Your own money saving tricks/tips?

I’d really like to know your own personal money management techniques, and how you use Emma in conjunction with them.
Do you use separate accounts for bills and weekly spending for example?

I know everyone has their own methods that work best for them and I’m always trying to learn new tricks :grin:.

I use:

:moneybag: Barclays for Current + ISA.
:credit_card: AMEX gold for credit card
:chart_with_upwards_trend: WealthSimple to invest

also have debit cards with all the challengers + curve + chip.

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Ok here goes

  • HSBC - been with them for 25+ years salary is paid here
  • Santander 123 - money transferred in for all household bills as it gets cash back on them
  • TSB Plus - current account but used as savings because until the end of July it was paying 5% up to £1,500 then drops to 3%
  • Starling and Monzo - £100 put on each every payday and it’s used for my lunches, coffee and bus journeys
  • Few credit cards, bog standard
  • curve kept in my wallet to save carrying loads of cards around
  • Chip - got up to the 5% now so gradually transferring my saving into there and of course
  • Emma to keep track of all of the above

@edoardomoreni
Is wealthsimple any good? Been tempted in the past but was told that unless you’ve a big deposit and can do large monthly investments it’s not as beneficial and a big of a waste!

I wouldn’t call myself an investor. I have a simple £50 direct debit to keep using/testing the integration in Emma. :wink: This is the thread with my current return: Wealthsimple Discussion & Feedback.

Why do people use these cards to pay for bus journeys? I see them a lot, but I kinda have a feeling, that’s not a primary account like in your case. :sweat_smile:

I don’t use Monzo as my primary because of the difficulty/charge for depositing cash.

Honestly? My Monzo and Starling accounts were first opened to see what other banks were doing in terms of banking app UX and account opening as my design/UX experience is within a building society where it’s savings accounts only and so not features heavy and only desktop and responsive. Essentially I was doing research.

Once opened, they were the first banks to do the whole ‘top up’ as well so I treat them almost like a budget now, I put money on each on payday and this will last me the month. My bus fare is £2.10 so whenever I don’t get a lift 90p goes into my coin jar or space. Likewise a coffee across the road from work is £2.30 so there’s another 70p ‘saved’

As much as I like both, and as slow as HSBC has been in terms of playing catch up with some features, I don’t think I’ll go the “full Monzo” or “full Starling” not yet at least

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Starling was the first bank account I had because when I moved here paperwork was…limited (pleasures of being an EU spouse). However, starling aced the account open and had/had customer service response times better than any I’ve seen elsewhere. However it’s brick and mortar for the salary. I wanted to go full starling but I need things like HSBC’s flexiloan (only for existing users-instant cash reusable loan w/ a lower interest rate than the credit card)

HSBC handles the the bills but Santander might take that. I’d keep them though because I want to move back to France and they’d help facilitate that.

Chip for savings

Nutmeg for lisa

They are other Finch apps I use like Circle for money transfer and of course Curve to manage my 15 or so pieces of plastic.

:scream::scream:

Am I the only one with Barclays and an Amex?

Well, I don’t have Barclays but I only use Amex for groceries (Tesco pay) or petrol (Tesco station) to collect Tesco points and auto redeem them for Avios/Executive Club points.

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:moneybag: 100% Monzo for salary/ rent/ bills/ ISA/ savings etc
:credit_card: not got one atm, but heard great things about AMEX from a few friends who are recent first-time users (@edoardomoreni would you recommend?)
:honeybee: Pensionbee for pension (just used it to combine two old pensions and setup a new monthly DD)
:chart_with_upwards_trend: AngelList/ Crowdcube/ Seedrs for early-stage investing, investor in Wealthify and use that occasionally, but always on the look out for alternatives.

Shared an office with Curve so have one of their cards, but never used it. Tried Chip, didn’t get on.

I use this one. :point_down:

http://amex.co.uk/refer/edoarmmiuw?XLINK=MYCP

It’s a bit expensive and I am not really into points/rewards. ehehe but I have grabbed a few offers like 10% cashback on TFL and Morrisons for a limited period.

My main reason to get an AMEX was to connect it on Emma.

ps: yes, that is my affiliate link. :rofl:

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  1. The most effective money saving technique for me is to do all my saving and/or investing immediately after getting paid and have this automated by standing order. Some refer to this as paying yourself first. I find I’ve been able to save/invest much more this way then when I used to wait and see how much I had left after bills and everyday spending.

  2. Since switching from cash to mainly contactless payments for everyday spending I’ve found that using a bank which provides instant balance updates and rich transaction information (Monzo in my case) has helped me be more mindful of my spending.

  3. I have accounts at several banks to take advantage of things like cashback on bill payments and high interest rates on current accounts and regular savers. The accounts that offer these features tend to require a minimum monthly deposit and I do that by automatically shuffling money between accounts once per month via standing order.

  4. Whenever I buy anything online I first check if I can get cashback on the purchase by going via Topcashback.

Because I use multiple banks and accounts (point 3), Emma is useful for me to see all transactions and accounts in one place.

WOW! That is impressive.

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I have AMEX. I got it purely for shopping at Costco. It is the only credit card they accept. And I get cashback on all purchases made at Costco.

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Yeah, I’ve been tempted with AMEX in the past as well for that very reason, the garage attached is normally quite cheap for petrol. Need to look into me thinks!

We find petrol to be a couple of pence cheaper at Costco than any of the other local petrol stations.

Hmm this paying yourself first thing sounds very interesting…I will delve deeper :grin:

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I use Nationwide (for Flex Plus benefits) as my salary and bills and then transfer the remainder over to my Starling account for day to day spending know I won’t accidentally go into my bill money. I also use Starling Goals for putting money aside for certain monthly or yearly erm goals.
I also use Moneybox for my LISA and Moneyfarm for my S&S ISA.