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Coronavirus has prompted a consumer rights conundrum. With everything from concerts to holidays cancelled, thousands of people are left having paid for something that isn’t going to happen.

Here our guest blogger, Emma Lunn takes a look at your rights to a refund during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Holidays

Travel has been a big victim of the virus. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office advised against all foreign travel on 17 March, with the restrictions now in place for an indefinite time period.

In theory, holidaymakers should be well protected against cancellations. ABTA rules state entitlement to a full refund for cancelled package holidays, while EU laws mean airlines must refund cancelled flights.

But, unfortunately, would-be travellers are struggling to get their money back from travel companies. According to Which [1] 20 of the UK’s largest operators are illegally with holding refunds that should be paid within 14 days.

Many holidaymakers are finding they are being fobbed off with vouchers or a credit note, or are being pressured to re-book their trip.

Frustrating as this is, industry bodies have warned that travel firms could go bankrupt if they paid out refunds straight away. As a result, various travel industry bodies are urging the Government to step in a support the travel industry.

Sporting events and concerts

The UK’s big summer of sporting events, gigs and festivals is another victim of Covid-19. Generally, if you bought your ticket for a cancelled event from an official seller, you should be entitled to a refund.

Ticketmaster, for example, says its refunding tickets automatically, with the refund including the ticket’s face value plus the service charge.

But most concerts are being rescheduled rather than cancelled altogether. Original tickets remain valid for postponed events – but you can get your money back if the new date doesn’t suit you.

The same goes for sporting events. For example, the London Marathon was rescheduled for 4 October – but you can get a refund if you can’t make the new date.

Tennis fans who got the option to buy Wimbledon tickets in the public ballot and paid for them will get a refund plus the opportunity to purchase tickets for the same day and court for next year’s championships. Football fans with tickets to Premier League matches are likely to be refunded too.

Train tickets

The cheapest Advance train tickets are normally non-refundable but, with people being advised not to travel, you can get a refund on Advance tickets purchased before 23 March.

Refunds can be processed remotely (you normally have to go to a station ticket office) via the website of the rail company or third party that sold you the ticket.

If you are a commuter with a season ticket you are no longer using due to being furloughed, working from home, or because the trains aren’t running, you can get a partial refund if there are at least seven days left on a monthly ticket,or more than seven weeks left on an annual ticket.

There’s normally an admin fee of £10 for season ticket refunds but train companies are waiving it at the moment.

Pausing premium sports channels

With live sport on hold for now, Sky Sports and BT Sport customers are faced with only being able to watch re-runs and repeats.

But you can save a bit of cash by pausing your sports subscription. If you’re with Sky,you can arrange for your Sky Sports subscription (and BT Sport if you have it) to be paused online and you’ll automatically start paying for the full package again when the action resumes.

If you pay for BT Sport directly with BT, you have two options: you can get a two-month bill credit for the service, or donate the cash equivalent to the NHS. If you pay for Sky Sports via BT you’ll have to call to request a bill credit.

If you’re a Virgin Media customer and subscribe to Sky Sports or BT Sport , you'll be able to pause your subscription online. The same goes if you pay for Sky Sports as part of a TalkTalk broadband bundle.

Gyms

Gyms,fitness studios and sports clubs have all been forced to close due to the pandemic. All the main chains, including Pure Gym, Better, David Lloyd, Third Space, Fitness First and Anytime Fitness, have automatically frozen memberships.

Some smaller studios, as well as outdoor bootcamp operators such as Be Military Fit, are running online classes via Facebook Live or Zoom for a reduced monthly fee. However, if you can afford to keep paying your normal membership subs, it might increase the chances of these small businesses being able to re-open when the pandemic is over.  

Cinemas and theatres

The entertainment industry has been one of the hardest hit with the pandemic bringing down the curtain on both cinema and theatre trips.

Film fans with monthly or annual cinema memberships can normally pause or extend their memberships. For example, Cineworld will be extending the membership of all My Cineworld Plus accounts retrospectively once it re-opens, equivalent to the total duration the cinemas closed. Meanwhile Odeon has paused Limitless membership payments until its cinemas reopen. 

The Society of Ticket Agents and Retailers says anyone with tickets for cancelled theatre performances will be contacted by the company they bought the tickets from regarding exchanges and refunds.

Car insurance

There’s good news for anyone who has car insurance with Admiral – the insurer is giving each customer a refund of £25. The pay-out is being made because the number of car insurance claims has dropped as drivers stay off the roads.

The owners of 4.4 million vehicles will automatically receive the payment by the end of May.

Admiral is the only UK insurer to announce an automatic refund policy so far – drivers with other insurers should continue to pay their car insurance, even if they are driving significantly fewer miles than usual.

If you’re not using your car at all, you could apply for a Statutory Off Road Notification (SORN). If approved, this means you no longer need insurance for your car (so you could cancel your policy and get a partial refund), but it also means you won't be able to legally drive it.

 [1] Which?

Emma Lunn is an award-winning freelance journalist who specialises in personal finance. She has more than 15 years’ experience writing for national newspapers, trade and consumer magazines, and specialist websites

Despite the low costs that are often advertised online and on television, a lot of people end up paying more for their internet connections than they originally expected.

What’s more, if you end up sticking with the same broadband supplier after your initial contract ends, there’s a good chance that you’re dealing with the high rates of a “standard deal.” This means that you’re not getting any of the discounts or offers that may have attracted you to a specific provider in the first place.

According to Ofcom, at the end of 2019, 40% of broadband customers in the UK (8.8million) aren’t in a contract [1]. Switching to an alternative provider could be the quickest way for these individuals to save hundreds on their connectivity bills.

So, where do you get started? Our guest blogger, Rebekah Carter, a Contributor at Broadband Genie [2] will get you on the right track to lowering your broadband bill.

Check your contract details

The first thing you need to do before you start looking for a better deal is to check whether you’re still in contract. While switching to another provider can save you money, you may put yourself at risk of some hefty bills if you try to move when you’re still in the minimum contract term.

Fortunately, it’s usually quite easy to find out what your situation is.

Consider logging onto your customer account if your broadband provider has an online portal. You’ll usually be able to find information about your current package in the “Billing” section.

If you can’t find the insights that you need online, call customer services. Ask what your current package is, and when it ends.

Consider the switch or stay debate

Once you know whether you’re free to leave your supplier or not, you can begin to think about what you want to do.

After all, you may like the service that you currently get from your provider. If that’s the case, then you don’t necessarily need to switch to get the best deal. Instead, you can contact customer services and ask your provider what kind of deals they can offer.

If your customer service rep says that you’re not eligible for any discounts, don’t be afraid to haggle. According to a Which? Independent study, 45% of customers have haggled with their broadband provider to get a better deal [3].

The key to successfully getting a discount from your broadband provider is often showing them that you’re willing to leave if you don’t get what you want. Sales reps will usually have the option to give customers certain discounts and offers if it means keeping their custom.

Telling your company that you’re willing to switch will often push them to give you something valuable – like a discount or a new deal.

If you’re not a fan of your current service provider, or you’re happy to try something new, then you may decide to simply switch immediately, without haggling.

Usually, switching can get you a better deal. It means that you can take advantage of the discounted pricing that is only available to new customers.

What’s more, a lot of broadband providers also offer introductory gifts for new clients too, such as vouchers and other freebies.

Finding your broadband deal

Provided that you choose to seek out a brand-new deal, you’ll need to do some research. Comparing your options will help to ensure that you don’t just get the best offer on your broadband, you also get the service that you expect too.

Start by checking what you can reasonably get in your area. A postcode search will tell you what kind of broadband options are available, and what sort of speed you can expect too.

Remember, just because you can get extremely high fibre speeds in your area, doesn’t mean you need them. As a rough guide, it’s often a good idea to allow for around 10Mbps per person. However, you should consider excessive usage. For instance, if you or your family does a lot of online gaming, streams videos from Netflix, and so on, then you’ll need more bandwidth.

Once you know exactly how much speed you need, look at ways that you can keep your monthly costs to a minimum. For instance:

Bundles:

Bundling television and phone costs in with your broadband can be a money-saving option [4]. However, it’s only worth considering these packages if you already use those services. Don’t upgrade to a bundle if you never use your home phone anyway.

Special offers:

As mentioned above, most companies will have special offers to attract new customers. See whether you can take advantage of things like 6 months at a discount price, or free gifts to improve the value of your package.

Bonus savings:

Some companies may even offer extra bonuses with broadband packages, like free mobile internet when you sign up for a broadband and phone package at the same time.‍

Always Read the Fine Print

It’s easy to get excited by the promise of fantastic deals when you’re signing up for broadband.

Just make sure that you’re not agreeing to something blindly. Read the fine print on all the deals that you consider, and make sure that you know what you need to do to claim your offers.

Additionally, it’s worth making sure that you’re not going to be locked into a new contract for too long if you want the flexibility to switch providers again in the future.

Information about Rebekah Carter:

Rebekah is a freelance writer and content creator specialising in technology, marketing, and business growth. She has years of experience writing highly-researched and well-informed pieces for the digital landscape.

[1] Ofcom

[2] Broadband Genie

[3] Which?

[4] Broadband Genie (ii)

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Now that we have found ourselves confined to the comforts of our own homes for the next few weeks, it’s a normal reaction to try and sooth one’s soul through the medium of online shopping. No judgement here, we’re all in this together (but did I really need that cactus?). Whilst we’re likely to save a bit of money by not going out, buying coffee, ordering takeaway etc, it wouldn’t be realistic to advise you to not spend a penny, we can offer a nudge in the direction of mindful spending. Below is a roundup of the apps, services and activities that are perking us up at the moment – most of them are free, but any costs involved, we believe contribute to feeling a bit brighter and we have detailed all information.

Top 5 free trials

Now is the perfect time to ‘try before you buy’, and these are our favourite free trials at the moment. Top tip: set a reminder on your phone to cancel your subscription, as most companies will sign you up and charge you automatically.

1.    Amazon Prime[1]

Terms: 30 days. £7.99p/m or £79p/a

This is the perfect option for those who has already exhausted all that Netflix has to offer. This streaming service has a whole host of original TV series and films available that you may not be able to find elsewhere. Here are a few TV recommendations from the team to get you started:

The Boys
Outlander
The Marvelous Mrs Maisel
This is Us
Vikings

2.    Spotify Premium[2]

Terms: 30 days free (for new Spotify members only) and then £9.99p/m.

To quote Plato, music gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination, and life to everything. If ever there was a time that our minds needed wings it’s now! Your premium membership will give you endless hours of uninterrupted tunes to help you concentrate, chill you out or cheer you up.

3.    Audible[3]

Terms: 30 days free plus one free audio book (If you're an Amazon Prime member, they'll bump this up to two books). Plans start at £7.99 p/m.

If a busy social calendar has gotten in the way of reading, now’s a good time to get stuck in. Audio books are a great step back into the world of books and they’re great company for your walk of the day! You get one free audio book with this trial, so choose wisely. May we suggest one of the Harry Potter books? Even if you’ve read them several times over, there’s something comforting about Stephen Fry reading these well-loved tales in such tricky times!

4.    Duolingo Plus[4]

Terms: 7 days free. £80 p/a for continued premium use

If you’retaking time to learn a new skill, maybe a new language is the way to go. The free version of Duolingo is pretty good, but you might as well enjoy seven days of no ads and unlimited attempts at words and phrases as you progress.  

5.    My Heritage[5]

Terms: 14 days free. Packages starting at £79 p/a (£59 for the first year).

A good bit of research to get your teeth into could be just the thing to keep you busy and interested over the coming weeks. Maybe you’ve binge watched all episodes of Who do you think you are and want to know how find out if you’re distantly related to royalty. This 14 day trial can send you down a rabbit hole of history and is bound to bring up new things to chat about!

Top 5 ‘feel good’ services

No one really likes change, but we’re all having to adapt to a new way of living, and pretty quickly. Below are a few things that we’re finding useful to get us through mentally as well as physically. 

1.    Hello Fresh[6]

Whilst the tendency might be to pop a pizza in the oven for comfort, spending (a lot) more time at home could offer the opportunity to experiment in the kitchen. Recipe boxes such as Hello Fresh (meals starting at around £3.50 pp) can be a good way of trying new things and being relatively healthy at the same time. When some form of normality does resume, you will have learned new recipes and be able to recreate them at any time.

2.    Free full body workouts from Barry’s Bootcamp[7]

Now that gyms are closed, the normal treadmill and floor schedule of a Barry’s class has been stripped back and adapted to 30 minute hardcore sessions that can be done from the comfort of your own home. These are broadcast on the Barry’s Instagram page and the schedule is released daily on their Instagram stories.

3.    Free yoga and Barre with FLY LDN[8]

To bring a spot of zen into your lives, FLY LDN are holding 45 minute yoga and barre sessions live on their Instagram page. Unlike many others, they are also posting each session on their Youtube[9]channel so that you needn’t worry about missing any part of the live broadcast.

4.    Calm app[10]

With stress and anxiety being at an all time high, having a toolkit to practice mindfulness and set yourself up for a restful night’s sleep is a great thing to have. This app offers everything from breathing exercises to bedtime stories. It’s free to download with an optional subscription so you can see how you get on with the basic package to begin with.

5.    Let’s Day Out App[11]

This popular app that focuses on bringing people together through experiences, is thoughtfully re-branding to ‘Let’s Day In’. They will be hosting lots of virtual group activities from cooking demonstrations to art classes. All the sessions are free, but there is the option to donate £1 to the World Health Organisation’s COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund.

5 things to jazz up home schooling

For many parents, the thought of having to home school their children is daunting and stressful. We’ve listed a few things below to bring some educational fun to your new school days.

1.    Joe Wicks PE lessons[12]

Joe Wicks aka The Body Coach, is hosting daily 30-minute PE sessions live on his Youtube channel at 9am. They’re great for waking everyone up, engaging the brain and getting into some form of routine when everything is so out of sorts. Although aimed at children, it’s a great way for the whole family to spend some time together being active, and if we’re honest it’s left some of us adults out of puff too.

2.    The Maths Factor[13]

Carol Voderman has announced that she is removing the paywall on her tutorial website for children, The Maths Factor. This is aimed at children of primary school age and will be freely available for as long as children are having to stay away from schools.

3.    Printable Pages

Many illustrators such as Matt Richards[14] and Jacqueline Coley[15] have started producing artwork that parents can print off for their children to colour in. It’s the perfect down time activity to break up a curriculum based timetable.

4.    David Walliams Audio Stories[16]

Just as audio books are great for adults, children can really benefit too. A huge part of school life is shared reading and being read to. David Walliams, author of Gangster Granny and Mr Stink (to name but a few) has announced that he will be releasing an audio story for school children every day at 11am for the next 30 days for free. These can be found on his website, under ‘Elevenses’.

5.    Family Baking

Studying at home needn’t purely revolve around times tables and literacy, there’s a lot to be gained from fun activities at home such as baking. Getting the family involved teaches measurements, elements of time keeping, the science behind baking, the importance of a clean kitchen…and patience from all involved! Little Cooks Co’s Instagram[17] has many recipes that little hands can get involved with, but there’s no reason they can’t get stuck in with your day to day cooking routine!

