Money Saving Expert Tips
Martin Lewis is a well known and respect financial commentator. Here are some of his latest thoughts.
What should I ask George Osborne? Question suggestions wanted.
p>On Thursday I’m part of a panel of four interviewing the Conservative Shadow Chancellor George Osborne MP for the News of The World. As far as I know there’s a senior economist, business person, city financier and me.
While of course I have my own ideas, I thought I would tap MoneySavers for [...]
The pain of watching people misplay monopoly – and an embarrassing display of geekdom
p>Picture it… you’re sitting on a train, three twentysomethings are playing travel monopoly next to you, you glance over and one is within easy reach of smashing the others out of existence. Yet he’s completely unaware of what he should do – the game drags on…
It’s pure pain
That may sound like no big [...]
Give pocket money as pay, otherwise you’re ‘trust fund teaching’
p>Pocket money is under-rated as a way to teach kids core money lessons. The idea of them having their own cash is beneficial…
It teaches them about regular income.
By having a regular amount of money you start to learn the concept of saving versus spending.
It incorporates ‘opportunity cost’.
While each of my two money mantras [...]
The Shouting Men Film Premiere – not my usual Tuesday!
p>Normally Tuesdays are sacrosanct, it’s the day we send the weekly money tips email, so from the moment I get up (which is early as it’s a GMTV day), barring a few appearances, it’s all guns a blazin’ until we finish sometime before 10pm (on a good day)…
My diary is permanently blocked out on [...]
Proven: the most annoying advert works, the Opera singer is a hit
p>Following on from my early comparison site advert missive on Moneysupermarket’s Omid Djalli there’s more news in the sector, this time about the GoCompare Opera singer. It’s without a doubt the most annoying financial advert, garnering 50% of the vote (see most annoying ads poll, yet a new story shows it’s a massive hit [...]
Good at haggling, but bad with cash? Omid Djalli ‘fame and fortune’.
p>This Sunday Time’s money section back page ‘Fame and Fortune’ profile was on comedian Omid Djalili, who’s referred to as the “Star of the Moneysupermarket adverts”…
Initially I found it tough not to picture the press office at the big comparison site, heads in hands, while reading the paper. Then again maybe it’s just part of [...]
My wife’s getting jiggy with Michael Fish – and I’m going to have to vote for it!
p>There are some things you thought you’d never say. For me, “my wife’s getting jiggy with Michael Fish” is right up there, but it’s true…
On Saturday night Mrs. MSE is taking part in the Sports Relief Let’s Dance programme as part of the weather girls’ team. Alongside GMTV’s Claire Nasir and ITV’s Becky [...]
Settled down, engaged, married, kids… what’s the next question?
p>On Friday night in the office, we were celebrating MSE Dan’s engagement to his girlfriend, now fiancée, Laura the week before (huge congratulations to them both)…
I instantly thought of my own engagement. Within three minutes everyone started asking ‘when’s the date’ and the pressure came on to sort out the wedding.
Then it occurred to me, [...]
Happy 7th birthday MoneySavingExpert.com!
p>This site was founded 7 years ago today, 22 February, and the design cost me £100. I’d drawn exactly what I wanted on a piece of paper and sent it out to a designer in Uzbekistan (see MSE history).
Prior to that, while I used the same URL, it was effectively just my home page [...]
I support MPs’ 1st class train travel as long as it’s at a 1st class price
p>The furore over Sir Nicholas Winterton MP’s uncouth comments about train travel seems to miss the point. Of course his remarks were ill-judged and out of order, saying on Radio 5 of people in standard class, who of course pay his salary…
“They are a totally different type of people. There are lots of children, [...]
Tim Vine… we’ve got your number
p>This is a message to pun-meister comedian Tim Vine…. we’ve got your number! Mrs MSE and I are going along with Jeremy Vine (Tim’s brother) and Mrs Vine to see a gig soon, and luckily someone has just sent me this denofgeek article.
Here’s a quick cut and paste of the offending paragraph…
On your last DVD, [...]
Winter Olympics consolation finals – I don’t get it?
p>I love the Olympics, and I’m glued every evening to my TV set, watching bizarre sports on white backgrounds…
One of my favourite discoveries has been Snowboard Cross – a motorcross race done on snowboards, with people gliding through the air as often as on the snow, and full of thrills and spills.
If you [...]
Is Facebook a virtual tattoo?
p>Mid-lurgy (the noro-virus isn’t fun and takes a long time to go) over the weekend, I caught one of the BBC2 Virtual Revolution programmes. It was quite interesting, although far too Americo-centric for me – I was surprised to find it was a money programme production at the end as it felt like [...]
Are annoying ads really bad – would you go compare with GoCompare?
p>This week’s poll is all about which of the current crop of financial ads is the most annoying. The runaway winner so far with 54% of the vote is GoCompare (see annoying ads vote).
In the linked forum discussion there are a number of people complaining that ad people must’ve been paid good money to [...]
Buy discounted engagement rings and make £6,000 profit – too good to be true
p>We’ve recently created the new Amazon Hidden Discount Tool which finds large reductions on Amazon. It enables you to create your own bespoke pages of hot discounts. We generated a few example links yesterday, and I ended up looking at the engagement rings 90%+ off* search.
I was blown away by the discounts [...]
Why are women too scared to poo?
p>Forgive me for blogging about a vernacular unrelated to MoneySaving, but while it may look like a light hearted blog, this is actually a genuine social issue and as I’m not sure it’s been covered elsewhere (and am worried what’ll happen when googling it), I thought I’d blog.
The Background…
In a break between meetings, the [...]
The National Theatre’s Take on the Financial Crisis – The Power of Yes
p>The National Theatre kindly invited Mrs MSE and me to see David Hare’s new play, The Power of Yes. It’s a first person narrative tale of his meeting with the big players in the financial collapse as they explain what went wrong.
A meeting that ran on meant we arrived a few minutes late, but [...]
If service is included why isn’t it in the bill?
p>I’ve just spent a couple of days in France, where in many places there’s no service charge, the price you pay is what it says on the menu.
This made me think about the pricing in UK restaurants. By and large it splits into two…
Service included. Here 10% or 12.5% (up to 20%) [...]
Insurance renewals should be forced to include last year’s cost
p>It’s not revelatory to say insurance renewal costs are a charge for apathy: if you don’t take the time and trouble to requote at renewal (see the car insurance and home insurance guides), you will almost always pay more.
In fact as many often discover, get a quote as a new customer from the company that [...]
Why don’t I do TV money makeovers on those in horrible debt?
p>Last Thursday night I did an ITV1 Tonight called ‘Can you save a grand in a day?’ (watch it here). Thanks to all those who sent great comments and feedback, though in the midst a few have commented that the family were wrong – and that we should’ve looked at a family with [...]
