A frugal life is an easy life!

T-Mobile, it has been revealed, are "working closely with" the Information Commissioner's office, over the passing on of millions of people's data and thousands of personal records of its customers.
The Information Commissioner's office, have interviewed staff after entering company premises with search warrants.

"Justice Minister Michael Wills has said that there was a "strong case" for introducing custodial sentences to prevent the illegal data trade" - the problem here is the law is clear but not being applied.
Under the Data Protection Act, information is not allowed to be passed or sold to any other company, without the individual's permission. Where the law fails is that only a "successful prosecution" results in an upto £5000 fine.
As anyone who has been cold called and requested information of where their own personal details have been received from, only to have the phone put down on them, knows, proving that companies have your personal data on their systems is hard enough, but to prove they sold it on, is almost impossible!

Also under the Data Protection Act, information is not allowed to be stored or transferred to or used, in countries that do not have the Data Protection Act, or similar legislation in place.
As we have all witnessed from the banks, insurance firms and other big businesses, they are passing on and using our information in countries not protected in the same way we are in the UK.

To be fair to T-Mobile, my family and I have been with o2 for many years now, two weeks before our contract is to be renewed, we get cold calls, from random businesses trying to sell us a new contract.
When I ask where they got my private number from, they put the phone down on me. I suspect that this happens to customers on other networks as well?

I've listened to the debates all over the news, radio and TV this week over the Y factor and the votes. I have heard a few different arguments about what was thought to be the reasons for it.

Tonight, as I post, I have on my Live Aid dvd, the original one from 1985.
Already after just four artists, we have had an angry Bob Geldof, a bouncing status quo and a youthful Paul Weller belting out his own hits with the style council.
It occured to me, that back then we had huge talent around, who made their money by selling records, if the records were not up to it, they made little money.
The artist was king, big business courted them, gave them a six figure record contract and the artist made their own albums and put them out to the public. If the public were lucky and the album was good enough, then maybe one or two successful singles came from each album, regardless, the promotion was relatively non existant, bar a guest appearance on swapshop or the like.

Would any of those artists I watched growing up through the 70s and 80s, have put up with such interference from record companies and big business? I doubt it!

In today's world, big business no longer needs the artist, they could put a tin of carrots on stage, as long as the promotion and image caught the public mood, the tin of carrots will make them big profits.
This is destroying creativity, which is why the more I think about it, the more I realise just how lucky my generation has been to have such varied styles and great artists coming through, the likes of which I'll never ever see again.
The question is, will the young people of today ever see it either? Or has musical talent gone forever? :no:

Halifax and Bank of Scotland ATM cards are not working this morning, as their systems have crashed.
This includes terminals in shops and stores.

The system could be off for many hours it is being reported, not good for saturday shopping!

Two sets of figures came out this week from our mighty leaders:

1. Unemployment figures increased by just over 30,000.
2. The number of homes repossessed in the UK rose by 3% in the third quarter of the year to 11,700 (CML). However, the figure was lower than the 12,700 repossessed in the first quarter of the year.

What I have read everywhere on blogs, in the media, on the news, etc. is that these figures/reports are given a gloss.
"Encouraging jobless figures" and "falling repossessions..."

I don't like the gloss at all - if you read number 2, it is deliberately misleading people, first implying that the 11,700 is the total for the year, when the second part clearly reveals that the 11,700 is for the last three months only. What is the total amount of repossessions for the year so far?

Every single repossession is a disaster for that person and their family, no gloss should be put on the figures or how they are presented. They certainly should not be dropped into news reports as "encouraging" just because the rate of unemployed/repossessions is slowing down compared to a time when the country was dropping into recession!
It may have escaped the powers that be, that no matter how they dress it up, the figures are still increasing!

I was listening to the radio in the car today, hearing Martin Lewis (self promoter extraordinare) declaring that he is putting his foot down over people spending too much at Christmas.
A person he has "helped" with their finances (pushing extra internet traffic through his website no doubt) spends £600 on presents for their children's classmates!
I do not believe that there are people out there that do this, to this extent.

Our Christmas' are always frugal.
Presents:
For three adults in our home, we place a £10 limit on gift buying.
A compulsary rule is that we all go out together on Christmas Eve and see how many presents we can get for this £10.
We make the most of the last minute afternoon quick sales and we knock every shop/store down in price, or we simply leave it and buy somewhere else.

