Pimp your pension, free Asda £5, free £200 bank switch, 3.55% savings, Buy new clothes 2nd hand?, 50GB Sim £8/mth

Plus... £3 cinema tix, Are your savings safe?, energy help, £46 make-up £4.50, free £50 investment

                                                           

18 April 2023 | View in browser

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THE TOP TIPS IN THIS EMAIL Martin's 18 pension pumpers, including... -Don't miss out on hidden pay rises - Free state pension boost - Find £10,000s in lost pensions New. FREE £200 cash switch bonus  Are your savings safe? 8 key rules Warning. Expect your mobile to go off 3pm Sunday Free Asda £5 3.55% easy-access savings - highest since 2009 'Martin Lewis' scammers uncovered?  New. 50GB Sim £8/mth Buy new clothes second-hand? FREE £50 investment 5p a litre off Morrisons fuel On heating oil, LPG or other fuels? More can get £200 support New beauty 'dupes', including £46 Chanel bronzer vs £4.50 Primark  'I've earned £1,000 in extra interest after ditching and switching fixed cash ISAs' £3 IMAX films, including Avatar, Top Gun FREE Green Living Live tickets  This week's best buys, including '£20/mth' fibre broadband, 30mth 0% debt shift, Car Insurance Compare+ tool Should I tell HR that I can now approve my own expenses? BEST BUYS & TOOLS MSE Cheap Mobile Finder Credit Club including free credit report 0% balance transfers Compare broadband deals MSE Car Insurance Compare+ Best bank accounts Top savings accounts Credit cards for bad credit Credit Card Eligibility Calculator Loans Eligibility Calculator Mortgage comparison Compare travel money Cheap Energy Club, with Pick Me A Tariff Best Sim-only deals

