Resourcefulness: The budgeter's friend

Humdinger1

My grandfather had a privet hedge than grew to roof height, seemingly.   After my aunt, mother, cousin and I were trimming it and managed to cut through the electric cord twice in an afternoon, there was quite the discussion about how safe it would be to set fire to the thing.  A phrase that's come down the years is 'Privet hedges should not be allowed to grow this high; in fact, they should not be allowed to grow AT ALL.'

foxgloves

Yes, I agree it's crazy stuff! I once had the bright idea (not!) of dumping a big trugful on top of Mr F's carefully nurtured bonfire. It extinguished his carefully managed flames in an instant & just sat there evilly smoking for the next 2 hours much to the disgust of 'Victor Meldrew' who used to live in the house backing onto our garden. We have still kept to all privet hedge on the other side of the garden, partly because it is used by nesting birds & also because we have no intention of paying out for 130' of fencing. I'd also prefer to look at greenery than fence, but it is truly ancient privet & I wouldn't be at all surprised if it has been here pretty much as long as the house (88 years!).
F

EssexHebridean

Just catching up with all your news - thank goodness Mr F was OK after the car incident - although what a pain. I had a similarly annoying although less clear "car incident" myself a few months ago when a large van rolled backwards into the front of my car. Unfortunately the driver was less honest than Mr F's collider - claiming that it was instead I who had rolled into him...although how that would have been possible allowing that my engine was off (stop/start had kicked in) AND we were facing uphill at the time, goodness knows. You  may want to pre-emptively set aside a little more for the insurance ahead of renewal time as even with the NCB not being affected unfortunately even a "no fault" claim does usually lead to a premium increase as you probably know. Very annoying. I've not currently increased ours as currently there is sufficient surplus in the car account that we should be covered unless it goes absolutely through the roof. 

As for the trimming of hedges, I have to say Humdinger that it sounds as though setting fire to your Grandfather's one might have been safer than the risk of electrocution! 

foxgloves

@EssexHebridean - Yes, we did think that next year, our insurers may stick a few quid onto our premium despite everyone agreeing that we are 100% blameless. I shall challenge it if I think it is too much. I toyed with the idea of changing providers this year, when our premium increased by £6 per month (I prefer to pay monthly) but I am glad I didn't now, as so far, they have been very good to deal with re our claim......including a new annoyance which came to light today. People always say that it is impossible to judge the overall performance of insurers until one has had to make a claim & I think following this experience, it is something I will bear in mind even more.
F

foxgloves

Hello Monday Money Savers,
Not a huge amount to report today on frugal front, but am kicking in a post to show that I am keeping the faith. Today's small budget-helping positives as follows:
*Did this week's laundry which I got into 2 loads, one of them a 30 mins at 30 degrees. Rainy all morning though, so onto the heated airer they had to go. I do very much prefer line-drying & had expected to be doing a bit more of it by now.
*Tweaked tonight's meal due to a c*ck-up on the shopping list. Supposed to be spicy chicken & vegetable wraps but forgot to buy wraps & didn't fancy making a batch as had planned to do other things, so I will be making spicy chicken rice instead, with some wokked chilli greens to go on the side (still using leftover chicken from Saturday's roast spiced Indian chicken, which is one of Mr F's favourite things to cook on a weekend).
*Made tomorrow's packed lunch & breakfast.
*Did my regular Monday morning budget updates. Final reckoning for grocery budget (Last day of March's budget cycle tomorrow!) is that we overspent by slightly over £10. This was largely due to frontloading the first week with a trip to the eco-refill shop for cleaning products & other bits and the ingredients for my Easter cake coming out of this budget in order defo to be able to get it baked in time.
*Checked for surveys - so far just a couple of PA.
*Defrosted a couple of that batch of rhubarb muffins I baked last week which will do us for dessert tonight. 
*Put the Easter decorations up - I don't have a lot & no new ones have been purchased for many years - just a 'tree' on my piano, made from twiggy garden prunings & 3 little chickens on the fireplace. I always like to get out a few embroidered Easter cards which my Mum made for us over the years. They are too pretty not to come out each year to join the display. So many nice Easter decorations in the shops, but I haven't been tempted - I think I would probably make my own if I wanted new ones these days.
*Aim to add at least another 20 rows of knitting this evening - it doesn't sound like much, but it is when they are very long rows - basically it's a long waterfall cardi & each row is from the neckline to the hem, as it is knitted in one piece edge-to-edge. I bought the yarn so long ago it will feel like a free new garment when I get to wear it!
Oh, & not money saving....in fact fairly neutral in ££ terms, but we have had an annoyance with the ongoing car incident today. Mr F rang the authorised repair garage to see if our vehicle had been fully assessed yet & to get an idea how long it will take. What a damn good job he did, as he was told that the recovery company who were booked by our insurers to collect our car on Thursday night, secure it overnight (it won't lock because of the damage to the rear), & deliver it to the repair garage on Friday HADN'T ACTUALLY DELIVERED IT!! Mr F got straight on to the claims handling dept & they were not at all happy. Said they would get in touch with the recovery people to tell them that if the car is not delivered to the garage today or tomorrow morning first thing at the latest, then they won't be paid & they will book another company. Apparently the recovery people were busy with a couple of live RTA incident recoveries on Friday, so didn't have time to deliver our car. Hmmm. And when exactly WERE they planning to take it, I wonder. Anyway, at least Mr F's enquiry this morning meant that this problem came to light. I don't expect much will happen very swiftly now with Easter Bank Holiday weekend, anyway.
Well, that is it for today's financials & frugals.
Love F x
 

