This is Money Blog

My blog of shame

It’s been a while since I last scribed a blog, early January to be exact, whereupon I wrote candidly about my addiction to fags and my New Year’s attempt to banish them from my life altogether.

But here I am, five months on since I quit the filthy cigs. A day at the Allen Carr clinic and all my fag related problems were solved – and here’s the bit where I am meant to wax lyrical about how proud and relieved I am that not a single cigarette has passed my lips since.

But alas the shameful reality of the situation is that, although I quit five months ago, I re-united with the tabs some four months ago, sorry, four and a half months ago. (See there’s a reason I haven’t blogged in a while, namely shame. Admission of failure is never easy, just ask the Government.) I managed a paltry two weeks – yep, a mere 14 days.

I know for those out there (the sensible lucky ones) who have never smoked at all, this could seem pathetic, and yes it is, but smokers, past and present, will hopefully have some sympathy…maybe. Okay, that may be asking a lot from the ex-smokers.

Notably, following my rapid return to a life of fag-ash my esteemed colleague Richard Browning prompted a call for my dismissal in light of my failure - a little harsh methinks. 

Of course, I am far from proud of my failure, anything but - and with the price of fags rising at a velocity similar to that of oil, I feel rather foolish and devoid of all willpower. Even though the Allen Carr method of dropping fags in theory doesn’t involve the stuff, but I have my doubts.

I believe I recently paid circa £6.40 for a packet of menthol dipped ciggies - madness. But I just cannot seem to divorce myself from them.

I have tried willpower – failed. I have read Allen Carr’s Easyway to Stop Smoking book, three, if not four times, it worked once, on the first occasion for four months – I can’t even remember what inspired my fall from the wagon.

And of course, I have had a trip to the Allen Carr day clinic in South-West London, which inspired me for a mere two weeks. And I am still infatuated with my filter-tipped ‘friends’.

One ex-smoker chum has recommended hypnosis, it worked for her, but then again Allen Carr has apparently worked for millions. This is the last time I will bring up the fag debate, at least for now, or until I can actually write something along the lines of ‘yep, I am actually off the fags for five months,’ but that feels like a long way off, so I’ll have to occupy myself with other topics in the meantime.

But have I given up, giving up? Well no I haven’t and one day I really do hope to be fag-free but as Mark Twain once quipped: ‘Quitting is easy, I've done it a thousand times.’

Phil Scott, This is Money

30 ways to save and make time and money

If you don't have time to worry about money and paperwork and other aspects of day-to-day life because you're... um... normal, we have created This is Not Work, a daily light-hearted but deadly serious tip-sheet of stuff you can easily take care of in your lunch hour; things you should know and things you might like to know. There are no ads and no time-wasters. It is primarily aimed at parents who work but everyone is welcome. Here's a round up of some of the tips featured since we launched.

Where to find the cheapest cars online
Half-price Sonic toothbrushes
Half-price meals at decent restaurants

The best Isas for 2008
How to be the world's richest parent
How to make a paper CD case

How to fight parking tickets
£189 flights to New York
Robot vacuum cleaner for £38

Where to get the best broadband
Time-saving tips from a top parent
Be my Valentine with cheap roses

Center Parcs for half price
Get your own back on your bank: reclaim the insurance you may not know you have
20 reasons to avoid British Gas

How to make your child a millionaire
Part 1 0-£40,025
Part 2 £40k-£500k
Part 3 £500k-£1m

Best all-round printer
Ryanair's 1p vs SAS £39, the true cost
Refunds: Claim £4 for delayed Tube journeys

Sort out your finances in eight steps

Part 1 - the will
Part 2 - the credit card debt
Part 3 - the life insurance
Part 4 - the company pension
Part 5 - the house
Part 6 - the emergency savings
Part 7 - the get rich slow plan
Part 8 - the fee-based adviser

And finally

The table football table for £16 that normally costs about £80 that you really don't need but if you did want one then this is worth checking out

>> Newsletter: Get more of these in your inbox

Gazza magic - money can't buy happiness part two

Like most people I could do with a bit more cash. A lot more cash to be perfectly honest – enough cash to roll around in, throw out of windows and behave like Richard Pryor in Brewster’s Millions.

Were I to win the lottery I would indulge in some serious purchasing and acts of generosity before heading snowboarding at various locations around the world for the next six months.

I don’t go in for any of this I wouldn’t want the money, it would change my life, wouldn’t know what to do, couldn’t trust anyone stuff.

But money can’t buy you happiness and sometimes, as I wrote about Watford footballer Al Bangura a while back, it doesn’t mean a thing.

Luckily, Al has been given leave to stay in the country and not be deported back to Sierra Leone, but another football-related incident brought the 'money doesn’t matter' thought to light again for me today.

Paul Gascoigne was in the news again today for the wrong reasons, having been arrested and sectioned. Like many of my generation, Gazza was the first superstar English footballer to really grab our attention and while he was a genius footballer he was no angel and often brought his problems on himself.

You can trace a path from how his every movement was watched and analysed by the media to today's millionaire superstars like David Beckham, John Terry and Wayne Rooney.

Sadly, it hasn’t turned out too well for Gazza since finishing playing football and I wish him luck getting himself sorted.

So, just because I can, here is some Gazza magic. Enjoy.

