My name is Harold Phillips. I'm a 34-year-old IT project manager in Toronto, and I've been recommending things I use on the internet for longer than I've been intentional about it.
The blog is called Referral Maxxing — which is a deliberate bit of irony. "Maxxing" is the internet's way of describing systematic optimization taken to an extreme: looksmaxxing, sleepmaxxing, whatever the current one is. Referral maxxing is that, but for your monthly bills. The philosophy: if you're going to recommend services anyway, you might as well track it.
I didn't come up with the philosophy first. I arrived at it backwards.
How This Started
A few years ago I was sharing my WeCook referral code — meal kit delivery, decent food, I genuinely liked it. I wasn't running a campaign. I found a few creative ways to get the code in front of people who might actually want it, and then largely forgot about it.
Months later I checked my account. The credits had stacked past $2,000. I'd been getting free food for months without really tracking it.
Then WeCook redesigned their referral program and introduced a $1,000 lifetime cap per user.
I'm fairly certain I'm the reason that cap exists.
That wasn't a scheme. I didn't exploit any loophole or automate anything. I just got the code in front of people, and apparently one person accumulating $2,000 in credits was more than the program was designed for. Completely reasonable business response. But the lesson stuck: finding creative ways to distribute your referral link — not spamming, not deceiving anyone, just getting it in front of people who'd genuinely benefit — is most of what referral maxxing actually is.
Around the same time I checked my Fizz account and noticed I'd accumulated over 125 referrals. Then Oxio: over 200. Years of free phone and internet, sitting there, because I'm apparently the kind of person who mentions their phone plan unprompted at social events. (My partner has strong opinions about this tendency. They're not entirely wrong.)
None of it was planned. That's the part that got my attention.
What Referral Maxxing Actually Is
It's not a scheme. It's not passive income that's going to change your life. It's the practice of recommending things you actually use, through official programs, in ways that are explicitly allowed — and being deliberate about it instead of accidental.
The goal, applied seriously, is to offset as many recurring monthly costs as possible. Phone, internet, banking fees, investing platform fees. If your Fizz referrals cover your monthly plan, you're getting mobile service for free. If your Wealthsimple referrals offset your subscription tier, you're not paying for that either.
Most people treat referral codes as a one-time thing — sign up, collect the bonus, move on. Referral maxxing is just the idea of being intentional about it, consistently, over time.
What You'll Find Here
Honest reviews of services I actually use. Canadian banking alternatives, MVNOs, fintech, a few other things where I've used them long enough to have an opinion worth reading.
When something has a referral program, I'll include my code. When you sign up through it, I might get a credit or bonus — and I'll always tell you that clearly. The disclosure isn't small print, it's the whole model: I earn credits by recommending things, and the only way that works long-term is if the recommendations are actually honest.
If a service has real problems, I'll say so. If a competitor without a referral program is genuinely the better choice for your situation, I'll say that instead. The moment I start softening a review because of a referral arrangement, this whole thing stops being worth reading.
Contact
General questions: contact@referralmaxxing.ca
Business inquiries: harold@referralmaxxing.ca
Beans, my orange tabby, has no opinions on referral programs. She does have strong opinions about sitting on my keyboard at exactly the wrong moment.
Last updated: April 2026