Frugal Living Challenge 2011 - part 1

JayneC

Oh just remembered about the slow cooker mogan6- usually you have to put it in hot, otherwise it takes ages to get there, so I'd usually brown any meat and add hot stock - the veggies all go in raw, but cut up quite small (not tiny tho). Usually put in on about 7.30am and it's ready when I get home from work just after 5pm. If there's an auto setting on it and you put it in coldi t will heat it up on high at first then continue on slow but never tried that so don't know how if it works!? HTH

Aril

Evening fellow frugallers:j
Have managed to wrench a few pennies here and there out of my purse on the odd occasion over the last few days but nothing too major:D
Have discovered that our local Wilkinsons now has a small brewing section- it will be useful I think for bits and pieces as our nearest option is now about 20miles away:j
Decided I rather fancied having a new bracelet today....no didn't dip into the reserves but have broken up a couple of beaded ones that I don't wear and instead threaded the beads into a new combination onto a piece of elastic. Am quite chuffed with the end result.

With regards to the slow cooker I have found that it has paid to experiment...I've borrowed a few recipe books from the library to get a good feel for what is possible as I found everything rather samey initially. I'm now rather partial to the lentil curry and chocolate chilli recipe I've found. We still tend to use ours more at the weekend but now we've got the solar panels OH is beginning to use it a bit more mid week aswell. The other thing I like about it is that invariably there's enough left over either to feed us the next day or at least make the leftover sauce into soup.

'Tis all my frugal news folk
Aril

natnat13

Hi all
Hugs to those who need them. I have had a really up and down busy week this week and although bank account is still looking good I must sit down with my receipts and get back on track. Not doing anything tomorrow though and my friend is treating us to chinese on Sunday so a cheap or even NSW!
I get on well with my slow cooker, I've done roasts, curries, stew, a lovely chicken breast and pepperoni thing, chunky chillis. I find the trick is to have enough water / stock to just cover everything, then dust it all with a good tablespoon of plain flour so the stock thickens through cooking. I know what you mean about it all tasting a bit the same though. I used it 5 days in a row when I first got it and DH was moaning and wanted chips by the 5th day!!! So I just use it once or twice a week now, usually when I've got a busy day.
Have a good weekend frugalists xxx

cw18

Well, I'm seriously unimpressed with Sc0ttish P0wer tonight.....

At the start of 2009 I was paying £60/month to them (combined gas and electricity account), and showing a credit balance of £125 on the bill that was generated in January 2009 and £150 on the August 2009 one. My D/Debit was reduced to £53 for September '09, and then down to £47/month from October '09 after I had a 'chat' with them.

I phoned with readings mid-November 2010 (normally submit them on-line), and asked for a forced review of my account to lower the payments further. I was initially told £46/month, but after I quoted various useage comparisons at the chap (stressing I've lived alone since September '10, and as well as my son I also 'lost' the energy hungry computer as it went with him) he did something to the system and came back with an offer of £41.50. At this I asked him to set it to £43/month so that I don't end up with a major debit balance at the end of this year due to price increases (and also don't see as steep an increase once all my credit balance has been used up).

So I've paid £43/month for Dec, Jan and Feb - and submitted fresh readings on line yesterday.

Came home from work this evening to find an email from them stating the D/Debit is being increased as "your current payments are not in line with your ongoing use.", so I've been into my spreadsheet and compared figures from the same period of 2009-10 as this one covers for 2010-11 - and then calcuted the cost of both based on the current (recently increased) costs per unit.

From 16 Nov 2009 to 8 Feb 2010 I used 3,729kWh of gas and 807kWh of electricity - giving a total (pre-vat) cost of £362 at todays prices (£226 gas, £136 electricity)
From 17 Nov 2010 to 9 Feb 2011 I've used 3,951kWh of gas (up by 222kWh) and 460kWh of electricity (down by 247kWh) - giving a total (pre-vat) cost of £317 (£239 gas, £78 electricity)

So I've "spent" £45 less compared to the same period of last year (exact same number of days), yet they want to increase my D/Debit by £15/month...... I think not :mad:

By the time I'd finished my checks the customer service lines had closed, but they're open again at 8:30am tomorrow so I plan to get up at 7:30am (as normal for a weekend) and be on the phone at 8:31


Although they bill for them combined, they split the payment at their end and apply 'x' to gas and 'y' to electricity. I don't know what the split is (want to find out tomorrow), but I do know that in November I was showing a credit of £28 on gas and a credit of £89 on electricity as the chap gave me that information and I logged it on my spreadsheet.

The only reason I can see for this increase is that I must be heavily 'in the red' on my gas side (used £239 (+vat), so owe £211 (+ the vat) after my gas credit is deducted - and I've only paid £129 in total during this billing period, part of which will have been applied to the electricity side)......... so I suspect that what they actually need to do is re-adjust the split so that more of the payment goes to gas and less to electricity, which will be confirmed when I ask for the current balance on each side of my account in the morning !!!

mooomin

Evening all

Not the most frugal of days as I did spend, but it was only £4.15 and it was spent catching up with a friend I haven't seen for ages so I felt it worthwhile!

I also received £39 from Mazuma today - I only posted the phone yesterday. Looks like choosing payment to bank account was a good idea as they use Faster Payments. I'm trying to decide what to do with the windfall - it might go on some crafting fun!

Tonight I'm about to have something to eat then going to spend the evening colouring some images for cards I'm making tomorrow. Low-cost and low-hassle. I'm currently keeping the heating off, but if it's too chilly for my fingers to work with my pens I might have to relent!