- Simon Lambert, This is Money

Useful links:

>> How to make your child a millionaire

>> How to pay less tax

Sort your life out in your lunchbreak

If this here internet fad is getting you down because of the sheer amount of second-rate and down-right irresponsible information and advice from time-wasters, scammers, spammers, self-appointed experts, money-grabbers, marketeers, spin doctors and, oh, the list is as big as the internet itself... fear not because today we have launched the This is Not Work blog.

It's primarily aimed at working parents but anyone who never seems to have the time to sort out the paperwork or who just wants a better deal is equally as welcome.

It will feature one quick tip a day to help you get your life and your finances back on track.

And if you miss a day simply click on the calendar and... sort your life out in your lunchbreak.

It's not work.

Richard Browning

Now go here...

>> This is Not Work

>> About This is Not Work

£30 cashback on car cover for This is Money readers

The battle-ground for insurers is changing. Once upon a time they could rely on loyal customers sleep-walking through the renewal process and gladly handing over premiums year after year.

But now home and car insurance customers who stick to the same insurer risk being hammered by renewal quotes that are deeply uncompetitive. A new breed of low-cost insurer will offer much better deals if customers are prepared to shop around.

Price comparison websites mean that these insurers can reach customers without having to support nationwide advertising campaigns and large support staffs that push up the cost of insurance.

But even in this ultra-competitive environment, canny customers can score even more money off their insurance and make the cheapest deals even cheaper.

Until the end of January, anyone that buys a Swiftcover car insurance policy through our car insurance deal finder will get £30 cashback.

The insurance from Swiftcover is a low-cost, no-frills option – for example, there is no replacement courtesy car – but Swiftcover is already one of the cheapest insurers and regularly features at or near the top of the price comparison tables.

Check our car insurance finder to see if the deal stacks up for you.

This is Money

A water meter cut my bills by 35%

I felt ethically obliged to have a water meter installed just over a year ago. We had endured another dry summer, resevoirs were parched and the south-east's hosepipe ban looked permanent.

I also thought I might save a few quid... and I have.

I've had my first full-year bill. It was £220, a dramatic reduction on the approximate £330 a year I was previously paying with Sutton and East Surrey Water board.

Admittedly, it was a wet summer so my thirsty tomoatoes largely looked after themselves but it's still remarkable given it's a home with a family of three (and now four with a new addition in the past few months).

It's some anecdotal evidence to back my previous estimates that households of three people or fewer should be able to save with a water meter. If you're interested in more advice see these articles...

- Can a water meter cut costs?
- 10 ways to cut water bills (and try an official water meter calculator)

- Blog: The great water meter rush (September 2006)
- Blog: A £110 cheque for having a water meter fitted (December 2006)

- Andrew Oxlade, Editor, This is Money

British Gas joins the conmen in our hall of shame

The country's greatest financial sleuth, Tony Hetherington (right), writes for the Financial Mail on Sunday and This is Money. His weekly column is a hall of shame that should be on everyone's 'must-read' list.

>>Check the archive

This week he shines his spotlight on serial conman Simon Hill, aka Simon Johansson, whose decade of deception has finally led to justice - not for him but for one of the men he worked for, Richard Dompier, who has just been jailed for ten years in the USA. Britain is criminally behind-the-times when it comes to dealing with its white-collar crooks.

Simon Hill is not a household name. But it is a name worth remembering as are so many of the names in Hetherington's files.

One thing I find particularly alarming about the exposure of scams and rip-offs is just how often our supposedly trusted household names come under investigation.

After the near collapse of Northern Rock it is becoming increasingly difficult to know who to trust. For example, Marks & Spencer was recently in the spotlight over the wording of its advertising. Trivial by comparison, you may say? But I don't agree.

Big companies that spend fortunes on PR and advertising that don't live up to their claims are the scourge of our lives. Who can forget the empty promises from ING Direct? But which is the worst company in these stakes over the past year?

Talktalk is up there with the worst of them. But my money is on British Gas, which gets another mention from Hetherington this week over yet more billing errors and legal threats.

Personally I would not do business with this company. Here's a few more reasons why:

• Hounded for nine years by British Gas
• When will British Gas bungles end?
• Hetherington: British Gas bullying and travel insurance failures
• Has British Gas fixed me up?
• British Gas messes up 45,000 direct debits
• Wooden spoon for British Gas
• British Gas: awful on every level
• Is British Gas really cheapest?
• British Gas swamped by billing complaints
• Billing errors? British Gas again
• British Gas household share plummets
• British Gas fined £5,000

And from the blog (don't forget to read the comments)

BLOG: British Gas - institutionally moronic
BLOG: My British Gas nightmare: customer services hell
BLOG: Would British Gas make you leave the country?

And finally

Switch your gas bill supplier now

Richard Browning, This is Money

How to get elected London Mayor - 30 minutes free parking

Becoming London’s mayor has come a long way since Dick Whittington heard the Bow Bells singing his name and turned around.

Whittington, as the story goes, was walking away from London - where he had arrived as a pauper with his trusty cat - when he heard the bells calling to him as he climbed Highgate Hill and made an abrupt about turn.

Of course, Whittington was not mayor in the same sense that Ken Livingstone currently is and Boris Johnson wants to be, he was Lord Mayor of London, a separate post that still remains as a figurehead role.

