The Road is Long.......

Tilly_MFW_in_6_YRS

Hi Jimmy, fantastic progress. You must be feeling really good about your achievements.

:T:T::j:j

Tilly x

jimmybrid

Thanks Tilly. There's always that certain sense of satisfaction at getting a good deal.

jimmybrid

The sim-free phone I ordered has gone up in price by £30...just shows that when you see a deal you've got to grab it cos it won't last for long :-)
Split the weekend's "big shop" between two supermarkets; Morri$0n$ to collect Pay Day vouchers for April, and Te$co to use voucher for £5 off a £40 spend. Stocked up on wipes and nappies for the boy, both were on offer.
Made up a batch of soup to use up "past their best" peppers, onions and tomatos from the fridge, which should mean a couple of NSD's this week instead of spending in the work canteen (and eating two main meals in a day instead of just the one).
TCB cashback has just hit the £500 mark (if it all goes to payment stage), not bad to say I only signed up 3 months ago.

jimmybrid

Just placed order for Sim-only contract with Orange. Will reduce my monthly mobile fee down from £26 to £10.50 and still has plenty of mins, texts and mobile internet. Still have 3 months to run on my existing contract with Vodafone, but Sim-only contract currently available with an enhanced £80 cashback through TCB, so better to get it early for the higher cashback - will probably be down to £30 or£40 when I actually need it. Gonna call Vodafone over the weekend to see what it would cost to get out of my contract early (suspect it will be the full monthly fees, but worth asking).

jimmybrid

Quick update....

Mrs JB just got bonus for last year, so an extra £1000 after all the usual deductions to sit in the offset current account.
Just got first Santander 123 credit card statement, more than £5 cashback on a spend of less than £350. Think I'm going to like this credit card:)
First direct debits started going out of 123 current account too, so cashback being earnt now there as well. From everyone except the amazingly inept Npower that is.....they changed their records for the direct debit but looks like they failed to inform Santander of the direct debit, so when they tried to claim the payment there was no DD set up on the account. They then emailed me to tell me that there was no DD setup, despite the fact it is them setting it up, not me. Rang up Npower to sort it out but they were "very busy" so would I like to arrange a callback. Yes please, when can I expect a call? Sometime in the NEXT 3 DAYS!!!!! Customer service anyone? I should have known better having dealt with Npower as a major business customer in the past - their customer service was shocking then and clearly hasn't improved.

While I'm ranting about Npower, they also failed to credit my dual fuel or DD discounts when they calculated my future payments, so have upped my payment from £125 to £156 per monthh. Not a problem though, cos my fixed rate ends in 3 weeks so I'll be saying tattybye to Npower anyway.

Supermarket shop to do today, Morri$on$ to use payday bonus, maybe pick a few things up at Tesco too (£2.48 credit to use from price match on last shop). Will probably go shopping for some new clothes for Mrs JB too, now that her baby weight is well and truly coming off she is struggling for things to wear. She deserves a bit of a treat, and we have £100 of Say Shopping vouchers sitting doing nothing (that I paid £80 for via Complete Savings).

Work pension changes to new provider on 1st May, so will need to hunt out some funds to invest in - think that might keep me out of bother for a while, will be tied to the computer figuring out which of the hundreds of funds to invest in. I enjoy that kind of stuff though, so it's not a problem. Might take the opportunity to increase my contribution too, it's a salary sacrifice scheme so every £50 means about £83 into my pot.

ixia

Hi hope you don't mind me popping in on your diary.

I have a 123 account and was considering the credit card seems like a good amount of cashback for only a £350 spend.

I have an MBNA cashback card that I use for everything but the return seems better on the 123. Do you have to pay an annual fee for it?

jimmybrid

Hi ixia,

The card fee is £24 a year. It will pay for itself though, especially if you buy petrol/diesel with it as this earns 3% cashback. All supermarket spends earn 1% and department stores 2%. You can also get extra cashback taking the card out via TopCashBack or Quidco.

elantan

Have a wee peak at the vanguard life strategy 80 acc for investment ... I'm thinking of hitting that next ... Only if its right or you of course ... If you can think of any others give me a wee buzz and ill check them out ... I'm just starting to learn about investing but really enjoying it so far

jimmybrid

elantan wrote: »

Have a wee peak at the vanguard life strategy 80 acc for investment ... I'm thinking of hitting that next ... Only if its right or you of course ... If you can think of any others give me a wee buzz and ill check them out ... I'm just starting to learn about investing but really enjoying it so far

Have quite a few funds I'm invested in with pensions etc, a few current favourites are:
Kames High Yield - 68% growth over 5 yrs
First State Asia Pacific Leaders - 71% over 5 yrs
Baillie Gifford International - 41% over 5 yrs

All 3 of these are consistent 1st quartile performers (in top 25% of funds in similar investment types) over 1, 3 & 5 yrs.

*Past performance is no guarantee of future returns......blah blah*

Have also just invested in two of these in S&S ISA's, so hope they keep performing well.

nPower

jimmybrid wrote: »

Quick update....
First direct debits started going out of 123 current account too, so cashback being earnt now there as well. From everyone except the amazingly inept Npower that is.....they changed their records for the direct debit but looks like they failed to inform Santander of the direct debit, so when they tried to claim the payment there was no DD set up on the account. They then emailed me to tell me that there was no DD setup, despite the fact it is them setting it up, not me. Rang up Npower to sort it out but they were "very busy" so would I like to arrange a callback. Yes please, when can I expect a call? Sometime in the NEXT 3 DAYS!!!!! Customer service anyone? I should have known better having dealt with Npower as a major business customer in the past - their customer service was shocking then and clearly hasn't improved.

While I'm ranting about Npower, they also failed to credit my dual fuel or DD discounts when they calculated my future payments, so have upped my payment from £125 to £156 per monthh. Not a problem though, cos my fixed rate ends in 3 weeks so I'll be saying tattybye to Npower anyway.

Hi jimmybrid,

Really sorry to hear about the problems you had with your direct debit.

If there's anything I can help with, please drop me an email to [EMAIL="forumresponse@npower.com"]forumresponse@npower.com[/EMAIL] and I can take a look.

Best wishes,

Adam