July Pin Money Savings Challenge

Queenie

:T :T WTG lemanie!!! :T :T You're doing just GREAT!!

Have you drawn up a menu plan and built your shopping list around it ready for the 12th? Don't forget to freeze any leftovers either ... even a one portion size amount of leftovers can make a "meal" when added to another couple of one portion sized left overs

Keep reading, that's the very very best way to resist the temptation of impulse/boredom buys

Have you checked out the Utilities forum to see if you can tweak your domestic bills?

As that famous supermarket ad says: Every little helps

kscour

Saved another £4.55 in vouchers from Tescos last night - thats £8.92 in my tub!!!! I don't think I would make nearly so much effort if I couldn't see that money saving up - now off to get my personal accounts upto date and work out a budget spreadsheet. Hopefully will be ready for the August grocery challenge. This is really really addictive!

Rabbit

What are you all going to do with your pin money from this month?

Do you save it and add to it next month, or are you saving for something in particular or reducing your debts?

I am just wondering what to do with mine, :think: I've got a car loan on a 0% card which I could put it towards but then I have just found an account I haven't used for a while with £5 in so thought I could add my pin money to that and do the same each month, then when it's a bigger amount pay it off the car loan.....it would be nice to build up some rainy day savings though...not sure what to do. Should you save up or pay debts first? Always useful to have a little bit of ready cash about to snap up bargains or multibuys that you couldn't get each week.

I got 1p from the pavement yesterday and 10p refunded from Tesco for charging me the wrong amount for a loaf....yes it's got that bad wanting to see the pin money grow that I asked for my 10p back...oh dear is that bad? It certainly focuses you on not wasting a penny - doing this challenge.


Hope you are all saving some pin money and enjoying it.

BFN Rabbit

omega_2

Hi Rabbit - every month, I use the actual savings to pay off an extra slice of debt. Except in May, when £25 of £60 aPMS went towards my holiday spending money.

Give it another month or so, I might look at splitting it 2 ways: half into extra loan repayments, half into an emergency fund. Eventually, I like the idea of investing a little of the money into something that saves me EVEN MORE MONEY, eg tomato plants/herbs for the garden, in a CompoundPMS sort of way.

Loadsabob

I'm not doing this at the moment, but reading all your efforts here I KNOW it will be my next challenge!! This month I'm doing my first grocery one, but in August, I think I'll be joining you guys in the PMS...it looks great fun!

Rabbit

:hello:

Hi Omega, thanks for your suggestion of splitting it, I might do that, get the best of both worlds hey?

There is more to this pms challenge than meets the eye methinks, once you start it one thing leads to another and it really is addictive.

Hi Loadsabob, you'll enjoy it - look forward to you joining us next month.

Must go and do some meal planning for next week, something Queenie mentioned and set me off thinking about using up leftovers, I always save the potatoes and veg not used for the next night but there is still more that I think I could be doing to save those pennies!!!

Toodle pip chums :-)

spendaholic

Rabbit: If your card is 0% you may as well stick it in a savings account and earn a bit of interest on it.

Bogof_Babe

Queenie, I am a virgin too :eek: (okay, only in some things, this being one of them ).
My weekly grocery/household budget (me, hubby and one cat) is £40, as that's what mum gives me out of her attendance allowance, for looking after her and dad, and consequently not being able to take a "proper" job.

I have a core shopping list that comes to about £20 - bread, milk, lemonade, catfood, eggs, oven chips, fruit, fruit juice, potatoes, veg/salad, cooked chicken (for the cat ). These are the things I have to buy, week in week out. However there are no main meals there, or snack lunches, or cleaning materials, bubble bath, soap etc., and these come out of the other £20.

I am a bit puzzled as to whether, if I (e.g.) use cupboard/freezer stocks for a meal but don't replace them immediately, or have enough (e.g.) washing powder so that I don't have to buy any for a few weeks, does this count as
PMS? Or is it more suited to the Grocery challenge threads?

I had to pay £22 for an eye test this week, and as I was in town I got a nice floaty skirt and top in the sales for £12, so only spent £5 in Tesco for basic essentials (not my full core list, obviously, just the really urgent bits). I've been managing with cupboard/freezer stocks in hand to feed us. Some of it was bought bogof, but not recently!

Does the fact that I only spent £5 so far on groceries mean I could say £35 was PIN money? Or does the fact that I had to pay for the eye test, and got the clothes "treats", mean I have negated the savings?

Doh!

Rebob

I know that it is a bit late now but check the site for free eye tests. A couple of weeks ago I printed a voucher off for a free eye test after seeing it posted on mse. saved myself £10 and then dad took me to where they make up optical perscriptions and got the same glasses as in d&h for £30 instead of the £90 that d&h wanted! saved £70 with very little work.

Rebob

Just started to add up my pin so far and thought it would be pennies, not so!

Fixed rate on mortgage ended and it has gone down by £3.89. Phoned and enquired about other products for this bit of mortgage and got another reduction of £4.25pm. Got £10.81 from sale of book off amazon and withdrew £60 from paypal sales.

pms so far........£78.95!!!!!!!!!!!!!!