One of the things people recommend to cope during lockdown is learning new skills. There are a lot of hacky memes about people learning Japanese and stuff like that. I'm sure there are probably people doing things like that just for the hell of it. Fair enough, good for them
But it makes sense to do something that is going to improve your employment prospects. I'd mentioned in my last weekly update that I had been learning to code. I've actually been doing it for a while, I started about a year ago and I'm getting near the end of the course.
Before I talk about what I'm doing, understanding the "why" is maybe more important. First thing to say is, I am not a coder. I am not involved in anything in the IT or technology industries. I've made a point of not saying what I actually do because it would make it really easy for my current employer to identify me from my posts. I like to shit on my employer and the company management (usually for good reason), I don't know if my posts could be used against me but I don't want to take that chance. It's better just to stay anonymous.
There were things I could do in my own industry. There are skills I could study and certifications I could do. But as I have said numerous times, I fucking hate what I do and the people I do it for. And it isn't just them specifically, the industry as a whole just seems to be run by arseholes. Things are changing slowly but it's still a largely old-fashioned, conservative, penny-pinching industry run by golf-club member-type twats.
What I did not want to do was get myself dug in further. Investing in skills related to what I do might bring advancement but it also gets me further into a world I despise. I've had a little taste of it before and it strikes me that the further up the ladder I got then the worse the job gets. The added financial reward did not make up for the sheer amount of hassle, stress and unhappiness it brought.
The other factor is that the industry I work in is very cyclic. It's one of the first to get hit during a recession and usually one of the last to recover. In fact, I'm still earning about 40% of my pre-2008 salary twelve years on. Getting new skills will do absolutely nothing for my prospects in another recession. It doesn't matter how skilled you are if there are no jobs.
So it made sense to be doing something that could lead in another direction. Coding has a lot going for it. Even junior positions are reasonably lucrative (compared to the industry I'm in), it tends to weather recessions well, there are tons of resources I can use without having to pay for courses, loads of opportunity for remote working, freelancing and self-employment, and long term it is a growth area. I've also got transferable skills like understanding engineering and design, project management and basic life skills like time management, social skills, team working, etc.
It came to me after I had a bit of flashback moment. I read an article about a year ago how where I'm originally from has become a bit of a European leader in technology. When I was a kid I was into home computers (Commodore 64's so that really dates me) and programming. I had a friend who was a couple of years older than me who went on to become the head of a big video game company in the US and I was easily as skilled and talented as he was. It really made me ask "how the fuck did I get here?". I made a couple of wrong turns when young, a couple of bad relationships as well and here I am, broke, in a dead end job, doing something that gives me zero satisfaction. I needed to course-correct or I was headed for doom.
That's what got me thinking about coding as a way of branching off my career. I did some searching around for resources and courses. I was even willing to pay for something like Open University (until I saw how much the bastards charge). That's when I came across the concept of coding bootcamps. Bootcamps are intensive, immersive courses designed to take you from know nothing to employable in a few months. But I couldn't afford either the time or the cost to do one so started looking at online.
From what I read, the most recommended options were Codecademy, Free Code Camp and The Odin Project. The general advice was just pick one and complete it, the main difference between them just comes down to the languages and technologies that are taught on the course. The skills you learn are more important than the details. So I picked The Odin Project based purely on their website being the most accessible. I signed up and a year later I am coming close to the end.
The Odin Project teaches "full stack web development". That means it teaches the "stack" of technologies necessary to create a web-based application. That means it teaches HTML & CSS for creating the visual look of web pages, Javascript for creating functionality within that web page and Ruby-on-Rails to build the code that does all the processing (like online shopping, blogging, booking hotels, etc) that exists on the server side that you never get to see.
Everything is broken down into 5 or 6 six courses which you work through at your own rate. Each course is made up of individual lessons which are usually either reading through info on external websites or watching selected videos on You Tube. Every few lessons you are given a series of projects to do that cement the learning of the previous lessons.
Some of the projects you can do in an hour, some longer. One of them, creating a chess game, took me around six weeks to finish. There are a lot of difficult concepts, too. The Odin Project says it is for complete novices but I think a bit of exposure to some basic computer science concepts wouldn't hurt before starting.
The big problem with the lessons is that it uses other people's stuff. The Odin Project doesn't have a lot of its own content, instead for each lesson it gives you a curated list of web-pages to read through. The quality can be variable and the level they are pitched at isn't consistent. Some resources seem like they are written for school-kids, others for people who know what they are doing. On the plus side, it means that they can swap things in and out as they find better resources for a particular subject. But this can also be frustrating as I've found I'll be halfway through a lesson when the structure has been changed while I've been working on it. Really annoying.
The other problem is that you are on your own. When something doesn't work or goes wrong then you need to figure it out for yourself. That can be a great learning tool but a lot of the time it is really frustrating. You need to have tenacity and discipline to see it through. There are forums like Stack Overflow where there are always similar questions that have been asked but you still need to be happy figuring stuff out for yourself.
But there are lots of positives. The reliance on external material means you are getting the best info that's out there even if you have to do a bit of extra reading because you don't understand something. And the lack of support means you have to get very savvy at solving problems. I've learned techniques for doing things because I had to work it out rather than being handed a standard method to follow. Most of all, it is really satisfying. I know how to do stuff. I know how things work.