But I’m sure that Ken or Boris would dearly love to go down in history in the same way as Dick has - even if instead of a cat Ken would have a newt and Boris his bike.

So, here’s my suggestion of a sure-fire vote winner for whichever of the sabre-rattling duo want to make London their own:

30 minutes free parking.

It’s a simple plan – easy to implement, bound to be popular with a lot of ordinary Londoners and could blaze a trail for common sense throughout Britain.

Cars can be parked in any space, be it residents’ bay, public car park, or metered area for 30 minutes for free. After that parking wardens can give them a ticket.

Residents will still be able to find spaces to park, as people will not be able to park beyond half-an-hour, small businesses will benefit from shoppers enjoying the same privileges they get at the supermarket, and people can regain the right to nip into a shop and buy something without getting a £60 fine.

The only people who will be affected are parking wardens, who will now have to go back to the way things used to work before the current insanity took over. In those days, wardens tended to write down people’s number plates and give them a bit of leeway before slapping on a ticket.
The 30-minute rule will not apply to single or double yellows and any council seeking to extend a yellow line area will have to justify it and then put it to a local vote.

I can’t see a single reason why everyone can’t have the right to park for half an hour and it would be the biggest boost we could give to local shops. Any environmental concerns about increased car use would be offset by less people driving to out-of-town supermarkets with their free parking.

Parking restrictions are meant to be for the benefit of local residents and businesses – at the moment they penalise them - so how about it Boris or Ken?

After all nowadays if Dick Whittington was travelling up Highgate Hill, he’d probably get a parking ticket while he was pulled up, mulling over whether to turn back or not.

- Simon Lambert, This is Money

PS. There’s a second part to this vote winner that could be implicated at a later date - make traffic wardens pick up litter while they are walking round too.

More:

Cost of parking rockets

Tycoon says £80,000 car in pound is good value compared to London parking

Councils banned from setting ticket targets

Something fishy about that chicken?

Have you ever opened a pack of supermarket chicken breasts only to be assaulted by a smell from somewhere between High Heaven and the drains at the colostomy clinic?

I have.

Three days ago to be precise.

Which, if you look at the label from the pack, pictured, was three days before its use-by date (today).

Apparently this is not uncommon. You are, I'm told, supposed to freeze chicken on the day of purchase and not leave it in the fridge for two days as I did.

But if this is correct, why doesn't it say so on the label?

This isn't the first time that I've sent chicken to landfill because it's gone off before it says it should and it got me thinking. What exactly does it say on the label?

Well, with a little help from Google, I attempted to find out.

1. Asda.
Big supermarket, Britain's cheapest. Started in Yorkshire now owned by American giant Wal-Mart. Named after founding Asquith family and the word Dairy, according to Wikipedia. Wikipedia is not always reliable. Wal-Mart's industrial relations record is often debated.

2. Fresh British Chicken
Blimey. There's a whole other world out there. A world of chicken marketing. 'Sporting legend Sally Gunnell, who still holds the 400m hurdles world record, is a big fan of British chicken.' Nice one Sal. Your chicken clearly doesn't whiff of sewage.

3. British chicken breast fillets
Although I'm reluctant to search for 'breasts' from my work computer (I like my job) it turns out the phrase returns Waitrose in the top slot. Waitrose chicken breasts cost £5.99.

4. £4.00
This pack of three big chicken breast seems very cheap to me. At the local butcher this would set me back three times more than that. Turns out you're allowed to inject chicken with water and beef so long as the ingredients list it. There are no ingredients listed and no mention of any beef. So we're OK. But how come it's so cheap?

5. UK 4633 EC
4633 is the name of 20cm pothole in York, a ray of sunshine watch, and the starting salary for a teaching assistant in Tameside. What it's got to do with meat is not immediately obvious.

6. L317107:09
317107 relates 'to the DPE deficit and unallocated resources of £9,707 from other Highways Revenue Budgets' in Cumbria. It's also the Barnes & Noble sales rank of The most critically acclaimed of all of Dr. Frank H. Netter's works, Musculoskeletal System: Developmental Disorders, Tumors, Rheumatic Diseases, and Joint Replacement. What this number is or has to do with dead poultry is not clear.

7. 5.88
This is the heading of a chapter in a document on the definition of dangerous weapons in Dublin and outdoor vending rules in Sacramento. It's also the price of an audio Sherlock Holmes book. Here, it is of course the price per kilo of my chicken breasts. £5.88/kg. This compares to waitrose, which sells at £11.98/kg. More than twice the price. Organic chicken breasts are more than £18 a kilo. How does Asda do it?

8. 680g
This is the weight of a jar of vegetarian tortoise food, a type of coaxial car speaker and the subject of a not-very-popular discussion in foreign on airbot.net. It is also the weight of my chicken breasts. That's heavy chicken, man. At Waitrose, the average weight of FOUR chicken breasts is 530g. At Asda you get THREE for 680g. Wow.

9. Use by HDY
HDY is the stock exchange code for Hyperdynamics Corporation, an offshore oil and gas exploration and exploitation company in Guinea and Louisiana. It's the official code for Hat Yai airport in Thailand. But I'm guessing in this context it's probably a shortform for Hadaway, a bit of Geordie slang for 'get away'.  I can find no other explanation.