Happy Frugal Friday all :j

silvasava

Evening all - looks like some serious hugs are needed all round at the moment.:grouphug::grouphug::grouphug: sorry I cant deliver them in person but I'm sending strong 'vibes' to all who need that bit of extra support.

A sort of NSD - apart from the fact that the lovely guy who's resprayed my front bumper, bonnet & rear bumper delivered my car back & needed paying - he's done a lovely job on the 'old girl' so if the weather stays dry tomorrow I'll give her a good clean, put down the new mats that DH bought me for Xmas and clean out the boot (does that qualify for the Declutter thread?)

Hope everyone has a good weekend

redglass_2

rubytuesday wrote: »

Thanks Redglass though sad to say it was three girls who attacked my neighbour! The main perpetrator who lives round the corner from me and I know her family to have a quick chat to in passing! They are at their wits end with her sadly!
I decided to inform the Police that I can't make that date in July after all. I didn't even get so much as a thanks for your time from the victims family yesterday and although it isn't about that I have decided to put myself first! I think they are just a bit oblivious rather than deliberately rude but they do have a bit of an attitude too!:rotfl:

They seem like a bunch of impossible people all round. What an extremely awkward situation for you. I'm glad you will at least have your anniversary in peace.

natnat13 wrote: »

I find the trick is to have enough water / stock to just cover everything, then dust it all with a good tablespoon of palin flour

Does that give it a 'tea-party' taste? (Sorry, I know it's awful but i couldn't resist).

Long slow cooking means a lot of flavourings aren't robust enough to last. I find it helps to put them in nearer the end, or stick to strong ones in the first place.

cw18 wrote: »

Well, I'm seriously unimpressed with Sc0ttish P0wer tonight....!

Sounds as if you have the same Sottish Power deal as I have or very similar and I've had trouble with them too...they recently insisted that there had never been a meter reading when I last switched suppliers and therefore they had to estimate that bill by doing some complex calculation based on current consumption. It was sorted out in the end - at least, I hope that is the end of it, I still don't really understand what the hull was going on - but in fact both meters WERE read at the time so what happened to those readings? And how come they only 'discovered' this recently??? I've been with Sottish Power for several months now. Good luck with them, you've got all your figures better worked out than I did.

Have a lovely weekend, everybody...

SandraScarlett

Cheryl, very interested in your saga with Scottish Power. The trouble is, a lot of Customer Service folk seem to do anything but provide service to the customers, and treat customers, clients or consumers as a load of idiots. :mad:

A few years ago, I found that my meter readings were the entire National Grid, so monitored them for a couple of weeks, and found that I was being charged Day Rate for night as well, because some gizmo in the meter had stopped working and wasn't switching over until 2.17am (or something like that) and then only for an hour!:eek:

And, yes, I discovered this by staying up all night, monitoring the meter every 5 minutes or so, for a couple of nights. But it was worth it, because armed with all my information, I got them to send me a very nice cheque for several hundred pounds! :j

Good luck to you in your quest for fairness. I am gearing myself up for the arrival of my King Williams in the next week! :eek:

xx

apple_mint

Good morning everyone :wave:

Loving the poetry and inspirational posts Big ((hugs)) to those who are going through tough times at the moment.

I spent £21.39 in total this week across Tesco and Lidl. It was mainly fruit, veg, milk and fruit juice, but also a little restocking of things I've used up e.g. items for my tinned store cupboard supplies and some split peas (for soup).

Also spent a total of £1 in the charity shops for 2 jigsaws and a nice little pyrex casserole dish which will fit nicely in my remoska. My batch cooking means I need to have some additional dishes as quite a few of mine are now in the freezer with main course meals in (Shepherds pie, fish pie etc.).

I don't have a standing order for my fuel payments. Living rurally we have oil for heating, gas bottles for the hob and electric for anything else. I work out how much these cost over the year, add 10% for increases and then divide by 12 and move this sum each month into a linked savings account. The power company would love me to go on direct debit but I like to keep control. When we get the bill we ring through and pay by debit card and get a discount for early payment. If the estimated reading is too far out, then we give them the correct reading and get a revised bill. It takes a lot of will power not to dip into the utilities savings account but it works for us. BT on the other hand :cool: - they are on DD but we make very few land line calls so it is mainly to allow us to have a broadband connection. It occasionally goes up for a few months (if we've had to sort a problem out by phone), but then goes down again.

Just popped a shoulder of lamb in the slow cooker - so that is for our dinner tonight with the left overs being converted into shepherds pies or pasties. This morning I'll peruse the fridge and veg rack to see what needs using up and turning some bits and pieces into soup.

Thank you everyone for keeping the motivation going. It looks as though I'll be able to pop money into my savings account out of my food and diesel budgets this month.

minnie2

sending big hugs to everyone who needs them! The start to this year seems to be filled with troubles! But we are all here for you!!

I have not been keeping such a great eye on things this month and although i am underbudget still - i know we have spent far too much of that on junk that we dont actually need!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Its just all been a bit manic with car failure etc and work has been horrendous - and quick junk food from shops is sooo much easier and less stressful when your head is full of other things!

im struggling with my pills this month too - so im feeling very aggitated which does not help - got a review with specialist in march but doubt they are going to change them - these are the best!


Spent £128.20 so far this month on groceries £1063.67 on Direct Debits so far!!! and £102.78 on other things. I am determined that March is going to be very different as we were going very well in January!!

Its difficult because in January we physically had no money therefore we didnt spent and ended up being much better off!! - now we are in February and there is money there (although technically its already spent) we are spending it and wasting it!! I cant mentally convince myself we have no money to get back into that mind set so not sure how i can get back on track!!