Food and drink:
This plays a huge part in our family Christmas. Money is paid each week, to our local butchers and every year, at around 7am on Christmas Eve, we head on down to them and stock up on various top quality joints of meat.
A large chicken is a must (we do not eat turkey in our house)
Fillet steaks
Large pork roll joint (that cuts in to two, one for freezing)
Slices of fresh, fat-free, braising steak
Chicken breast fillets
Large topside joint (with hardly a trace of fat running through it)
Maybe some lamb shanks or lamb cutlet chops.
We have enough meat to last two weeks, for around £50. If we were stuck at home for whatever reason, we could easily survive for about a month, as none of this meat is thrown away, we make curries, plate pies, etc.

Fruit and vegetables:
Fresh is the name of the game and we hit our regular market stall and stock up.
Vegetables a plenty and a huge variety of fruits, all fresh (as they have to sell everything or it will go off!) bartering with them of course, normally costs about £20 for enough fruit and veg to last well over a week. Don't forget the dates!

Fish:
We don't really do salmon, etc, in our house.
What we do is visit our local small fishmonger (small as in he has a small market stall, not one of the bulk sellers) for a big piece of fresh cod (enough for three meals) and some fresh plaice fillets (leave the skins on them and shallow fry mmmmmm)
Maybe pick up some kippers or finny haddock as well.

Supermarket shopping:
Supermarkets lose out to us as customers. Using the outdoor market traders and a local butchers who slaughter their own meat, we not only save pounds each week and at Christmas, but we save huge amounts of money when we go to our nearest supermarket.
As we have already purchased our meat, fruit, vegetables and fish by the time we land there, we walk straight past a third of the store, so we are not affected by any marketing.

During these frugal times, when everyone is cutting back and watching their pocket money, it always astounds me that the public do not spot that the only businesses employing more people and making increased profits are the supermarkets.
The supermarkets release statements everytime their profits are released to the public, just this month we have seen Sainsburys making hundreds of millions in profits in the first six months of the year, alongside other reports that halloween sales were up and there is a "toys sales war between supermarkets and competition is fierce!"
Utter rubbish this is, a smokescreen.

The first six months of the year didn't include halloween!
The toy wars they speak of, are made up to hide the monopolies the big four supermarkets have in the market place.
The "big savings" they offer, are very little savings at all.
EXAMPLE: Fairy conditioner only £1 - all seems ok, but look at the bottle size!
Instead of the 1 litre size that is normally on sale, this "offer" the bottle is only 750ml!
So to buy the equivelent of 5 litres of the same fabric softner would be approx £6.50!
Even though I have access to a cash and carry, they are still quite expensive on the fabric softners, after VAT is added I'd be looking to pay between £3.80 - £4.20 for a five litre tub.

The only reason why supermarkets are making huge profits when the economy is tight, is because they are increasing their prices on our weekly shopping items, an appalling way to treat their customers!

Anyways, back to our frugal Christmas...

Once inside the supermarket and walking past a third of the store and avoiding all their marketing, we head for the branded bread (cheaper at our local garage by 10p per loaf) but as we are picking up some tinned goods and cat food, then it is no trouble to get three loaves and some teacakes (baps, buns, etc.)
Maybe some salted peanuts etc, then we are all done.

Total cost including presents (£10 spending limit each) is around £130 for enough top quality, branded, fresh food and presents.
The only thing we insist upon is a nice card, even better if the card is home made.
We save on these as well, we only use our friends on the local market, they charge around 99p for an individual card, whereas card shops and supermarkets charge around £1.50- £2 for the same card.
When it comes to our Christmas cards, then we buy lots and in advance and we can negotiate the prices we pay.

Christmas in our house is a very frugal one, our only expensive item we always get, is our Christmas tree, a six foot real tree which is the centre-piece of our front room for the Christmas season.
I make mince pies on Christmas eve, we have great food and drink for the two weeks or so of our Christmas holiday, we sleep in, we go sledging, we listen to carols and Christmas music, we visit our parents, and have our neighbours round. (This year I am going to try and roast some chestnuts)

It may well be a frugal Christmas, but in our house, it is how Christmas should be, not the useless product buying frenzy that businesses would have us believe.
It is not everyone's choice, for two weeks we eat, drink and be merry like kings and we turn no one away.