10. Fresh Class A
Class A is 'ecstasy, LSD, heroin, cocaine, crack, magic mushrooms, amphetamines (if prepared for injection)'.

11. Packaged in a protective atmosphere
This means the air's been sucked out to prolong the shelf-life. There's some serious science going on here. Protective atmosphere means the packet's full of nitrogen. There's a website called Chicken Yoghurt.

12. 'Produced in the UK', and the red tractor logo
'The red tractor logo guarantees that the food you are buying has been produced to high standards from the farm right through to the supermarket shelf to ensure you are buying quality fresh food.' So that's OK.

Must be my fridge that's dodgy. 

Richard Browning This is Money

More...

Asda / Tesco telephone prank
Asda under fire over cheap roses
Asda guilty of anti-union bribes
Is Wal-Mart getting it wrong?
Asda showdown with unions
Asda milk ads banned from kids TV
Caring consumer

And finally...

A calculator to see when fruit is available in the UK

There's no such thing as a free pay-as-you-go upgrade

Technology is the scam artist's best friend nowadays.

While I am sure there are still a wealth of grifters out there working cons face-to-face, the automatic choice for the enterprising scammer nowadays must be the internet and mobile phone networks.

And while the advice is run a mile if anyone contacts you by email, text or phone call and claims to be offering you something too good to be true, there's a natural temptation to want that good deal to be true.

Two days ago I had one of those moments. A message arrived on my Orange pay-as-you-go mobile, promising me the holy grail for us pre-pay cheapskates - a phone upgrade.

It said: Orange customer. You may now claim your FREE CAMERA PHONE upgrade for your loyalty. Call now on 0207 153 9153. Offer ends 12th June.T&C's apply. Opt-out available.
Sender:UpgrdCentre

For a brief time I honestly thought Orange was genuinely rewarding me for being too lazy  to seek a better deal for the past however many years. And then the alarm bells rang. These were the tell tale signs:

1) Orange love to bombard customers with pointless messages, but they always begin Hi from Orange and the sender is always Orange.

2) Mobile phone companies are not in the business of rewarding pay-as-you-go customers for their loyalty - they might give you a free phone, but they want an 12/18-month contract in return.

3) In order to get this free upgrade you rang a normal 0207 phone number. Everyone knows big business dumped normal phone numbers years ago to milk customers dry with 0845 numbers.

Interested to see what the scam was, I gave the number a call. There was a telltale click, the fuzzy sound of a long distance line and the chirpy voice of an Indian worker (they tend to be a lot friendlier than anyone on the end of a UK phone). He asked me for my phone number. I asked him who he was and why I was texted? And while I couldn't get the full details of what whoever he worked for is trying to do I gleaned the following:

• The company is called CNT
• They bought the numbers for Orange customers from a source they won't divulge
• They are not in the UK, but won't say where they are based
• They pass on your details to a third party who then might offer you an upgrade

I don't know whether this is an outright scam to get people's personal details or one to coax people on to contracts through third party suppliers. It is however to be avoided at all costs. Remember there's no such thing as a free lunch/pay-as-you-go upgrade/lottery ticket/inheritance from a Nigerian prince.

- Simon Lambert, This is Money

Useful links:

Broadband, phones and TV news and advice

Pink with embarrassment

Ten days holiday in Florida has left me pink. Mr Pink to be exact.

Remember that scene from Reservoir Dogs when Steve Buscemi – as Mr Pink - argues with his fellow gangsters about why he won’t tip the waitress? If you don't mind some colourful language, here it is.

It’s a conversation that has run through my head a lot in the past two weeks. At least every time we came to pay for a meal. Or a taxi journey. Or our car being parked for us. Or our room being cleaned.

You see, America has a tipping culture. It has come to be expected that the customer will tip the worker that serves them. In fact not doing so is seen as open rudeness. Tips are not an occasional perk, but are relied upon by employees in certain jobs to make up their wage. (Mr White’s argument in the movie.)

During our ten days in Florida we tipped waiters and waitresses, cab drivers, tour guides, valet parking assistants, hotel porters and cleaners. Each time I tried to decide if I agreed with Mr Pink or not.

My girlfriend and I both agreed that the levels of hospitality and helpfulness we received were far higher than we have come to expect in the UK and I have no doubt that this is down to staff hoping to bump-up their tip. On this point the tip as an incentive works well.

But each time I coughed up I couldn’t help feeling that I had been not-so-subtly pressured into it. However ‘discretionary’ a charge is described as there is no doubt that avoiding embarrassment plays a part.

The amount to tip, and which jobs are deemed worthy of one, is never defined. While some general rules exist – for example 15% of the cost of a meal in a restaurant – there are endless conventions that patrons are expected to bear in mind when it comes to paying up.

A hotel we stayed in left a helpful leaflet for 'out-of-towners' explaining that it is considered fair to tip the porter $2 for each bag they have carried for you and to leave $1 per person, per night, for the hotel chamber maids. Parking assistants should, we were told, be tipped $2 each time they collected your car and a barman should expect 20% of the value of the bill as a tip.

All this can prove difficult for the wide-eyed tourist. Even the method of handing over the cash was the subject of uncertainty. We tried everything from clumsily asking a porter how much we should tip him  - ‘That’s really up to you, sir’ - to conspiratorially palming a folded $10 bill into the hand of a bemused tour guide – ‘Oh my!’

