Christmas Shopping

If you’re anything like me, you finished your Christmas shopping last month. My presents are wrapped, and cards written, just waiting for the Big Day.

I realise, however, that some people don’t do all of their present-buying in October, and I know that some of my friends are struggling with the amount of “compulsory” December spending.

In my office alone there are two Christmas lunches (£25 and £14), and an ice-skating trip (£18) as well as a general Secret Santa (£10) and a bargain one for just our cohort (£1).

That’s £68, before we even get a drink.

 

Then there are presents for family and friends. This year I’ve cut down on gifts for other people; I’ve bought things for my parents, my little sister and my godson, but nothing for the extended family. None of my friends are getting presents either. What a tight-fisted shopaholic, hey?

 

Well, I’m not expecting presents from those I don’t buy for. It’s a mutual agreement.

I stopped giving and sending out Christmas cards a while ago, too. It seems like a generational shift. None of my friends post me cards, but I still get them from aunties and uncles, godparents and long-time-no-see family friends.

These days the price of a stamp is surely prohibitive for most people. A pack of 10 Oxfam Christmas cards is £3.99. Even if you sent everything second class, at 50p a go, the stamps for those cards will cost you a fiver. So that’s £9 for cards to ten people. Supposing I sent a card to each of my Facebook “friends” that would set me back £221.

As for gifts, my advice is to set your budget before you shop. Don’t go rushing out to the shops on Christmas Eve, desperate to find something. The sales assistants know you’re desperate.

A couple of my favourite sites for Christmas prezzies:

http://www.oxfam.org.uk/shop

http://www.iwantoneofthose.com

 

Unless you’re shopping with me in mind, in which case:

http://www.tiffany.co.uk/

http://www.linksoflondon.com/gb-en/online-shop/women

Advertisement

Day 75: Coppers

Not that kind of copper. . .

On Saturday I picked up my Tardis money box (okay, it WAS my little sister’s, before she upgraded to a pin-code locked one) and took it to the supermarket. Before I left the house I emptied all my coat pockets and coin purses of small change. I even stuck my hand through the ripped lining of my handbag and pulled up some silver. Even those little storage spaces in my car yielded a couple of coins.

It took a while to tip them all into the machine, but when I’d finished I had a voucher for £37.27. Pretty good, huh?

I paid in an old cheque, a tenner I’d found in a pocket in a rarely-used bag and the change I’d poured into the counter. Altogether I had £76.37. Wow. Given I’d had a minus number in my account, money that I hadn’t noticed not having suddenly transformed my finances.

So how about running your fingers down the back of the sofa? You might have enough to set up your own arcade attraction. . .

Day 71: Control Freak

Are you taking me seriously?

I’ve said it before, but I’d like to reiterate that an addiction to shopping is similar in many ways to other well-known addictions. It’s not fun, or light-hearted or even to be smiled upon and indulged by others. It doesn’t come from nowhere; there’s always a reason.

This is not just buying the odd thing you don’t really need, or a big shopping splurge. Being a real shopaholic means that your life is totally consumed by it. Addicts devote huge amounts of time and energy to it. Some are bargain-hunters, and spend hours hunting for the cheapest version of a product. Others are serial buy-and-return types. Still others never actually buy very much at all, but spend so much time window shopping or browsing online that it dominates their life. Of course there are some who do spend in an out-of-control way, buying regardless of product price or bank balance. These people end up in crippling debt, all as a result of their “fashionable” addiction.

Shopaholics are not taken seriously, instead they’re derided or glamorised. Unlike alcoholism or an addiction to narcotics, there is no compassion for those “greedy”, “silly” or “materialistic” (usually) women who over-shop.

“Having more things means enjoying life less.”
– April Benson, PhD

There’s a vicious cycle to the addiction.
When I get upset or stressed out I buy myself a treat (or ten) to cheer myself up. Buying more “stuff” makes me feel like a failure, and rocks my financial stability. I get upset and stressed. I’ve lost control.

