Personal interests

An ad for a Walkers crisps competition which offered 20,000 holidays has been banned after more than 100 complaints to the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) that the trips were virtually impossible to win.

After a spate of high-profile data breaches, including those at social networking sites LinkedIn and MySpace, which have affected hundreds of millions of accounts in total, it's important to know whether you've been hacked. Thankfully, there's a quick, free and easy way to see if you're at risk from a number of recent data breaches.

Restaurants could be forced to take discretionary service charges off the menu if a Government proposal to introduce an 'opt in' tipping system is served up following a public consultation this summer.

Thorpe Park is to release a further 4,000 12p tickets to those who missed out last month after a technical fault meant the theme park's high-profile ticket promotion started earlier than advertised. However, you'll need to have actually entered your details at around 10am on the day the deal went live to be eligible – others who missed out won't be so lucky.

Bargain hunters were left furious after a promotion for 12p Thorpe Park tickets started earlier than advertised, meaning those who tried at the planned time missed out.

Normally we're about easy, sensible or clever things to stop you wasting cash. Yet today, to channel the Godfather of Soul... let's take it to the bridge now, like a MoneySaving machine (get on up).

If you're searching online, beware – Google has increased the number of paid-for ads shown at the top of many search results, meaning on some smaller screens that's all you see without scrolling further down the page.

Being frugal on a first date is officially the "new sexy", after a poll of more than 5,000 MoneySavingExpert users found eight out of ten think it's acceptable to use a 2for1 voucher to pay for dinner.

Tastecard customers have complained about being stung by a £30 fee for yearly membership they didn't want, after phone lines to cancel were busy or the firm failed to act on emailed cancellation requests.