Nice People Thread No. 14, all Nice and Proper

Generali

CKhalvashi wrote: »

But wages are higher to compensate for it, in many expat-oriented sectors at least.



Nice. We're in Serbia for the weekend with friends, flying back on the first flight from Timisoara (which is easier than Belgrade for where we are). Belgrade in on Friday night, Timisoara out on Monday morning is becoming far too regular at the moment.

Unfortunately, not a long weekend

Yes but I want to pay UK prices for food and utilities while getting Aussie quality and Aussie fuel prices and Aussie wages.

I'm pretty frugal and can feed a family of four for two hundred bucks.

vivatifosi

Nikks, we have Tesco mobile. It piggybacks O2 so I knew I would get a signal and the price is way lower. I bought my phone outright to keep price lower but offset that by using a bunch of clubcard points that were due to expire. Service is v good too if I need to call them. I pay £10pm for 750 mins, unlimited text and I think 1 gb of data, which is plenty given free WiFi everywhere. I think others have posted their tariffs too. Giffgaff I think it was looked good too.

Generali

vivatifosi wrote: »

Nikks, we have Tesco mobile. It piggybacks O2 so I knew I would get a signal and the price is way lower. I bought my phone outright to keep price lower but offset that by using a bunch of clubcard points that were due to expire. Service is v good too if I need to call them. I pay £10pm for 750 mins, unlimited text and I think 1 gb of data, which is plenty given free WiFi everywhere. I think others have posted their tariffs too. Giffgaff I think it was looked good too.

I use Giff Gaff when I visit the UK and found them to be fine, even in the wilds of SW England.

Doozergirl

michaels wrote: »

Phone and broadband switch today...and it is all working <shocked smiley>

Nothing less than a miracle. Ours was Tuesday. Doesn't work.

Engineer booked for this afternoon.

vivatifosi

Saw an amazing medical technology story today. Very uplifting and will be interesting to see what advances can be made as a result of this. The technology involves taking an MRI scan and turning it into a 3D print of an organ so that surgeons can better zone in on an issue. Doesn't seem that long ago that MRI was the new kid on the block, now it gets to team up with even newer technologies:

http://news.sky.com/story/1563135/surgeon-uses-3d-printed-heart-to-improve-surgery

silvercar

We (and I take personal credit for all this as he isn't interested) transferred sky TV and BT phone to virgin (already have their broadband). 3 new boxes, superfast broadband and all inclusive calls, for £35 less a month than we were paying before. All went smoothly apart from the landline that got delayed by a week. (No doubt upsetting the scammers).

Am currently transfering gas and electric to e.on with the MSE energy club switch. Think its going ok, though e.on and BG have both asked for meter readings this week. Supposedly saving £55 a month.

Mobiles (all 4 iphone 6) are split between EE and O2, currently all in contract. All insured with my bank account, £24 a month that includes worldwide travel insurance for 3 of us.

Mortgage is lifetime base rate +0.5, so currently pay 1.25%.

I feel that I have everything sorted for the moment and paying about £100 a month less compared to a few months ago. Just shows what a few more spare hours in the week can produce.

GDB2222

The Guardian has a pretty impressive illustration of the number of mass shootings in the USA, practically one incident a day for the last three years.

http://gu.com/p/4dxe4?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

michaels

silvercar wrote: »

We (and I take personal credit for all this as he isn't interested) transferred sky TV and BT phone to virgin (already have their broadband). 3 new boxes, superfast broadband and all inclusive calls, for £35 less a month than we were paying before. All went smoothly apart from the landline that got delayed by a week. (No doubt upsetting the scammers).

Am currently transfering gas and electric to e.on with the MSE energy club switch. Think its going ok, though e.on and BG have both asked for meter readings this week. Supposedly saving £55 a month.

Mobiles (all 4 iphone 6) are split between EE and O2, currently all in contract. All insured with my bank account, £24 a month that includes worldwide travel insurance for 3 of us.

Mortgage is lifetime base rate +0.5, so currently pay 1.25%.

I feel that I have everything sorted for the moment and paying about £100 a month less compared to a few months ago. Just shows what a few more spare hours in the week can produce.

£55 a month saving on utilities - you don't switch often enough - when I run a comparison the best tariff is never more than a fiver a month cheaper and no a fix the £60 switching fee makes it marginal even with the switching cashback.

Before the financial crash it was marginally cheaper to go for 2 year mortgage deals that worked out at base minus (even including fees) rather than base plus 0.5% lifetime trackers. Then came the crash and the base plus tracker margin went up to 2%+. I have regretted trying to squeeze out that extra margin every day since. I envy you your mortgage. I fixed about 2 years ago for 5 years at 2.49% IO which seemed like as low as it would go and of course now you can fix 5 years at 2.19%

I get paid to have a mobile but that doesn't include a £100 handset every few years (current one is 3 years old and refuses to break) and of course aim to get paid to have landline and broadband although this year I am paying a fiver for the year. Freeview TV is quite sufficient for my needs and having less for the kids to waste their time watching is a bonus.

But then we blow all that and more on kids activities and have a full time post work job as taxi-drivers.

michaels

GDB2222 wrote: »

The Guardian has a pretty impressive illustration of the number of mass shootings in the USA, practically one incident a day for the last three years.

http://gu.com/p/4dxe4?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

The figures are more than alarming but they do combine deaths and injuries for dramatic impact.

GDB2222

michaels wrote: »

The figures are more than alarming but they do combine deaths and injuries for dramatic impact.

11 people were injured in a shootout in a bar in Greenville on 27 September. It didn't even make the news.

These mass shootings are just the tip of the iceberg. There have been 39650 incidents so far this year and 9992 deaths.