In terms of time, it varies. I aim to do at least an hour a day but I don't think that is enough. It's not just that it takes longer to get anywhere, it is harder. You lose momentum and it's easy to forget something you read yesterday or the day before. If I was doing it again I'd aim for doing longer chunks of time even if that meant doing it less often. Some stuff is more enjoyable. Personally, I'd rather read than watch videos. But I really enjoy the coding projects and would happily lose hours writing code. I liked to spend my lunch break coding on my laptop somewhere quiet whenever I could. Or wake up early and write for an hour.
It doesn't take much of an investment in technology, either. I use a really shitty, old laptop for doing all my coding projects on. One thing I'd say, The Odin Projects doesn't work well with Windows computers. There is a lot of dicking around to get it to work with the software you need (Ruby and Rails). It all works better with Ubuntu or on a Mac. I got a cheap, old laptop for £50 on Ebay, added some extra memory and installed Ubuntu and it works fine for the coding projects. But it isn't easy if you don't know what you are doing and I still don't find Ubuntu a particularly friendly system.
A year down the line and I've really enjoyed it. I'm glad I've done it. The scary part is that I am now approaching the part where I start talking to employers and recruiters. In a couple of months it is going to become real. That's when I find out if the time I have invested has been worth it. I need an escape from this industry and I'm pinning my hopes on this being it. If it doesn't work then I don't know how I will feel about that.
I don't know what else to say other than if you are looking for a way to learn to code then The Odin Project has been a really thorough and enjoyable way to do it.
Sunday, May 24, 2020
Wednesday, May 20, 2020
Weekly update: 20th May 2020
I'm trying to get back into the habit of uploading a weekly update. It's about time I got back into a routine.
So this week I got my car insurance renewal through from the RAC, my current insurer. £800. No surprise, everyone knows your current insurer knocks the arse out of the renewal every year. They know a ton of people will just accept it and let it auto-renew. And they know another ton of people will phone up and try to bargain. And miraculously they always seem to manage to cut it in half, a special deal just for you, just for today, so that you couldn't possibly turn it down. I don't know what their retention rates are but it must be high.
It pisses me off. I just want to be able to buy a service and that's it. I don't want to have to haggle, I don't want to sit through a script where someone in a call centre pretends to talk to their supervisor about discounts. I just want to know what I'm paying without having to do this tedious fucking dance. And it is everywhere now as well. It used to be car insurance and everyone just accepted that's how it was. But it's mobile phones, it's broadband, it's buying a fucking couch. I don't want to do it, it doesn't build loyalty, it makes me want to just get it over and done with.
As usual, I just do a search on Confused and go with the lowest deal. I never even bother going through the hassle of calling them that may or may not result in a few pennies saved. But the one thing I always do is I go through Topcashback. There is usually a kickback on the insurance search providers (they are all much the same) so I get a quote through that first. But I always check cashback offers for the lowest insurer as well. If they have a better deal then I'll dump the search provider and do the policy direct. If not, I go through Confused (or whoever) and get their cashback instead (usually about £40).
I had a look at my savings today. I'd been regularly pumping what I could into fairly conservative index tracker funds through an ISA with Hargreaves Lansdowne's. At the start of lockdown about 20% got wiped off the value. Now, they are only down 6%. A small loss is good news. Most financial bloggers say hold on to your shares through shitty times unless you really need to sell so that's what I've done. It was tempting to just move it into cash to minimise the loss but I'm going to plough through for the minute. I've also switched my monthly deposit from all trackers to half trackers and half bond funds for a bit more conservatism right now.
Chances are I won't be making my usual £165 deposit next month anyway. As far as I know I am still on track to be furloughed. And I am still super-angry about the whole thing. As far as I know, I am the only one right now. And, everyone else seems crazy busy right now as well. So everybody else has too much on but they can't find anything for me to do?
You can't help take it personally. It has soured my relationship with the company. I'm actually finding it really hard to work with other people there this week. I'd forgotten how many people are competing for the next rung on the ladder. And you see it now, so many people trying elbowing each other out the way to get recognition. Sending emails at stupid hours. Messages where senior management are copied in unnecessarily so that they get to be seen. Working well past reasonable hours all for free. The way things are you can't blame them but I guarantee that senior management are going to take advantage of the goodwill generated by this self-inhterest.
Me, I just want to get the fuck out now. I think I'd happily eat the 20% pay hit to not be working amongst them. But what worries me is that if you are first on furlough then you're probably first in the queue for redundancy when they realise that long term the company is now too big. Even with the government funds they still have employer's NI to pay so there is still a cost in me being on the books. The ax will fall eventually.
The thing is, they told me it could have been anyone. But everybody knows there are people who it won't be and I'm not on that list. On the plus side, it is pushing me into other things. I've been learning to code for the last year and I'm nearing the end of the course (I will post about it separately) so the time is coming when I will be able to start looking for work as a junior developer. And the other positive is that I saw an ad for a job the other day that could have been written for me. They're looking for my specialism which is in short supply, they are offering a similar salary and it's only a couple of miles away (I could probably cycle it). I contacted the recruiter and I've got a video interview next week.
Mentally, I've not been doing well this week at all. Monday I was pretty depressed. Tuesday, I veered between anger and depression. My phone died on Monday as well, five months outside of warranty. So now I'm back to using a ten year old phone. I don't really care, I'm not into technology. It's just the principle of it. It cost me £100 seventeen months ago and now it's going to cost me another £100 if I want to replace it.
