My Budget Review Q3 2008

Another three months has passed and it’s time again to review my finances. The economic climate may have taken a turn for the worse, but will my finances require a government bailout?

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Free map with the Daily Star

I have been looking for a new road map for months now as my old map is slowly disintegrating into dust in my car. Online searches had proved rather fruitless and the cheapest I had found so far was the AA 2009 Road Atlas for £4.99 from a service station which I resisted as I know service stations tend to be quite expensive.

Then by chance today whilst looking at the Saturday papers in my local shop I noticed that the Daily Star is giving away the exact same AA map for free by redeeming a voucher inside the paper at WHSmith. So off I went to WHSmith to purchase my copy of the Daily Star for 60p and claim my free map (it’s not really an atlas as it’s not a collection of maps!).

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Victory reclaiming my Credit Card charges

I finally won my battle to claim back my credit card penalty fees today when I received a letter from my credit card provider confirming they would refund the charges in full. The battle commenced back in May when I sent them a letter based on the brilliant templates provided by MoneySavingExpert.com.

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Victory in the Broadband switching battle

Having already switched my electricity supplier and mobile phone operator in recent months it was now time to turn my attention to my broadband supplier. This switch was to prove far more difficult and time consuming than the previous two.

Selecting a new provider was easy as O2 were offering me a years free broadband as one of their existing mobile customers. Their offer was perfect as it was four times faster than my current package with Pipex and most importantly for me had no download limits.

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The true cost of going organic

Tempted by a leaflet from Abel & Cole that dropped through the letterbox last week offering a free £15 fruit and veg box if I spent more than £25 with them, I decided to give organic food a go. Whilst the choice may not be as wide as a supermarket I have to say the selection on offer was certainly very tempting and if I hadn’t been watching the cost of my shopping basket carefully I could have easily spent a fortune. But I remained frugal and my shopping came in at £26.79 entitling me to the free fruit and veg box.  (more…)