EssexHebridean

Ahh interesting that you pay monthly - I assume your provider is one of those who doesn't charge a premium for that then - I know there are a few of those these days! You are absolutely right about only really discovering how good or otherwise an insurer is when you come to need to claim - it's the reason I would never contemplate returning to the firm with the name of a high-ranking seagoer - they were shocking!

Sun_Addict

How annoying re the car. Good job Mr F rang to check its progress. 

I love the Easter tree 🐣 

foxgloves

@EssexHebridean - Our insurer does charge a modest premium for monthly payments but it just suits me to pay monthly. I know there is a small future saving to be made there if I am minded to do it.
Yes, I have also had experience of a poor provider, although my experience was a big name company with an extremely rude advisor. It was back when customers were really only just starting to change providers for better deals - the internet made all of that much easier, didn't it, as it was so easy to check prices. Anyway, I remember that my car insurance renewal letter arrived & it had gone up yet again & was now nudging £40 a month. We don't pay anywhere near that now nearly 2 decades later! I phoned to complain about the significant increases year after year & was told "it's industry standard'. I said that wasn't a reason & quoted the current rate of inflation.  I said that as a loyal customer, I expected their best price at renewal time. She said really stroppily, "Well this is the first we've heard that you're not happy with it, so what do you expect?". Needless to say I didn't renew & have never returned to that particular company!  Worst EVER provider was an energy company - a big one with a big letter at the beginning of its name (which isn't an 'E'). Oh my life, I had some run-ins with them back in the day! We got into a disagreement in which all the maths proved that I was right, so I refused to let it lie. 
F 

Moorviews

Love your Easter twigs and beautiful cards made by your mum. Very Spring like and pretty!

I try not to think about insurers too much; they seem to be sent to try us rather than being a reassuring safety net. Although I realise that they have to adhere strictly to their policy or they wouldn’t be profitable businesses. Unfortunately, they are one of those necessities of modern life and I somewhat dread it when it gets around to renewal time. 

EssexHebridean

My standard with insurance renewals has for a long while been to look at the quote, look at the comparison, and if there is a price elsewhere which is better, with a company I am happy with and for like-for-like - or better - cover, then I jump, then call my former insurer to cancel the renewal. Of course they "offer to check things through to see if we can beat the deal you have elsewhere" at which point I put on my best overly astonished voice and say that while I'm grateful for the offer, I can't imagine there would be any point, because nothing has changed, and surely as an existing customer they will have offered me their best price in the renewal letter...wouldn't they? Inevitably the poor devil at the call centre doesn't quite know how to answer that one, as from their perspective there really is no right answer, and they know it!  

Fair enough on the monthly payments, too - we all have things where paying some extra is worth it for convenience I guess, don't we! We paid monthly for a long while, then when we got the second car I worked out quite how much extra we would then be paying for the monthly payments, decided that money was better off in my pocket than theirs, and as we were in a position where we were fortunate to be able to pay upfront we switched at that stage. I did notice when I was looking last year that I think it was H@lif@x Home Insurance offered monthly payments at no extra - so clearly there are some out there who are willing to do that now. 

Ahh - energy providers. You couldn't pay me enough to go back to SP, BG are little better, and as for the French lot with the three letter name - no thanks! Oh - and the Warehouse of Utilities - little better than a pyramid scheme, and don't get me started on their utterly rubbish billing! It's probably quite a good job that the 8 legged ones seem to be as good as they have been so far as I'm running out of options!  I remember your energy wrangling I think - didn't the company rep on here get involved in the end, or was that with someone else?