[1] Amazon

[2] Spotify

[3] Audible

[4] Duolingo

[5] My Heritage

[6] Hello Fresh

[7] Barry’s Bootcamp Instagram

[8] FLY LDN Instagram

[9] FLY LDN Youtube

[10] Calm

[11] Let’s Day Out

[12] PE With Joe

[13] The Maths Factor

[14] Matt Richards

[15] Jacqueline Coley

[16] David Walliams Audio Stories

[17] Little Cooks Co Instagram

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According to the Bank of England, the average UK household spends around £2000[1] per month, however in the run up to Christmas we end up spending at least £500 more on festive activities and purchasing gifts. It sounds like an exaggeration, but we’ve all fallen victim to the odd £8 Christmas Market mulled wine… Haven’t we? The costs surrounding the festive season can often take away the joy and cause a lot of stress, with 1 in 10 Britons[2] saying that they ‘regularly worry’ about money leading up to Christmas. The months of buildup to the big day can really take its toll, but celebrating in a cost-effective way may be easier than you think. Here are our top tips for enjoying Christmas on a budget.

Plan ahead

Sometimes it helps to have everything laid out in front of you. Write down your estimated festive spending alongside your day to day outgoings and adjust your budget accordingly. Seeing what you have and need to spend make sit much easier to create a Christmas savings plan.

Remember that it’s never too late to start squirrelling away a few pounds here and there when possible. This could just be a matter of collecting loose change in a jar, only to be dipped into for stocking fillers, or you could take the step to open a saving account for Christmas (just be sure to check on the terms of the account regarding any restrictions on withdrawal). Regardless of how you go about it, every little really does help and just having a pocket of cash put aside can put your mind at ease.

Research is key

Panic buying can lead to us overspending when there was most likely a saving to be made elsewhere. It’s so easy to give into the hype and get swept along the high street with the masses. It’s common to be told to simply do it all online which certainly has its perks, but for some, a touch of the mad rush is all part of the fun. If you are venturing out, have a quick scan of the internet for deals available in store (think, the annual 3 for 2 sale in Boots), this will help you target the shops with the best offers and not buy the first thing you see.

Popular voucher sites such as Groupon often have great offers on a wide variety of gifts, and experience sites such as Virgin Experiences tend to have great offers, often up to 40% off, on their festive excursions and adventures, shopping smart really can help you save for Christmas!

Be prepared to say no

Being a time for eating, drinking and being merry, spending can add up really quickly without you really noticing. It just takes one diary clash for a pre-Christmas dinner and drinks with friends to descend into four or five smaller (bust just as costly) outings to ensure you’ve celebrated with everyone. The old ‘never mind, it’s Christmas’ chestnut becomes the most used sentence in conversations. Drinks on a Monday? Sure…it is Christmas after all. We’re not suggesting a ‘bah humbug’ approach but it’s worth having a think about whether gatherings can be consolidated or whether you’re up for everything you’re invited to.

The same principle can be applied to gift-giving. Knowing where to draw the line is key. It’s the best feeling being able to treat those close to us, but it’s certainly not the main point of Christmas. If you find yourself struggling to gather gifts for friends of friends and extended family members that you rarely see or speak to, take a minute to think about whether it really is necessary. Could a thoughtful Christmas card do instead? Sometimes you have to say no to yourself as well as others for your own peace of mind.

With the build up to the big event seemingly starting earlier and earlier, it’s totally understandable for the natural concerns about money to creep in simultaneously. However, with a head on approach, you can keep things under your control without feeling like you’re missing out. For even more ideas on how to save within the colder months, take a look at our blog on how to save money in winter.

[1] - Bank of England [2] - Money Advice Trust

Saving money can be difficult and is often easier said than done. If you’re on a low income or stuck in a cycle of living paycheck-to-paycheck, saving every month may feel even further out of your reach.

A recent study by the Independent shows that a quarter of UK adults don’t have any savings, with one third blaming too much debt and high monthly outgoings as the issue. One in ten also admitted they spend more than they earn each month.

Whether you need to save money fast for a holiday next month or you are trying to save as much as possible each month for a wedding or house deposit, there are several ways you can cut costs and increase savings.

At OpenMoney, we understand the importance of having enough cash savings put away, so we’ve put together some tips of how you can save money on a low income.

Budget, budget, budget

The first step you should take in trying to figure out how much you can save is figuring out how much you spend. To do this, take a look at your bank statements and try to categorise payments into things like rent, bills, travel, food, subscriptions and anything else that works for you.

Writing all of this down can help you understand where most of your money goes. You may quickly realise that you spend £100 on work lunches every month or that you’re still subscribing to a service you don’t use!

Once you have all this information, split your spending into ‘committed spending’ and ‘disposable income’. Everything you need to pay for, such as bills or essentials, is committed spending and the rest is disposable income.

Now it’s time to start setting a budget for your disposable income. If you have £600 of disposable income a month, try to set yourself a budget of £400 – roughly £100 a week. Stick to your budget and you’ll save £200 a month which is £2,400 a year!

You can go even further and set budgets for each category you created like eating out, weekly food shops and entertainment to make sure you stick to your overall budget.

Switch and save

Another great way to save money quickly is to look at your committed spending to see if you can save by switching your current providers for services like gas, electricity and the internet.

Companies are always battling for your hard-earned cash and there’s probably someone out there who can offer you a cheaper deal than your current one. If your energy bills cost £100 a month and you’re offered a new contract for £80, that’s a saving of £240 a year!

Do this across all of your household bills and it’ll soon start to add up and fast.

Later this year we’ll be partnering with uSwitch to make it really easy for our app users to find out if they could save by switching their energy bills. Keep an eye out for more updates from us on that one.

Round it up

Look after the pennies and the pounds will look after themselves.

Most transactions are now paid with our debit cards, meaning we never see the money pass through our hands. An old-fashioned way of saving used to be putting your spare change in a piggy bank and watching it grow over time.

If you take that principle and apply it to your debit card transactions, the pennies will soon add up. For example, if you spend £2.70 on a coffee, simply deposit 30p into a savings account to round up the transaction.

Many banks offer this as a service that directly deposits your ‘change’ into your savings account. Get in touch with your bank to see if this is something they can offer.

If not, simply add up your transactions on a daily or weekly basis and deposit it in your savings account manually.

Be open to change

One of the most difficult things we face when trying to save is changing your usual habits.

If you’re used to buying a coffee on the way to work every day, starting to take your own coffee may be a difficult change to make.

When making these decisions you need to weigh up why you’re doing it and whether it's worth it to you. 1 month of bringing in your own coffee could save you £90 (if you spend £3 a day). A good quality bag of coffee can cost as little as £5 and you still get to have your morning coffee.

There is a limit to how far you should take this. Don’t stop doing everything you enjoy as you may start to lose the willingness to save. Finding the right balance of sacrifice and saving is key to reaching your goals.

Find out what you’re entitled to

Not everyone is aware of the benefits - such as tax credits - that are available to them from the UK government. This may mean they’re missing out on extra cash.

A full list of UK tax benefits can be found on the Gov.uk website and there’s a handy benefits calculator to help you understand if there are any benefits available to you.

Try to take make use of all of the benefits that you can - they’re there for a reason!

Just like saving on your bills and rounding up your cash, these small wins can make a big difference over the course of a few months.

Remember why

One final tip is to always remember why you’re saving in the first place. It’s often easy to make an impulse purchase that you didn’t need or get your favourite takeaway after a stressful day. If in these moments you remember why you’re saving, you can avoid plenty of unnecessary spending and watch those savings grow!

If you’d like to learn about how to budget better in 2019 and money saving tips for your summer holidays read our other blogs on money management.

The thought of living on a budget or actively saving can be daunting. Sacrificing a couple of non-essentials is off putting and enough reason to put the idea to bed. We’re not suggesting that you shouldn’t be enjoying your hard-earned money, but when you see how far the money saved from simple swaps and stops can go over the course of a year, you might think a little differently about that last minute trip to the pub.

Alcohol

From after work drinks to sharing a bottle of wine in front of the TV, it all adds up. So why wait for Dry January to have a break. According to the Office of National Statistics, the average cost of a pint is £3.67 so it’s no surprise that the average UK household spends at least £17 per week on alcohol. It doesn’t sound like a ground-breaking amount, but when this rolls into £64 for the month, saving it can seem more appealing - particularly when you look at it as:

• Eight months subscription to Netflix • Two tickets to Alton Towers

High Street Coffee

Caffeine makes the world go round, but it can also run rings around us financially without us really noticing. That ‘essential’ high street coffee that you grab on the way into work may be waking you up, but it’s also eating away at your funds. Coffee giants are charging as much as £3 for a medium latte and assuming a Monday to Friday coffee shop routine, you could end up spending £60 a month on twenty coffees. Your twenty coffees could look like:

• A pair of return national flights • Two tickets to a West End show

Cigarettes

Research shows that giving up smoking for 28 days is long enough to break the habit entirely. The health benefits are endless, but what could this mean for your wallet?

The cost of a premium pack of 20 cigarettes averages around £11 and it’s set to rise. If we follow in the footsteps of the Australian Government – they’ve been implementing a steady increase in tobacco costs - that will see cigarettes costing the equivalent of around £20 a pack in 2020!

Based on current prices and a smoking habit of 40 a week, stopping for just a month could end up saving around £100. If the science works and you go forward and stop altogether, you’d be looking at a saving of over £1000 a year. Here’s what £1000 looks like:

• 90 trips to the cinema • Two season tickets for a Premier League club • An all-inclusive holiday to Cancun

As far-fetched as some of these alternatives may seem, the saving possibilities are very real. Put it away for a rainy day or kick start your pot of savings, the smallest of changes really could make a world of difference to your financial situation. It’s worth a try, good luck!

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When I started thinking about wedding planning, the first thing I did was try and understand how much it was going to cost us - typing ‘average cost of a wedding’ into Google was a big mistake!

There are so many articles, each giving different figures ranging from £17,674 to £32,273, but don’t let this fool you.

Not wanting to splurge too much on the big day, we managed to spend a fraction of that cost, without making any scarifies on what we really wanted.

Whether you’re planning a wedding and it’s coming in overbudget, or you’ve just started planning and know you want to keep it low-cost – these tips could help you plan a wedding without the price tag!

Decide what’s important to you

Start the process by deciding what’s important to you. Straight away we knew having a great band and photographer for the day was something we were willing to spend money on.

However, when it came to wedding favours, invitations or having a big countryside manor for a venue – we knew we didn’t want to splash the cash.

Everyone will have different priorities and there’s no right or wrong, but it will help to be clear on this from the outset so you're both in agreement on the areas that are most important to you and the areas you’re happy to spend less.

Cut costs where you can

There are lots of ways you can reduce costs on the big-ticket items for a wedding.

Guestlist: Your guestlist will be one of the biggest contributors to the cost of your wedding. The larger the guestlist, the bigger the venue needs to be and the more food and drink you need to buy.

If you’d prefer to keep costs down by having a smaller wedding, stick to your guns – you may well feel pressured into inviting more people than you’d like. Try to explain to others the impact these additions will make to the cost of your wedding.

You could also cut costs by keeping the ceremony and wedding breakfast smaller, then inviting everyone you want to the evening. Without the need for arrival drinks and a full wedding breakfast meal – the cost per head for evening guests is so much cheaper.

Music: If you aren’t bothered about having a band or even a DJ for entertainment, load up a Spotify playlist and put it on shuffle. You can even ask for song requests from guests on your RSVP cards!

Suits and dresses: Don’t be afraid to go to high street retailers for your wedding outfits, whether that be suits, bridesmaids’ dresses or even the wedding dress! ASOS have some lovely wedding dresses for £100 - £500, all with free returns. And remember to shop the sales – especially online.

When it comes to bridesmaids’ dresses, I saw many for £70 - £150 each but if you don’t want to spend that much, you really don’t have to.

You might feel comfortable enough to ask the bridesmaids or groomsmen to buy their own dresses and suits - particularly if you’re flexible on the outfit itself. You can stick to one colour and let them get their own mix and match styles – they’ll be happier paying for something if they choose it and are likely to wear it again.

Venue: Venue prices vary wildly. They can charge anything from a few thousand pounds upwards – one we contacted was £18,000 just for one day because they offered exclusivity over the whole complex!

With finding a venue, you will need to research to find the right place with the right price tag. There are websites like Hitched and GuidesForBrides which have long lists of venues you can search through. Make sure you take advantage of wedding fairs and showcases so you can get a look inside venues you might be interested in.

One option is to save by choosing a non-registered venue. If you’re happy to get officially married and go through the paperwork the day before or after, you could hold a symbolic ceremony and party anywhere you like.

Also, don’t forgot to take into account decoration. If you opt for a plainer venue, you will have to consider the additional cost of décor and a venue dresser to put it up for you (unless you want to do that yourself on the morning of the wedding). If you choose a venue with enough character, you won’t need any additional décor!

Your wedding date: If you’re flexible on your wedding date, you might find you can make huge savings. Many venues offer discounts on their last few available dates for the year or for Autumn and Winter weddings. You can also save by getting married on a weekday.

Flowers: Fresh flowers can be very expensive, but often you can save if you choose to rent from an artificial flower supplier. If flowers aren’t important to you then perhaps you should decide not to have them at all – all weddings don’t need to look the same!

Food and drinks: The timing of your ceremony can impact the amount you need to spend on food and drinks at your wedding. If you opt for an early ceremony, the longer people will be in your care and you will need to keep them fed. If you choose a ceremony time 1pm or later, you can often forget the canapes and only the wedding breakfast and evening food are needed.

A ceremony even later than that can mean only one meal in the evening is necessary, cutting costs even more!

An open bar might be on the top of your list but if that’s not the case and you’d rather use the money elsewhere, don’t feel the pressure to keep a drink in everyone’s hands all night. An arrival drink or toast drink will go down a treat – but we found that most wedding guests are happy to pay for their own drinks.

Watch out for creeping costs

It’s really important to be clear with your suppliers from day one what the prices will be for the date of your wedding.

Most suppliers will raise their charges year on year. With weddings often being organised years in advance, you need to be sure whether the price you’re quoted is the price locked-in for your wedding date, or whether the suppliers expect the price to go up when it comes around to payment for your big day.

For example, our venue locked in the meal prices for us when we booked so we knew what we’d be paying. Whereas our florist waits until January on the year of the wedding to raise her prices and give final costs. This is when they know more about the cost of flowers for that season. You can ask for previous years price increases to give you an idea of what to expect.

When considering your wedding budget, ultimately, it’s about whether getting that extra drink for everyone, ordering the gold foil invites rather than plain or having a bouquet in your hand for the day will make a difference to your enjoyment of the day.

It’s so easy to get wrapped up in what you think you should have but it’s your wedding, so make sure you stay focused on what will make a difference to you both and not everyone else – even if that may be easier said than done!

Good luck!

Whether you’re in your 20’s, 30’s or even 60’s. Moving in with another human is a big thing. It can open doors to new possibilities in that relationship. But it can also get very messy if you’re not careful with your finances.

We put together our top tips for managing money when moving in with someone else.

Be honest from the start

Money isn’t the easiest topic to approach in a relationship but it’s important to get a clear picture from the start.