Martin's 18 pension pumpers  Need-to-knows to protect & boost savings for, and in, retirement   Incl... don't miss out on hidden pay rises | avoid leaving your pension to your ex | boost state pension by £1,000s | cut tax | find £10,000s in lost pensions | free 1-on-1 help   On average we live 85ish years, but only work 45 of them, so that work needs to pay for a lot of years. You may say "but it's parents who pay for us when we're ickle", but then again most adults then pay for their children too, so it often evens out. All that means saving for retirement is crucial. Yet pensions are often bad-mouthed, under-managed and ill-understood. So today I've key tips and need-to-knows. This is not a comprehensive guide, more an appetite whetter for tooling yourself up with knowledge about... - State pensions: Income from state once you're a set age (today 66+). - Private pensions: Tax-free savings only usable from age 55. - Company pensions: Pensions via employers, which they contribute to - either build up a pension pot of cash or a 'final/average salary scheme'. For an easy briefing, if you missed it, do catch up on my step-by-step TV pensions special from March. Now to the tips... 1. Don't accidentally leave your pension to your ex. You CAN'T LEAVE PENSION SAVINGS IN YOUR WILL. Die before taking your private or company pension and the provider/trustees decide what to do with it. An expression of wishes (or 'nomination') form tells them your preference. You need to fill one in - many have, years ago, without realising, so check it's up to date - see expression of wishes help. As Floochy tweeted: "@MartinSLewis - had a case where a colleague's ex-husband was still on her nomination form. Family had to contest. A nightmare for all involved." 2. The big pension boon: it's saved from PRE-tax income. Normally for every £100 you earn, a basic-rate taxpayer only takes home £80. Yet save this in a private or company pension and in simple terms, one way or another (more below), the whole £100 goes in. A huge gain you don't get with other savings / investing. PS: I've ignored national insurance to keep the concept simple. 3. Defer taking your state pension and you get more: is it worth it? The state pension is boosted by 5.8% for each year you defer (you can defer part years too), so defer one year and someone on the full 'new' state pension would gain £500/yr extra. Yet, of course, you won't be getting it for as long, and it can impact how much tax you pay. See our Should I defer taking my state pension? guide. 4. ENDS 31 July. DON'T DELAY! Aged 45 to 70? Boost state pension by £1,000s buying missing national insurance (NI) years. Millions may benefit from this - but get on with it - as you've only until 31 July to buy missing national insurance (NI) years back to 2006 (the deadline was 5 Apr, but was extended as phone-helplines jammed). After that you can only go back to 2017. This applies to the 'new' state pension - the system for all who have / will hit state pension age after 2016. If so... Step 1: Use govt tool to check if you're missing NI years. If you are missing years since 2006 (you can't buy back before that) then... Step 2: Use govt tool to check you're due to get / getting full state pension. If not, buying back years is likely to be very lucrative. Yet for those projected to get a full pension, even if you've missing years, buying them won't boost your pension, as you can't get more than the full pension. Each NI year costs up to £840, but can be fractions of that if you're a few weeks short of qualifying. This can be so lucrative. As Martine emailed: "After listening to Martin's podcast, I checked my NI contributions and found I had 8 years missing! I've now paid 6 years and will pay the next 2 years when possible. This has made a difference of about £49/wk which is considerable! I'd never have known without the podcast! Thank you." To put that in context, Martine paid up to £5,000 to increase her state pension by £2,550 a year. If she lives for the typical 20 years after state pension age, that'd be a total uplift of c. £51,000, and it's inflation-proofed. Warning. This ISN'T a simple 'just do it'. Ensure you watch my easy video and/or read the full Boost state pension guide for pros & cons, step-by-step & key checks first.  - Under 45? In general you're too far from state pension age to know if it's worth buying years, even if you're missing them. However, you may find you're missing a partial year, and could top it up for as little as £15. At that price it's worth considering just in case, even if it turns out to be futile. 5. There's £27 BILLION sitting in lost, old pensions. Are you one of those with £10,000s hidden? After watching one of my TV shows on lost pensions, Rob got in touch to say he'd checked the free Pension Tracing Service, after it'd triggered a memory of signing up to a long forgotten pension in his first job 30 years ago. This helped him locate his old provider, and he found he'd paid in £24,500, and it was now worth £97,000. Gobsmacked, he then checked through his box of old papers, and found another pension from the 1990s he'd paid £600 into, traced it, and was shocked to find it was now worth £24,000. This is my long way of saying... it's worth a check. 6. SCARE-TIME. Take your age when you start(ed) saving in a pension - and halve it... that gives you a rule of thumb of the % of your salary to aim to put into your pension for the rest of your life for a good pension income. So start at 20 and it's 10% (this includes employer's contributions), at 40 it's 20%. Don't worry, almost nobody does it, but the real takeaway is start as early as possible with whatever you can, as you've longer for the gains to compound. See our beginners' guide to pensions for more. 7. Are you an employee? Don't throw away a hidden pay rise. This is about auto-enrolment pensions - almost everyone should try to avoid opting out - or you're throwing away free cash from your employer. See my Important warning to every employee explainer (including video) for why. 8. Can you boost state pension for FREE with missing national insurance (NI) years? (Grandparents especially.) Carer? Had a career break? Had an illness? You could be due NI credits which can boost the amount of state pension you get. Most are applied automatically, but some you have to claim, including grandparents/others who childcare for close relatives, spouses of members of the armed forces, and those on a government-approved training course. For more see our Are you due NI credits? help. As @MickLumley tweeted: "@MartinSLewis I can't thank you enough. My wife retired five years early to help with our grandchildren. She was four years short of full state pension. We will now save £3,000 not having to buy missing years."  