Nothing we tried quite felt correct.

When we finally got back to our front door in London I was glad that I could take the change from the cab driver with no embarrassment whatsoever.

Ed Monk, This is Money

The car insurance price trick - part 2

A year ago I switched car insurance to a new name in insurance - Swiftcover. I found the deal on our car insurance finder and, at £390, it undercut every other provider and our previous insurer Tesco, which wanted nearly £500 to cover our ageing Honda Civic.

But as predicted on this blog (The car insurance price trick), great insurance deals never last.

Companies suck in thousands of new customers with market-leading deals and then let the price drift down the best buy tables.

They then rely on inertia, for customers to blindly renew their policy the following year. The profits then come rolling in on the second and third years.

To be fair Swiftcover's quote fell to £360 (and was second on the best buy table), however, it was handsomely undercut by Bell at £262.

I guess Bell won't be making much profit on this year's premiums and then next year I'll be comparing and potentially moving on.

The internet has blessed consumers with incredible new power - make sure you use it.

- Andrew Oxlade, Editor, This is Money

Make your own paper wallet

I'm not entirely sure why anyone would need one of these but it's a strangely appealing concept: make your own space-saving wallet with a piece of paper and some sticky tape. Cost: about 10p.

http://www.instructables.com/id/S9331VJF3DES9J73YS/

THIN END OF THE WEDGE: The wallet on the left is paper and contains notes and six credit cards. The other is leather and empty.

There are several other money-related DIY projects on the site, instructables, although it is rather slow to load.

Richard Browning, This is Money

You also may be interesting in...

MONEY-SAVING VIDEOS: This is Money has teamed up with VideoJug to produce a handful of How to... save money videos. See them here.

100 ways to save money

I'm concerned about the country's debt.

And at the weekend I heard yet another story of a young woman who has racked up a credit card debt of £2,000 in no time at all. And now she is terrified she cannot pay it back.

According to the money education charity, Credit Action, 3.4 million UK credit cardholders - and almost two in every ten 18-34 year olds - only ever make the minimum monthly payment. This is like paying protection money to your bank for the rest of your life.

There are, however, ways to change your spending habits to easily clear £2,000 in a year. To find out how, read these:

1. 50 ways to save money 

2. 50 more ways to save money

3. Money-saving overflow 

Remember, £10 a week is £520 a year. Imagine if each of these tips could save you £10 a week. That's £52,000 of savings. Worth a read?

Richard Browning - This is Money

Related items

Alternative guide to loans

Threaten to cancel Virgin TV and get a better deal

I don't watch a great deal of television and have never been one of those people who casually switches the idiot box on and uses it as the background sound to everyday life.

However, when I do settle down in front of the TV, I do watch certain things and when some of them suddenly disappear from my screen I am not pleased.

The loss of Sky One from my Virgin Media cable TV and the subsequent inability to watch new episodes of The Simpsons and continue watching the series of Lost that I was halfway through, didn't go down well.

I only have cable TV because we have no outside aerial and diabolical TV reception in our flat, but I had grown accustomed to the little bit of extra choice having Sky One offered - and, as I've written before, I don't care whether this was Virgin or Sky's fault, I'm angry that it's the viewer who has lost out.

But there is a way to get a little bit back if you act fast.

Virgin has said that customers can leave their contracts at no charge until the end of March. And if you call up and threaten to do so, it is offering improved TV, phone or broadband packages.

I gave Virgin a call this week and while it took a brutal 15 minutes or so on hold to get through, I then got a very helpful lady who asked what they could do to keep me. I emerged with a TV package bumped up from about 40 channels to more than 80.

True, it's just more rubbish I won't watch, but at least I got something back and there was no contract extension, extra cost etc.

So, if you have Virgin TV, call their bluff and get a better deal - but you only have until Saturday.

- Simon Lambert, This is Money

Useful links:

Ask an Expert: Can I cancel Virgin TV?

Broadband & phones: News and advice

Search for cheaper broadband

Tesco: a sorry state of affairs

So Tesco has apologised to drivers who bought contaminated petrol at its stores in the South East of England. 'We'd like to say how sorry we are,' it twitters in full-page ads in today's national newspapers.

This, less than a week after the Tesco PR machine (and Morrisons' for that matter) was quick to deny there was a problem.

It is a sorry state of affairs.

---

[Read this :Sly tricks of the supermarkets ]

---

Some years ago I used to drive from north to south London to work. It was cheaper to buy, maintain and fuel a car than pay for public transport. But the economics only added up if I was careful about where I bought my petrol. One slip and you could pay a tenner extra to fill the tank.

Thankfully, the route was littered with garages vying for my trade - the embodiment of  perfect competition.

Ply that route today, however, and just about all the garages are gone. Replaced by flats, the odd hand car wash franchise and - in the main - Tesco petrol stations. And if the forecourt isn't run by Tesco then the chances are that there is a Tesco Metro concession on site.

Tesco will argue, as it does with robotic indifference whenever I've phoned them for a quote, that customers want cheaper prices and that's what Tesco provides.

Of course customers want low prices but what they also deserve is decent, fair competition on a level playing field where a combination of quality and price creates a healthy relationship between the supplier, the retailer and the customer.