The best way to make sure that things go smoothly when it comes to managing your money, and making sure you have enough for bills, rent and food is to be honest with each other.

Be honest about your income and what you can and can’t afford so that you’re both on the same page.

This might mean you need to think more realistically about the standard of living you’re able to afford.

Make sure you’re on the same wave length

Moving in together is a big step in any relationship so it’s important to make sure that you both know each other’s goals going forward.

If you’re looking to save for a mortgage, then make sure that the other person is invested in this as well. The same goes for if you want to save up for a holiday together.

Make sure you talk about what your financial goals are so you can work towards them together. You don’t want to book a holiday if the other person can’t afford to pay their half.

Budget before you buy

Whether you’re renting or buying a property make sure that you work out your budget before you commit to anything.

Although you might like the idea of living in a city centre it could increase your outgoings as rent in the centre of a city may be higher. Plus, it can be even more tempting to go out if you leave nearer to bars, restaurants and cafes – which can add to your overall outgoings.

It might be cheaper to live further away from the city center and commute in every day if you work in the city. The added travel costs are outweighed by the lower rent.

Factors like the council tax band you’re in, travel costs and rent can determine how high or low your monthly bills are. Make sure you take these into account when budgeting.

Have an account for rent and bills

When you live with other people who are contributing to bills and rent your bank statements can start to get confusing with all the different transactions and transfers flying around.

You might find it easier to set up a joint account just for the household direct debits. That way you can transfer a set amount over each when you get paid to cover the cost of the shared outgoings.

You could even use this account to add extra money to cover food and other services you both use such as broadband and TV subscription packages.

Seems like a good idea but, it’s important to remember that you’ll both be responsible for any debts or overdrafts – and opening a joint bank account may affect your credit rating, so don’t rush into it.

The Money Advice Service has a great article on things to consider when splitting your finances.

If you decide a joint account isn’t right for you, you could consider opening another account for bills, for yourself. It will be easier to keep your own spending money separate from money you need for bills and rent - and it will make sure you always have enough to cover the bills without having to think about it.

Try and build up a cash buffer

Although when you first move in with someone it might take time to get your ducks in a row, it’s always good to make sure you can put a bit of money aside every month and start to build up a cash buffer.

We recommend people to have at least 3 months’ worth of outgoings saved up in a cash buffer.

This can be used to help pay for any unexpected bills that may come up should you or your partner fall on hard times.

Work out what’s fair for your situation

When moving in with someone it’s important to make sure that you‘re realistic about both of your incomes and what you can both afford to pay.

If you or your partner is on a much higher income, splitting everything right down the middle might not be the fairest option.

Instead maybe consider working out a ratio or percentage you each should pay towards household items and outgoings in relation to the amount of money coming in.

We’ve seen some great examples of how couples, including some of our team, split their finances:

One of our team members lives in Sheffield, she commutes via train everyday which takes a fair chunk out of her salary! As her boyfriend owns their flat, works in Sheffield and doesn’t want to move, he pays the mortgage and she pays her commuting costs.

Some people pay different amounts into joint accounts, for example if someone earns £1,500 and their partner earns £2,500 per month, he pays £750 and she pays £1,250 into their joint account for bills and savings.

Moving in with someone is a big commitment and it can take time to adjust, especially when money is involved. But as long as you’re able to talk about things and work together you will be able to get through it.

Managing your money in your 20’s can be hard, usually due to moving out, university, car insurance and those weekly nights out. But according to research by ClearScore, 31 is the most expensive age for Brits.

The average Brit spends £43,000 during their 31st year because of major life events like getting married, having kids and buying a house. Some of which can add to your yearly bill throughout your 30’s and beyond.

We think it’s just as important to manage your money efficiently in your 30’s as it is in your 20’s. So here are some of our tips on keeping costs low and spending your money wisely.

Split up your savings

Dipping into your savings to pay for unexpected bills is something we’ve all done at some point. But 60% of people rely on their savings to pay for those big milestones too.

Your savings can be a good option when it comes to paying for expensive events but with so many milestones usually occurring in your 30’s you can be left with next to nothing by the end of it.

Splitting up your savings or having multiple pots for your wedding, mortgage deposit and holiday can help you budget for these events. It can also help you to visualise where you are in relation to any saving goals you set yourself.

Prioritise

It can be very easy to get wrapped up in the moment by planning multiple events in the same year and investing in your future. The next thing you know you’re paying out for a new car, mortgage, wedding, honeymoon, 30th birthday and a summer holiday.

Sometime though we need to remember to take a step back and rethink our spending and our priorities.

If you can go without a big birthday bash or a summer holiday then you can focus your saving and budgeting on the bigger things that take priority in your life.

It’s not just big purchases but small ones as well. Cutting back on those non-essentials or switching them for cheaper alternatives will help you in the long run.

Don’t give into debt

When you have a lot of things to pay for it can be tempting to turn to other finance options such as taking on debt, dipping into your overdraft or taking on credit.

In fact, 1 in 5 under 34 year old’s turn to credit to fund big purchases.

Being able to pay something off in instalments or not have to pay anything at all for several months sounds like a great idea.

But when you’ve bought a TV, games console, laptop and coffee machine on finance it all soon starts to add up each month.

Saving up the money for 6 months to pay for these items can be very different to paying for the items over the course of 6 months on a finance option.

Although taking on credit options means that you will have the item straight away, it also means that your income is tied up in paying off that debt every month. You may also have to pay interest which can make a big difference to the total amount you pay!

Where as if you are saving up for the item and you get an unexpected bill you can use the money you’re saving to pay for it.

You can also reduce your savings if you have an expensive month, where as there’s rarely any wiggle room with credit.

Try not to give into debt. If you don’t need it then don’t buy it.

If you have to use credit options, then make sure you’re able to pay back the instalments every month.

Think of the bigger picture

Prioritising your finances for the next 5 years is great, but don’t forget about the bigger picture.

There are things you need to start thinking about now, even though they might not be happening for another 10 or 20 years from now.

Retirement is something you should definitely be thinking about in your 30’s. If you haven’t already done so in your 20’s make sure you’re putting money aside each month to go towards your pension.

If you want to help your children finance their education, first car and first home then you need to think about this as well. Lump sum payments are easier to finance when you’ve planned for them in advance.

Life insurance

Nobody likes to think about the possibility of getting sick but getting life insurance in your 30’s is something worth thinking about.

Getting life insurance whilst your young and healthy is most likely going to be the easiest time to get approved for a life insurance plan.

Although you might not think you need life insurance it’s always worth looking into, especially if you have dependents. Whether it’s children, a partner or if you care for someone. You’ve now got to think about other people as well as yourself.

Increase your cash buffer

Everyone should try and have a cash buffer.

Then if you ever get an unexpected bill you have a 3 months worth of rent and outgoings saved up to help you out.

But as you get older your outgoings may increase so it’s important to make sure that your cash buffer increases to cover any additional costs.

It might be particularly difficult to keep this sum aside in your 30s as you are likely to have more outgoings, but it can be even more important. You might have a mortgage, finance or credit payments and dependants that rely on your income.

Work out what you’d need to live on for three months and then you might decide to put some extra away to cover any upcoming purchases you might have.

Your 30’s don’t have to be a financial burden. Just make sure you’re prepared for the future and the major life events you have coming up.

There is no shortage of investment companies willing to look after your money (my social media and weekend papers are full of adverts promoting the different services) and reviewing all financial affairs is always good sense.

What is worrying is the growing use of incentives by these companies to get you to choose them and transfer your money for them to look after. I have seen everything from cashback offers, a heap of airmiles to even cases of wine!

Everyone loves something for free but when it comes to money and investments then I believe that these offers are really irresponsible. The decisions you make with your money have long-reaching effect and the wrong decision today could lead to problems in the future.

Here are a few of things to think about when you’re looking to switch your investment company.

What’s the true cost of that ‘free’ gift?

The phrase “there is no such thing as a free lunch” is absolutely spot on here. Any gift you receive is paid from the fees you will pay.

Not only that, but it could end up costing you a lot more if the new providers fees are higher than what you’re currently paying – is that case of wine really worth thousands of pounds in fees over the life of your investment?

Is it the right thing for your financial goals?

Whilst cost is a really important point when considering these offers, it is absolutely essential that you consider whether it is the right thing to do for your personal situation.

You could easily end up transferring your money into a product that’s not suitable for you.

Most of these firms make their money by investing yours, but they won’t tell you whether transferring your hard-earned money is the right thing to do for your financial circumstances. The risk involved in this decision still lies with the customer.

It’s not always easy to say if transferring is the right thing for your investments in the long run, but it is definitely easier to say that making those decisions based on the free gifts on offer isn’t sensible.

Unfortunately, there are too many examples in financial services where poor decisions, often as a result of unscrupulous investments promoting false hope, have led people to lose money or even their life savings. Not only can they ruin your finances but by their nature, these circumstances are incredibly emotional.

We offer free transfer reviews, which means we will tell you whether or not it’s in your best interest to transfer your investments to us. And if it isn’t, we’ll tell you honestly.

Financial advice doesn’t have to be expensive and having someone else look over your situation could give you piece of mind when it comes to your money. No gimmicks. No bribes. Just financial advice.

A lot of scaremongering takes place surrounding your credit history, what it means for your day-to-day life and your future financial decisions. Our guest blogger and Personal Finance Expert, Andrew Hagger, is on hand to take you through what matters, the common credit myths, and tips on how to boost your score.

 Checking your credit report

 The first step is to sign up for a copy of your own personal credit report. You can do this online and for free direct via credit reference agencies such as Experian and Equifax or through third party providers including Clearscore and TotallyMoney.

Once you’re set up, you’ll get an updated report and score emailed to your inbox every month, making it easy for you to keep a close eye on your important financial information.

The first time you get hold of a copy of your credit report, take a little time to read through of all your personal and financial information. These reports are not always 100% correct, so make sure you’re happy with all the details held on your file.

These are the sort of things you’ll find in your report:

•                 Personal information: your name, date of birth and address – including previous addresses going back 6 years.

•                 Financial associations with another person, such as a joint mortgage or borrowing.

•                 Whether you’re on the Electoral Roll,meaning you are registered to vote at your current address.

•                 Your borrowing: how much you owe and whether you have paid on time, and how long you’ve had each account. This will include mortgages, credit cards, store cards, personal loans and overdrafts.

•                 Any County Court Judgements (CCJs),bankruptcies and Individual Voluntary Arrangements (IVAs).

•                 Searches carried out on your account by financial providers – including date and purpose of search.

 These are a few things that do not appear on your credit record:

•                 Savings account information

•                 Your salary details

•                 Criminal record(s)

•                 Medical history

•                 Parking or driving fines

•                 Council tax arrears

•                 If you have an agreed mortgage holiday or payment freeze due to Covid-19, this will not appear on your record and will not have a negative impact on your score.

Much of the information shown on your credit report is confidential, and that’s why it’s managed by Credit Reference Agencies such as those mentioned. It’s important to remember that these agencies may manage your report, but it is the lender who makes a decision to offer credit of any kind.

What affects your credit score?

 The factors that have the biggest negative impact on your score are:

•             Late or missed payments

•             Defaults on debt

•             County Court Judgments (CCJs)

•             Bankruptcy

These are not the only things to consider, other factors that can have a negative impact on your score include:

•  A large amount of borrowed money or using a high proportion of your credit card limit(s).
These can be a warning sign for lenders that you may be struggling with your finances

• Too many searches
Each time you apply for credit the lender will review your credit report. This is known as a ‘search’ and will stay on your report for 12 months. If you accumulate a lot of searches in a short period of time, lenders may feel that you may be having financial difficulties.

• Frequent changes of address.
This can be viewed as a lack of stability and therefore make you appear more high risk.

• Mistakes on your report
These can be factual errors, such as the wrong address listed under one of your accounts, closed accounts still showing as open, or an unknown account is linked to your record either by mistake, or in extreme cases as a result of fraudulent activity.  It’s important to check your report regularly, otherwise you may be turned down for finance through no fault of your own.

• Financial association or connection
The credit history of anyone you are financially associated with, such as a joint mortgage or bank account with a spouse, can affect your credit rating. If you are divorced or separated, cut all financial ties and make sure your former partner’s details are eliminated from any joint accounts.

Even if you turn your finances around, be aware that the items on your report stay there for 6 years and will be taken into consideration by lenders when deciding to grant credit.

 Credit record myths

There are many other misunderstandings when it comes to credit reports and scores. Here are some of the most common examples:

• There’s a credit blacklist
There is no blacklist used by credit companies or Credit Reference Agencies. But every finance company or lender has its own criteria, so there are circumstances when it won’t agree a credit application.

• Where you live impacts your credit rating
Your address doesn’t influence your credit rating.Lenders ask for this information purely to help them find an individual’s credit file and confirm their identity.

• Unpaid student loans can damage your credit rating
Students loans aren’t visible on your credit report, so don’t impact your credit score. This is because they’re paid back through salary deductions. However, any credit cards or additional bank loans you take out as a student will show on your credit report.

Top tips to help your credit score 

• Make sure you’re on the electoral register - Lenders use the electoral register to confirm an individual’s address.

• Try not to regularly keep a high balance on your credit card - Lenders may view this as excessive debt and that there’s a risk that you may be unable to repay.

• Make sure you pay your bills on time, every month – this shows you are financially disciplined and can manage your finances.

• Only apply for credit which is necessary – applying for more than three times in a year can lower your score.

• Cancel old credit card agreements and out of date credit cards, such as store cards you no longer use, as these will still show on your file.

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Andrew is a respected personal finance writer and commentator from Moneycomms.co.uk. He has many years experience of helping consumers manage their money, enabling them find the best deals on anything from savings and current accounts to loans, mortgages, travel money and credit cards. Andrew can be found tweeting here.

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Coronavirus has prompted a consumer rights conundrum. With everything from concerts to holidays cancelled, thousands of people are left having paid for something that isn’t going to happen.

Here our guest blogger, Emma Lunn takes a look at your rights to a refund during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Holidays

Travel has been a big victim of the virus. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office advised against all foreign travel on 17 March, with the restrictions now in place for an indefinite time period.

In theory, holidaymakers should be well protected against cancellations. ABTA rules state entitlement to a full refund for cancelled package holidays, while EU laws mean airlines must refund cancelled flights.

But, unfortunately, would-be travellers are struggling to get their money back from travel companies. According to Which [1] 20 of the UK’s largest operators are illegally with holding refunds that should be paid within 14 days.

Many holidaymakers are finding they are being fobbed off with vouchers or a credit note, or are being pressured to re-book their trip.

Frustrating as this is, industry bodies have warned that travel firms could go bankrupt if they paid out refunds straight away. As a result, various travel industry bodies are urging the Government to step in a support the travel industry.

Sporting events and concerts

The UK’s big summer of sporting events, gigs and festivals is another victim of Covid-19. Generally, if you bought your ticket for a cancelled event from an official seller, you should be entitled to a refund.

Ticketmaster, for example, says its refunding tickets automatically, with the refund including the ticket’s face value plus the service charge.

But most concerts are being rescheduled rather than cancelled altogether. Original tickets remain valid for postponed events – but you can get your money back if the new date doesn’t suit you.

