Help w/ sisters 6th grade word problem

nerdingitup87

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Hi all. I'm new here. Usually, I'm pretty good with helping my little sister with her homework. I don't know if its the wording of this question or I'm just having an off day but I can't seem to figure it out.

"A year subscription to Netflix is $180. However, if you sign a 3 year contract you get 40% off your first year.

  1. In what month does Netflix start to make back the money they lost with the 40% savings?
  2. In what month does Netflix fully make back the money they lost with the 40% savings?
  3. How would a $75 cancellation fee change the first two questions?"

    Thank you SO much for any help. That's exactly how the questions are worded.

 
Hi all. I'm new here. Usually, I'm pretty good with helping my little sister with her homework. I don't know if its the wording of this question or I'm just having an off day but I can't seem to figure it out.

"A year subscription to Netflix is $180. However, if you sign a 3 year contract you get 40% off your first year.

  1. In what month does Netflix start to make back the money they lost with the 40% savings?
  2. In what month does Netflix fully make back the money they lost with the 40% savings?
  3. How would a $75 cancellation fee change the first two questions?"

    Thank you SO much for any help. That's exactly how the questions are worded.


Welcome to the forum nerdingitup87!

I assume that the two cases being compared are:

1) Customer signs up for a 1-year contract costing $180
2) Customer signs up for a 3-year contract costing $180 per year except in the first year, when it is 40% off

If we're comparing 3-year to 3-year subscriptions in both cases, then the question doesn't make sense.

To answer this question, you'll need to answer the following questions:

- how much cheaper is the first year in the second case? I.e. Calculate what is 40% off of $180. This is how much money Netflix lost on their first year
- how much does Netflix cost per month in year 1? What about in years 2 and 3?

Once you know how much money they lost in year 1, you can figure out how many months it is into year 2 that they start to make it back. You know for sure they aren't going to start making any money back until after year 1 is over.
 
Hi all. I'm new here. Usually, I'm pretty good with helping my little sister with her homework. I don't know if its the wording of this question or I'm just having an off day but I can't seem to figure it out.

"A year subscription to Netflix is $180. However, if you sign a 3 year contract you get 40% off your first year.

  1. In what month does Netflix start to make back the money they lost with the 40% savings?
  2. In what month does Netflix fully make back the money they lost with the 40% savings?
  3. How would a $75 cancellation fee change the first two questions?"

    Thank you SO much for any help. That's exactly how the questions are worded.


I'd have to agree that this is difficult to interpret. Truthfully, I think it's pretty terrible and shuold be severely rewritten,

I think it does NOT mean:
Without Contract: 180 in year 1 + Maybe 180 in year 2 + Maybe 180 in year 3
With Contract: 180 in year 1 + 180 in year 2 + 180 in year 3

I think it DOES mean:
Without Contract: 180 in year 1 and then nothing.
With Contract: 180 in year 1 + 180 in year 2 + 180 in year 3

Thus, if they give you a discount of 40% in year one, how much is that?

The problem also seems to be assuming that there are MONTHLY payments of this 180 annually. It does NOT say that. It should.

How much is the Monthly payment?

After you calculate the 1st year discount, how many months of payments is that? Keep in mind that the last PAY-ME-BACK month may not take the whole payment, that month.

As for the cancellation charge, how does 75 compare to the discount? Think about that.
 
The problem also seems to be assuming that there are MONTHLY payments of this 180 annually. It does NOT say that. It should.

Agree in principle, although anyone who's ever actually used Netflix knows that it is monthly subscription service...:D
 
Hi all. I'm new here. Usually, I'm pretty good with helping my little sister with her homework. I don't know if its the wording of this question or I'm just having an off day but I can't seem to figure it out.

A year subscription to Netflix is $180. However, if you sign a 3 year contract you get 40% off your first year.

  1. In what month does Netflix start to make back the money they lost with the 40% savings?
  2. In what month does Netflix fully make back the money they lost with the 40% savings?
  3. How would a $75 cancellation fee change the first two questions?

Thank you SO much for any help. That's exactly how the questions are worded.
Since you posted this to "Arithmetic", we'll need to assume that the student has not yet studied pre-algebra or algebra. But we can't know where the student is needing help until we can speak with her.

So please reply with a clear listing of the student's thoughts and efforts, so we can see what's going on and where she's getting stuck (and also perhaps figure out what arithmetical method she's supposed to be using). Thank you! ;)
 
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