A frugal life is an easy life!

Exactly what is going on with Abbey national's online banking?

First, we cannot log on for 9 days - the page just states that "ebanking is offline at the minute, please try again later"
(There is nowhere to email or contact Abbey, only a phone line which the customer will be charged 4p per minute from a landline)
We rang the Abbey, three times, they couldn't tell us what was happening, after an hour on the phone, the third advisor said he would investigate and ring us back - this comes after he asked for our security pin number off the back of the debit card or refused to look into the account!
The Abbey advisor did not ring back.

I tried to log on, the evening of the tenth day without being able to even view our account.
I was greeted with a "one time passcode" - whereby Abbey have to have our mobile number, and send out an 8 digit code whenever we attempt to use a transaction, via online banking.
I use it to pay seperate bills every month, this would mean that I must use 8 new codes just to pay them.
Clearly not happy with this, I ring the helpline number again and speak to a lady who informs me that she has no idea what is going on with online banking, but states that everyone with Abbey must now use a "one time passcode" - but has no idea what it is or when it will be implemented!
We are given an email address for customer services, to write to and get urgent information.
I received an automatic email stating they had received my complaint and enquiry and would be back in touch within 24 hours.
TWO DAYS LATER - still no contact!

Tonight, I finally concede that there is no way around this farce, so log in and register a mobile number on screen. I click next and it now allows me access to our account.... or does it?

Now I am faced with a screen that shows an old instant saver account that we have had for twenty years, containing £3.50 (I had forgotten we even had it!)
Our current account that we use every week, has suddenly vanished, there is no trace of it, no doubt another hour on the phone tomorrow, speaking to advisors that haven't got a clue what is going on and no inclination to find someone who they work with, that has the mental capacity of a wasp, to find out!

Someone please tell me: Exactly how does this kind of practice towards its customers, permit the Abbey (santander) to keep its consumer credit license and continue trading as a bank?

Looking out of the window in October, it is dull, cloudy and windy. Not much opportunity to be frugal and thrifty there then?
Oh yes there is...

Bang in a one or two loads of washing and get it out on the line to dry.
If it rains then it rains and you will have to use the dryer or your radiators, as you would have anyway, but if it stays dry or only drys your clothes till they are damp, then it is indeed a frugal saving!

Each dryer load, (even if you have an AAA rated energy saving top of the range dryer) costs you around 80p per load, if you put a load in straight from the washing machine.
Our house isn't especially big on washing loads, so I took a count one week.
I discovered that we do 8-9 loads of washing per week, sometimes more.

If I dry just 6 loads on the line in a dull, windy October, then I have saved my household £2.40 - this adds up to £9.60 saving per month and a whopping saving of £124.80 over the course of a year!
I am only counting for drying 6 out of 8-9 washing loads on the line outside. In summer I should be able to dry all 9 loads outside, increasing the saving even more.

Sounds obvious? Of course it does, yet on our part of the street of 20 houses, only three houses, put their washing out to dry!
On our street alone, if the other 17 houses, all had 8 loads of washing per week, those using a dryer to dry their washing would be paying the electricity companies an extra £2,121.60 - WOW!
Imagine that on a town scale... it is a staggering amount of money the electricity businesses are making off the back of householders. Electricity companies are businesses that exist in our homes to take our money off us.

By being organised and taking five minutes of effort per load of washing, I have beaten our electricity company!
With just this one single saving made, I have got a free TV license for the year and still left me with change in my pocket!

Frugality, thrift, penny pinching, etc, is not a "way of life" it is a way of thinking. A state of mind that always questions motives, reasoning, prices.

In the words of Norman Stanley Fletcher - "It is all about little victories!"

What is the purpose of a business?
To get as much money as possible, from your pocket into their pockets!

From voucher code websites to supermarkets, from price comparison websites to "Reality" TV shows asking you to phone in, one thing and one thing only makes them tick... PROFITS!
If you want to save yourself money, then you and only you, can keep your money in your pocket. You have to think in exactly the same way as a business approaches you (it's customer).
A "sale" is only a sale if it is good value - ie, if something is £1 one week, then increases in price the next week to £1.10 - only for it to be reduced to £1.05 the next week in a "sale" - then it is not good value is it!