Tesco is a phenomenally successful business - to the point where it could claim to run the lives of a significant proportion of the country. It controls 30% of the grocery business alone. And that's fine if there is trust on both sides. Part of that trust has just run out.

Richard Browning, This is Money

More on Tesco from This is Money

Tesco 'cheat' on 50% pledge

Rogue petrol threat to 400,000 cars

People power defeats Tesco

Tesco's Trojan horse trick exposed in email

Tesco Direct embarrassment

Battle over Tesco towns begins

Tesco to create UK's biggest store

The story of Tesco

Tesco's direct threat to Argos

Guru Buffett builds 3% Tesco stake

Tesco criticised over school vouchers

Do supermarkets still stack up?

BLOG: Asda / Tesco telephone prank

BLOG: Tesco and the complete opposite of a sale

Our fuel bills map and The 30 Second Rule

Just a quick note about a new feature here at This is Money – our interactive fuel bills map.

We have always published the latest prices from the different gas and electricity suppliers and have written about the importance of switching your supplier to get the best price.

But it has always been difficult to report accurately what the savings will be because it depends on where you live and who already supplies your energy. The best advice has been to tell individuals to log onto switching sites, enter their details and compare the best prices available.

The process is by no means difficult but it does fall foul of The 30 Second Rule. This is the principle that says most people haven’t got the patience to stick with a website longer than half a minute if they don’t get the information they need.

No doubt there are many people that will happily punch in their details all day long if it means shaving a few quid off their bills, but those less savvy with the internet are less inclined to do so. It helps explain why half of the households in the UK still haven’t switched away from their original energy suppliers – despite the savings that can be made.

The new map is made with these people in mind. They don’t have to punch in all the details of where they live, how much gas and electricity they use or whether they want to pay by direct debit of a cheque.

They can simply click on the region they live in – it is divided up according to the old electricity regions that still influence the price of bills – and see how the amount they currently pay compares with the best deals on the market. A number of different prices are given so that they can see what effect paying by direct debit or getting an online tariff will have.

It takes just one click to get a decent idea of the best prices available and should give reluctant switchers the encouragement to go that step further and change their supplier.

We will update the map whenever suppliers change their prices.

Have a look for yourself. Try clicking on regions where you have friends or relatives that have not switched – those without the internet, the elderly in particular, won’t be able to check for themselves but they are often the ones that can benefit the most from switching.

Ed Monk, This is Money

Congestion charge expands - money saving for the rich

One side has been wailing and gnashing its teeth and the other is accusing anyone who dares disagree with them of being grossly irresponsible.

No, it’s not the nation’s footballers buffing up their reputations over the weekend, but two very vocal opposing sides of the argument about the extension of London’s Congestion Charge today.

(Readers outside the reach of the capital, please don’t click away now – this does concern you, I’ll explain how later.)

One faction that has been relatively quiet on the Congestion Charge front recently though are the wealthy residents of Chelsea, Kensington and Notting Hill, who now live within the zone.

In fact, ask a lot of these residents of London’s richest areas and you find that despite their initial distaste, the extended zone will actually do them a favour.

If you live in the zone you get a 90% discount on the £8 congestion charge. Buy a month’s worth of the charge and it’ll cost you just £16. That means the wealthy citizens of Chelsea, Kensington and Notting Hill can now drive around central London, at any time of any day of the week, for a bargain price.

Previously, despite the fact it made little difference to their deep pockets, most avoided driving into Central London, as they objected to paying £8 for the privilege. Now, many I have spoken to say there will now be no point not taking the car. Going to the hedge fund office in Mayfair - might as well drive; Bond Street for lunch and shopping – I’ll take the car; Meeting in the City – traffic might not be too bad at this time of day.

The people who it will really hurt though are small businesses. West London is one of the few places in the country still full of small shops and traders, as the rich residents’ cash helps support them. But these small traders – who don’t get the same discount as residents - find the Congestion Charge hits their delivery vans and their staff who have to drive for business reasons. And the pain is worse as big chain rivals can easier absorb similar issues.

This problem was raised when the original charge was introduced and nothing has really been done to help. And that's why the rest of the country should be concerned, because, despite any denials you hear, similar congestion charges are being plotted for the rest of Britain's cities.

Congestion will drop substantially at first as a result of the charge – it did in the original zone – but then it will rise again – in the original zone it is now estimated to be 8% lower than before. (As stated by the eco-friendly Guardian)

Unclogging our painfully congested streets is an admirable ambition, but freeing them up for the rich and hurting our already struggling small businesses doesn’t seem right.

- Simon Lambert, This is Money

Useful links:

Money saving for the not so rich (rich folk not excluded)

Investing tips to help you get rich

Don't fall for the "Firteekwid" rip-off, you'll save 85%

It's the law of suburbia that every job requiring the intervention of a tradesman will cost a thousand pounds. "Agraaand".

'Decking? Coorse, sir. I can do that for "Agraaand!'"

'Barffrum? Nah problem. "Agraaand!". Coorse, that won't be including yer ficts-stures and fittins. New bath plug? "Agraaaand!"'

And so on.

But further down the food chain I've spotted a new trend - welcome to the new world order of "Firteekwid".

Last week after a peculiar incident with some nail varnish remover and some pliers, my car key melted. I nipped down to the key cutting man, explained my predicament and enquired whether he could cut me a new key.