The same goes for sporting events. For example, the London Marathon was rescheduled for 4 October – but you can get a refund if you can’t make the new date.

Tennis fans who got the option to buy Wimbledon tickets in the public ballot and paid for them will get a refund plus the opportunity to purchase tickets for the same day and court for next year’s championships. Football fans with tickets to Premier League matches are likely to be refunded too.

Train tickets

The cheapest Advance train tickets are normally non-refundable but, with people being advised not to travel, you can get a refund on Advance tickets purchased before 23 March.

Refunds can be processed remotely (you normally have to go to a station ticket office) via the website of the rail company or third party that sold you the ticket.

If you are a commuter with a season ticket you are no longer using due to being furloughed, working from home, or because the trains aren’t running, you can get a partial refund if there are at least seven days left on a monthly ticket,or more than seven weeks left on an annual ticket.

There’s normally an admin fee of £10 for season ticket refunds but train companies are waiving it at the moment.

Pausing premium sports channels

With live sport on hold for now, Sky Sports and BT Sport customers are faced with only being able to watch re-runs and repeats.

But you can save a bit of cash by pausing your sports subscription. If you’re with Sky,you can arrange for your Sky Sports subscription (and BT Sport if you have it) to be paused online and you’ll automatically start paying for the full package again when the action resumes.

If you pay for BT Sport directly with BT, you have two options: you can get a two-month bill credit for the service, or donate the cash equivalent to the NHS. If you pay for Sky Sports via BT you’ll have to call to request a bill credit.

If you’re a Virgin Media customer and subscribe to Sky Sports or BT Sport , you'll be able to pause your subscription online. The same goes if you pay for Sky Sports as part of a TalkTalk broadband bundle.

Gyms

Gyms,fitness studios and sports clubs have all been forced to close due to the pandemic. All the main chains, including Pure Gym, Better, David Lloyd, Third Space, Fitness First and Anytime Fitness, have automatically frozen memberships.

Some smaller studios, as well as outdoor bootcamp operators such as Be Military Fit, are running online classes via Facebook Live or Zoom for a reduced monthly fee. However, if you can afford to keep paying your normal membership subs, it might increase the chances of these small businesses being able to re-open when the pandemic is over.  

Cinemas and theatres

The entertainment industry has been one of the hardest hit with the pandemic bringing down the curtain on both cinema and theatre trips.

Film fans with monthly or annual cinema memberships can normally pause or extend their memberships. For example, Cineworld will be extending the membership of all My Cineworld Plus accounts retrospectively once it re-opens, equivalent to the total duration the cinemas closed. Meanwhile Odeon has paused Limitless membership payments until its cinemas reopen. 

The Society of Ticket Agents and Retailers says anyone with tickets for cancelled theatre performances will be contacted by the company they bought the tickets from regarding exchanges and refunds.

Car insurance

There’s good news for anyone who has car insurance with Admiral – the insurer is giving each customer a refund of £25. The pay-out is being made because the number of car insurance claims has dropped as drivers stay off the roads.

The owners of 4.4 million vehicles will automatically receive the payment by the end of May.

Admiral is the only UK insurer to announce an automatic refund policy so far – drivers with other insurers should continue to pay their car insurance, even if they are driving significantly fewer miles than usual.

If you’re not using your car at all, you could apply for a Statutory Off Road Notification (SORN). If approved, this means you no longer need insurance for your car (so you could cancel your policy and get a partial refund), but it also means you won't be able to legally drive it.

 [1] Which?

Emma Lunn is an award-winning freelance journalist who specialises in personal finance. She has more than 15 years’ experience writing for national newspapers, trade and consumer magazines, and specialist websites

Now that we have found ourselves confined to the comforts of our own homes for the next few weeks, it’s a normal reaction to try and sooth one’s soul through the medium of online shopping. No judgement here, we’re all in this together (but did I really need that cactus?). Whilst we’re likely to save a bit of money by not going out, buying coffee, ordering takeaway etc, it wouldn’t be realistic to advise you to not spend a penny, we can offer a nudge in the direction of mindful spending. Below is a roundup of the apps, services and activities that are perking us up at the moment – most of them are free, but any costs involved, we believe contribute to feeling a bit brighter and we have detailed all information.

Top 5 free trials

Now is the perfect time to ‘try before you buy’, and these are our favourite free trials at the moment. Top tip: set a reminder on your phone to cancel your subscription, as most companies will sign you up and charge you automatically.

1.    Amazon Prime[1]

Terms: 30 days. £7.99p/m or £79p/a

This is the perfect option for those who has already exhausted all that Netflix has to offer. This streaming service has a whole host of original TV series and films available that you may not be able to find elsewhere. Here are a few TV recommendations from the team to get you started:

The Boys
Outlander
The Marvelous Mrs Maisel
This is Us
Vikings

2.    Spotify Premium[2]

Terms: 30 days free (for new Spotify members only) and then £9.99p/m.

To quote Plato, music gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination, and life to everything. If ever there was a time that our minds needed wings it’s now! Your premium membership will give you endless hours of uninterrupted tunes to help you concentrate, chill you out or cheer you up.

3.    Audible[3]

Terms: 30 days free plus one free audio book (If you're an Amazon Prime member, they'll bump this up to two books). Plans start at £7.99 p/m.

If a busy social calendar has gotten in the way of reading, now’s a good time to get stuck in. Audio books are a great step back into the world of books and they’re great company for your walk of the day! You get one free audio book with this trial, so choose wisely. May we suggest one of the Harry Potter books? Even if you’ve read them several times over, there’s something comforting about Stephen Fry reading these well-loved tales in such tricky times!

4.    Duolingo Plus[4]

Terms: 7 days free. £80 p/a for continued premium use

If you’retaking time to learn a new skill, maybe a new language is the way to go. The free version of Duolingo is pretty good, but you might as well enjoy seven days of no ads and unlimited attempts at words and phrases as you progress.  

5.    My Heritage[5]

Terms: 14 days free. Packages starting at £79 p/a (£59 for the first year).

A good bit of research to get your teeth into could be just the thing to keep you busy and interested over the coming weeks. Maybe you’ve binge watched all episodes of Who do you think you are and want to know how find out if you’re distantly related to royalty. This 14 day trial can send you down a rabbit hole of history and is bound to bring up new things to chat about!

Top 5 ‘feel good’ services

No one really likes change, but we’re all having to adapt to a new way of living, and pretty quickly. Below are a few things that we’re finding useful to get us through mentally as well as physically. 

1.    Hello Fresh[6]

Whilst the tendency might be to pop a pizza in the oven for comfort, spending (a lot) more time at home could offer the opportunity to experiment in the kitchen. Recipe boxes such as Hello Fresh (meals starting at around £3.50 pp) can be a good way of trying new things and being relatively healthy at the same time. When some form of normality does resume, you will have learned new recipes and be able to recreate them at any time.

2.    Free full body workouts from Barry’s Bootcamp[7]

Now that gyms are closed, the normal treadmill and floor schedule of a Barry’s class has been stripped back and adapted to 30 minute hardcore sessions that can be done from the comfort of your own home. These are broadcast on the Barry’s Instagram page and the schedule is released daily on their Instagram stories.

3.    Free yoga and Barre with FLY LDN[8]

To bring a spot of zen into your lives, FLY LDN are holding 45 minute yoga and barre sessions live on their Instagram page. Unlike many others, they are also posting each session on their Youtube[9]channel so that you needn’t worry about missing any part of the live broadcast.

4.    Calm app[10]

With stress and anxiety being at an all time high, having a toolkit to practice mindfulness and set yourself up for a restful night’s sleep is a great thing to have. This app offers everything from breathing exercises to bedtime stories. It’s free to download with an optional subscription so you can see how you get on with the basic package to begin with.

5.    Let’s Day Out App[11]

This popular app that focuses on bringing people together through experiences, is thoughtfully re-branding to ‘Let’s Day In’. They will be hosting lots of virtual group activities from cooking demonstrations to art classes. All the sessions are free, but there is the option to donate £1 to the World Health Organisation’s COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund.

5 things to jazz up home schooling

For many parents, the thought of having to home school their children is daunting and stressful. We’ve listed a few things below to bring some educational fun to your new school days.

1.    Joe Wicks PE lessons[12]

Joe Wicks aka The Body Coach, is hosting daily 30-minute PE sessions live on his Youtube channel at 9am. They’re great for waking everyone up, engaging the brain and getting into some form of routine when everything is so out of sorts. Although aimed at children, it’s a great way for the whole family to spend some time together being active, and if we’re honest it’s left some of us adults out of puff too.

2.    The Maths Factor[13]

Carol Voderman has announced that she is removing the paywall on her tutorial website for children, The Maths Factor. This is aimed at children of primary school age and will be freely available for as long as children are having to stay away from schools.

3.    Printable Pages

Many illustrators such as Matt Richards[14] and Jacqueline Coley[15] have started producing artwork that parents can print off for their children to colour in. It’s the perfect down time activity to break up a curriculum based timetable.

4.    David Walliams Audio Stories[16]

Just as audio books are great for adults, children can really benefit too. A huge part of school life is shared reading and being read to. David Walliams, author of Gangster Granny and Mr Stink (to name but a few) has announced that he will be releasing an audio story for school children every day at 11am for the next 30 days for free. These can be found on his website, under ‘Elevenses’.

5.    Family Baking

Studying at home needn’t purely revolve around times tables and literacy, there’s a lot to be gained from fun activities at home such as baking. Getting the family involved teaches measurements, elements of time keeping, the science behind baking, the importance of a clean kitchen…and patience from all involved! Little Cooks Co’s Instagram[17] has many recipes that little hands can get involved with, but there’s no reason they can’t get stuck in with your day to day cooking routine!

[1] Amazon

[2] Spotify

[3] Audible

[4] Duolingo

[5] My Heritage

[6] Hello Fresh

[7] Barry’s Bootcamp Instagram

[8] FLY LDN Instagram

[9] FLY LDN Youtube

[10] Calm

[11] Let’s Day Out

[12] PE With Joe

[13] The Maths Factor

[14] Matt Richards

[15] Jacqueline Coley

[16] David Walliams Audio Stories

[17] Little Cooks Co Instagram

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The 2019/20 tax year ends on April 5th 2020.

The end of the financial tax year is a great reason to review your finances and make sure that you’ve taken advantage of all of the tax efficiencies available to you. We’ve listed the top things to consider before the end of the tax year.

Top up your ISA

The 2019/20 personal ISA allowance is £20,000. Any returns made within an ISA are tax efficient and are free of UK income tax and capital gains tax.

If you do not use your allowance, you can’t carry it over to a new tax year. So, if you’ve got savings lying around in your current accounts, it may be worthwhile putting as much savings as you can in a tax efficient ISA.

Don’t have an ISA? Take our financial health check and get personalised Financial Advice from OpenMoney.

Contribute towards your retirement

As with your ISA, it may be worthwhile considering topping up your pension to increase your savings for retirement. When saving in a pension you receive income tax relief, depending on your personal circumstances.

The annual allowance for 2019/20 for pension contributions is £40,000. It’s also worth noting that you can bring forward unused allowances from previous three tax years, as long as you were a member of the pension scheme within those years.

Save for your children

If you have children, it may be a good idea to start saving for when the reach the age of 18. Children who are not yet 18 can open a Junior ISA (JISA) in their name and they can only access when they reach the age of 18.

As with an adult ISA, returns on money made within a Junior ISA are free of UK income tax and capital gains tax. The annual allowance for a JISA in 2019/20 is £4,368.

Use your capital gains tax allowance

Everybody has an annual capital gains tax allowance of £12,000 in the 2019/20 tax year. This means that if you dispose or sell any assets such as property and stocks are shares, you won’t be taxed on the profits if they're below £12,000.

You cannot carry over any unused capital gains tax allowance to the next tax year, so if you are planning to sell your assets, it may be worth considering staggering them over two tax years to take advantage of your allowance.

Reduce your inheritance tax

When gifting money to your family or loved ones after you pass, it’s important to remember that any estate (that includes your home) worth over £325,000 will be taxed at 40% for everything above that amount. So if your estate was worth £400,000, £75,000 of that would be taxed at 40% - that's a staggering £30,000.

One way to combat this is to use your annual exemption allowance of £3,000. This allows you to gift that amount without being liable for inheritance tax in the future.

You can carry over your gifting allowance from a previous tax year if unused, making the maximum amount £6,000. There are other exemptions too, such as no tax on wedding or civil partnership gifts up to £5,000 to your children and £2,500 to your grandchildren.

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That completes our list of things you need to consider before the tax year ends in order to benefit from the tax efficiencies available to you.

Read more about financial wellbeing and money management over on the OpenMoney blog.

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Many people are confident about researching and making decisions about their finances without professional help, but that’s not the case for everyone. We carried out research with YouGov in 2019 and found that 19.8 million people feel they would benefit from free financial advice.

Managing money can be daunting, especially dealing with more complex financial matters like mortgages, investments and pensions. It’s hardly surprising some of us would like a bit of help. But how do you decide when you need guidance and when you need financial advice? And what’s the difference anyway?

Free guidance

There are several organisations offering free financial guidance including the government’s own Money and Pensions Service. They provide free specialist financial information but are not allowed to give a personal recommendation of where to save or invest your money. You are solely responsible for making sure any products you buy based on their information are appropriate for your needs.

Regulated financial advice

Alternatively, a regulated financial adviser will give specific advice around whether investing is right for you now, how much you should invest, and which investments best match your goals. They will manage your investments, meaning you don’t have to worry about them. You also have greater protection as advisers should be authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), however you usually have to pay for regulated advice.

Our research with YouGov found that less than one in ten people had paid for advice in the last two years. Of those who hadn’t, three quarters were unlikely to do so in the future and when asked what would encourage them to do so, the top five changes were “I would need to be convinced it would save me money”, “I would need to be sure I could trust the advice”, “I would need to earn more money”, “I would need to be sure how to pick the right adviser” and “it would need to cost less”.

Adding value

Measuring how much value advice can add is difficult, but for complex products like investments and pensions, which can make a major impact on your future financial position, it can make sense to get help from a qualified adviser. A 2017 study by Royal London found that over the long-term, taking financial advice can add nearly £40,000 to the wealth of those on modest incomes.

While it’s true that some traditional financial advisers will not take on clients with small sums to invest, it’s not always the case. Some can also be pricey,charging an initial fee of anything from £75 to £350 an hour, or up to 5% of the value of the money being invested

At OpenMoney we provide personalised advice, no matter the size of your investment. You can start investing with us from as little as a £1 and our management fee is less than 0.50% of whatever you decide to invest.

We use the right mix of smart technology and qualified human advisers to give our customers personalised advice that’s always in their best interests.

Finding the right advice

Here’s our five-point checklist to choosing the right advice:

1.     Workout what you need: A free financial guidance organisation or comparison site could help you choose home insurance or a new current account and provide useful information about more complex financial products. But you may be better going to a regulated financial adviser for investment and pension planning or a mortgage as these are big decisions which can have a major impact on your future finances.

2.     Decide whether meeting face-to-face is important, or if an adviser who holds meetings by phone or online would work – the latter might be more cost effective and offer greater flexibility outside normal working hours.