9. Under 22, over 66 or earn under £10,000? A way to make your employer contribute to a pension for you. If you're in these categories, you don't automatically get a pension contribution from your employer, but many have a right to make it do it. So if you're under 22, over 66 or earn under £10,000, click the link and have a read or watch m'video on it. 10. Self-employed and want a pension? Pension saving is very valuable, necessary for most, to ensure you've cash in your older years. There are tax advantages too, in simple terms... You automatically get 20% tax relief. So for every £80 you pay in, the Government adds £20, bringing your payment up to a total of £100 (see How much can I put in my pension?). If you pay tax at a higher rate (40% or 45%) you can usually claim the rest back via your tax return (which you need to do anyway). This isn't added to your pension but reduces your tax bill on other income. As for where to start, guidance or advice is always worthwhile, but as a primer see our beginners' guide to self-employed pensions. 11. State pensioner earning under £220/wk (or couple under £320/wk)? You could be due £1,000s. Nearly a million pensioners are missing out on pension credit, a vital benefit worth £1,000s a year for many, which tops up your income. Yet that's just the start - even if you'd only get a quid or two, I call pension credit a 'gateway benefit' as it opens the door to a whole host of other payments too such as cost of living support, council tax reductions, free TV licences and more which can be worth thousands. Do read Are you missing out on pension credit? 12. You can, & should, get FREE ONE-ON-ONE pensions help to answer your questions No doubt after reading this you'll have questions. Thankfully though, pensions are one area where FREE guidance is available, online, via chat or on the phone, funded by a govt levy on the finance industry. Where to get free guidance: Guidance means they can give an overview about what you need to think of, talk you through choices over tax, product types and options. Yet they can't pick specific products. I usually get good feedback about the service. - Age 50+: Pension Wise (you can even book a 60-min appointment). - Under 50: MoneyHelper has phone or webchat help.   For full help, pay for independent financial advice: Guidance is a great start, but for help picking the right products, you need a pensions financial adviser. You have to pay, which means this is generally best for larger pension pots, say £50,000+, but then as mistakes can cost £1,000s, it's worth it. See how to find a financial adviser. 13. Annuity rates are at their highest for years, but NEVER just grab the one from your pension provider. Now here's a clever idea: just imagine that with your pot of money saved up in a pension (company or private) you could buy a product that gives you the security of a fixed, sometimes inflation-linked, income each year for the rest of your life. You can, it's called an annuity. It used to be the way almost everyone took their pension, but then new 'pension freedom' rules meant the mandate changed. The problem with annuities is while the idea is good, the rates have been pants. Yet with interest rates rising, annuities have become an option again for some, for some of their money (especially useful when older, say, 75+). When a few years ago every £100,000 of pension savings would only get you £4,000/yr of income, in the same circumstances now it'd get £6,000. Though do get guidance/advice to ensure it's right for you. There are some key rules if you're considering it though. DON'T just get an annuity from your pension provider without checking elsewhere (start with a quick annuity comparison), as you could be locking in many £1,000s less each year for life. DO remember if you've health issues, or are a smoker, you may be able to get a special higher rate. 14. It's important to know when you're likely to die. You can currently take your private pension money at age 55 (rising to 57). Yet one big question is how long you'll need it to last. - Spend it all too soon, and you'll have a poor retirement. - Be overly cautious, especially when you first retire, and you'll have a worse lifestyle at the time when you can most enjoy it. Don't underestimate your longevity - your health, genetics all affect it, but your current age is the single most important factor. The Govt has a basic tool, the life expectancy calculator, as a start point. Here's the situation for someone aged 65... 15. Important. Taking money out of your pension can be very taxing, if you do it the wrong way. Don't start taking money out without first getting guidance, as get it wrong and some pay £10,000s more than they need to in tax. My swiss roll 'taking your pension' explanation (yes, the sponge cake) may help you understand it (and make you peckish). 16. Woman aged 70+? You may be due £10,000s back due to errors in your state pension. 100,000s of married or now divorced/widowed women on the 'old' state pension (those who hit state pension age before 2017) are due big bucks due to pension system errors, mainly as they didn't get the cut of their husbands' pensions due. It's often about if the wife receives under 60% of the husband's state pension. There's a full eligibility list in Are you one of 100,000+ women missing out on £1,000s of state pension? Many will now automatically be refunded, so I want to highlight situations where you have to claim. You got divorced AFTER reaching state pension age, and haven't had your pension reassessed. Your husband turned 65 before 17 March 2008 and you get less than 60% of his basic state pension. You're a married woman who's on zero state pension, getting a small amount of additional state pension / SERPS. As Annette emailed: "I watched your programme saying that a married woman's state pension should be 60% of their husband's and found mine fell short. I wrote to the Pension Service and have just been advised I've been underpaid since Nov 2008 and will shortly receive £17,202.26 into my account. Thank you so much."  17. Should you consolidate your private or company pension? This was one of the most asked questions when I did my pensions show. The advantage is it's easier to manage and keep track of one pension, but I'm afraid there's no simple solution. As financial planner Sarah Lord told me on my show, it mainly depends on...  - Will charges on the consolidated pension be cheaper than now? - How the investment choices compare and your attitude to risk - Are there any exit penalties or hidden benefits that apply to your current schemes? This is a good reason to get some guidance or advice (see above for how) before you do anything, as get it wrong and it can cost you. For more explanation read our Pension need-to-knows guide. 18. On a final salary pension? Be careful cutting your hours before retiring. If you're thinking of reducing your hours, check your scheme's rules before you agree to a pay cut. A few rules state that it's literally a percentage of your final salary - in which case dropping hours could cost you large. Do check before making a decision. PS: Thanks to the MoneyHelper team and independent pension adviser Charles Riches of London-based Capital Asset Management for giving this a read-through to double-check everything for me.