I feel rubbish when I lose control; in fact, I’m a control freak. I’m extremely uncomfortable when I’m not able to direct my life, like a play.

Getting dumped, being made redundant or losing a loved one; these are the kind of thing we can’t do anything about. I handle this kind of situation spectacularly badly. I try to find a reason, or some way that it was “my fault”. At least if it’s my fault, that means I can just go back and change whatever I was doing wrong, and then everything will be alright again.

Sometimes the company you work for can’t afford the staff salaries. Sometimes he’s “just not that into you”. Sometimes someone dies before you get a chance to tell them how much you love them. It’s not in your sphere of control; there’s nothing you can do.

When things like this happen, joy and self-esteem are sapped, and I snap. I shop. I think it will bring me joy, boost my self-esteem. Perhaps it will give me back control; over what I look like, what I own. The reverse is true. The cycle begins.

Life’s sometimes like a pressure cooker, and it’s tough trying not to explode.

Somehow, you have to release the tension. Whether that’s through exercise, yoga, meditation or whatever. Just please don’t make the mistake of thinking that a trip to the shops will help. It won’t.

Day 64: Confessions of a Shopaholic

A friend of mine has asked me to publicly own up. I have behaved terribly recently. I have completely blown the budget. I confess, I am a shopaholic, and I have slipped up. I am embarrassing myself in front of you all in the hope that I won’t be so bad in the coming month…

1. Winter boots

2. Cord skirt

3. Birthday present for my cousin

4. Phil Collins’ Hits (revision, strangely, has turned me into a Phil Collins fan!)

5. Brrrr, it’s cold. Gloves, please!

6. Brrrr, it’s cold. Earmuffs, please!

7. Brrrr, it’s cold. Woolly tights, please!

8. Brrrr, it’s cold. Jumper, please!

9. Brrrr, it’s cold. Thick socks, please!

As you can see, a crazy month. . . I just went a bit mental and lost track of my spending.
An addiction to shopping is like any addiction. Even when you admit your problem, you’ll always be a “recovering addict”. There is, as yet, no cure.

Day 62: The Booze Blues

My liver is groaning at me, and my purse sympathises.

Let me give you an extract from my week:
On Friday I drank with my Grandad. It’s not often we get through a bottle of wine these days, because I’m usually driving afterwards. Last week, though, I stayed over, so we got the corkscrew out.
On Saturday I had a date and drank rather more than usual to compensate for my nerves.
On Sunday I met up with a friend for a drink post-church.
On Monday I helped out at a graduate recruitment evening, and, surprise surprise, more wine was involved.

You get the picture.

In London this is no cheap thrill. Although some of those glasses were free, some had to be paid for. Oh dear.

Another problem with drinking, especially after work, is that I need something to soak up the alcohol in my lightweight body. Last night I ended up spending £6.50 on my post-drinking alcohol sponge. Six pounds fifty! So annoying in the cold light of the sober morning. All I got was some fruit, a sandwich and a chocolate bar. I’d never hand over a crisp ten pound note for so little during the day.

Once the bottle is uncorked, though, money starts to feel like those little Monopoly notes. Somehow not real, with no impact on real life. It does impact, though, of course.

Have you ever had that horrible feeling of looking at your bank statement and seeing a series of amounts you’d forgotten about, post-booze? I just looked at my online banking, and remembered a few amounts I’d pushed to the back of my mind. Some amounts I’m not sure I even noticed at the time; I blindly punch in the PIN number on the terminal, without noticing the number before it.

I blame it on the wine, of course I do. But someone (okay, me…) makes the choice to drink in the first place. So now I’m going to make the effort to cut down. I’m not going teetotal (that would just be silly) but I’m going to start out by limiting myself to one night a week. That way I should also limit the surprises on the bank statement to a more manageable figure.

Cheers!

Day 56: Money Saving Expert @Home

As Savvy-Saver-In-Training, I’m an apprentice to anyone who’ll have me. This time, I looked to Martin Lewis of MoneySavingExpert.com for help.

