water. If they have to give you a paper cup, hell yeah they should charge you. If it's in a glass and part of a meal, no way. If you are just getting water, of course they should charge you. You aren't a customer- you are a freeloader wasting their time.
posted by gjc at 8:46 PM on July 16

Question: what kind of store gave out free plastic utensils? For what? Like, a plastic scooper for the potato salad? I've never heard of that.

I have never been to a grocery store deli that did not give out free plastic utensils. What, you are going to eat that tub of potato salad with your fingers? And some stores even put plastic spoons (plastic wrapped and free for the taking) next to the yogurt, in case you are buying a single yogurt to eat on the run. So in my experience, this is still quite normal.
posted by Forktine at 5:18 AM on July 17

forktine- your answer and your username compliment each other! Congrats!

I guess I've lived in a sheltered land. My concept of the grocery store was that you bought stuff there to take home to eat. I never considered the grocery store as a place to go to grab a quick bite to eat. Or, if I did, it would be something that didn't require a utensil. It's even possible the stores do have this kind of thing and I never noticed. I agree, I suppose that is something they ought to have available. Or, maybe charge some nominal price like a dime to keep the old ladies from stuffing them in their purses...

(I take that back- I have seen ready-to-eat salads with a knife/fork/napkin wrapped thing *inside* the container.)
posted by gjc at 9:11 AM on July 17