Save £547.50 per year!

Just take a minute to stop and think how much you spend each year on bottled water!

Lets say that you buy 1 bottle of water each day from a motorway service station. You could easily end up paying almost £600 a year for bottled water. This doesn't include bigger bottles for the house and your water rates!

Your granny would be turning in her grave at the thought of (1) the waste of money and (2) the waste of plastic

Why not dump your bottle today and purchase a reusable water bottle. I have done a bit of research and there's a reusable bottle, complete with a built in filter available at the Guardian's online shop. Click here to check it out



Have a look at Think Outside the Bottle.org
It's the simple things that make all the difference both to your pocket and to the environment. Buy a bottle now!

Pounds down the drain!

How often have you thought it would be such a good idea to wash the car, but just never got round to it?
How often have you driven in to get petrol or passed a car wash and thought - hmmmm it would only take a minute to wash the car.

The lack of action first time around is costing you money.

A bucket, sponge, car shampoo and elbow grease is much cheaper than your usual Bronze, Silver or Gold car wash tokens.

If you haven't got a bucket and sponge - go and buy one. Just think how many calories you will burn off washing the car.

Ps. If you haven't got a car - no need to go out and buy the bucket!!

Expensive Rumbling Tums

Every day our pockets and wallets are just hemorrhaging money!
Think about it - you pick up a "posh" coffee on your way to work - £1.80. Next you pop out to get a sandwich for lunch - that could amount to £4.50 with crisps and juice at least. Add on another £1.00 for the vending machine and you could be looking at £7.30 per day. Even more if you have another coffee in the afternoon.

£7.30 per day doesn't sound much - but just think what that is over a working year. almost £1500 per year. That would pay for a lovely holiday for you once a year!

It is even scarier if you think how much it costs for a 30 year working life - £85,000 +++

The solution: Buy yourself a packed lunch carrier - you can get them in most supermarkets for about £3.00 and then pack your own lunch. Remember it will only cost a fraction of the price above and be smart when you are doing your shopping.
Plan ahead for the week and buy in bulk to save money!

What about SKYPE? - Save money on your phone bills...

SAVE MONEY ON YOUR PHONE BILLS.

Have you heard about SKYPE?

So what is Skype?

Skype operates over the internet and offers free calls from SKYPE to SKYPE users and much much cheaper calls from SKYPE to Non SKYPE Users. If you use your home phone, or mobile, you should certainly investigate SKYE further.

You will need to have a broadband connection and a SKYPE phone. Phones can be purchased for as little as £27.00. It's sems to be really simple to connect the phone.

You can then phone or message them for free for as long as you like!

You can also use Skype through your computer’s broadband connection to phone land or mobile phones in many countries of the world at extremely competitive prices. A phone call from the UK to Italy currently 0.017 euros per minute! That’s less than 2p per minute!!!

So how do you get Skype

Firstly you need to download the Skype Software. This is really really easy and comes with a wizard to help you!

Next you need to choose a Skype name. This is the name people will use to call you on Skype. It’s that simple, all you need to do now is make a free test call.

This will check that your phone is set up correctly and your speakers are working.

You can then find friends who use Skype. Search by name, email address, location, or other criteria. You can also tell your friends about the services and get them on line and it won’t cost you anything to call each other.

Start making calls.

To call your friends simply double-click on their Skype name and you will be connected, just like your usual phone.

So what else can you do with Skype:

Video calling is simple to set up and offers a great way to see friends. This is ideal if you don’t see your family or friends regularly due to geography

Making a video call using Skype requires a webcam (in addition to your headset or speakers and microphone). These can be obtained really cheaply by clicking on the title above

Find the cheapest petrol in your area

I just paid £1.06 for my petrol at the Petrol station at the Forth Road Bridge! That's Mad!
I wasn't a very canny squirrel I'm afraid, as I should have checked the website that compares petrol prices in your area. www.petrolprices.com.
Have a look at the site and work out where in your area offers the cheapest petrol!
The website compares over 9000 petrol stations in the UK and on average has 8000 updates per day.

On Thursday 21st the lowest priced Petrol available was 99.9p and the most expensive 114.9.

House Sales - How much did it go for?

We had an email in from a Canny Squirrel with a superb mony savng tip.
Do you know how much your house is valued at? Do you want to know how much your neighbours sold their house for?

I discovered today that using the website www.ourproperty.co.uk you can view the prices of houses sold within a short radius of a particular postcode for free - as opposed to others, such as www.myhouseprice.com which charge. You still have to register, but you don't pay any money!

Canny Tip Number 3

I previously had a Tesco Clubcard Fob that I used to have on my Car Keys so that I could collect Clubcard points for the weeks shop and also for petrol, but as it was plastic and well used it snapped and I lost it. While I was getting a new card I wasn't using my loyalty card, so Tescos though that I had deserted them. Over the next couple of weeks, I started to get emails and mailshots through the post with discount vouchers, money off home delivery, free wine club membership. You name it, it arrived. So stop using your loyalty card for a couple of weeks, this will prompt the company to send you money off vouchers to tempt you back. Remember to keep all your receipts so that you can get the points for the two weeks added on at the end.

I suppose it just shows you how they analyse their loyalty card transactions and data.
TESCOS CLUBCARD
The picture above is of the Island of Skye - I took it last year just as the sun was setting. Have a look at http://www.highlandscapes.co.uk/ - there's a few others on there.

Canny Tip Number 2

If you have any Red wine left over (as if) freeze it in a freezer bag and use for gravy's or for cooking when required. If you are really mean empty your guests left over red wine into a freezer bag and freeze for the same purpose. This is what Nigella does!!!