But that's somewhere else I can save a little bit of money when I go on to furlough. I'm only paying £13 a month for a pay as you go SIM card with Vodafone. But if I'm not working and not going anywhere then I don't need much mobile data. I can swap to a lesser deal on Giff Gaff for about half of that. So I save £6 a month? Well, that's £1.50 a week I can spend on something else. A little treat for my daughter or something.
I had a lot of optimism at the start of the year. I thought this was when things were going to turn around. I guess a lot of people thought that. Right now, I'm just trying to maintain that optimism. I'm trying to be disciplined with household chores. I'm being mindful when doing tasks, take pleasure in doing it and experiencing it. I'm still working out hard and I'm probably in the best physical shape I've been in for a while.
My ideal scenario is that I get offered that job next week, I get a couple of weeks on my arse on furlough while everything is finalised and then I tell where I work to go fuck themselves finally. If it doesn't happen? Then there's going to be something else. There has to be. I just need to keep reminding myself that.
So this week I got my car insurance renewal through from the RAC, my current insurer. £800. No surprise, everyone knows your current insurer knocks the arse out of the renewal every year. They know a ton of people will just accept it and let it auto-renew. And they know another ton of people will phone up and try to bargain. And miraculously they always seem to manage to cut it in half, a special deal just for you, just for today, so that you couldn't possibly turn it down. I don't know what their retention rates are but it must be high.
It pisses me off. I just want to be able to buy a service and that's it. I don't want to have to haggle, I don't want to sit through a script where someone in a call centre pretends to talk to their supervisor about discounts. I just want to know what I'm paying without having to do this tedious fucking dance. And it is everywhere now as well. It used to be car insurance and everyone just accepted that's how it was. But it's mobile phones, it's broadband, it's buying a fucking couch. I don't want to do it, it doesn't build loyalty, it makes me want to just get it over and done with.
As usual, I just do a search on Confused and go with the lowest deal. I never even bother going through the hassle of calling them that may or may not result in a few pennies saved. But the one thing I always do is I go through Topcashback. There is usually a kickback on the insurance search providers (they are all much the same) so I get a quote through that first. But I always check cashback offers for the lowest insurer as well. If they have a better deal then I'll dump the search provider and do the policy direct. If not, I go through Confused (or whoever) and get their cashback instead (usually about £40).
I had a look at my savings today. I'd been regularly pumping what I could into fairly conservative index tracker funds through an ISA with Hargreaves Lansdowne's. At the start of lockdown about 20% got wiped off the value. Now, they are only down 6%. A small loss is good news. Most financial bloggers say hold on to your shares through shitty times unless you really need to sell so that's what I've done. It was tempting to just move it into cash to minimise the loss but I'm going to plough through for the minute. I've also switched my monthly deposit from all trackers to half trackers and half bond funds for a bit more conservatism right now.
Chances are I won't be making my usual £165 deposit next month anyway. As far as I know I am still on track to be furloughed. And I am still super-angry about the whole thing. As far as I know, I am the only one right now. And, everyone else seems crazy busy right now as well. So everybody else has too much on but they can't find anything for me to do?
You can't help take it personally. It has soured my relationship with the company. I'm actually finding it really hard to work with other people there this week. I'd forgotten how many people are competing for the next rung on the ladder. And you see it now, so many people trying elbowing each other out the way to get recognition. Sending emails at stupid hours. Messages where senior management are copied in unnecessarily so that they get to be seen. Working well past reasonable hours all for free. The way things are you can't blame them but I guarantee that senior management are going to take advantage of the goodwill generated by this self-inhterest.
Me, I just want to get the fuck out now. I think I'd happily eat the 20% pay hit to not be working amongst them. But what worries me is that if you are first on furlough then you're probably first in the queue for redundancy when they realise that long term the company is now too big. Even with the government funds they still have employer's NI to pay so there is still a cost in me being on the books. The ax will fall eventually.
The thing is, they told me it could have been anyone. But everybody knows there are people who it won't be and I'm not on that list. On the plus side, it is pushing me into other things. I've been learning to code for the last year and I'm nearing the end of the course (I will post about it separately) so the time is coming when I will be able to start looking for work as a junior developer. And the other positive is that I saw an ad for a job the other day that could have been written for me. They're looking for my specialism which is in short supply, they are offering a similar salary and it's only a couple of miles away (I could probably cycle it). I contacted the recruiter and I've got a video interview next week.
Mentally, I've not been doing well this week at all. Monday I was pretty depressed. Tuesday, I veered between anger and depression. My phone died on Monday as well, five months outside of warranty. So now I'm back to using a ten year old phone. I don't really care, I'm not into technology. It's just the principle of it. It cost me £100 seventeen months ago and now it's going to cost me another £100 if I want to replace it.
But that's somewhere else I can save a little bit of money when I go on to furlough. I'm only paying £13 a month for a pay as you go SIM card with Vodafone. But if I'm not working and not going anywhere then I don't need much mobile data. I can swap to a lesser deal on Giff Gaff for about half of that. So I save £6 a month? Well, that's £1.50 a week I can spend on something else. A little treat for my daughter or something.