3.     Check the adviser’s specialism and qualifications: not all advisers cover all products, so make sure they deal with everything you need, and have at least the minimum qualifications required for the products you want to discuss.

4.     Understand the costs: some advisers don’t display their fees on their website, but even if they do, it’s worth clarifying up front all the fees you’d pay for initial and ongoing advice.

5.     Ask for a free initial consultation: many firms offer meetings to help you decide if you trust their advice and whether they will add value to your finances.

All figures are sourced from The UK Advice Gap: Are consumer needs for advice and guidance being met?

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Millennials are generally classed as those born between the early 1980’s to the mid 1990’s.

Stereotyping any generation is misguided, and while all generations face their fair share of negative press, millennials seem to bear the brunt of the media’s negative headlines, especially around money matters.

They have been accused of wasting their money and spending too much on coffee and avocados[1], while simultaneously getting heat for not spending enough, and killing the napkin, cereal and golf industries to name a few![2] However, the topic of millennials investment habits is not talked about often.

Why should millennials be investing?

Almost half (47%) of those aged 18-24 prefer to put their money into a current account,with only 5% of this age group opting to invest.[3]

With interest rates at record lows for the past few years, current and savings accounts may not be the best option for millennials wanting to grow their cash over the medium to long term.

Investing is a great way to prepare for retirement as products like our Self-Invested Personal Pension offer tax relief (which you can find out more about here) as well as tax protection benefits. Many millennials are wanting to retire sooner, creating movements such as FIRE (financial independence retire early) which originated in the US. Millennials are also being expected to live longer than boomers or gen x-ers, so millennials should be investing at a younger age than previous generations.  ‍

When should millennials invest?

As with all investment the sooner you can invest the better. This is because your investments can generate interest and returns, reinvesting that means you start to make interest on your interest, this is called ‘compound interest’ and can make a huge difference to your investment pot over the long term.  

Where are millennials investing?

Millennials are conscious about where their invested money is going and what it will be supporting. Ethical investing is more popular among millennials than any other generation. If you want to find out more about ethical investments and OpenMoney’s stance on it, you can read this blog here.

For those investing in their property, Help to Buy ISAs are a government initiative investment product, available to first time buyers who are saving to get onto the property ladder. The Help to Buy Scheme has supported over 230,000 property completions since December 2015 and of those using the Help To Buy ISA, 29.9%were aged 19-24 while 69.4% were aged 25-34.[4]

How is millennial investing different?

Millennials grew up in a time where family members may have suffered as a result of the famous market crash in 2008. This means that millennials can be more cautious with their money, it is also clear that education about investment is lacking.

In a piece of research conducted by Barclays[3], 40% of those surveyed claimed that not knowing enough about investing is one of the biggest barriers to investing. This is something we at OpenMoney are addressing, we want to close the advice gap and make financial advice accessible to all.  

1. twentytwowords.com
2. independent.co.uk
3. barclays.co.uk
4. HM Treasury

When it comes to investing, it makes sense to shop around for the most competitive rates so that you can keep more of your potential returns, but it can be tricky to do so when not all providers are upfront with the costs involved in the management of your portfolio. A recent study by The Lang Cat[1] states that only 54% of investors are aware of what they are being charged for their Stocks and Shares ISA.

According to The Telegraph[2], investors could be paying fees up to six times higher than advertised rates, so are you aware of what are you paying for?

Exit Fees

We’re seeing an increase in investment platforms abolishing their exit fees which is shaking up the way the industry has operated for many years. As things stand, when looking to transfer your investment to another platform, your current provider can charge an (often sizeable) exit fee. This can often deter from a switch regardless of how competitive rates are and ultimately causes investors to miss out on the best rates available. As we offer financial advice here at OpenMoney, we have found ourselves in situations where we have advised customers against transferring to our products purely because the exit fees charged by their current provider would make transferring a more costly option, which is the last thing we want!

The OCF

The standard charge that comes with investing is the Ongoing Charge Figure(OCF) - here at OpenMoney we combine the OCF and Transaction Fees to give you our ‘Overall Portfolio Charge’. You should be made aware of from the offset. The OCF is made up of the fund manager’s fees for running your portfolio as well as admin and marketing costs. This fee will usually be presented in percentage format to represent how much of your investment is taken by running costs. It’s worth noting that although this fee is transparent as standard, it does not include others that could really ramp up the cost of your portfolio.

Transaction Costs

No two funds are the same and so you can expect that some providers will charge more in what’s called ‘transaction costs’ since they are buying and selling stocks more frequently than others, in order to make the most of the market in all states. It’s not necessarily a bad thing as long as you know what you’re paying for and why, and as long as you’re happy with the level of risk being taken with your investment.

Trading fees, commissions & stamp duty

You will need to pay Stamp Duty Reserve Tax (SDRT) on any electronic, paperless share transactions. The amount of SDRT you pay is worked out at a flat rate of 0.5%[3]based on what you give for the shares, rather than what the shares are worth.

So, if it’s a cash transaction, the amount of SDRT is based on the amount of cash you pay. For example, if you buy shares for £1000, you’ll pay £5 SDRT whatever the value of the shares themselves. If you give something else of value, the SDRT is based on the value of what you give.

[1] The Lang Cat – Can’t get there from here

[2] The Telegraph

[3] Gov.co.uk

Love, respect and kindness are just a few of the values I hope we have instilled in our children. Despite spending most of our time feeling like we are winging it, my husband and I like to think we are bringing up well-rounded individuals who know right from wrong, and treat others the way they would like to be treated.

Value is a word with many connotations which has morphed, in our household, from emotional, to practical, to tangible, and everything in between, over the past six years.

While we have tried to teach our children about value, whether that be looking after their favourite toy or cherishing kind words or acts bestowed upon them, teaching them the value of money is a whole different ball game.

My eldest son is now six and is becoming aware that in order for us as a family to have the things we need, or would like, money has to be earned.

The phrase pocket money has been bandied about over the past few weeks so a discussion about how he will earn it has taken place more than once.

But how does our view on teaching children about the importance of value and money tally with the rest of the UK?

According to a report from AXA Investment Managers, British children under the age of 16 are becoming increasingly savvy when it comes to finances.

Kids, aged between eight and 15, claimed they were actively tracking how much they saved a year, but less than half of those interviewed said they had learned how to manage money at school. More than half of the people involved in the study said they received pocket money regularly, giving an average weekly income of £12.76, or £663.52 a year.

Moves have also been made to arm thousands of schoolchildren with essential money skills. Last year, 16 of Britain’s leading savings and investment firms, brought together by TISA (the Tax Incentivised Savings Association), launched Kickstart Money, a collaborative project which aims to take financial education to nearly 18,000 primary school children in a bid to build a national savings culture for the future.

The project received £80,000 funding from the Money Advice Service (MAS) whose research found that behavioural attitudes to money are formed by the age of seven, and that a lot of teachers and parents lacked the confidence to equip young people with money managing skills.

For us, consistency and fairness when dishing out pocket money to our children will be key. We will give them the choice of doing extra chores to earn a bit more, allow them to make mistakes if they decide to splurge their cash, and show them ways to invest their money and watch it grow. The money will be theirs to save or spend as they see fit, but we hope that giving them autonomy over their own cash will teach them a valuable lesson.

Following our press briefing in London, we’re excited to be releasing our report with YouGov on the UK financial advice gap.

We found that 19.8 million people* across the UK would appreciate a bit of financial advice. But not everyone knows how to get it or that it’s even an option for them.

We speak to customers every day about their financial situations, and we’re all too aware of the financial advice gap across the UK.

When we launched OpenMoney we made it our missions to make financial advice available for everyone. Which is why we wanted to undergo this research to get a better understanding of the advice gap issue in our country.

Our advisers talk to people aged 18 to 75 and it’s usually the first time they’ve tried to get advice.

There are a few reasons for this.

Some people thought it was too expensive, whilst others felt they would be overlooked by advisers as they had a relatively small amount to invest.

There’s a belief that traditional face-to-face financial advice is only accessible to those who have already got a large amount to invest, typically those who are approaching or at retirement.

In 2015, Citizens Advice conducted some research around the advice gap and identified four different types.

1. The affordable advice gap affects consumers who are willing to pay for advice but think it is too expensive.
2. The free advice gap affects people who want advice but are unable to pay for it and are unaware of, or unable to access, free services.
3. The awareness and referral gap affects people who do not know where to get advice.
4. The preventative advice gap affects those for whom non-money issues can impact their financial position.

We decided to build on this research to understand to what extend these gaps still exist and if the availability of advice services has improved in the past four years.

Download the report

You can download the report here.

*Where figures like this are shown, OpenMoney has extrapolated the YouGov findings from our sample to represent GB population estimate of 50,644,094 (source ONS, June 2018).

• What is a financial adviser?
• What are they really doing for you?
• What do they charge?
• Are they worth the money?
• And do you really need one anyway?

A financial adviser is someone who can help you achieve your financial goals.

They can create a financial plan for you, based on your circumstances; taking into account what you want to achieve and how much risk you’re willing to take.

Their plan will lay out what you could do to help achieve your financial goals, whatever they may be. An adviser should let you know if your goals are realistic for how much risk you’re willing to take.

They should then monitor your savings and investments to make sure they are still suitable for you, and regularly review your goals and progress.

But for that they will typically charge you 2.5% (according to a study by Grant Thornton, Aug 2016) of all the money you have invested - every year.

What are you paying them for?

2.5% annually might not sound like much, but it can quickly add up. For this fee someone putting away £200 a month for 20 years could pay charges of more than £15,000 during the life of their investment.

So, if you’re thinking of investing, the big question you need to ask yourself is, ‘are traditional financial advisers really worth the money’?

A traditional financial adviser may tell you that their expertise and experience will help to ensure you don’t end up investing in an unsuitable product or one that gives poor returns. And it’s true that some advisers can help you access investment opportunities that aren’t readily available to the general public.

It’s also true that investing with a financial adviser means that you could be protected if things go wrong – as long as your adviser is approved by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), the body that regulates financial services firms in the UK.

But the reality is that consumers are paying fees of at least £1bn a year to financial advisers for investments that don't perform any better than far cheaper alternatives.

Some of the time, advisers just put an investor’s cash into passive investment funds, which simply benefit from the natural growth of the stock market and require absolutely no effort or active management on their part!

That said, investing with no advice means you run the risk of making the wrong investments, which could cost you a lot of money in the long run.

Thankfully, there is a third way.

Best of both worlds

At OpenMoney, our team of qualified financial advisers have designed an advice platform which uses algorithms to create personal recommendations for our customers.

By supplying some straightforward facts about yourself, including things like your goals, your earnings, your assets and your attitude to risk, we can build an accurate profile of you and provide you with a personal recommendation, which will let you know which of our products and funds are suitable for you.

We’ll always be honest with you – if we think you could be better off paying off your credit card or loans, we’ll tell you.

Even if that means you don’t invest with us.

Our use of algorithms helps keep our costs down, so you will never be charged more than 0.5% every year – which could save you many thousands of pounds over the lifetime of an investment.

But, crucially, we always have human expertise on hand to answer your questions and guide you along your investment journey.

With a traditional financial adviser you’ll be lucky to see them once or twice a year, but at OpenMoney you can book as many phone or Skype appointments as you like with our advisers at no extra cost and at a time convenient for you.

And we are authorised and regulated by the FCA too, so you can feel confident that we are treating our customers fairly.

To see if investing is right for you just answer a few questions on our website.

We recently celebrated the OpenMoney family’s third birthday! As well as sharing a toast (via video call), we took the chance to reflect on the last three years and what we have learned along the way.

Customer service is key

Since we launched back in 2017 we’ve seen how much our customers value the ability to speak to us about any financial issue, at no extra cost. As a result we will be introducing all of our customers, current and new, to their own personal support specialist and financial adviser here at OpenMoney. We know that a friendly face and expert voice can give reassurance as and when needed. Your dedicated adviser will be on hand to answer any questions that you may have and help with any issues, as well as keeping you up to speed regarding any new services or features that we’re launching. To make sure you can make the most of this,we’re extending our support and advice hours to include weekends!

Your Feedback makes a difference

Earlier this year we launched our new app and whilst we were happy with it, we’re firm believers that there is always room for improvement. So, we turned to your reviews to find the gaps and make a few tweaks. Since then we have joined forces with Moneyhub which means that our customers will benefit from a wider range of provider integrations, faster transaction refresh times and accurate spending categorisation while continuing to receive our expert advice on their finances. As well as this, we are also making further improvements to the app including savings and budgeting tips, and our partnership with Uswitch will be expanding later in the year. When our customers speak, we listen. We’ve also invested in user research and we will keep using the feedback we receive to make ours the very best possible service for you.

The financial advice gap still exists

Back in August of last year we released a report that we complied with YouGov on the financial advice gap in the UK. We found that 19.8 million people* across the UK would appreciate a bit of financial advice, but not everyone knows how to get it or that it’s even an option for them. This report, which you can download for free here, was put together off the back of a 2015 study by Citizens Advice[1].They identified the four types of advice gap: the affordable advice gap, the free advice gap, the awareness and referral advice gap and the preventative advice gap, and we were interested to see if much had changed in four years.

Our findings showed that a great deal had changed in that time, such as an increase of over 5 million people* who would benefit from financial advice but are not aware of public financial guidance. As we are trying to bridge the advice gap in the UK, we didn’t want to wait another four years to re-evaluate and so we have decided to make this an annual report with the help of YouGov. Our 2020 report will be released later this year, so watch this space!

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*Where figures like this are shown, OpenMoney has extrapolated the YouGov findings from our sample to represent GB population estimate of 50,644,094 (source ONS, June 2018).

[1] Citizens Advice

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We’re really excited to announce our new partnership with the Open Banking platform Moneyhub.

Moneyhub were one of the first services to offer secure Open Banking integrations globally, and this accessibility aligns perfectly with our mission of making financial advice accessible and affordable to everyone.

When you come to OpenMoney, whether that’s online, through our app or chatting to one of our financial advisers, we know it’s really important that you have a great experience with us.

The relaunch of our app back in January led to some exciting new features, but it also highlighted some ways in which we can improve the experience for customers downloading and registering on our app.

In partnering with Moneyhub to offer our account aggregation service, our app should become faster and more reliable as well offering new features.

This partnership will bring full Open Banking capability to our app, helping customers to get a complete view of their finances.

Users will be able to connect their bank accounts, saving accounts, investments, loans and other financial products at the touch of a button, now including full integration with Monzo and Starling.

Users can also look forward to instant balance and transaction information, as well as intelligent categorisation on items they buy.

Anthony Morrow, our CEO and co-founder, said: “We want to ensure that our customers can make the most of the new Open Banking rules by having a complete picture of their financial circumstances through the OpenMoney app. Customers will benefit from a wider range of provider integrations, faster transaction refresh times and accurate spending categorisation while continuing to receive our expert advice on their finances.”

Samantha Seaton, CEO of Moneyhub said: “The advice and engagement gap remains a significant challenge. In combining Moneyhub's Open Finance platform and OpenMoney’s technology, we can provide an innovative solution that is both intuitive, impactful, and cost effective for all. Open Banking changed the rules of the game, but Open Finance which in addition to current accounts also covers pensions, mortgages, investments and loans, will truly transform how everyone thinks about money. I'm inspired by what the OpenMoney team has achieved, so the opportunity to collaborate with them and develop our shared goal of promoting greater financial awareness and insight is exciting. OpenMoney firmly believe in making financial advice accessible to all - and I couldn't agree more. What an absolute treat to partner with such a like-minded team.”