 

 

DON'T believe the fake 'Martin Lewis' or 'MSE' ads Lots of scam ads litter social media and even newspaper websites - some of these lie that we or Martin promote Bitcoin, binary trading etc. See Fake ads warning.

 

 

 

New. FREE £200 cash switch bonus  Now THREE banks pay proper money to tempt you to switch, so unless you like a smooch with your current bank, why not take the cash... There's a new - or more accurately, returning - player to the bank-switching price war. HSBC's joined NatWest in offering newbies £200, with First Direct close behind. Switching is usually quick and easy. You need to use the seven (working) day switch service, which moves all direct debits and standing orders over for you, closes your old account, and ensures any payments to it are auto-forwarded for at least three years. Full explanation in Best bank accounts, but at a glance... Top newbies' FREE CASH switching offers You must pass a not-too-harsh credit check and the account switched must be from a different banking group Account Key perks Why should I get it? New. HSBC Advance* Customer service:  37% 'great' - FREE £200 - 5% linked regular saver Joint top upfront cash. A simple deal, switch to it and you can get £200 added to your account within 30 days of opening. To qualify for this: Switch 2+ direct debits / standing orders, and pay in £1,500+ once within the first 60 days (which you can then withdraw). See full HSBC eligibility info & review. NatWest Reward*  RBS Reward* Customer service: NatWest 62% 'great', RBS 46% 'great' - FREE £200 - £3/mth cashback - 6.17% linked regular saver Joint top upfront cash and possible £3/mth cashback. Switch to one of these sister banks and you can get £200 paid within 16 days of opening. To qualify for the free cash: Pay in £1,250+ and use the app within 60 days. The account has a £2/mth fee, but you can get £5/mth cashback - leaving you net £3 up. To qualify for the cashback: Each month, pay in £1,250 (equivalent to a £16,250/yr salary), have 2+ direct debits of £2+ going out and use its app. See full NatWest/RBS eligibility info & review.  First Direct* Customer service:  90% 'great' - FREE £175 - TOP rated for service - 7% linked regular saver - £250 0% overdraft for many Free £175 and top for service (and 0% overdraft). First Direct's been top or near it in every service poll we've ever done - and smashes the other bonus-paying banks for service - so it's a pretty safe option. To qualify for the free £175: Pay in £1,000+ once within three months (you can withdraw it straight after). It's also strong if you're sometimes overdrawn up to about £400, as the free cash pays some of this off and then £250 is interest-free (though for big overdrafts, see our full cut your overdraft help). See full First Direct eligibility info & review.   Urgent. Only three weeks left to also grab a year's 1% cashback on almost all spending. Until Tuesday 9 May, the Chase account* gives a year's unlimited 1% cashback on almost all normal daily debit card spending. While it is a bank account, in reality it's just an app and a card, and you needn't switch to it to get it, so just use it alongside your main bank, and top it up for spending. It doesn't do a hard credit-check either. It's also the top debit card for spending abroad, and gives 3.1% AER interest on up to £500,000 in a linked easy-access savings account. After Tuesday 9 May (and/or after your first year), the cashback will be capped at £15/mth and to get it you'll then need to pay in £500+/mth. See full info in our Chase bank review. Done right, you can make £100s or £1,000s by repeatedly switching banks, just like Lynn, who emailed us to say: "We took the plunge at the end of last year and made our first switch - and have moved again twice since then. We've made a grand total of £1,000. Great tip - thank you."