I had a lot of optimism at the start of the year. I thought this was when things were going to turn around. I guess a lot of people thought that. Right now, I'm just trying to maintain that optimism. I'm trying to be disciplined with household chores. I'm being mindful when doing tasks, take pleasure in doing it and experiencing it. I'm still working out hard and I'm probably in the best physical shape I've been in for a while.
My ideal scenario is that I get offered that job next week, I get a couple of weeks on my arse on furlough while everything is finalised and then I tell where I work to go fuck themselves finally. If it doesn't happen? Then there's going to be something else. There has to be. I just need to keep reminding myself that.
Saturday, May 16, 2020
On Furlough
I got the phonecall yesterday that I had been expecting for a while. I was told that as of next Friday I would be on furlough. I had work for this week but after that, game over.
I knew it was coming. I'd done fuck all this week and started every day pestering my manager for something to do. I'd be given a simple task and 7.5 hours to do it. I knew when there was no-one chasing it that this was just something so that both me and my manager could pretend I was busy.
It reminded me of the old Bill Hicks gag:
"Hicks! Can't you just pretend to be working?"
"You're paid more than me. Can't you pretend I'm working?"
So it was no surprise. I'd expected it about a month ago so the impact isn't going to be huge. I'd already thought it through in financial terms. It translates to losing £500 a month. I pay £165 into a savings plan which I can cancel and I'm probably spending about a quarter of my monthly budget so that's the £500 taken care of.
There are discretionary things I can cancel as well. I've got Amazon Prime because the free delivery was useful in lockdown but it's £7.99 that can go. I've got £6 for membership of a local nature reserve where I like going birdwatching. I hate to do it but that can go as well as it's shut for the duration anyway. I'm going to hit up my car insurer and see if I can get anything reduced there. Weather is getting milder so I can cut back on heating.
There are lots of things I can do to make this work financially. I can't get worked up about it. I fucking despise this government but surprisingly the Job Retention Scheme is an absolute godsend. And they've extended it to October. So worst case, I've got the summer with my feet up. My line manager says that all the work that was put on hold is coming back on stream in another month or so, we're an NHS supplier so in theory should weather this OK. And if everyone is still in this shit in October then we're all fucked.
The problem is the mental impact. I tried writing this post last night and I just couldn't do it. It hit me hard and I'm still pretty angry about it. I'm really good at my job and I'm really reliable. People ask for me to be assigned to their projects. There's a lot of people there that you honestly cannot say that about. So it is a real slap in the face that I get furloughed and they don't.
And it is ironic because I fucking hate my job. I have no end of things I could fill my time with and just having the break would do my mental health a power of good. But it's just that little, shitty niggle that says "you aren't as good as these people".
I know that's bullshit and that I am just inventing a narrative based on shit that has happened in the past. I have zero evidence that that is the case. I know that the likely explanation is that I am more skilled so more expensive. At the minute, they just need the office equivalent of a labourer. They don't need skilled. So if they get me off the books then it pays for nearly two "labourers". But I just can't shut that voice off that keeps asking "so why aren't they doing it to others? Why is it just you?". And the answer to that is "they hate you, you must be shit at it".
It's my brain fucking with me. I know it intellectually but I just don't feel it on a gut level.
I'm a big fan of Jocko Willink's outlook. I know what he would say. "Good". On furlough? Good, more time to train, more time to learn, more time with my daughter. Losing 20% of your salary? Good, you've still got 80%. You aren't on the dole. There is a big part of me looking forward to what is basically extended paid leave. I keep thinking maybe this is the push I need to start a business. There are a couple of things I could be doing to make a little extra money that I'd have the time to pursue. It'd just be getting some advertising and hoping that the demand was there.
Someone else I am a fan of is Ram Dass, a late American spiritual teacher. Ram Dass had this idea of "becoming nobody". He said that we build up an identity based on all these external things. Our careers, our hobbies, the clothes we wear, the stuff we own. But all of that can be taken away. So who are you underneath it all? Being "somebody" means having all these pointless trappings. Becoming "nobody" is who you really are without all that shit. I know that I hate work so why do I let it define me? This is an opportunity to let go.
We'll see. I'm bouncing along the edge of a depression. It's not how I saw this year playing out. I'm getting older but I don't feel like I'm getting further along the track. The things I'd hoped for like getting out of debt, getting on my feet, starting a new relationship, having more of a life outside of just work and childcare, it feels like they have gone. I wanted to finally put divorce and nearly going bankrupt in the past. What is worse is that it feels like the opportunity is gone. That door has closed and there's nothing on the horizon to get optimistic about. Even wars have an end, this seems to just be the normal state of human life from now on.
I knew it was coming. I'd done fuck all this week and started every day pestering my manager for something to do. I'd be given a simple task and 7.5 hours to do it. I knew when there was no-one chasing it that this was just something so that both me and my manager could pretend I was busy.
It reminded me of the old Bill Hicks gag:
"Hicks! Can't you just pretend to be working?"
"You're paid more than me. Can't you pretend I'm working?"
So it was no surprise. I'd expected it about a month ago so the impact isn't going to be huge. I'd already thought it through in financial terms. It translates to losing £500 a month. I pay £165 into a savings plan which I can cancel and I'm probably spending about a quarter of my monthly budget so that's the £500 taken care of.
There are discretionary things I can cancel as well. I've got Amazon Prime because the free delivery was useful in lockdown but it's £7.99 that can go. I've got £6 for membership of a local nature reserve where I like going birdwatching. I hate to do it but that can go as well as it's shut for the duration anyway. I'm going to hit up my car insurer and see if I can get anything reduced there. Weather is getting milder so I can cut back on heating.
