And the answer to the credit crisis is…

… well according to the Bank of England and the Fed it’s to cut interest rates to keep people spending and borrowing. Whether this policy will work in the short to medium term is debatable, but in the long-term people will have to cut back their levels of borrowing as its simply not sustainable.

The rate cuts are bad news for savers as interest income will be cut and with inflation continuing to rise, as a result of higher food and energy prices, savers will be feeling a lot worse off this year.

The Mystery of Mystery Shopping

I signed up for another mystery shopping assignment today, this time I had to go to the nominated post office and ask three specific questions and note the response. There was also a couple of questions asking me for my opinion on the state of this particular post office and in return for doing this I was offered £4 + reimbursement for the cost of purchasing something on display.

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BT changes its calling tariffs

Last week BT announced increases in their line-rental charges which means that my monthly bill will go up by 75p a month. This has caused outrage in the popular media although I am not sure why as this is the first increase in 2 years and a 7.1% increase is roughly in line with inflation over that time (it of course depends on which measure of inflation you believe!).

BT are also going to increase the discount for customers who opt for paperless billing from 50p per month to £1.25 per month. So I made sure I signed up for this today which will effectively protect me from the line-rental increase and net me a £5.50 saving for the year too!

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