Their “Money Makeover” has eleven tips in the “household” category which, they claim, can save you upwards of £6,750.

1. Gas and electricity

• The problem is that I’m a renter in a shared house. I’ve no idea how long I’ll be staying in my current pad, and to get the cheapest deals you need to tie yourself in for at least two years, or incur early exit fees that negate the benefit of switching suppliers in the first place. Secondly, opting for direct debit gives you great savings. Unfortunately, I can’t rely on my housemates to transfer the money before the bill leaves the joint account. Every time we accidentally fall into the overdraft, we incur a £25 fine, which also negates the savings you get initially.

Savings: Nil

2. Food shopping

• The argument goes that we’re all duped by the supermarket. We are too thick to understand that just because something is “three for two” doesn’t necessarily make it a great deal. Apparently we’re comforted by the words “discount” and “savings”, too blind to read our shopping lists (because we’re all doing shopping lists now, boys and girls, aren’t we?).
• As I’ve written about my food shopping before, I’ll leave you to read my other posts on this subject.

Savings: £50/month

3. Council tax

• It’s said that 400,000 homes are in the wrong council tax band, and are paying too much. Within minutes, you can check how much all of your neighbours are paying, to give you an idea of whether you’re one of the 400,000. I clicked onto direct.gov.uk and had a nosey to see what the houses around me were paying. With the exception of one house, which has been extended, and is now much larger than all the rest, we are all in the same band. No savings to be found here, then.

Savings: Nil

4. Home phone & broadband

• MoneySavingExpert says that you don’t need to pay any more than £15 per month to get top-notch telephone and broadband. Well, now I feel like a numpty. I did a lot of scouting around a couple of months ago, trying to get the best deal for our house. Orange was the one I settled for, and they charge us £25 per month for high speed broadband and unlimited phone calls at any time. The only upside I can see is that at least our bill is divided by three, so I’m only paying £8.83 each month. Ah well, you win some, you lose some.

Savings: Nil

5. Childcare costs

• Alleluia, praise the Lord! Not applicable.

Savings: Nil

6. Cut boiler cover costs

• Fortunately, my landlord is responsible for our boiler repair (which is rather frequent, in my house). No savings for me.

Savings: Nil

7. Free international calls

• I don’t make any international calls, but if I did, I’d use Skype anyway.

Savings: Nil

8. Calling mobiles

• My mobile contract gives me more free minutes than I use, and our home phone gives us free calls to mobiles.

Savings: Nil

9. Should you use a water meter?

• Already got one.

Savings: Nil

10. Cut your digital TV costs?

• We only have Freeview, which, as the name implies, is… free.

Savings: Nil

11. Direct debits

The instruction is thus:

“Being a Cancellation Hero is simple: unearth EVERY wasted regular payment and stop any you no longer need or use. “

As I’m pretty hot on keeping my finances in order (if not in the black) I’m well aware of what each of my direct debits is for. On the website people complain about having paid white goods insurance for over five years, without even realising! I’m not sure how you could do this, but I, for one, do not.

Savings: Nil

Well, Mr Lewis. I’m not very impressed with your eleven tips. You told me I would save seven grand, but the only saving I’ve made, I was already doing, without your help. Sigh. Still, I hope this has helped someone.

Day 51: Plan A

Are any of you also part of the see it-want it-get it brigade? I certainly was, and it’s taken quite a lot of hard work to change that. Now I just see it-want it, and feel rather disappointed I can’t get it then and there.

So, can I ever buy what I want, or am I doomed to eternal frustration?

Of course I can still buy things, even outrageously expensive things, if I so desire. I just have to make sure that I have the money to do so before I hand over the plastic, rather than guiltily stressing out afterwards. The new mantra is want it-save for it-get it.

Let me give you an example. There’s something I’ve wanted for a long time, but thought I’d never realistically be able to afford. Well, two things actually. Flights to America and to Cambodia.

Unlike, say, a new laptop or even a car, I can’t write down the exact price of these, because they’re constantly changing. This would be the first step: write down how much the thing you want costs. Whether it’s a mansion in the centre of London, or something much smaller, you need to have an idea of the cost, so that you have something solid to work towards.

Secondly, we need a time frame. For me, I know that I can get flights much more cheaply if I go before I reach 26. That gives me around 650 days to save. On the basis that I go before I turn 26, a rough estimate would be £800 for Cambodia and £500 to the US.

Thirdly, get out that calculator! In my case, to save £1,300 in 650 days would be £2 per day. So, roughly the price of a cup of coffee.

Depending on your personal situation, you might need to switch the last two points over. For example, if you know that you can only afford to save a very limited amount per month, you’ll have to work out your time frame on that basis.

 

Now then, do we all have a chubby pink piggy bank to pop in those pounds every day? A daily act of physically putting aside the cash would be reasonable for something like a meal out, or a new pair of jeans, but I’d probably need a life-sized piggy to save for my ambitions.

A better idea for me is a savings account and a standing order. It took me about two minutes to set mine up. I have the set amount going out from my current account on the first day of the month; then I have a leftover amount to live off for the rest of the month. If I forget all about the savings account for the next 650 days, and do absolutely nothing else, I will have amassed enough to see my family in Cambodia, and friends in the States.

It’s something I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to do, but as the sand grains slip through the hourglass, slowly but surely, I’ll get there.

Day 45: Tithe Me Up!

Where there is charity and wisdom, there is neither fear nor ignorance.

Francis of Assisi

How much do you give to charity? Is it a little, a lot?

It has recently come out in the news that young people don’t give nearly as much, proportionately, as older people. What is the long-term impact of this on charities? Will they be sustainable?

To me, it seems that asking how much one gives to charity is akin to asking someone’s salary. In Britain, at least, still taboo.

Historically, religions have provided a guide as to how much to give. In Islam, zakat, the third pillar of Islam, requires an annual contribution of 2.5% of an individual’s wealth and assets. Tzedakah is the name for compulsory giving for Jews; Deuteronomy commands ten percent of earnings to be given away every three years.

Perhaps the decline in religious affiliation correlates to the fall in giving by younger generations.

So, when I’m in debt, and trying desperately to scramble out, what should I give? Nothing? A little?

When I started work, I signed up to Give As You Earn or Payroll Giving. It’s fantastic for charities, because their income is steady, and guaranteed. It’s also great for you, because deductions are made pre-tax, which means that (if you’re a basic rate tax payer) giving a tenner to charity effectively only costs you eight quid.

As a church-goer, how much I give to charity is based on a guideline from my church. Guidelines are useful; in schools there are rules to teach children how to behave, in society we have laws to keep order. In religion, alms-giving commandments are similar. If it’s a law, rather than a choice, there is no alternative. That’s not to say that we should feel forced into giving, just that it makes it the happy norm; it would be abnormal not to give.

Zakat, tzedakah, tithe. Do we need religions to impose rules on us, to behave charitably? In one American study*, religiosity and charitable giving were causally linked, and across the web many seem to think the same. Of course we don’t need these rules. Of course atheists, agnostics, and so on, give to charity, and do not need the threat of eternal damnation or an angry god to compel them to do so.

For me, it’s just useful having someone to tell me how much is a reasonable amount. At the start of the post, I asked you if you give a little or a lot. Who knows?

I like this quotation and I hope that, whether religiously inclined or not, you do too (non-believers can just ignore the last six words!):

Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver

(2 Corinthians 9:7)

*Wolfgang Bielefeld, Gifts of Money and Time: the Role of Charity in America’s Communities, ed. Arthur C. Brooks (New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2005).

Day 43: The Yo-Yo Diet

“Shopaholic”, I hear you cry, “have you gone on a diet?”. Well, my friends, in a way. It occurred to me earlier that this cut-back exercise is quite like a diet in some respects; a self imposed restriction on things I like.

Given the similarities, are there lessons I can learn from yo-yo dieters, without making the mistakes myself?