We’ll be rolling out more new exciting features in the future through our partnership with Moneyhub.

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We have some exciting news to share!

We have reduced the total cost of our investment portfolios, and this reduction will be passed directly to our customers, and the investments they hold with us. This change sees our fees drop from between 0.50% and 0.52% to between 0.46% and 0.49% depending on which investment portfolio is chosen. You can see a breakdown of these changes by portfolio in the table below.

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Almost three years after launching our service to bring affordable and accessible financial advice to all, we’re pleased to be able to reduce our fees even further. We’re committed to ensuring that our investment fees are as low as possible, while still offering a spread of investments across different assets, markets and geographical locations to try and minimise risk for our customers where possible.

We worked closely with Finalytiq to review our portfolios prior to the impact of Covid-19 and whilst it has caused turbulence in the markets, our investment strategy hasn’t changed. We do not try and time the markets and therefore our reasons still stand for making the changes to the portfolios.

We understand that with the impact of Covid-19, people will naturally have questions about their investments. We offer ongoing advice and appointments with our financial advisers at no extra cost, so people can continue to get the support they need during these unsettling times.

You can contact our team with any questions you have using our Contact Us page.

The recent Apple advert plays on the notion that our phones hold a lot of data about us, even seemingly irrelevant information like your heart rate. ‘Privacy. That’s iPhone’. The fact that Apple are using privacy asan emotive subject to promote their product as opposed to its flashy new camera shows the importance that we put on keeping our data safe.

It’s hard to know what data about you is out there and it’s increasingly important to know it’s in safe hands. Here at OpenMoney, keeping your data safe and secure is our priority. Here’s the steps we take to make sure your data and investments are safe with us.

SSL Certification

Our websites have SSL certificates. Like many, I didn’t know what that meant apart from the website has a green padlock in the URL bar – for most of us, this visual cue is enough. But what does it actually mean?

SSL stands for ‘Secure Socket Layer’. An SSL is a small data file that establishes a secure connection between the browser and the website. Any communication or data passed is encrypted.

Still sound confusing? Encryption looks something like this… 

As the image shows, the output of encryption is a load of gobbledygook that humans can’t read or understand!

Bank level encryption

Now that we’re all encryption boffins, it’s useful to explain the level of encryption we use.

Our data is encrypted using 256 bit SSL encryption, which is the same level as most banks. If it’s good enough to protect your money, it’s good enough to protect your information too!

A 256-bit key can have 2256 possible combinations, that’s 2 x 2, x 2, x 2… up to 256 times.

It is one of the most secure methods of encryption available and according to this article, it would even take the fastest supercomputer inthe world thousands of years to crack.

Data Protection Training

As well of all of this fancy technology to keep your data safe from external threat, we also make sure that our staff are trained and educated in the world of GDPR (General DataProtection Regulations) to keep your data safe internally. GDPR practices are regulateand enforced by the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) and any breach in the legislation means we as a business - and sometimes as individuals - are held accountable for the misuse of data.

We’ve all had training from our Data Protection Officer - he doesn’t wear a police uniform if you were wondering – and we have strict procedures in place when it comes to accessing customer data.

There are other things we do to ensure your data is safe too. We’re very selective as a business over the technology we use and we don’t access public with our work computers WIFI in case of any threats posed by the network.

FCA regulated & FSCS protection

As well as your data, it’s important to know that your money is safe with us too.

We’re regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority who set the rules and regulations for financial providers in the UK. If we breach any of these rules, we’ll be held accountable and will potentially face fines from the FCA. This also means that we’re not a scam and we won’t be transferring your money into our private pension pots!

If you do invest with us, you’re also protected by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS).This means that your money is protected up to £85,000 if anything does go wrong. The FSCS is an independent fund set up by the government to help protect people’s money. If we go bust, it means you won’t be left out ofpocket.

There’s more things we do to protect your data but unfortunately some are too technical for me to write about! If you do have any questions or queries about our processes, you can contact our support team on live chat Monday – Friday, 9am – 5pm or via email at hello@open-money.co.uk.

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New and improved for 2020

Our brand new app has just gone live on the app store, we are really proud of it and believe it’s  a great tool to help you get more from your money. Product Analyst Adam Briggs-Dawson talks you through what’s new and the thinking behind the new features!

Here at Open Money we have been working on a new and improved app to make managing your money work better  for you.

As a product team we have spent a lot of time putting ourselves into our customers’ shoes to figure out what the most important and helpful features in a money management app should be.

We’ve been working really hard on making an app that goes one step further than money management. We’re excited to also offer financial recommendations within our app.  

We believe that financial advice should be accessible for all, that’s why our app is designed to guide you towards your financial goals. Whether you have £10 or £10,000 - our app could help you make your money work harder for you.

The new app is a real progression from our pioneer app and we are really proud of the result. We’ve improved the on-boarding process, making it very simple to link your accounts and there are lots of new features we didn’t have before.

Better Budgeting

First of all, we feel that visibility is key. The OpenMoney app allows you to see all of your money in one place. This sounds like a basic concept, but with many people having accounts with different banks, alongside loans, credit cards and investments,  it ’s a simple, but sometimes overlooked element, we didn’t want to miss out.

Secondly, saving money should be simple, easy, even fun! We wanted to create a way for you to set up savings goals for yourself and track your progress – and we have done just that!

Our app also gives you the option to set your own budgeting period, specific to your schedule. We know not everyone gets paid on the same day of the month, so set your custom budgeting period and get rid of second guessing.

If you are looking to work down debt, the app has a feature to allow you to set this up as a goal and allows you to track your progress.

You can also see a predicted forecast for the month based on your current spending, allowing you to plan ahead and adjust your spending if needed - so you’re not caught short at the end of the month.

You can also group your transactions together into categories such as dining out, bills etc. This allows you to see what you are spending your money on each month.

Ongoing Advice

The app is more than just money management, it also offers advice based on your spending activity. For example, if you’ve told us that you want to save money, the app will notify you of areas you could be saving. Such as letting you know you’ve spent £20 on takeaway coffees this month.  

We also have a new and exclusive partnership with uSwitch, where we are able to proactively tell you if you could be saving money on your bills – starting with energy. This way, we are constantly analyzing your finances for you and you can have the peace of mind knowing it is being taken care of, without you having to lift a finger.

There are lots of great features on this app and we believe it is going to make managing your money, easier, simpler and more efficient than ever.

I am really proud of what our team has created and hope that it will make managing your money easier for you. Let us know on our social media channels what you think of the new app if you’ve tried it, we love to get feedback and new ideas!

You can download the app on the App Store or Google Play now.

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We’re really excited to announce our acquisition of respected employee benefits platform Jargonfree Benefits.

Our mission at OpenMoney is simple: To make financial advice accessible and affordable to everyone, and the work Jargonfree Benefits does complements this perfectly.

Jargonfree Benefits was set up in 2013 with the aim of helping the estimated 16.3 million workers[1] employed at UK small or medium-sized companies (SMEs), gain access to the same standard of workplace benefits as those enjoyed by workers at larger firms.

It currently provides services to almost 40,000 employees and over 500 employers. We want to enhance these services and build on this platform. Whilst there is a lot of work to closing the advice gap, we believe it is absolutely possible and are excited to play our role in doing that. Steve Bee, founder of Jargonfree Benefits, said: “This is a hugely exciting moment for the business, our existing clients and the millions of employers up and down the country who care deeply about the people who work for them.

“It makes sense to me that the tools people need to both understand and control their own finances should be readily available in the workplace. “We’ve got a long way to go, but I’m confident that as part of OpenMoney we can make huge strides in building the benefits market for SMEs and in doing so ensure high quality affordable financial advice might one day become accessible to every worker in the UK.”

This is just the first of many exciting announcements we have planned over the next few weeks and months.

[1] House of Commons Business Statistics Briefing Paper, 12 December 2018

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Buying a house is likely to be the biggest financial decision most of us will make, but many people are struggling to get onto the property ladder at all. For those who do, the process is often confusing, expensive and time consuming, with multiple parties to contact and chase.

As part of the continuing work we do to make your financial life easier, we have taken the first step to expand our offering into the mortgage space and we are really pleased to announce that we have recently hired James Brocklebank as our Head of Mortgages.

James’ experience as a mortgage broker and developing fintech mortgage solutions will be so valuable as we begin to shape our mortgage advice process over the next few months. We can’t wait to get started, and we’ll be sure to keep you updated along the way.

We aim to make the entire home-buying journey easier and less stressful with clear, continuous, communication and at a low cost. From setting deposit goals and providing mortgage, insurances and mortgage protection advice, to linking to conveyancing, we want to support customers all the way through to their final repayment.

We have always strived to help people make the most of their money, and by adding mortgage advice to our growing list of services is the next step in our ambition to become a one-stop-shop for people’s financial affairs.

• New partnership announced with uSwitch.com.
• Giving customers more ways to make the most of their money.
• Offering comparison services on utilities, broadband and more.

We’re really excited to announce our new partnership with price comparison and switching service uSwitch.com!

Our ambition is simple: To help people make the most of their money, and this will allow us to do just that.

Our new service will launch this year and we will be the first company to partner with uSwitch on this unique offering.

You will be able to see your finances in one place using our app, and we will offer recommendations on how you can make the most of your money.

Rather than the traditional comparison services where you have to input the information and make the decision on which is the best option, we will recommend personalised deals when it is in your best interest.

This will include the comparisons of utilities, broadband and mobile, with credit cards and insurance products coming early 2019.

Kushal Ghuwalewala, Head of Partnerships at uSwitch, said: “At uSwitch, we're passionate about helping as many people as possible save on their household bills. We're excited to be working with OpenMoney and look forward to helping more households pay less for their everyday bills.”

We’ll be sharing more details on our partnership with uSwitch as we add more features to the app and service.

Figuring out the best ways to use your money isn’t always easy, so it makes sense to seek advice from professionals. But that advice usually comes at a price and can be time consuming.

At OpenMoney we want to help you make the right decisions with your money, and make sure that these services are accessible to everyone!

We will give anyone who comes to us honest and expert advice, and because of our extensive use of technology we’re able to keep costs very low.

How it works

We’ve tried to make our advice process as quick and simple for you. Firstly, we’ll ask you a few questions on our website to determine how we can help you.

These are all simple questions such as your age, how much you earn each month, what your monthly outgoings are and how much you might pay towards short-term debt every month, plus what you have in savings.

This step should only take a few moments and we will use this information to guide you towards the next best step for you.

Depending on your situation we may be able to help you to start managing your money better – such as cutting down your spending and working down any debt you might have.

Or we could help you to start saving and building up a cash buffer.

Your answers might even mean we’re able to help open you up to the world of investing or get more from the investments you might already have.

But we will never recommend something that isn't right for you!

How we can help you will depend on your answers to the above. But whatever we recommend the next step is for you to provide us with more information so we can understand your situation and figure out what's best for you.

In some cases, this includes requesting access to your bank details. This can scare some people (and we totally understand) but be assured that your privacy and security are our number one priority.

We have all the legally required and rigorous data privacy and security provisions in place to protect your data.

Our app will be able to use this information to analyse your finances and to help us to provide you with advice advice on how to manage, save or invest your money.

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Helping you to manage your money

Our new OpenMoney app will be able to help you see your income and outgoings clear as well as help you manage them better.

Due to our app’s technology we will be able to analyse your financial situation, including your spending and debts. We will help you reduce them so you cna save to meet your goals.

Saving your money

We always recommend that you have at least 3 months’ worth of outgoings saved. If you haven’t already got this cash buffer saved up, we will point you towards our OpenMoney app.

One of our key features on the app is a service we have developed in partnership with uSwitch.

It will allow you to look at your outgoings for utilities and household bills and provide you with ideas on where you can save money.

In the past you’d have to actively search for cheaper deals on your utilities but now you’ll be able to receive information on potentially cheaper alternatives though our app.

Investing your money

After answering the questions at the start of the process it might be clear that investing your money could be an option for you.

If investing is right for you then we can guide you through your investment choices on our website and recommend a diverse portfolio to suit you.

In order to shape our recommendations to you we will ask you further questions about your existing assets, how much you want to invest and your appetite for risk

One of the biggest barriers to investing for some people is the cost involved. But our charge for your investment is a market-leading 0.50%*.

Personal advice

As well as offering you advice through our website and app our team of qualified financial advisers are available to speak to if you have any questions.

We offer a web and app chat option for any general queries. If you need a more detailed conversation about your recommendation you can book a free phone appointment with them.

Our team are on hand between 9am and 8pm and you can make as many appointments with them as you like – even on weekends and evenings!

*based on the maximum charge payable across all evestor/openmoney portfolios as at 16/08/2018. Fees may vary and may be higher than this stated amount.

We have some exciting news to share!

We have reduced the total cost of our investment portfolios, and this reduction will be passed directly to our customers, and the investments they hold with us. This change sees our fees drop from between 0.50% and 0.52% to between 0.46% and 0.49% depending on which investment portfolio is chosen. You can see a breakdown of these changes by portfolio in the table below.

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Almost three years after launching our service to bring affordable and accessible financial advice to all, we’re pleased to be able to reduce our fees even further. We’re committed to ensuring that our investment fees are as low as possible, while still offering a spread of investments across different assets, markets and geographical locations to try and minimise risk for our customers where possible.

We worked closely with Finalytiq to review our portfolios prior to the impact of Covid-19 and whilst it has caused turbulence in the markets, our investment strategy hasn’t changed. We do not try and time the markets and therefore our reasons still stand for making the changes to the portfolios.

We understand that with the impact of Covid-19, people will naturally have questions about their investments. We offer ongoing advice and appointments with our financial advisers at no extra cost, so people can continue to get the support they need during these unsettling times.

You can contact our team with any questions you have using our Contact Us page.

The coronavirus is impacting all of our lives, whether that is physically, mentally or financially. Things are changing every single day, and that is the same with mortgages. Whether it is the Bank of England reducing the base rate to 0.1%, lenders announcing mortgage payment holidays or lenders announcing they won’t lend anymore money. There are changes every single day.

Whilst there are some great things coming out of this from mortgage lenders, there are also several pitfalls which we'll explore below.

Payment holidays

Let’s start with the big news: lenders allowing you to take payment holidays. Almost all mortgage lenders have risen to the challenge. They have agreed to allow you to take up to three months off from paying your mortgage and have also said this may be extended depending upon external circumstances. This is a great step by lenders, but there are a couple of things to consider.

·       Do you need it? Whilst we appreciate this is a great boost to thousands of people, only apply for this Mortgage holiday if you need it. Don’t take it for the sake of having three months off your payments. Despite your payments being paused, you will continue to be charged interest. This interest is then added to your mortgage meaning you will pay more over the term of your mortgage. If you do need it, please speak to your lender.

·       How will it affect your credit file? Lenders have said they will try to stop it impacting your credit file, but that doesn’t mean it won’t. When you come to re-mortgage in two years’ time and there are three missed mortgage payments on your file, you may find that it could stop you moving lender, moving to a new house or getting a better rate.