'Nah problem, sir. I can do that. "Firteekwid!"'

'Thirty pounds!? But it's just a key! A key that, as it happens, is slightly less long than my little finger!'

There followed an exchange about a microchip for the immobiliser system that my car doesn't have and I stomped off, thirty pounds in my pocket but with little prospect of driving my car in the near future.

Then a couple of days later after a peculiar incident with an umbrella and a newspaper, my mobile phone battery ended up down a drain. I nipped down to the mobile phone shop, explained my predicament and enquired whether a replacement could be arranged.

'Nah problem, sir. "Firteekwid!".'

'OK, what about a cord to transfer photos from the phone to a computer?'

'Nah problem, sir. "Firteekwid"'.

Now, I've seen the drunk man outside Earl's Court tube station who sells two packs of batteries for a pound so I knew it was time to shop around.

I logged on to eBay. Got a new phone battery for a fiver from someone who has 27,000 positive feedbacks - surely trustworthy. And I got the cord for four pounds, both including postage.

A saving of fifteewunpaands. Or 85% off. (I think that's right).

Regular readers will know I'm not a fan of the High Street. Now I wonder how long it can survive.

But the real question is this. As Government inflation figures clearly no longer include the prices of things that go up, what else is now a mere "Firteekwid"?

More money savers

50 ways to save money

Tools to save you money

More money-saving ideas

Best money-saving tip in the world

Bored of shopping

Hurting from higher interest rates? Hurt them back

Should you be hurting from higher interest rates, rest assured - you can hurt them back.

Them?

Well, there are the banks, who mysteriously always seem to respond to a rise in official rates with much greater alacrity than they do to a reduction in official rates.

There is the Treasury, which has been only too happy to see you borrow enough money to offset their stealth taxes and which does not appear to give a hoot now that the Bank of England is jacking up the cost of borrowing.

Oh yes, the Bank of England. Now there is an outfit that deserves something in the pain line. After all, its Monetary Policy Committee relied on consumer borrowing to keep up demand and ensure it met its inflation target. Now it fears too much inflation rather than too little, thus wants to break you of that bad borrowing habit into which it helped to lure you in the first place.

All right, you may say, granted these players deserve a kick in the shins, how is it to be administered?

The obvious method is by employing that centre-piece of our live now, don't pay later culture - the Individual Voluntary Arrangement. This is the procedure whereby a borrower pays back part of what they owe (but not the rest) in return for avoiding the stigma of bankruptcy.

In years to come, 'IVA' will stand alongside 'BlackBerry' and 'iPod' as one of the emblematic expressions of our time. But I would advise against this drastic remedy, particularly as a  tried and tested alternative is at hand. Thrift.

Consider this: the entire world-view of the Treasury, the Bank, the clearing banks, finance houses and retail industry, indeed, the whole of our domestic economic policy is based on the belief that we have an insatiable appetite for consumer goods (a large proportion of which are simply variations of assorted expensive tat) and that this addiction can be used to steer the economy.

Like the bosses of a dumbed-down television channel, they are confident in their lamentably low opinion of the rest of us.

Why not prove them wrong?

Of course, thrift is easier to talk about than to do. But that need not be an insuperable obstacle. In the right frame of mind, saving money can be almost as much fun as spending it. And there is an increasing amount of useful advice on this topic. Just check out the shelves in your local bookshop (but take care to borrow the titles from your local library).

Perhaps you have come across some of the thrift tips doing the rounds, little rules such as never buying a 'second' of anything (lipstick, magazine) simply because you left it at home, such as making up your own soft drinks and never paying for bottled water.

All excellent, I am sure, and there is no need for a ten-point plan from me. Instead, I offer just one additional piece of advice. Take stock of all the stuff you have already - unread books, unlistened-to discs, unwatched videos or DVDs, almost unworn clothes or jewellery. You will be amazed at what you forgot you had.

Finding it all again is almost as good as going on a shopping spree. Better in fact. Firstly, because it is free. And secondly, because, if enough of us do it, we will go some way to ensure the abovementioned powers will be well and truly spooked.

Dan Atkinson, Economics Editor, Financial Mail on Sunday

Affordable art - the Christies ski poster sale

There are two schools of thought when it comes to buying art – you either display it with pride, or squirrel it away, protecting your investment behind closed doors.

The latter option always seems a shame, but for me, as with many people, it’s not really a problem – art is generally beyond my means.

But at auction house Christies, on Thursday, there is a sale of iconic images, which may prove to be a decent investment, at prices that would allow you to hang them on your wall.

At lunchtime today I cycled down to the South Kensington auctioneers, to have a look at the classic ski posters that go under the hammer this week, in the tenth annual Ski Sale, with prices ranging from a couple of hundred pounds to a few thousand.

Many of them date from the 1920s and 1930s – the golden era of the ski poster – when resorts, the railways and tourist boards across Europe commissioned artists to create adverts for the first wave of mass ski tourism. Posters of this style continued to be produced until the 1950s/60s.

Now I’m biased, because I love these vintage posters and the mountains, but if you fancy buying some art that might appreciate in value this auction seems great.

Unfortunately, the posters, printed from the original lithographs, are beyond my price range at the moment, but for people with a bit of cash to spend this is affordable art.

