Archive: MoneySavingExpert's Money Tips Email

Spend a penny for less - cut the cost of your water bills
Here's my simple rule of thumb; if there are more bedrooms in your house than people it's very likely fitting a water meter (it's free) could save you £100s a year. Completely Re-researched Article: Cut the Cost of Water  Related Articles: Cheapest UK Home Phone Provider, Cut The Cost of your Mobile Also: Don't Switch Gas & Elec Provider

Travelodge rooms for a tenner Ends 4 Nov. Tennertastic!

MUST READ IF YOU SPEND ON CHILDCARE! Possible £1000 plus annual saving
There's a little mentioned Govt scheme with huge benefits. Until filming for Make Me Rich, when I suggested a family did it, I didn't realize the scale of savings - over £1,000 per parent per year for them, and it's easy to do. Effectively childcare costs come from your pre-tax not post-tax salary. It's so huge I wanted to do a full article on it so here it is: Childcare Vouchers. Related articles: Nappy MoneySaving, Child Trust Funds (Special mini-mutterings)

DVD recorder £85 all-in Nowt clever, just a great Chat Forum spot. Can you beat it?

When you apply for credit, who do they ask? Brand new info
Three main credit reference agencies compile info on us. Apply for credit and lenders ask one or two of them for information.  As different agencies hold different details, its possible to boost your acceptability by picking a lender using the right agency. So I've complied a full Who Uses Who table. Related Article : Your credit rating, how it works, how to improve it

SPREAD THE SAVINGS! Pls suggest friends/family/colleagues get this email too

FLIGHTCHECKER SALES WATCH  Aprox £20 each way flights to Biarritz, Verona & the Loire. Flights are about 30p but taxes and charges add £20. Use the free FlightChecker to find the seats in seconds.

Swap your blood for ice cream A fab Chat Forum spot - seems like a fair deal!

Push Dixons, Currys and others into giving you a big discount
Buy anything from Dixons or Currys (and similar stores) and they'll try to flog you their Coverplan warranty. Generally it's a waste of money and you should say no. However, try to get 20-30% off the price of what you're buying if you take Coverplan - then take it out and cancel the policy. Details

Great Grants Hunt
Thousands of pounds worth of grants go unclaimed each year and they're available for all sorts of weird and wonderful projects - from energy-saving to studying. I thought I'd tap MoneySavers' collective knowledge to see what grants are up for grabs.  Add your ideas/read others Past Great Hunts:  Sat Nav, Pricebeaters Plus and Ways To Cut Back

Don't goggle at specs prices
Last week I asked how to get specs for less. Sharp-sighted MoneySavers'ideas included Irisoptical, Glassesdirect and Myoptics

Cheaper MOTs article - it sooo works!
Just received this email, which sums it up. "Heard you on Radio 2 and it reminded me my MOT was due. Ever since the onset of the MOT I've paid out every time. But I took your advice and rang Wakefield Council at 9.20am booked my car in for 2pm, collected it at 3pm. Passed first time ever - cannot be a coincidence." Article: Drive Down The Cost Of MOTs

Freeview users - are you getting the new More4 channel for free? Here's How

Free MoneySavingExpert.com car sticker
Someone emailed this week to say they'd spotted the sticker, checked out the site, thought it was great and wanted to know how they could get one too. Great stuff! Plus now we're wanted by the Police! Grab your own, Car Sticker Hunt

Board of the week: The Competitions Board
This board is about reporting and often providing answers for lots of free to enter competitions to see what you can win. Check out the Competitions Board and the I won! I won! I won! sub board to read the celebrations and the list of regularly available competitions.

MAKE ME RICH RESCHEDULING: ITV has rescheduled the transmission of my new series Make Me Rich.  It is now due to run every day for three weeks from 4th December at 2pm.

This week's Martin's Musings: Now UK's number 2 overall Money site
'Make Me Rich 12: The rain in Spain may cause plenty of pain', 'UK's number 2 overall money site', 'plugging another website, I nearly choked!' m'blogs (or RSS users access)

FINDERS KEEPERS POLL: You find a £50 note on the floor. What would you do? Vote or Discuss. Also, see last week's Loophole Lion or MoneySaving Mouse Poll results

That's it for this week.  However, as many of you might notice, there are some subtle changes being made to the look of the site at the moment, gradually it's sprucing up.  Yet someone with a certain political bent seems to have done their own version.  See what you think, read this post but I don't think i'm going to adopt it!

I hope you save some money

Martin