If you are struggling, we wholeheartedly recommend speaking to your lender and seeing if you can have a break from your mortgage payments. Please consider all the risks of this, as your payments are going to increase after the holiday, and there are a lot of unknowns.

There are also other alternatives to having a break from your payments. Why not consider extending your term? The impact of this virus is likely to be far longer than three months, which could allow you to make this more affordable for the future. Why not convert to interest only temporarily? This will mean the interest isn’t building up on your mortgage. Or even paying some of the mortgage.

Whatever you are considering doing, please speak to your lender first. Don’t stop paying your mortgage!  

Interest rates

Don’t worry, it’s not all doom and gloom, there are some positives too. We are seeing the Bank of England base rate at an all-time low and as a result of this, mortgage rates are low, with some below 1%. If you are currently on the Standard Variable Rate, or on a tracker deal it might be worth considering re-mortgaging. We understand now might not be a great time to review your finances with everything going on, but it is worth getting some impartial advice to make sure you are on the best deal for your circumstances.

Purchasing a home

I have had a lot of people get in touch with me asking whether they should continue with their House purchase. Here at OpenMoney, we know how much goes into buying a home - the planning, the finances and most importantly the emotional impact on you. With these factors in mind, the answer is different for everybody.

The government is urging people not to move house during the outbreak to avoid breaking social distancing protocol, but this does not mean you should stop buying your dream home. It means you need to consider your options, such as delaying the purchase.

When deciding to buy a home, you will have put months of planning in place, and spoken to mortgage advisers, estate agents, solicitors, and family about the process. You will have saved for months and months to put your deposit down. You shouldn’t therefore stop buying your house without taking some time to thoroughly consider key factors such as the below:  

·       What does your financial situation look like? A lot of businesses are under enormous financial pressure with thousands at risk of losing their jobs, what is the chance of you losing yours? Are you self-employed, will your income be affected by everything going on? Whilst the government is doing its best, their help won’t last forever. Once that stops will you be able to afford those monthly mortgage payments for the next 40 years?

·       How could you be affected if you already have a mortgage offer? If you have lost your job and you have a mortgage offer, you must tell your mortgage lender. It is vital you do so. If they find out after you purchase the property, they can repossess it, and you could find yourself in a lot of trouble. If you have any potential issues, please speak to your mortgage provider or adviser.  

·       Will your options be limited? Some providers have stopped lending to help people purchase homes, and others have reduced what they offer. This may mean your choice is limited. However, it doesn’t mean there aren’t still thousands of mortgage products out there, it simply highlights the huge benefit of getting independent advice.  

The reasons for you buying a home aren’t going to disappear overnight. Whether it is buying your first home, your family needs more space, or you want to move to a nicer area. These reasons will still be there in two months or two years’ time, so don’t give up your dream of a new home. Take time to assess your situation and make an informed decision.  

One thing that this has reinforced for me, is the need for our country to have the right insurance and protection. Everyone in the office is sick of me saying this, but as a country we do not have enough protection in place if the worst is to happen. If you do one thing once we have recovered from this, and we will, please speak to someone and get the right insurance. Naturally, we don’t like talking about people passing away, or not being able to work for months at a time due to ill health, but it does happen and you need to have insurance in place to protect both you and your family.

I hope this has shown you a few of the options available to you, and has also given you few things to consider. Most importantly speak to your lender if you are in trouble, they are on your side and are there to help you.

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Now that we have found ourselves confined to the comforts of our own homes for the next few weeks, it’s a normal reaction to try and sooth one’s soul through the medium of online shopping. No judgement here, we’re all in this together (but did I really need that cactus?). Whilst we’re likely to save a bit of money by not going out, buying coffee, ordering takeaway etc, it wouldn’t be realistic to advise you to not spend a penny, we can offer a nudge in the direction of mindful spending. Below is a roundup of the apps, services and activities that are perking us up at the moment – most of them are free, but any costs involved, we believe contribute to feeling a bit brighter and we have detailed all information.

Top 5 free trials

Now is the perfect time to ‘try before you buy’, and these are our favourite free trials at the moment. Top tip: set a reminder on your phone to cancel your subscription, as most companies will sign you up and charge you automatically.

1.    Amazon Prime[1]

Terms: 30 days. £7.99p/m or £79p/a

This is the perfect option for those who has already exhausted all that Netflix has to offer. This streaming service has a whole host of original TV series and films available that you may not be able to find elsewhere. Here are a few TV recommendations from the team to get you started:

The Boys
Outlander
The Marvelous Mrs Maisel
This is Us
Vikings

2.    Spotify Premium[2]

Terms: 30 days free (for new Spotify members only) and then £9.99p/m.

To quote Plato, music gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination, and life to everything. If ever there was a time that our minds needed wings it’s now! Your premium membership will give you endless hours of uninterrupted tunes to help you concentrate, chill you out or cheer you up.

3.    Audible[3]

Terms: 30 days free plus one free audio book (If you're an Amazon Prime member, they'll bump this up to two books). Plans start at £7.99 p/m.

If a busy social calendar has gotten in the way of reading, now’s a good time to get stuck in. Audio books are a great step back into the world of books and they’re great company for your walk of the day! You get one free audio book with this trial, so choose wisely. May we suggest one of the Harry Potter books? Even if you’ve read them several times over, there’s something comforting about Stephen Fry reading these well-loved tales in such tricky times!

4.    Duolingo Plus[4]

Terms: 7 days free. £80 p/a for continued premium use

If you’retaking time to learn a new skill, maybe a new language is the way to go. The free version of Duolingo is pretty good, but you might as well enjoy seven days of no ads and unlimited attempts at words and phrases as you progress.  

5.    My Heritage[5]

Terms: 14 days free. Packages starting at £79 p/a (£59 for the first year).

A good bit of research to get your teeth into could be just the thing to keep you busy and interested over the coming weeks. Maybe you’ve binge watched all episodes of Who do you think you are and want to know how find out if you’re distantly related to royalty. This 14 day trial can send you down a rabbit hole of history and is bound to bring up new things to chat about!

Top 5 ‘feel good’ services

No one really likes change, but we’re all having to adapt to a new way of living, and pretty quickly. Below are a few things that we’re finding useful to get us through mentally as well as physically. 

1.    Hello Fresh[6]

Whilst the tendency might be to pop a pizza in the oven for comfort, spending (a lot) more time at home could offer the opportunity to experiment in the kitchen. Recipe boxes such as Hello Fresh (meals starting at around £3.50 pp) can be a good way of trying new things and being relatively healthy at the same time. When some form of normality does resume, you will have learned new recipes and be able to recreate them at any time.

2.    Free full body workouts from Barry’s Bootcamp[7]

Now that gyms are closed, the normal treadmill and floor schedule of a Barry’s class has been stripped back and adapted to 30 minute hardcore sessions that can be done from the comfort of your own home. These are broadcast on the Barry’s Instagram page and the schedule is released daily on their Instagram stories.

3.    Free yoga and Barre with FLY LDN[8]

To bring a spot of zen into your lives, FLY LDN are holding 45 minute yoga and barre sessions live on their Instagram page. Unlike many others, they are also posting each session on their Youtube[9]channel so that you needn’t worry about missing any part of the live broadcast.

4.    Calm app[10]

With stress and anxiety being at an all time high, having a toolkit to practice mindfulness and set yourself up for a restful night’s sleep is a great thing to have. This app offers everything from breathing exercises to bedtime stories. It’s free to download with an optional subscription so you can see how you get on with the basic package to begin with.

5.    Let’s Day Out App[11]

This popular app that focuses on bringing people together through experiences, is thoughtfully re-branding to ‘Let’s Day In’. They will be hosting lots of virtual group activities from cooking demonstrations to art classes. All the sessions are free, but there is the option to donate £1 to the World Health Organisation’s COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund.

5 things to jazz up home schooling

For many parents, the thought of having to home school their children is daunting and stressful. We’ve listed a few things below to bring some educational fun to your new school days.

1.    Joe Wicks PE lessons[12]

Joe Wicks aka The Body Coach, is hosting daily 30-minute PE sessions live on his Youtube channel at 9am. They’re great for waking everyone up, engaging the brain and getting into some form of routine when everything is so out of sorts. Although aimed at children, it’s a great way for the whole family to spend some time together being active, and if we’re honest it’s left some of us adults out of puff too.

2.    The Maths Factor[13]

Carol Voderman has announced that she is removing the paywall on her tutorial website for children, The Maths Factor. This is aimed at children of primary school age and will be freely available for as long as children are having to stay away from schools.

3.    Printable Pages

Many illustrators such as Matt Richards[14] and Jacqueline Coley[15] have started producing artwork that parents can print off for their children to colour in. It’s the perfect down time activity to break up a curriculum based timetable.

4.    David Walliams Audio Stories[16]

Just as audio books are great for adults, children can really benefit too. A huge part of school life is shared reading and being read to. David Walliams, author of Gangster Granny and Mr Stink (to name but a few) has announced that he will be releasing an audio story for school children every day at 11am for the next 30 days for free. These can be found on his website, under ‘Elevenses’.

5.    Family Baking

Studying at home needn’t purely revolve around times tables and literacy, there’s a lot to be gained from fun activities at home such as baking. Getting the family involved teaches measurements, elements of time keeping, the science behind baking, the importance of a clean kitchen…and patience from all involved! Little Cooks Co’s Instagram[17] has many recipes that little hands can get involved with, but there’s no reason they can’t get stuck in with your day to day cooking routine!

[1] Amazon

[2] Spotify

[3] Audible

[4] Duolingo

[5] My Heritage

[6] Hello Fresh

[7] Barry’s Bootcamp Instagram

[8] FLY LDN Instagram

[9] FLY LDN Youtube

[10] Calm

[11] Let’s Day Out

[12] PE With Joe

[13] The Maths Factor

[14] Matt Richards

[15] Jacqueline Coley

[16] David Walliams Audio Stories

[17] Little Cooks Co Instagram

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The Coronavirus has been eye opening in all aspects of our lives and has made many of us take a close look out our personal situations including how we stand financially when the going gets tough. Our latest research with YouGov has highlighted the nation's precarious financial position as we entered the uncharted territory that is this global pandemic.

We found that a fifth (21%) of British adults have no immediately accessible savings; and just under a fifth (18%) only have enough to cover essential outgoings, like mortgage and rent payments, utility bills and food, for two months or less if they had no income coming in.  

The research, conducted earlier this month among 2000 British adults, shows that a huge number of households were already struggling financially and may need even more help to survive the additional economic difficulties stemming from COVID-19. Our other key findings were:

• Over the last two years, of those that have experienced financial difficulties, 12% have been behind on paying essential bills and 10% have missed a debt or loan repayment.
• In the last twelve months, over two fifths (44%) have run out of money before their next pay day at least once and over a third (34%) have relied on short-term credit to pay for something.  
• Three fifths (60%) of households have some form of debt. Credit card (32%) and mortgage debt (29%) are most common but many also have unsecured loans (20%), authorised overdrafts (14%) and car loans (9%)2.
• Only half (51%) of people are keeping up with their financial commitments without any difficulties.
• Almost a third (30%) are rarely or never able to put aside any of their income into savings.

Our research makes it clear that many households were already in a fragile financial position and the additional economic uncertainty created by Covid-19 may push people into further difficulties. The ongoing response by the Government and banks to help vulnerable customers with mortgage payment holidays and extra protection for credit card users is to be welcomed, but more may need to be done to support those in financial distress as the crisis continues and as we come out the other side.  

If you are struggling to pay essential bills, or with making debt repayments, contact your provider as soon as possible to discuss delaying or reducing payments. Prioritise paying off debt with the highest interest rates first and if you do need to take on more short-term credit opt for the form with the lowest paying interest. Look at your outgoings to see if there’s any services you can stop or reduce given the current circumstances. As always, if you are concerned, we’d recommend contacting the Money Advice Service for guidance.

These findings were from OpenMoney’s annual research into the UK financial advice gap and will form part of a larger report later this year. The 2019 report, The UK Advice Gap: Are consumer needs for advice and guidance being met? can be downloaded here.

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What should I do with my Pension? Is now a good time to invest? Should I sell my investments or buy more? 

These are just some of the questions we’ve been helping our customers to answer. There is so much uncertainty at the moment, and not just for your money. We asked Hayley Millhouse, our Head of Advisory Services here at OpenMoney, to shed some light on our most frequently asked questions.  

Is now a good time to invest?  

With the markets in a dip, you might hear that it’s a good time to invest new money. While investing in a market downturn can offer the potential to make returns on your money when the market does pick back up, we don’t advise our customers to try and time the markets in this way.  

This is particularly important in the current circumstances, when the outcome and timescales for economic recovery are so unpredictable. No one can say how long the markets will take to recover. If you are considering investing, thinking about your goals is a good starting point.  Are you considering investing to help you achieve your medium to long-term goals, such as retirement, or because of what you’ve seen or heard in the press? 

Investing money is a way to help you achieve your long-term financial goals and shouldn’t be thought of as a quick way to try and make some extra money and capitalise on what’s going on in the markets. 

Here are three things we advise our customers to consider first before making a decision to invest: 

• Are your debts manageable? We only recommend investing if you’re paying less than 15% of your salary each month to manage unsecured debts. 
• Do you have a cash buffer to cover you in emergencies? We recommend you have at least 3 months outgoings to keep in accessible cash savings for an emergency. This is more important than ever, as many people’s incomes might be uncertain over the next few months.  
• Are you happy to leave your money invested for at least 5 years? We only recommend investing if you’re happy to leave your money invested for at least 5 years. This helps you to ride out any short-term market fluctuations. This is particularly important now, as the next few years for the market are so hard to predict. 

If you want to know whether investing is right for you, you can take our financial health check to find out and we’ll advise you on what’s best for you. 

Should I sell my current investments? 

We know that changes in the market can be unsettling at any time and particularly now, with the wider impact Coronavirus is having on our day-to-day lives. However, it’s important to remember that volatility is all part of the investing journey. It’s really important not to panic and make decisions led by emotion - although we know that’s easier said than done.  

We all have an emotional attachments to our hard-earned money, and it can be worrying to see the value of our investments fall, but investing is for the medium to long-term, and we tell our investors to stay focused on their long-term goals throughout these periods of uncertainty.  

If you have access to a financial adviser, we’d recommended speaking to them about your concerns before you sell down any investments you hold.  

If you’re an OpenMoney customer, you can book an appointment with one of our advisers at no extra cost, through your OpenMoney online portal. 

I am close to retiring – should I be worried about my Pension? 

If you’re close to retiring, it could be a particularly scary time for your Pension. If you have a plan for retirement it’s a good time to review it – we always recommend reviewing your retirement plan on an annual basis, or when there have been any specific changes for your circumstances.  

If turbulence in the markets have impacted your Pension and retirement plan, you might need to look at your options on how and when you take your retirement income. For example, is it necessary to take your tax-free cash right now? Do you have other savings you can take income from? Is there an opportunity to delay or phase retirement or take a part-time job for extra income?  All of these options could give the markets opportunity and time to recover. 

