My story - determined

setmefree2

determined1 wrote: »

It was a specsavers. Not best pleased with the service TBH

to them. I got glasses recently. I used Boots - they were great, though I expect you were maybe just unlucky on this occasion

Kind Regards

SMF2

determined1_2

Stats below for balance, overpayment made, "interest saved" that month, "interest saved" to date, and months taken off (denoted as balance/OP/interest saved that month/total interest saved/months saved).

July 09: £131,499.99/£1,532.51/£5,910.43/£50,266.99/77
June 09: £133,200.00/£1,008.83/£4,102.48/£44,356.56/67
May 09: £134,250.00/£490.93/£2,065.86/£40,254.08/61
Apr 09: £135,000.00/£1,137.13/£4,970.81/£38,188.22/58
Mar 09: £136,269.03/£1,000/£4,588.67/£33,209.26/50
Feb 09: £137,459.47/£740/£3,538.81/£28,620.59/43
Jan 09: £138,323.21/£2,030/£10,364.53/£25,081.78/37
Dec 08: £140,466.66/£2,380/£13,508.64/£14,717.25/22
Nov 08: £142,970.30/£100/£605.23/£1,208.61/2
Oct 08: £143,170.74/£100/£603.28/£603.28/1

Projected balance incorrectly by 1p :rolleyes: Was aiming for £131.5k

Good to see this month has taken us over the £50k of interest saved. That's goal number 2 in post #2 acheived then :T

Think I will start noting each months daily interest. Each goes from 2nd of previous month to first of the month stated. E.g. £20.76 was for 02.06.09 - 01.07.09

July 09: £20.76
June 09: £20.94
May 09: £21.05
Apr 09: £21.24
Mar 09: £21.43
Feb 09: £21.56
Jan 09: £21.84
Dec 08: £22.23
Nov 08: £22.26
Oct 08: £22.29

To meet my target of £130k by 17.11.09 I need to OP by then ~£850. I think this is achievable. Note, I do have to pay back ~£1.4k of stoozed money in November, so OP money will be redirected there for Sept, Oct, and partly Nov.


Have got a couple of days off 20/21th august. These tie into the weekend so nice four day break. The 20th is the anniversary of us becoming engaged :iloveyou:

Will be sending off my letter to b.gas tomorrow to get my DDs lowered and credit balance of ~£220 back. This should help OPs next month. Having to pay another £109 for my lenses (no news yet) will soak up some of this :mad:

As mentioned in a previous post I will get my energy usage posted shortly!

Well done everyone.

Determined

StuartGMC

Great data - well done on such significant progress.

determined1_2

As mentioned in post #157 we have been taking an almost savage monitor of our energy consumption.

Few stats to begin with. For the period 16.05.08 - 15.05.09 we used

Gas: 3,935 kwh (was 3,919 but flexed to current calorific value and volume correction)
Leccy: 2,018 kwh


So that works out at a daily average of

Gas: 10.78 kwh
Leecy : 5.53 kwh


Since mid June we have taken a number of steps to further reduce our consumption. Including the following:

• turn off all lights when leaving the room
• when watching TV, turn the light off
• NEVER leave anything on standby. Turn of at wall
• organised the study where there is 11 electrical items so they all feed into one RCD protected individually switched multi plug. This way, only the phone and router (plays funny games otherwise) is on overnight. I can then switch whichever switch I need so only those items are on not everything. This cost £5.99 but this with have a relatively short payback period
• have windows open in the kitchen when home so the fridge stays more naturally cool
• the shower thing mentioned is a post on the preious page
• only plug phone chargers in when needed

Other than this, which doesn't seem very hard to follow, we haven't really done anything else. Hope to draw up a new meal plan that uses the oven less as I know this will help. OH needs a bit of persuading here :rolleyes:

From doing this our daily consumption averages since then are

Gas: 2.91 kwh
Leccy: 4.07 kwh

Now obviously, the gas is going to be out of line as it does not include any winter months. But the leccy is def a good sign :T

Any more ideas?

This ones for you stuart!! Have just got a fresh new spreadsheet drawn up for recording our daily meter readings. Only this, nothing else. Have a seperate one for cost and another one for monthly usage along with graphs.