Nicolette Tomkinson, Christie’s vintage poster specialist and the head of sale, tells me buyers tend to be those with a passion for skiing, who are looking for art for their home, or a ski holiday chalet or apartment. It’s a specialised field but the auction is one of Christies’ most popular and the value of the posters has risen in recent years.

Nicolette says: ‘We would always recommend people buy something because they love the image or are passionate about the place advertised rather than as an investment, but hopefully they will also be a good investment.’

Her favourites are designed by Roger Broders, the grandmaster of the travel poster, (see picture on the left) and the biggest public demand is for those that feature iconic resorts such as Chamonix.

Sadly, I’ll have to skip the auction until my bank balance is a bit healthier. But here’s a moneysaving tip if, like me, you can’t stretch that far – reproductions are available and can be bought online at sites such as allposters.co.uk

Affordable art indeed

- Simon Lambert, This is Money

Useful Links:

Is wine a corking investment?

Art draws the big money

A new way of watching DVDs

Enjoy watching TV series on DVD? Constantly buying or renting them? Sick of paying massive amounts of money for them? Read on.

Like many people without Sky or Sky+, the future-Mrs-C and I enjoy watching television series on DVD.

The theory is this:

You can be selective.

You watch less TV overall, because you only watch things you want to watch and avoid channel surfing.

You don't miss or forget to record an episode.

You don't get all those annoying commercials.

But this can be pricey. Typically a recent box set of a new TV series will set you back around £40. This is a lot of money for something most of us will only watch once.

I tried renting the series from online DVD rental websites. But you have to be sent one disk at a time. So frequently I would be sent disks one and two, but then face an excrutiating three month wait for disk three.

So I am going to try something new. Buying and selling on Amazon marketplace.

If you have not heard of Amazon Marketplace, it is a place where normal punters, like you and I, can sell and buy their wares. If you go to most items for sale on Amazon under the price that it is selling the item will normally be the words 'Used and New'. Click on this and you will see the marketplace.

Unlike eBay, it is not an auction, so you can set the price of what you want to sell. As soon as someone meets the price, you post it to them.

Amazon deducts from the sale price a sellers fee, and VAT, while you set the postal costs. Before you even advertise the item Amazon will tell you how much you stand to make.

Last year I ordered series 5 of 24 before it was released. By doing this it cost me £29, as opposed to the full retail price of £49.99.

I watched it once and then lent it to a friend. Since then it has been gathering dust on my bookshelf at home.

Yesterday I sold it for £28. After seller's fees were deducted I pocketed £25. So essentially I paid £4 to watch this TV series. That is less than I would have paid to rent it.

So this is my new 'thing' for the year. I've just ordered The Wire. I'll let you know what happens when it comes to selling it.

If you have any other ideas to save money, like this, then let me know.

James Coney, Money Mail

A £110 cheque for taking a water meter

I had a free water meter fitted on our home three weeks ago (the delay was less than I feared).

At the weekend I received a cheque back from Sutton & East Surrey water for £111. It's a refund of four months of our bill. We then pay £17 a month which is based on our water usage.

It's a pleasant surprise. The water calculator I used suggested my bill would fall from £330 a year to around £250 (based on three of us using average amounts). It looks like we'll be paying little more than £200 a year.

There's nothing better than a bumper cheque before Christmas but the better present will be if my monthly payments are correct. There's nothing worse than underpaying and being caught out with a larger demand later on. Just ask this reader or these gas customers.

- Andrew Oxlade, Editor, This is Money

Don't miss...

• 10 ways to shrink water bills
• Can a water meter cut costs?
• Water meter plans for millions
• 'I've been paying the neighbours water bills'

My British Gas nightmare: Customer service hell

I can firmly state that I have never had to deal with a firm as incompetent, bullying, or incapable of rectifying a simple mistake as British Gas.

A fortnight ago I wrote a blog about the Kafkaesque nightmare I had suffered with British Gas since I first received an incorrect gas bill in September. Since writing that blog, a situation that seemed farcical has escalated into something a lot more serious, demonstrating what I think is a disgraceful flaw in the company’s system.

The problem revolves around the fact that, despite repeated requests, British Gas’s billing department kept failing to send me a correct bill. Everytime I called up about this I received an apology and was assured a correct bill was on the way.

However, while the billing department was repeatedly cocking up my bill, another department was sending me demands for £31.45 I’d been told I didn’t owe. These started as reminders, then became red letters, a threat of disconnection, notice of legal action and finally an ‘urgent’ notice that the company was getting a warrant to enter my home and disconnect the gas with the police potentially present.

Understandably, the threat of the heavies arriving to cut off my gas seriously worried me. British Gas were hounding me for £31.45, they admitted I didn’t owe, but everyone who had promised to sort this out had failed to do so

So, I buckled and did something I hate doing for personal matters. I called the British Gas press office to say I would be writing about this and sent a letter of complaint through them. Unsurprisingly, things then started to get sorted out - I had an apology, an assurance that no action would be taken against me, and this staggering statement regarding the threatening letters:

‘You should have been warned that the system could generate letters while the account was being amended and that these letters should be ignored. I am sorry that you were not made aware of this’

Now call me old fashioned, but I don’t think it’s okay to send letters threatening imminent disconnection, the imposition of a pre-pay