There are lots of things I can do to make this work financially. I can't get worked up about it. I fucking despise this government but surprisingly the Job Retention Scheme is an absolute godsend. And they've extended it to October. So worst case, I've got the summer with my feet up. My line manager says that all the work that was put on hold is coming back on stream in another month or so, we're an NHS supplier so in theory should weather this OK. And if everyone is still in this shit in October then we're all fucked.
The problem is the mental impact. I tried writing this post last night and I just couldn't do it. It hit me hard and I'm still pretty angry about it. I'm really good at my job and I'm really reliable. People ask for me to be assigned to their projects. There's a lot of people there that you honestly cannot say that about. So it is a real slap in the face that I get furloughed and they don't.
And it is ironic because I fucking hate my job. I have no end of things I could fill my time with and just having the break would do my mental health a power of good. But it's just that little, shitty niggle that says "you aren't as good as these people".
I know that's bullshit and that I am just inventing a narrative based on shit that has happened in the past. I have zero evidence that that is the case. I know that the likely explanation is that I am more skilled so more expensive. At the minute, they just need the office equivalent of a labourer. They don't need skilled. So if they get me off the books then it pays for nearly two "labourers". But I just can't shut that voice off that keeps asking "so why aren't they doing it to others? Why is it just you?". And the answer to that is "they hate you, you must be shit at it".
It's my brain fucking with me. I know it intellectually but I just don't feel it on a gut level.
I'm a big fan of Jocko Willink's outlook. I know what he would say. "Good". On furlough? Good, more time to train, more time to learn, more time with my daughter. Losing 20% of your salary? Good, you've still got 80%. You aren't on the dole. There is a big part of me looking forward to what is basically extended paid leave. I keep thinking maybe this is the push I need to start a business. There are a couple of things I could be doing to make a little extra money that I'd have the time to pursue. It'd just be getting some advertising and hoping that the demand was there.
Someone else I am a fan of is Ram Dass, a late American spiritual teacher. Ram Dass had this idea of "becoming nobody". He said that we build up an identity based on all these external things. Our careers, our hobbies, the clothes we wear, the stuff we own. But all of that can be taken away. So who are you underneath it all? Being "somebody" means having all these pointless trappings. Becoming "nobody" is who you really are without all that shit. I know that I hate work so why do I let it define me? This is an opportunity to let go.
We'll see. I'm bouncing along the edge of a depression. It's not how I saw this year playing out. I'm getting older but I don't feel like I'm getting further along the track. The things I'd hoped for like getting out of debt, getting on my feet, starting a new relationship, having more of a life outside of just work and childcare, it feels like they have gone. I wanted to finally put divorce and nearly going bankrupt in the past. What is worse is that it feels like the opportunity is gone. That door has closed and there's nothing on the horizon to get optimistic about. Even wars have an end, this seems to just be the normal state of human life from now on.
Sunday, May 10, 2020
Cashing Out: The Pots of Money You Forgot You Had
It's pretty clear with the economic situation is that a lot of the companies which we know now are not going to be there after the coronavirus pandemic is done.
There are a few sick men on the High Street that always seem to be on the verge of going under. Department stores, like Debenhams. Mainstream travel agents and airlines. Bar & dining chains. It's always the same names, Debenhams, Marks and Spencer, some celebrity chef's restaurant chain, anything owned by Richard Branson or Phillip Green. But there are also going to be a lot of others as well.
It got me thinking about how much money I've got tied up in companies. I'm not talking about investments or pensions or anything like that. In case you missed it, I'm skint. No, I'm talking about things like gift cards, refunds, cashbacks. Little pots of money that are sitting in my account on some company's website.
It all mounts up to a decent pile of cash. And here's the problem: none of that is protected. If the company goes tits up then good luck getting it back. I had a ball-ache of a fight when my electricity supplier went bust and that was WITH protection under the law. Without it? You're money is as good as lost.
So over the last few weeks I've been working my way round all of these. The first step is to just take an inventory of where you are. Go round everyone you spend money with and just make a little list then check out your account. You'll be surprised. A good start is to go over your credit or debit card statements and have a look at where you spent money. Same with Paypal (or any of the other payment providers). Just go round them all and have a look at your account balances with them. If you are in credit with them, even by a couple of quid, get it out. That company may not be there in a few months and that cash is better in your pocket than being lost in the system.
Refunds are a good place to check. Usually you are going to get a refund paid back on the card you used originally. Make sure that refund actually happened. Sometimes they will credit the refund to your account, though. If it is then withdraw it. It is your money, they put it there because they know the chances are high you will spend it with them. It's worth keeping track of withdrawals and just double check it ends up in your bank.
Another area to look at is gift cards and vouchers. This is your money tied up in that company. Something like 6% of all gift cards never get used which translates as millions of pounds. Guess who loses that money? It isn't the company. They are winners, they've already received money for the card and the longer it takes you to spend it the better. Inflation means a £10 gift card bought last year buys you a lot less today than it did twelve months ago. Some gift cards have expiry dates, too. So if your gift card expires then they make even more on you. There are two things to remember with gift cards: they are YOUR money and their value decays as time passes. But there is also a third issue and that is the really important one right now: if the company goes bust then the gift card is worth zero.
