Lots more Sneaky Ways to save the pennies

PipneyJane

Bounce!

What is the one OS money-saving tip you’re going to try in 2024?  

I’m not very well at the moment, so mine is to buy a new slow cooker and use/abuse it constantly, to ensure we have a meal ready when I’m too exhausted to cook.  (My old one died in November.). I’m also going to use a lot more frozen veg - chopped onions, sliced mushrooms - so that there isn’t waste.

- Pip

kimwp

Frozen prepped veg is awesome!

I'm trying to introduce more dishes into my repertoire to reduce the number of takeaways I order - the number of dishes I know reduced when I tried to go v-eggan.

flamingo747

Mr Flamingo is changing jobs, and I will go from being driven to the supermarket during school hours with him once a week to doing it with a wheely trolley! So I will be trying shopping more than once a week, and not buying snacks/drinks for the way home. Also, my limited space should mean I buy less

Elisheba

My new house being much more rural will mean no lunchbreak pops to the shops, so that should be money saving. But the biggest thing I'm going to do this year is work on actually sticking to the budgets I have made.

basketcase

I pay for shopping, petrol etc by credit card, which I pay off in full at the end of each month.  (I get points when I use it, which is kind of a mini-discount)  So far so good.  BUT, I'll actually 'spend' that money from my bank account again, forgetting I'll need it to pay the bill, and I end up using what should be spare cash put into savings paying the card off.

In future I'm going to transfer the amounts I spend straight into an instant access savings account.  A sort of saving because it gives me better awareness of the real amount of money available.

PipneyJane

basketcase said:

I pay for shopping, petrol etc by credit card, which I pay off in full at the end of each month.  (I get points when I use it, which is kind of a mini-discount)  So far so good.  BUT, I'll actually 'spend' that money from my bank account again, forgetting I'll need it to pay the bill, and I end up using what should be spare cash put into savings paying the card off.

In future I'm going to transfer the amounts I spend straight into an instant access savings account.  A sort of saving because it gives me better awareness of the real amount of money available.

To avoid not having enough real cash, I have always paid off my credit card as I’ve gone.  For instance, if I used it to buy petrol then, when I get home, I’d pay it for the petrol bill.  I rarely carry a balance for more than a few days.  That way, too, the balance in my bank account is my real bank balance.

HTH

- Pip

General_Grant

PipneyJane said:

basketcase said:

I pay for shopping, petrol etc by credit card, which I pay off in full at the end of each month.  (I get points when I use it, which is kind of a mini-discount)  So far so good.  BUT, I'll actually 'spend' that money from my bank account again, forgetting I'll need it to pay the bill, and I end up using what should be spare cash put into savings paying the card off.

In future I'm going to transfer the amounts I spend straight into an instant access savings account.  A sort of saving because it gives me better awareness of the real amount of money available.

To avoid not having enough real cash, I have always paid off my credit card as I’ve gone.  For instance, if I used it to buy petrol then, when I get home, I’d pay it for the petrol bill.  I rarely carry a balance for more than a few days.  That way, too, the balance in my bank account is my real bank balance.

HTH

- Pip

But the system @basketcase uses earns interest and your method misses on that.  Paying off in full by DD would also provide a monthly DD from a current account if this is useful for the terms of earning from that account too.  In both cases the bank account reflects the "real bank balance".

basketcase

@General_Grant
Also true, but Pip's method has the advantage of knowing the (eg) petrol's definitely been paid for and avoids the possibility of dipping into the amount with every intention of paying it back, then forgetting.  Plus, if any of the payments are wrong they're caught when the final monthly statement's issued and you can just pay off the difference.

That's actually very important for me.  When I was in my late 20s I was eventually diagnosed as being dyscalculic, which was a relief because it explained why I so easily made mistakes in Maths.  God bless the person who invented Quicken.  I no longer had to spend all afternoon struggling to get one statement to reconcile - it always ended, literally, in tears!  Mind you, it still sometimes takes 2 or 3 attempts...

I wish I could claim to be financially savvy enough to have worked out all the other advantages you point out, but I'm afraid I didn't.  The advantage of using a DD to pay the CC is something I did think of, but there's very little interest to be gained.  My less worthy thought was that it's better in my pocket than the bank's!  So it's roundabouts and swings, really. 

It's comforting to know that if my experiment with bank transfers doesn't work, there's another option
Thanks, Pip!

MrsCD

Apparently more people are using cash to keep track of their spending, but I also use a credit card which pays me to use it, and pay it off in full every month. I try to allow just a small amount of pocket money!
I have an Asda Christmas savings card which I haven't used yet, but I'm going to try a low spend January. This should help me use up the food in the freezer and some of my cupboard stash which will be replaced eventually.

Gem-gem

1. Remember that a budget is a limit not a target. 

2. Do not buy any new books until I have read the ones that I have. If I see a book that I want ....Go back to using the library. Or for my favourite author - request as a birthday / Christmas gift. (Budget for this year £0)

3, Swap jigsaw puzzles with family / friends. Request as a birthday / Christmas gift. (Budget for this year £0)
4. ....