The yo-yo cycle often occurs because dieters are so strict with themselves at the start. The effort is so extreme that is is completely impossible to sustain.

Likewise, I found my sudden halt in spending pretty tough, and have a longing for some former favourites. I miss flicking through a magazine, buying into the latest trend, enjoying a large glass of Chilean Merlot on a Friday night. It’s oh-so-tempting to slip back into old habits.

Initially, dieters feel great; they’re looking forward to the weight loss, and they’re proud of themselves for shunning the sugar. As time crawls along, though, it seems harder to sustain. Tired and fed up, they reach for a pick-me-up: food.
Again, I relate to the experience; I felt very self-satisfied with my initial budget-slashing, and looked forward to watching the debt diminish and the savings stack up. When I passed the first thirty day marker, still in debt and still running a deficit, my motivation wavered. I felt like reaching for my equivalent of the dieter’s chocolate bar: the shops.

So, having failed, and feeling upset, the dieter eats more and more until they regain the weight they lost (and usually a bit more).

And here’s the lesson. Now that the initial excitement has passed, and I am in the humdrum period of living with less, how do I ensure I do not slip backwards?
Already I’ve clocked myself casually buying tea at Pret-a-Manger and “forgetting” my packed lunch. It’s so easy to forget how quickly all those “little extras” used to kill off my cash.

Perhaps the trick is to treat myself with non-monetary rewards. Here are a few of my practically free treats:
1) Time spent relaxing is pretty cheap; a candle-lit bubble bath, chilling out in front of the TV, doing the crossword and listening to the radio are all pretty much free, and are all amongst my favourite things to do!
2) Living in one of the most hectic cities in the world is fantastic, but escaping to the country is a retreat, and another cheap thrill. Just looking at the sky and the stars, listening to the birds sing or breathing in the heady fresh air all make such a difference; I know it sounds clichéd and trite, but it’s true.
3) Unfortunately for the real yo-yo dieter, food is a great pleasure, and as I’ve learned, doesn’t have to be expensive to taste delicious and be nutritionally balanced.

“Joy” comes in all kinds of guises, and what qualifies for my list won’t necessarily be on yours. One thing’s for sure, though. Having a few reliable freebies on the list, whatever they may be, certainly helps the shopaholic to cut back!

Thanks for reading,
Xx

Day 41: Savvy saver or massive miser?

Searching for inspiration for more cost-cutting tricks, I just came across a forum on loo roll use.
Come on, hundreds of people spending hours discussing how to minimise toilet paper use? One, gross, and two, get a life!! Perhaps this is the signal to prompt me into taking my cost reduction exercise more seriously. On the other hand… No. Just, no.

More seriously, I did come across a couple of more useful ideas. One with remarkably higher success rates than I expected was haggling.

The money saving expert website did a poll of 2,544 people, where at least 100 attempted to haggle in each store. In Comet, B&Q and Currys/PC World 78% met with success.

Could I do it, though? It takes a certain chutzpah to even attempt to barter, which I’m just not sure I have.

The easiest place to barter, I find, is my local market. The greengrocer has an easy, flirty rapport with his customers and often offers a “discount” (either to shift produce nearing the end of its life, or where the so-called “discount” is no such thing). The irony, of course, is that the greengrocer’s margins are much slimmer than the major supermarkets’, where I would never dare to barter.

If you’re interested, though, the poll found 60% luck at Asda, 58% at Tesco and 54% at Sainsbury’s. So, if you’re confident enough, it’s certainly worth a try. The worst outcome will be “no”.

The cashiers at the supermarket checkout are usually in no position to offer a discount, while 10% off a single sale would have a negligible result on their finances. On the other hand, the greengrocer is autonomous enough to gauge what effect a discount would have on his profits. One discount could be damaging to his finances, yet could keep customers loyal.

Personally, I don’t have the audacity required; I’d hate the humiliation of trying and failing at the supermarket checkout. I’d hate the awkwardness of requesting a further discount on already bargain prices from the greengrocer.

 

If you’re brave enough, though, go for it. You’ve got nothing to lose.