I have a John Lewis credit card with a cashback deal on it which I use for my daily spending. Every four months they pay out the cashback. But here's the catch: they pay it out in John Lewis/Waitrose vouchers. I fucking hate Waitrose, you might as well just shop in Tesco and just throw an extra 10% of what you spent in the bin. But I actually quite like John Lewis, they're pretty good for some big ticket items like electricals.
However, John Lewis is also one of those "sick men" I mentioned at the start. They are always warning about losing money and being close to collapse. So having £150 mounting up in JL vouchers is a big risk and letting inflation erode their value is stupid. So, I spent a big chunk of them and if things seem to be sliding for them I'll spend the rest.
You have to kind of take a view on it. I doubt we'll see Amazon collapse any time soon so their cards are probably a safe bet. You can maybe hold on to these a little longer. Others, you might want to order something soon. But either way, inflation makes holding gift cards a really bad idea regardless of whose name is one the front. Same goes for goodwill payments, like when a company bungs you a few quid because they screwed an order up. A lot of payments will be in the form of a gift card or discount code and will be in the same boat.
So as a lesson for the future, here's some things to remember:
Another place I knew I had a lot of unprotected money was in Topcashback. I use it a lot for online purchases and over the last couple of years I've built up around £400 in my account. Again, that account is unprotected. I don't know what effect this whole situation is having on them but that money is still safer in my bank account than in theirs. Like gift cards, inflation is also eroding how much that is worth. Even with the current shitty savings rates the interest is still better than nothing. So, that is going to be moved from there to my savings account.
If you've been into matched betting then you've probably got pots of money scattered all over the place with bookies. There is nothing to bet on so I cleared mine out. I wasn't hugely enamoured with matched betting, I doubt I'll continue with it after this all recovers so not bothered about my accounts going dormant or whatever. I think I only made about £150 profit but the big thing was that I had a lot of my own cash tied up there to leverage it. Some bookies are going to go bust, there is no question of that. Take it out now.
Your money is your money. You need to be really proactive with it right now. Companies will go bust, companies that you use. Sure, cashing out your gift cards and clearing out accounts might be the push some need to fold. It's a tough decision but there was no question for me. I don't have the money to spare just so I can feel like I did the ethical thing.
There are a few sick men on the High Street that always seem to be on the verge of going under. Department stores, like Debenhams. Mainstream travel agents and airlines. Bar & dining chains. It's always the same names, Debenhams, Marks and Spencer, some celebrity chef's restaurant chain, anything owned by Richard Branson or Phillip Green. But there are also going to be a lot of others as well.
It got me thinking about how much money I've got tied up in companies. I'm not talking about investments or pensions or anything like that. In case you missed it, I'm skint. No, I'm talking about things like gift cards, refunds, cashbacks. Little pots of money that are sitting in my account on some company's website.
It all mounts up to a decent pile of cash. And here's the problem: none of that is protected. If the company goes tits up then good luck getting it back. I had a ball-ache of a fight when my electricity supplier went bust and that was WITH protection under the law. Without it? You're money is as good as lost.
So over the last few weeks I've been working my way round all of these. The first step is to just take an inventory of where you are. Go round everyone you spend money with and just make a little list then check out your account. You'll be surprised. A good start is to go over your credit or debit card statements and have a look at where you spent money. Same with Paypal (or any of the other payment providers). Just go round them all and have a look at your account balances with them. If you are in credit with them, even by a couple of quid, get it out. That company may not be there in a few months and that cash is better in your pocket than being lost in the system.
Refunds are a good place to check. Usually you are going to get a refund paid back on the card you used originally. Make sure that refund actually happened. Sometimes they will credit the refund to your account, though. If it is then withdraw it. It is your money, they put it there because they know the chances are high you will spend it with them. It's worth keeping track of withdrawals and just double check it ends up in your bank.
Another area to look at is gift cards and vouchers. This is your money tied up in that company. Something like 6% of all gift cards never get used which translates as millions of pounds. Guess who loses that money? It isn't the company. They are winners, they've already received money for the card and the longer it takes you to spend it the better. Inflation means a £10 gift card bought last year buys you a lot less today than it did twelve months ago. Some gift cards have expiry dates, too. So if your gift card expires then they make even more on you. There are two things to remember with gift cards: they are YOUR money and their value decays as time passes. But there is also a third issue and that is the really important one right now: if the company goes bust then the gift card is worth zero.
I have a John Lewis credit card with a cashback deal on it which I use for my daily spending. Every four months they pay out the cashback. But here's the catch: they pay it out in John Lewis/Waitrose vouchers. I fucking hate Waitrose, you might as well just shop in Tesco and just throw an extra 10% of what you spent in the bin. But I actually quite like John Lewis, they're pretty good for some big ticket items like electricals.
However, John Lewis is also one of those "sick men" I mentioned at the start. They are always warning about losing money and being close to collapse. So having £150 mounting up in JL vouchers is a big risk and letting inflation erode their value is stupid. So, I spent a big chunk of them and if things seem to be sliding for them I'll spend the rest.
You have to kind of take a view on it. I doubt we'll see Amazon collapse any time soon so their cards are probably a safe bet. You can maybe hold on to these a little longer. Others, you might want to order something soon. But either way, inflation makes holding gift cards a really bad idea regardless of whose name is one the front. Same goes for goodwill payments, like when a company bungs you a few quid because they screwed an order up. A lot of payments will be in the form of a gift card or discount code and will be in the same boat.