If you don’t have a plan yet, there is help out there for you: 

• The government’s Pension Advisory Services offer a range of guidance and planning tools and they’re free to use 
• Pension Wise offer free and impartial government guidance for over 50s on retirement options 
• You can also speak to a financial adviser, although there may be additional cost associated with this 
• We’ve partnered with GUIIDE [1], who offer a free tool to help you build a plan for your retirement and save money too 

If you’re an investor with OpenMoney and you have any questions or just want to chat to our support or advice team for some support and reassurance, please reach out to us. Our team are ready to help: 

• Email hello@open-money.co.uk 
• Reach out through our webchat between 9am – 8pm on weekdays  
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We’re all in this for the long term and we’ll get through these challenging times together! 

[1] Guiide

There are lots of different political and global events that can cause uncertainty and have an impact on markets – Brexit, elections and the recent breakout of Coronavirus are some of the more recent examples. 

We understand that people have an incredibly emotive attachment to their hard-earned money, and rightly so! We understand it can be very unsettling when markets dip, especially in times like this where we are hearing headlines about the ‘worst day since 2008’ [1] for the stock market.

So, we wanted to explore how our core principles of investment strategy and getting your financial foundations in place before investing can help to minimise the impact of these changing markets and support our investors in achieving their long-term investment goals. 

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Diversification  

When we talk about diversification, we often refer to the phrase ‘don’t put all your eggs in one basket’.  

When you diversify your investments, you’re spreading your money across several different types of assets, and we also diversify across geographical locations and industries too. This helps to minimise the risk involved.  

Different assets, like equities, bonds and property, do not react in the same way to a market event – often when some investments fall in value others will rise. It’s often the same with markets across the globe or different industries such as technology or retail.  

Diversification can’t protect you from losing money entirely, but it does help to manage and balance risk. 

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Regular investing  

Although making a big lump sum upfront could boost returns as your money is in the market longer, ‘pound cost averaging’ highlights the benefits of making regular monthly contributions to your investment.  

Regular contributions mean that some fund purchases will be made when the markets are up, and some when the markets are down, averaging out over time. This reduces the risk of trying to ‘time the market’ if you’re making a big one-off deposit.  

There can be emotional benefits to investing on a monthly basis too.  

The natural rise and fall you will see in the value of your investment returns will not be as harsh as when investing a large one off, lump sum. This may help reduce the emotional bias that can get in the way of effective and sensible investment decisions.[2]  

Emotions and investing is something we often talk about. Money is incredibly emotive, but it’s important to stick to your plan and try and avoid making decisions due to fear, panic or excitement – we know it’s easier said than done! 
 

Cash buffer

We recommend that our investors keep three months outgoings in accessible savings, to act as a cash buffer for life’s emergencies. Investing is for the medium to long term (at least 5 years), and so having a cash buffer to draw on will take some of the worry out of seeing your investments rise and fall in the short term. 
 

Ongoing advice and support

 
We know that seeing the value of your investments fall can be worrying – especially for new investors. That’s why we think it’s so important to have access to help and support from real people! 

We offer ongoing advice and appointments with our financial advisers at no extra cost. 

If your circumstances change, or even if you just want to have a chat with one of our advisers for a bit of comfort, we’re here to tell you what’s best for you and your investments and answer any questions or worries you might have about your money.  

You’re not alone – we’re here if you need us!  

[1] independent.co.uk

[2] barclays.co.uk

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You may have heard the media or popular social media influencers discussing terms such as ethical investments, ESG (Environment and Social Governance) portfolios or SRIs (Socially Responsible Investments). They differ very slightly in the areas that they cover, however a running theme throughout them is the premise of using your money to invest in industries that are not damaging to the environment or members of society. Naturally the growing popularity of this type of investment has brought questions to the surface regarding the products that we offer and the impact that these are having on the planet. Ethical portfolios are not currently something that we actively promote or provide for our customers, so let’s take a look at why.

On trend investing

The world of investing is slowly becoming more accessible and therefore possibly less daunting for the masses. Conversations about money are beginning to take place on platforms that were once reserved for aspirational lifestyle content as well as within mainstream press. Breaking down the barriers surrounding the topic of money and how we choose to manage it is a huge step forward, so we are glad that our customers are interested in progressing with their portfolios.

According to the 2018 Ethical Consumer Markets Report, the UK spends roughly 80 billion pounds on ethical goods (green energy, fashion, ethical food choices) every year[1]. This is no surprise given the spotlight that has been shone on our ethical conscience throughout traditional, digital and social media. With this move towards a more sustainable and responsible way of life, we are seeing an increase in customers wishing to invest in a more ethical manner.

Our stance on ethical investment portfolios

Hannah Cole, our Support Team Lead & Financial Adviser is often first on hand to look after queries such as this from our customers.

“We are often asked to look into ways that our customers can make their portfolios more ethical such as avoiding certain industries (American tobacco, Oil and Gas etc), or even how they can withdraw their money altogether to place it into an ethical portfolio...

... At OpenMoney and our investment site, evestor, we operate by offering model investment portfolios comprised of Mutual Index Funds as opposed to Exchange Traded Funds which is where you will mostly find ethical portfolios. The mutual funds that we use, aim to track specific market indexes such as the FTSE All Share and the S&P 500.”

This means that the only way our portfolios will exclude companies deemed to be unethical is if they are removed completely from the indices. As we don’t actively manage our own funds, we don’t pick the individual companies that they are made up of. Instead, we favour a passive investment approach, which you can read more about on our Jargon Buster page.

What are the ethical boundaries?

As well as being a functional decision, it is also worth taking a look at how far other providers go in terms of being ethical and are we really a lesser option because of our seemingly limited products? When looking to invest, it’s common to be averse to harsher industries that could have a negative reputation such as weaponry, alcohol, gambling etc and support a more sustainable, environmentally friendly portfolio.

However, Hannah raises a strong point in that we need to look at where the boundaries lie. “Where do we draw the line? There are respected companies that we know of, who boldly offer ethical investment opportunities despite having faced fines due to various misdemeanors.” Would investors be happy to invest in an ethical fund, but with a provider who has a somewhat tarnished track record?

Moving forwards

Our current opinion on how we operate within the realms of the ethics is not set in stone. We are constantly researching ways in which we can keep up with political and cultural climates at the same time as maintaining our extremely competitive costs and levels of service. However, if we are going to involve ourselves in the world of ethical investments, it needs to be for the right reasons rather than as a reaction to the media. If we cannot offer a justified rate of costs and returns, then we would be doing our valued customers a disservice which is not an option for us. As the market develops over time, ethical investment is of course something we would like to incorporate within our proposition, and our Investment Committee continue to assess the benefits and risks involved for those choosing to invest with us. As these conversations progress, we will keep our customers updated with developments.

[1] UK Ethical Consumer Markets Report

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You might have heard in the media about Neil Woodford’s investment fund ‘Woodford Equity Income’ and the plans to close it down after months of hardship.

This is obviously a stressful and confusing time for investors and it’s important to learn from what has happened to Woodford Equity Income.

Difficulty for Neil Woodford’s fund (which is essentially a pool of lots of different investors’ money) began after a period of underperformance caused investors to withdraw their money in big numbers back in June of this year. This flood of withdrawals caused Woodford to ‘suspend’ his fund. This means that to avoid the fund from falling further in value and investors losing out, Woodford stopped investors from removing their money.

News has now come that Woodford will soon be ‘winding down’ his fund – meaning that he will begin the process of selling off the investments, returning investors’ money and closing his fund for good. We explore some of the learnings we can take from what’s happened with Woodford Equity Income...

Active and passive investment – what does it all mean?

Neil Woodford is an active fund manager. Active managers use their own research, judgement and experience to make investment decisions on what assets to buy and sell. This differs from a passive investment.

A passive investment strategy, like ours, is one where investments are bought and sold to mimic something called a market index. An example of a market index is the ‘Financial Times Stock Exchange (FTSE) 100’.

The FTSE 100 tracks the top 100 companies with the highest share values publicly trading on the London Stock Exchange (LSE). The FTSE 100 represents roughly 80% of the value of all the companies on the LSE!

A passive fund could track which companies fall within the FTSE 100 and buy and sell the stocks of those companies.

There are lots of assumptions made about active management bringing in higher returns for investors than passive, but research has shown that more often than not, active management does not outperform passive management. The charges however are certainly higher and this difference in fees can mean thousands of pounds over the life of your investment.

As an active manager like Woodford enjoys early successes, the media can fuel their growing ego - often heralding them as having some kind of stock-picking superpower! But, just as easily as this media hype builds, it can quickly fall apart.

Active managers will naturally experience losses in their investment funds, much as any investment goes up and down in the short term – they can’t get it right all the time. When this happens for any extended period, the industry and media will pounce, and the sentiment can begin to turn on these managers, picking at their reputation. The media will then find someone else to build up as the new Woodford.

When you invest in an actively managed fund, you should be fully aware that you’re trusting these managers and relying on their experience and research to look after your money. You need to understand the risks associated with active management so you can make a sound decision that you feel comfortable with – don’t fall for the hype around active managers.

Diversification

No matter whether you’re invested in active or passive funds or a mixture of both, you should always make sure your investments are diversified. This means investing across funds in different markets and industries so you can spread your risk across all your investments – think of the old phrase ‘don’t put all of your eggs in one basket’.

If you’re making your own investment decisions and choosing your own funds, you should always make sure you diversify. If you get advice, your adviser should diversify your investments for you.

While it’ll be a worrying time for those invested in Woodford’s fund, hopefully they’ll have diversified portfolios and will be invested in a selection of other funds which have performed better, off-setting any loss.

Get advice

If you’re not sure, the best way to make sure you’re making the right decisions with your money is to get honest financial advice. As an online advice company, we talk a lot about the importance of asking an expert what the best thing for your money is.

It’s also really important to know the difference between ‘best buy’ tables and regulated financial advice. Lists and tables in articles online, telling people which investment funds are ‘the best’ can be dangerous. People may not fully understand the investment decisions they’re making when they follow these tables and have no protection if these decisions are wrong for them.

We really hope that what’s happened doesn’t put investors off completely. There are ways you can manage the risk you take with your investments and feel comfortable and confident even if you’re not a seasoned investor – diversify your investments, keep costs low, understand where you’re investing and, above all, get advice from a person or company regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA).

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Depending on where you live in the UK, your relationship with money may be different. Every one of our interactions with money will help form our understanding and confidence in dealing with financial situations.

In our recent Advice Gap report, we discovered some interesting statistics on each region’s relationship with money and financial decisions. Here’s what we found…

Londoners lack confidence

People living in London often face higher living costs in comparison to those living elsewhere in Britain[1] , which could leave them feeling less confident in making financial decisions. This was backed up by our research as we found that people living in London have the lowest confidence when it comes to selecting financial products.

54% were confident in choosing an appropriate mortgage in London, against the UK average of 60%. Scotland were the most confident, with 65% being able to confidently select a mortgage.

This lack of confidence also spread to more essential financial decisions such as choosing an appropriate current account. 81% of Londoners felt confident enough to do this against the UK average of 87%.

Our CEO, Anthony Morrow commented “Our research shows that the picture in terms of people’s confidence in choosing financial products is mixed across Britain, but those in London consistently come out as least confident. This may be due to the lower average age of Londoners compared to Britain as a whole[2]. Many Londoners have yet to deal with mortgages, energy tariffs and insurance and taking income from a pension is not yet on their radar.

“However, having an appropriate current account and savings product should be essential for all adults and it is concerning that those in the capital feel particularly ill-equipped to deal with these important financial decisions. We need to make sure that information around financial products is simple and easy to understand to make sure these crucial products are accessible to everyone that needs them.”

The East is struggling

Adults living the East of England were found to be struggling with their finances more than the rest of the UK. Although the East Of England is not a generally poor area of the UK, some of the most deprived neighbourhoods are located there[3].

In our Advice Gap research we discovered that 53% of the Eastern population ran out of money before payday at least once in the last year, with the average 46% across Britain.

Less than half (45%) said they were keeping up with their financial commitments without difficulty, less the UK average of 51%.

Finally, less than a third (32%) of those living in the East said they never experienced financial difficulties with the UK average at 36%.

It’s clear that these results show the East of England is struggling to stay on top of their finances and manage their financial situations confidently which can have a wider impact on their wellbeing.

Our CEO, Anthony Morrow commented on the issue saying “Our research shows that the picture in terms of people’s financial security is mixed across Britain, with those in the South of England generally faring better than their neighbours in the East of the country.

Financial services companies need to improve the financial confidence of the nation by ensuring that information is simple and easy to understand. Plugging the adult advice gap by making support and advice around good financial management and planning accessible to all areas of the UK is crucial to improving the wealth of the nation as a whole.”

What can we do to change this?

Education is very important when giving people the right tools to make the correct financial decisions for their personal situation.

There are plenty of websites available that have information on everything from current accounts, to mortgages. Check out Money Saving Expert or the Money Advice Service if you want more information on a specific financial product or issue.

We recommend researching as much as possible before making a financial decision as it can have a long-lasting effect on both your financial and mental wellbeing.

If you’re not sure of your next step, get some advice. OpenMoney was created to help people who aren’t sure what the next step is for their finances – after all, our research revealed that 19.8 million people would appreciate a bit of advice on their finances! So, if you want clear and honest advice, we’re here for you.

If you would like to read more about the Advice Gap report we produced in partnership with YouGov, you can head to our blog here and download the report at the bottom.

[1] - https://www.investopedia.com/articles/personal-finance/091415/how-much-money-do-you-need-live-london.asp

[2] - http://bit.ly/37F7jof

[3] - https://www.eadt.co.uk/ea-life/four-maps-show-some-of-suffolk-and-essex-s-poorest-and-richest-neighbourhoods-sit-side-by-side-1-5100441

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There are lots of headlines right now about Brexit, a potential general election and how these could affect house prices, the economy and so on. We can’t predict the future, but when it comes to investment, we can make smart decisions with the knowledge that we do have.

Diversification

Here at OpenMoney there are several ways we prepare our investment portfolios for uncertainty. We make sure our portfolios are diversified, this means we spread our investment funds across different markets, and across different geographies. We do this so that if an event affects one industry or market, your overall fund shouldn’t be impacted too much.

Rebalancing

We also rebalance your portfolio when needed. Over time as investments rise and fall, the original asset allocation can ‘drift’. Because the value of your better performing funds will grow and those lower risk funds may not grow as fast. Rebalancing is the process of buying and selling assets in a portfolio to maintain the original asset allocation.

Try not to panic

You may be thinking about withdrawing your funds in anticipation of a negative market change. You can of course withdraw your funds at any time. But it’s important to remember that the reason investing is for the long term, is to ride out these changes in the market.

The market has always seen periods of uncertainty and market turbulence is unfortunately just a part of the investing lifecycle. We know that the potential for market fluctuations around political events can be unsettling, however the global stock markets have continued to rise overall for much of the past ten years.

It is also important to remember that you only really lose money if you sell during these dips at a lower price than you bought.

We only allow people to invest if they have a cash buffer of at least 3 months’ outgoings saved. Having these savings easily accessible should help to ease any worry of seeing your investments fluctuate in value.

Still have some questions? You can chat to one of our friendly advisors for free via webchat, email or by phone.

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