 

Warning. Expect your mobile to go off 3pm Sunday. It's an alarm and warning as a test of a new emergency system. Full info on whose phones will ring, what it'll sound like and more. Free Asda £5. Newbies to its rewards app can get a £5 voucher to spend on almost anything. Free fiver Top easy-access savings now 3.55% - highest since 2009. App-only Chip 3.55% is top payer though it can be fiddly to operate, closely followed by app-only Tandem 3.5%* (includes a 0.35% top-up). Top manageable online is Family Building Society 3.4%. Top big name is Post Office 3.22% (operated by Bank of Ireland UK). Sainsbury's 3.22%* and Nationwide 3%* also have strong rates, but limit you to three penalty-free withdrawals a year. All rates are AER variable. Full info and far more options, including fixes that pay more, in Top savings. Have the 'Martin Lewis' scammers finally been uncovered? A BBC investigation has lifted the lid on those behind the online scam ads featuring MSE's founder, and how they do it. See 'Martin Lewis' scammers. New. 50GB mobile Sim for £8/mth - cheapest we've ever seen. MSE Blagged. With unlimited minutes & texts through Smarty (Three's no-frills network), and a rolling one-month contract, so you can cancel at any time. Want a different network / data amount / handset? Use our Cheap Mobile Finder. Can you buy new clothes second-hand, such as £197 bodysuit £6, £36 Asos dress £3? Read more in MSE Olivia's Buy new, second-hand? blog. Invest £50, get a FREE £50 back. 2,500 more available. This frankly ridiculous Wealthify deal was popular last time, so we've got 'em to extend it. Newbies putting £50+ into Wealthify's robo-investments get £50 cashback after a year. So invest £50, wait, and then you get your money back, so whatever the investment's worth in a year is a win. Even if it flops, at worst you break even. For full details, including up to £700 back if you've more to invest, see Robo-investing cashback. Ends Sun. 5p a litre off fuel at Morrisons when you spend £35 in store or online. It's back again, but this time for online shopping too, making the supermarket cheapest for filling up in most locations we checked. Cheap fuel

 

 

BLAGGED FOR MSE - 50GB Smarty Sim (Three network) for £8/mth Ends Sunday	DID YOU MISS? - Sainsbury's launches 'Nectar Prices' - any good? - Are solar panels worth it? How to crunch the numbers - Fixed mortgage rates now from 3.8% - should you fix? - A YEAR's 2for1s at 416 UK gardens with £8.50 mag - See Hamilton for £10, Cabaret for £25 & more

 

 

