Archive for the ‘Finance’ category

Money-making expert

Sunday, 3 June 2012

MoneySavingExpert.com, a site offering consumers tips on reducing bills and finding the best deals, has been sold by its owner Martin Lewis for a reported £87 million. The buyer is Moneysupermarket.com, which already provides the click-through links on MoneySavingExpert.com that make money for both sites. Many users of MoneySavingExpert are furious at the move, which […]

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Britain’s new coinage – finally!

Tuesday, 4 August 2009

Last year, British coins underwent their first major redesign since decimal coinage was introduced in 1971. The Royal Mint held a competition to design the new coins. The winning entry was by Matthew Dent, and features the Royal Shield split across all of the coins from the penny to the 50p so that they fit […]

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Sir Fred hasn’t blamed Google Street View

Wednesday, 25 March 2009

With all the bad press Google Street View has been getting recently, with people claiming it invades their privacy, and leaves their homes vulnerable to criminals, I was slightly surprised not to see any sections of the media blaming it for aiding vandals who attacked the home of unpopular RBS banker Sir Fred Goodwin. What’s […]

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New name for a merged bank

Thursday, 18 September 2008

A name has yet to be decided for the newly merged Lloyds TSB and HBOS. Yesterday, cybersquatters were have reported to have registered domain names of potential names for the merged business, including lloydshbos, hboslloyds, lloydsbos and lloydstsbhbos (the .coms of which were all registered yesterday). I would have thought Lloyds BOS is a sensible […]

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Income tax: they took my idea!

Tuesday, 13 May 2008

Today the Chancellor finally announced what the measure would be to compensate people who have lost out due to the income tax changes. They are going to give all basic rate taxpayers an extra £120 by raising the personal tax allowance by five times that amount. That was the solution to the problem that I […]

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Income tax and bank charges

Monday, 28 April 2008

Last week the government seemingly did a u-turn over the scrapping of the 10 pence rate of income tax, although it is far from clear what form the compensation will take for people on lower incomes who will lose out under the new tax regime. It’s difficult to see how the government could have thought […]

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Don’t bank on keeping free cash

Saturday, 1 March 2008

It has emerged that customers in Northern Ireland who bank with the Nationwide building society, and who used cash machines belonging to Northern Bank, did not have the sums of money they withdrew debited from their accounts. The fault has existed since November, and 7,500 customers have been affected, withdrawing a total of £375,000 between […]

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Most people agree on bank charges

Thursday, 9 August 2007

My article on bank charges a few months ago prompted a few angry responses from people who claimed the current system of bank penalty charges is unfair. Under the current system, people who go overdrawn – borrowing their bank’s money without permission – are charged fees. Some commentators have suggested that if these fees are […]

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Save our bank charges!

Tuesday, 15 May 2007

For the first time, a bank has had its charges upheld in court. Since the Office of Fair Trading warned credit card providers last year that their penalty charges were excessive, causing all providers to cut fees to £12, people have been encouraged by numerous consumer groups to demand the refund of charges from bank […]

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The spin put on BT’s cash penalty

Thursday, 15 February 2007

The news that BT is introducing a “penalty” for people who pay by cash rather than direct debit almost passed me by last week. Apparently, evil BT are going to punish pensioners and the needy, are pushing up charges by £4.50 with a new surcharge, or hiking charges by £4.50 per quarter for customers who […]

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