Following Martin's blog post, were the worries about intereference unfounded?

newsgroupmonkey_

You may have seen Martin's blog post about the donations
https://blog.moneysavingexpert.com/2023/02/martin-lewis--what-happened-to-my-pledge-to-give-p10m-to-charity/

The money from this came from the sale of the site to Moneysupermarket in 2012.

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/3992837/mse-discussion-moneysavingexpert-com-to-join-the-moneysupermarket-com-group/p1

At the time, it was felt it was a "sell-out" for cash. A little over 10 years later, I think we can safely say that the worries were overhyped.

Short of a single mention at the bottom of the site to say that it's part of the group, it has indeed been kept entirely editorially independent. It doesn't have the "look and feel" of the parent group and there's none if any spam from it. In fact, the site often mentions their competitors (particularly when it comes to comparison sites). It even tells you how to make the most of comparison sites and how to get cashback.

I think it's fair to say that Martin doesn't have to worry about how he's going to pay his mortgage (and honestly, neither should he - he's saved me personally a lot of money over the last 20 years) and yet here he is, an employee (albeit probably a decently sized shareholder), still fighting our corner.

I for one think it was a great move as it's turned out.