Are your savings safe? 8 key rules Bank collapses are back. The Bank of England is considering boosting protections. If you've savings, ensure you know how safe they are... If you've got savings, it's hard to work out how solvent banks are. Even City specialists - whose job it is - get it wrong. So instead we and you should focus on how your money is protected, in the unlikely event that things do go wrong. To help, we have 8 key rules to ensure your nest-egg won't fall from the tree - and there are more in our protecting your cash guide. First though, here's Martin's upsum of what's going on. Martin: Banks are safer than money under the mattress - but nowt's perfect  The 2007/8 collapses of Bradford & Bingley, Northern Rock, Icesave etc were a saver's nightmare. Though thankfully with these, the protections worked and no consumers lost money. Yet bank failure is rearing its ugly head again with the collapse of tech-specialist Silicon Valley Bank, and two other US banks - and a crisis at one of Europe's biggest, Credit Suisse. We're not immune either: with Silicon Bank's UK arm, the Government needed to follow its now tried and tested 'bank gone wrong' first option of porting all the business's savings across to HSBC, to protect them. Bank of England Governor Andrew Bailey says he doesn't believe we face a systemic banking crisis - his general premise is UK solvency rules are robust - though clearly he is worried that we're falling behind on protections, especially important for smaller banks. He's just said: "The US authorities have announced a review of their deposit insurance system [they're protected up to equivalent of £200,000 - ML]. In the UK, the Bank is also considering improvements to ours. It has so far focused on the speed of payouts [here you get savings back in 7 working days - ML]. Going further and considering increasing deposit protection limits [currently up to £85,000 - ML] could have cost implications for the banking sector as a whole." Confidence in savings is crucial for a functioning economy. So far the UK has held up pretty well. Yet with many people having built up bigger savings during the pandemic, and some older people sitting on nest-eggs to hold on to over retirement, ensuring more money is protected would be a welcome boost. PS: If you're wondering about stuffing money under the mattress, even top home insurance policies only cover up to £1,000 in cash, whereas savings are protected up to £85,000 at no cost to you. Now on to the safety rules... You are protected up to £85,000 per person per UK-regulated financial institution. Almost all banks operating in the UK - including foreign-owned such as Santander - are covered by the UK Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS) protection of up to £85,000 per person. Yet a few EU-owned banks opt for a 'passport scheme', which is where they rely on their home country's protection scheme. So it's always worth checking what the licence is, and that it's not a fraud, before you put money in. See how to check a bank's protection. The protection is per institution, not per account. You can have as many accounts as you like with a bank: savings, current account, cash ISAs - but you're only protected up to a total £85,000 in all of them added together. This is about savings - in other words, deposit protection. Other money storage & investments aren't protected the same way. Current accounts, savings accounts, cash ISAs are all covered but cash on a prepaid card and cash saved in a Christmas hamper club are not. You're also not covered if your investment drops in value (that's the risk of investing), but there are some protections if the investment firm itself goes bust. See What's covered by the FSCS? Many banks are part of 'groups' & sometimes they share protection... sometimes they don't. So check. Halifax and Bank of Scotland are both part of Lloyds Banking Group and those two banks have an £85,000 protection limit combined. However, Royal Bank of Scotland and NatWest, both part of the NatWest Group, have separate £85,000 protection for each bank, though Ulster Bank, also part of the group, shares its protection with NatWest. It's all about their banking licences, so to help use our Which banks are linked? tool. You're protected up to £170,000 in a joint account. Two names mean double the protection. But understand that FSCS considers it to be half each. So if you've £90,000 in a joint account (that's £45,000 each) you could also have up to £40,000 of your own in the same bank and still be protected. You get £1 million protection for six months for life events, such as selling a property, getting an inheritance. This special provision is to cover life events that could lead to you having a temporarily high balance. See life events for full info on what's covered. Option a). Keeping larger savings safe. Spread your cash across multiple institutions. For perfect protection, save no more than a little above £80,000 per institution (the extra bit gives room for interest). Our Top savings accounts guide has the best players. If you're lucky enough to have millions saved, and it's too much to spread in £85,000 pots, then spreading it across a number of accounts mitigates the risk of all eggs in one basket anyway. Option b). Keeping larger savings safe. Put it in state-owned bank NS&I. All money in NS&I is fully backed by the Government, rather than just up to £85,000 with other institutions. And thankfully right now it has some very competitive accounts, such as its 4% guaranteed growth bond, basically a 1yr fixed rate savings account you can put up to £1m in (not that far behind the 4.56% top payer). And if you're asking what if the UK Government goes bust - well, then we'd all have bigger problems.

 

On heating oil, LPG or other fuels? Rule change means more can get £200 towards bills. Most should've received the £200 alternative fuel payment automatically in February. If you didn't, you can apply for it but you previously needed receipts since Sept 2022. Now, after Martin raised the issue of those with earlier receipts with Energy Secretary Grant Shapps, this date has been made earlier, 1 June 2022. See alternative fuel support. New beauty 'dupes', such as £46 Chanel bronzer vs £4.50 Primark lookalike. MSE Rhiannon shows you where to find much cheaper alternatives to expensive make-up brands. Beauty dupes 'I've earned £1,000 in extra interest after ditching and switching fixed cash ISAs.' Our success of the week comes from Paul, who used our Should I ditch my fixed cash ISA? calculator to see if it was worth switching his savings. "I was pleasantly surprised. I had two fixed-rate ISAs which incurred early closure penalties of £346 in total. But by switching to a new ISA with a better interest rate I'm gaining an extra £1,328 interest, so I'm better off by £982. Many thanks." If we've helped you save money (on this, or owt else), please send us your MoneySaving successes. Saturday only. £3 IMAX films, including Avatar: The Way of Water, Top Gun: Maverick and more. At 26 Cineworld locations. See this and 22 more cinema savers. FREE Green Living Live tickets (normally £15). London Excel 29 Apr to 7 May. 75,000 available. Green Living Live

 

 