So as a lesson for the future, here's some things to remember:
- don't buy gift cards. There's nothing socially awkward about giving cash. Nobody prefers to receive a gift card over cash. No-one.
- if you do, use a credit card to pay for it. At least there is a chance you can recover the payment if the company goes bust.
- if you get one, spend it as soon as you can to avoid inflation
- you can sell them. Card Yard buys and sells them for a fee (I think it was 10% on an Amazon card when I sold the one I got from work as a shitty Christmas bonus). You used to be able to sell them on Ebay as well but you have a high chance of being scammed
Another place I knew I had a lot of unprotected money was in Topcashback. I use it a lot for online purchases and over the last couple of years I've built up around £400 in my account. Again, that account is unprotected. I don't know what effect this whole situation is having on them but that money is still safer in my bank account than in theirs. Like gift cards, inflation is also eroding how much that is worth. Even with the current shitty savings rates the interest is still better than nothing. So, that is going to be moved from there to my savings account.
If you've been into matched betting then you've probably got pots of money scattered all over the place with bookies. There is nothing to bet on so I cleared mine out. I wasn't hugely enamoured with matched betting, I doubt I'll continue with it after this all recovers so not bothered about my accounts going dormant or whatever. I think I only made about £150 profit but the big thing was that I had a lot of my own cash tied up there to leverage it. Some bookies are going to go bust, there is no question of that. Take it out now.
Your money is your money. You need to be really proactive with it right now. Companies will go bust, companies that you use. Sure, cashing out your gift cards and clearing out accounts might be the push some need to fold. It's a tough decision but there was no question for me. I don't have the money to spare just so I can feel like I did the ethical thing.
Sunday, May 3, 2020
Weekly Update: 3rd May 2020
April has disappeared and I have barely even noticed its passing.
I haven't bothered doing a weekly update because there hasn't really been anything to update. Like a lot of people, I'm saving a shitload of money because I'm not driving, I'm not going anywhere, I'm not doing anything. By the end of the month my spending was something like £250 below my budget. I basically spend about £50 on my weekly shop for me and my daughter and that's it. I occasionally buy something for the house from Amazon. Like I have a leaking pipe and needed some materials to repair it with.
It's great but is it worth reporting? It's all artificial. I'm only saving money because of circumstances, I've not done anything to "earn" it. There's no real opportunity to do anything particularly productive.
A few people at work have been furloughed. I get the feeling that there was more to it than simple lack of work. The people chosen, if someone asked you who were either the most lazy or least competent in the place you'd probably choose them. One of them, worryingly, had had mental health issues in the past and mentioned to his line manager that he hadn't been doing too well in the last week. And, sure enough, by coincidence he was the first furlough announced.
That really spiked my anxiety and depression when it happened. There was a little bit of relief when the Job Retention Scheme was extended to the end of June. That relaxed me. But it still hasn't eased the low level anxiety that I've got burning in the background. I deal with it by just not thinking about it.
I don't know if "depression" is really what I've felt. It's more a general melancholy brought on by the loss of liberty, the endlessness of it, the uncertainty, the lack of anything to differentiate one day from the next. I'm filling my time with housekeeping and jobs that don't really need doing. Minor repairs. Tidying. A lot of exercise, I've been training really hard.
I think the key to this is remembering that tomorrow is not today. We tend to get into the mental habit of thinking that how today goes is the template for the future. But it isn't, we learn to deal with things, situations change, we make progress. That really keeps me going.
Not looking deeply at the news helps keep my mental health in check. I don't need to read the biographies of the dead that sites like the BBC love to post. I get it that some people see this as humanising the Covid victims but you have to ask what it is doing to you mentally. Especially when they love to post about the people that don't fit the normal victim profile. When fit and healthy people, people who look not dissimilar to you, are dying then that sets my nerves on edge.
Everyone says "wash your hands" but we need to bring that same hygiene standard to our minds as well. You need to be aware of where your attention is. It might seem disrespectful to the dead but you need to ask yourself: is reading all this stuff helping? The same with posting to social media: is what you write helping either you or others? Usually the answer is "no".
I had a month long break from Facebook and I've applied that principle to anything I post or get involved in. Is it helpful? Is it funny? Is it useful? If not, then I don't bother. I don't need to reply to other people. I don't need to get into discussions about who thinks who is right.
I listened to a financial podcast the other day. The guy on it said the best thing to do in situations like this is to over-react but not panic. I think what he was trying to say is that panicking means making decisions where your judgement is clouded. Over-reacting means taking steps that are maybe more aggressive than they need to be but done with conscious thought and planning.
I think I've done that. My "over-reaction" has been shut down all unecessary spending. It's fairly easy because there's nowhere to go and nothing to do. But my outlook right now is to act like I have already lost my job. I've been through my monthly bills and I know what my spending is. I know what I need to pay and when I need to pay it. I am trying to set aside cash as much as I can. I've rebuilt a decent stash of food in my freezer after the disaster a few weeks ago. Maybe it isn't the most nutritious (a lot of Aldi frozen stuff) but it's food and isn't what I'm going to be living off forever.
If I am wrong then so what? It doesn't hurt to have pared everything down to the minimum. If I am right then I am starting from a better position.