Do not believe anything you are told, be sceptical ALWAYS.
Future postings in this section will be basic methods for saving money.
Some just require better organisation, some frugal tips will involve a small change in the way things are done, but all of them will allow you to save your hard earned cash and keep it in your pocket!

REMEMBER: It is business against you in the race to get your money!

Now that I have been banished to the front doorstep as we have a new baby, I see the neighbourhood kids more than I would normally do.
We live in a cul-de-sac and the neighbourhood kids are the life of "the street" - always something happening and it is guaranteed to be good fun.

I love kids, I used to be one, they have an approach to life that is so open and uncomplicated. No matter what their age, their imagination knows no bounds, it is disheartening to know that I will never be a kid again. I have always plodded on through life having a laugh, I don't take many things seriously and have found that providing the local kids with a lend of my cricket bat, football, footpump for their bikes, etc, has always brought some laughs.
Half the problems with society today and breakdown of family units can be eased by not dismissing kids out of hand, but remembering that they are just as adults used to be, before the world of work, money and pressure landed upon us.

Occasionally I will mention the local kids on here, their names limited to initials, such as K, D, M, etc. of course for their safety, as is the way in this "modern" world.

Anyways, this said, I bumped into D this afternoon... he has just started senior school (or high school as it is now called) I asked how he was doing at school, he loves it!
What is his favourite lesson? Maths!
Wow that's unusual, what do you want to do when you leave school? I want to join the army and fight for my country... with that, off he went up the street with his football cards.

A very respectable career choice, if only our armed forces were allowed to be armed forces and not glorified policemen, I'll let others inform him of this, I don't want to shatter any of D's dreams.

Have you come across the "new" banking security feature, one time passcode?
Abbey banking, have restricted my account for 9 days for online banking, posting the message, "The ebanking service is off line at the moment, please try again later."

I rang them, spoke to three customer service advisors (I use that term loosely) each did not know what was happening, but arranged to investigate and call me back.
No call came back, so I attempted to log in last night and came across the page to register for a one time passcode.
Now I am all for improved security but I already have to enter a card number, passcode and registration number, do I really need now to have this?

Without registering, banking online becomes a "view only" option, unable to make transactions, move money between accounts, pay bills online, etc.
Which defeats the object of banking online I think. Of course, if I want to arrange my banking without this I must use telephone banking, which a part of the phone charges goes to the Abbey bank!

To register for the one time passcode, you must give the Abbey your mobile phone number, so no doubt we can look forward to marketing texts being sent to my phone, no doubt we will be getting cold calls from them regarding loan products, etc.
My mobile phone is nobody's business but mine!
I don't have a mobile phone for the convenience of business to force me to use it for their benefit, I pay for it, it is for communicating with my family and friends.

Why should I have to either pay a minimum of £120 a year (to run a mobile phone), to use a banking service to manage my money, or not use the "new" service and walk across town everytime I want to pay a bill or pay Abbey in phone charges for using their telephone banking service, to control my own money?
Should I choose to register a mobile number with the Abbey, then each time I use ebanking to manage my account, they send out a passcode to my mobile to enter on their website.

It is fair to say I am raging and ranting about this, I do not care for giving away my information and privacy, to a business, bank, company, etc.
I do not trust them one bit when they state they won't use it for marketing or cold calls, every other business I know of has said this and it has not been true.
Some companies even pharm your email address when you visit their website and then sell it on to other companies, have you ever tried to stop companies from using your information to market products against you?
Every tea time we get the automated call, stating "we can wipe off all your debts," my email is spammed by the likes of comparethemeerkat, even though I have never submitted an email address to them or used their business (they can call it price comparison, I'd call it a business that makes money from all of us and increases our premiums).

Then we have the security aspect - look at how much of a "success" chip and pin has been!
Billions of pounds to implement the system, everyone sets up codes etc, and yet when the figures come out, fraud on credit and debit cards is at record levels.
Banks have even refused to pay out thousands of customers because the thief has managed to aquire the victim's passcode, so the bank pass the buck and blame the customer.

The onus is always on us the customers, to change and do things differently. Banks are greedy money making institutions and nothing else!

Other posts:
Abbey online banking nightmare
Abbey banking farce continues