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AT A GLANCE BEST BUYS 0% balance transfers Longest 0%: NatWest - 30 months 0% 2.99% fee (23.9% rep APR) No-fee 0%: NatWest - 19 months 0% (23.9% rep APR) Best bank accounts £200 to switch + linked 5% regular saver: HSBC £200 to switch + £36/year cashback: NatWest / RBS Top savings accounts Top easy access: Chip 3.55%, min £1 Top one-year fix: Allica Bank 4.56%, min £10,000 Car insurance Try our Car Insurance Compare+ tool Cheap loans Cheapest for £5,000 to £7,499: AIB (NI) (apply), 5.6% rep APR Cheapest for £7,500 to £15,000: HSBC (apply*), 4.8% rep APR Broadband top picks Standard (10Mb+): Shell Energy '£15.77/mth' Fibre (30Mb+): Shell Energy '£19.66/mth' Fast fibre (55Mb+): Shell Energy '£19.71/mth' On universal credit or similar? Check all discounted social tariffs Cheap Sims Up to 3GB data: Lycamobile, '£2.38/mth' for 3GB 4GB to 9GB data: Lycamobile, '£3.35/mth' for 5GB 10GB+ data: Smarty, £8/mth for 50GB

 

THIS WEEK'S POLL How much do you have in cash savings? Bank collapses are back in the news right now and the Bank of England is considering upping savers' protection above the current limit of £85,000 per institution (see Are my savings safe? above). So this week we want to know, how much money do you have in cash savings? Vote in this week's poll. Most households are paying at least £500 in monthly bills. Last week, we asked how much you spend each month on household bills (for example, energy, council tax and groceries - but excluding rent or mortgage), and how much they've increased by. Of the 4,950 respondents, more than half said they spend at least £500 a month, with 27% spending between £501 and £750 a month. The most common increase was between £50 and £150 a month - 23% saw a rise at this level over last year's bills. See full poll results.

 

 

MSE NEWS - Top story: Why energy bills are rising this month despite 20% price-hike postponement - Prepayment meter installations banned for over-85s and those with chronic illnesses - Tesco shopper? The Clubcard app is closing - don't get caught out at the checkout - Barclays will now close 84 bank branches this year - full list plus alternatives

 

 

MONEY MORAL DILEMMA Should I tell HR that I'm now able to approve my own work expenses? My boss is off work with a long-term illness, and responsibility for approving leave and expenses for his team has fallen to me. I submitted overtime hours for work I did over Easter using our HR system, and they came straight back to me to approve. My instinct is to point this out to payroll and avoid any conflict of interest. But moving these approvals to someone else could take months - my employer is quite slow with stuff like that - and in the meantime, I won't get paid for my overtime or expenses. What should I do? Enter the Money Moral Maze: Should I tell HR that I can now approve my own expenses? | Suggest a Money Moral Dilemma

 

 

MSE TEAM BLOG - MSE Forum highlights: Bonds, blossom & bailing builders

 

 

MARTIN'S APPEARANCES (WED 19 APR ONWARDS) Wed 19 Apr - Good Morning Britain, ITV, presenting from 6am Wed 19 Apr - Ask Martin Lewis, BBC Radio 5 Live, 1pm Tue 25 Apr - This Morning, phone-in, ITV, 10.20am MSE TEAM APPEARANCES (SUBJECT TBC) Tue 25 Apr - BBC Radio Cambridgeshire, Mid-morning with Jeremy Sallis, from 10.45am

 

18-YEAR-OLD KIPPERS AND PRE-WAR SUGAR - WHAT'S THE OLDEST FOOD ITEM YOU'VE FOUND?  That's all for this week, but before we go... One unnamed MSE team member recently admitted to finding a packet of jelly from September 1996 when cleaning out their kitchen cupboards. So, we asked you for the oldest food item that you've found - and we're relieved it's not just MSE that holds on to ancient grub! MoneySavers reported baking powder from the '70s, Bovril dated 1988, almond extract that expired in 1993 and 18-year-old frozen kippers. One MoneySaver helped their grandmother clean and discovered sugar dated before World War Two - and was shocked to realise their grandma may have stockpiled when rationing was introduced. Share your old-food stories in our Facebook and Twitter conversations. We hope you save some money, The MSE team

 

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