Mentally, that will be the real challenge. It makes me wonder about what this will do long term. After the last recession and then through a divorce I did the same thing. I got into the habit of being extremely tight with money and it took me a long time to get out of that. For the last year (at least) I was financially back on my feet and didn't need that same level of extreme money-saving but I just could not snap out of it because I'd been living it so long. I had to literally remind myself not to be so mean and spend a little cash now and again. Like when I was out with my daughter or on holiday or something. Yes, you can afford to go into a cafe without it bankrupting you...
And now I am back in that mindset. I don't know, I think because the circumstances I've been living in (job worries, lack of money, lack of opportunities, etc) that this hasn't been much of an adjustment. The only thing that I've really struggled with so far has been the lack of physical touch. I'd been single for a while and just got around to getting back into dating again when all this happened. Knowing that it will be a long time before people are going to start feeling like they can be physical with another person, especially a stranger, really bothers me.
But like I said, tomorrow is not today.
I haven't bothered doing a weekly update because there hasn't really been anything to update. Like a lot of people, I'm saving a shitload of money because I'm not driving, I'm not going anywhere, I'm not doing anything. By the end of the month my spending was something like £250 below my budget. I basically spend about £50 on my weekly shop for me and my daughter and that's it. I occasionally buy something for the house from Amazon. Like I have a leaking pipe and needed some materials to repair it with.
It's great but is it worth reporting? It's all artificial. I'm only saving money because of circumstances, I've not done anything to "earn" it. There's no real opportunity to do anything particularly productive.
A few people at work have been furloughed. I get the feeling that there was more to it than simple lack of work. The people chosen, if someone asked you who were either the most lazy or least competent in the place you'd probably choose them. One of them, worryingly, had had mental health issues in the past and mentioned to his line manager that he hadn't been doing too well in the last week. And, sure enough, by coincidence he was the first furlough announced.
That really spiked my anxiety and depression when it happened. There was a little bit of relief when the Job Retention Scheme was extended to the end of June. That relaxed me. But it still hasn't eased the low level anxiety that I've got burning in the background. I deal with it by just not thinking about it.
I don't know if "depression" is really what I've felt. It's more a general melancholy brought on by the loss of liberty, the endlessness of it, the uncertainty, the lack of anything to differentiate one day from the next. I'm filling my time with housekeeping and jobs that don't really need doing. Minor repairs. Tidying. A lot of exercise, I've been training really hard.
I think the key to this is remembering that tomorrow is not today. We tend to get into the mental habit of thinking that how today goes is the template for the future. But it isn't, we learn to deal with things, situations change, we make progress. That really keeps me going.
Not looking deeply at the news helps keep my mental health in check. I don't need to read the biographies of the dead that sites like the BBC love to post. I get it that some people see this as humanising the Covid victims but you have to ask what it is doing to you mentally. Especially when they love to post about the people that don't fit the normal victim profile. When fit and healthy people, people who look not dissimilar to you, are dying then that sets my nerves on edge.
Everyone says "wash your hands" but we need to bring that same hygiene standard to our minds as well. You need to be aware of where your attention is. It might seem disrespectful to the dead but you need to ask yourself: is reading all this stuff helping? The same with posting to social media: is what you write helping either you or others? Usually the answer is "no".
I had a month long break from Facebook and I've applied that principle to anything I post or get involved in. Is it helpful? Is it funny? Is it useful? If not, then I don't bother. I don't need to reply to other people. I don't need to get into discussions about who thinks who is right.
I listened to a financial podcast the other day. The guy on it said the best thing to do in situations like this is to over-react but not panic. I think what he was trying to say is that panicking means making decisions where your judgement is clouded. Over-reacting means taking steps that are maybe more aggressive than they need to be but done with conscious thought and planning.
I think I've done that. My "over-reaction" has been shut down all unecessary spending. It's fairly easy because there's nowhere to go and nothing to do. But my outlook right now is to act like I have already lost my job. I've been through my monthly bills and I know what my spending is. I know what I need to pay and when I need to pay it. I am trying to set aside cash as much as I can. I've rebuilt a decent stash of food in my freezer after the disaster a few weeks ago. Maybe it isn't the most nutritious (a lot of Aldi frozen stuff) but it's food and isn't what I'm going to be living off forever.
If I am wrong then so what? It doesn't hurt to have pared everything down to the minimum. If I am right then I am starting from a better position.
Mentally, that will be the real challenge. It makes me wonder about what this will do long term. After the last recession and then through a divorce I did the same thing. I got into the habit of being extremely tight with money and it took me a long time to get out of that. For the last year (at least) I was financially back on my feet and didn't need that same level of extreme money-saving but I just could not snap out of it because I'd been living it so long. I had to literally remind myself not to be so mean and spend a little cash now and again. Like when I was out with my daughter or on holiday or something. Yes, you can afford to go into a cafe without it bankrupting you...
And now I am back in that mindset. I don't know, I think because the circumstances I've been living in (job worries, lack of money, lack of opportunities, etc) that this hasn't been much of an adjustment. The only thing that I've really struggled with so far has been the lack of physical touch. I'd been single for a while and just got around to getting back into dating again when all this happened. Knowing that it will be a long time before people are going to start feeling like they can be physical with another person, especially a stranger, really bothers me.
But like I said, tomorrow is not today.
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