Has macros incorporated too :rotfl:

Just realised I have three spreadsheets for our utilities :rotfl:

determined1_2

Oh, forgot to say.................

......................we have a bee nest in one of our roof eaves.

Started sorting this morning.

Not sure what all your plans are for a thrilling saturday evening, but mine will be

"OPERATION BEE HIVE"

:rotfl::eek::rotfl:

pammyj74

oh no D1 :eek: my worst nightmare is bees and wasps

well done on the energy consumption. My three kids are a pain when it comes to leaving lights on and I am constantly following them around turning them off. I leave a light on in the hall at night but they still insist of having there bedroom light on til they are asleep!
This winter I am going to TRY and not put the heating on so much, this had put my bill right up this year. Looking on eons graphs of my usage its shocking how much more was used in dec/jan!!
I am guilty of leaving things on standby and leaving things plugged in and on (ie laptop charger) does this still use elec if its not in the lappy? and the phone charger?) Will try and take a leaf out of your book (maybe not the kitchen window one though!)

determined1_2

pammyj74 wrote: »

I am guilty of leaving things on standby and leaving things plugged in and on (ie laptop charger) does this still use elec if its not in the lappy? and the phone charger?) Will try and take a leaf out of your book (maybe not the kitchen window one though!)

Yup they do.

Simple way to tell is to feel the plug/transformer. If it's warm it's using energy!

A lot of TVs also use electricity when switched off at the main switch on the TV (i.e. not on standby). This is why we turn things off at the wall.


Operation bee hive

Status - successfull

Will wait until the remaining few die off then I will go up in the loft and get the nest out with a spade. :eek:


On the glasses front, no news as of yet. Will wait until they are sorted and then I think I'll send off a letter of complaint with a copy of both perscriptions cleary showing they are different. Not sure what will come out of this, but hopefully something. Still annoyed they charged me £109 for the lenses when they are £60 online when they got the prescription wrong. I know I would have had to pay the £109 in the first place had they got the prescription correct, but it almost feels that because they are such a big organisation, they think can do what they like. I could quite easily order them online. Wonder if there would have been cashback :rolleyes:

setmefree2

determined1 wrote: »

Operation bee hive

Status - successfull

Will wait until the remaining few die off then I will go up in the loft and get the nest out with a spade. :eek:

well done on that

determined1_2

Time for a bit of an update I think

a) British gas have now returned my £182 gas credit balance
b) British gas have now actioned my £47 electricity credit balance. Dont ask :rolleyes:
c) British gas have now set my leccy DD at £23 - after some persuasion :rolleyes:
d) British gas have now set my gas DD at £21 - after incorrectly setting it at £19 which would be a tad low :rolleyes:

As you can see, few :rolleyes:'s

e) got my new glasses today with the correct lenses. Quite pleased with these as my eyes do not feel like they're straining. Are taking a bit of getting use to as I have never had varifocals before. If you look at something and nod your head, it really makes your belly go funny :eek: Will wait until I've settled into these and will then get my other set sorted (as these were free). I will then send off my letter of complaint for the poor service as even the long distance perscription is different. Just happy I have now got a set I can actually see with! This led for a very unproductive afternoon at work so will have to make up some time over the weekend

No news on the mortgage front since my previous posts.

Halifax are tempting me with a 10 month 0% BT card of which I could stooze into my mortgage, but I now I cannot implement this until Dec as we will cross our 10% OP limit.

Will be looking after my little brother and sister all weekend :eek: Think I will get them hyped up for a cinema night in our lounge with the surround sound and 42" plasma Don't worry, the telly was bought before we started our MF journey and surround sound was paid for out of match betting winnings

Hope everyone is well out there in MFW land!

uzubairu

determined1 wrote: »

Have got a couple of days off 20/21th august. These tie into the weekend so nice four day break. The 20th is the anniversary of us becoming engaged :iloveyou:

It's our 10th wedding anniversary on the 21st August, so we'll be celebrating on the day because I can't get the weekend off (due to staffing issues at work :mad:).

I hope you do something nice, because you've both earned it. :beer: