From foraging for firewood to finding the best financial deals – our team’s year of sparkling savings

Even money experts slip up with their own finances from time to time – and the Money team is no exception. 

Here, we reflect on our greatest successes over the past year – and our biggest failures.

Jeff Prestridge

Group Wealth & Personal Finance Editor

SUCCESS: Keeping my Mum’s finances in relatively good order throughout 2023. Through the exercising of a lasting power of attorney, I’ve managed to keep an eye on her bank account – occasionally topping it up with a transfer from a savings account when needs must. 

Mum now spends a lot of time at home and is dependent upon family to look after her. It’s the very least we can do after all she did for us while we were growing up.

FAILURE: Putting years’ worth of possessions in self-storage, rather than doing the sensible thing and spending time beforehand culling them. 

The result is that I am shelling out £161 a month to store many items I will probably never look at again – other than (eventually) to deem them fit for a charity shop, attempt to sell online, or condemn them to the scrapheap. In a month’s time, £161 will become £322 as the initial three-month discount ends.

Adele Cooke

Money Reporter

SUCCESS: In June I finally applied for a credit card to help improve my credit score so it’s in good shape when I buy my first home in a couple of years’ time.

I had already put my household bills in my name, made sure I was on the electoral roll and updated my address. I opted for a cashback credit card and have already earned £111.16. I set up a direct debit so I pay off my balance in full.

FAILURE: A summer of enjoying the warmer weather with friends and visits to see family overseas left my bank balance a little worse for wear. I said ‘yes’ to meals out and visits to see family too many times and found myself £200 over budget. This year I’m determined to stick to budget.

Rachel Rickard Straus

Money Editor

SUCCESS: I bought a tumble dryer. When the cost of energy started to soar two years ago, dryers gained a reputation as ravenous electricity guzzlers. We steadfastly did without. But the problem? Our laundry stank.

Our home is so cold in autumn that it takes three or four days for a pair of jeans to dry on a clothes horse. By then, they reek of damp. So we spent £540 on a dryer. Yes, a steep outlay, but we got a heat pump one, which is exceptionally energy-efficient. A cycle costs around 12p – with older models it can be several times that. 

We may have saved money without a dryer in the short term, but it wouldn’t have been long before clothes – and towels in particular – would have become unusable. I’m a diehard money saver, but am on my guard against false economies. The dryer was our best purchase of the year.

FAILURE: Earlier this year my contract with Three Mobile expired. So what did it do? Double my bills.

And what did I do? Nothing.

I know I should have shopped around for a better deal straightaway. But life requires so much shopping around it is hard to keep on top of. Months later, I’ve now finally switched to an ID Mobile contract for a third of the cost and it even uses Three Mobile’s network. So long, Three Mobile.

Lucy Evans

Money Reporter

SUCCESS: 2023 was my first year in full-time work so it was my first opportunity to start building up my retirement pot. I have already increased my contributions by 2 per cent, matched by my employer. Upping my contributions by 1 per cent in my 20s, with my employer matching this, could grow my pension pot in retirement by 25 per cent, according to financial guidance platform Wealth at Work.

FAILURE: Every year for Christmas and my birthday, extended family members give me some money and tell me to buy something nice for myself. But nine out of ten times when I’ve tried to spend it, high street shops have turned up their noses. Instead I use my debit card so the cash has sat in my purse for months on end.

I should’ve put my money in a high-rate easy access savings account from the start.

Toby Walne

Chief Money Reporter

Cutting bills Toby Walne saved £250 a month on heating

SUCCESS: I chopped back my heating bills by swinging an axe. I foraged for fallen trees around the countryside where I live to feed my woodburners at home. 

Armed with chainsaw and maul (a long-handled axe) it took just a couple of weekends to pick up enough slow-burning oak and far more combustible silver birch to see me through the entire year. 

I took from branches that would only have rotted otherwise – and saved around £250 a month by not using central heating.

FAILURE: The sale of my 1968 Sunbeam Alpine car this summer. Having long held a belief that a classic motor is a shrewd investment – while throwing thousands of pounds at the old banger just to keep it on the road – I decided the cash-haemorrhaging had to stop. 

I got a dealership to sell it on my behalf – for which, after commission, I only pocketed about £5,500. The car had cost me a similar price 15 years ago and I have spent double that amount on keeping it roadworthy.

Jessica Beard

Deputy Money Editor

SUCCESS: I finally took control of my savings. For years I have been one of the ‘complacent’ savers that experts warn me about – I hadn’t switched bank accounts in a decade. But when I saw a deal for 6.05 per cent this July, I decided to get in on the action. I opened the one-year fixed rate bond with Atom. I also opened a NatWest digital regular savings account at 6 per cent and pay in the maximum £150 each month.

FAILURE: Paying for my energy bills as I go by bank transfer rather than direct debit. It has cost me hundreds of pounds over the years, but I only just found out last month.

I noticed on my energy bill that my supplier has been charging me substantially more than the price cap set by the Government. When I asked why, I was told that the guarantee only applied to those paying via direct debit. As I pay by bank transfer, there is no upper limit to the amount they could charge me. I wrongly assumed I was protected and won’t be making that mistake again.

Sarah Hartley

Head of Money

SUCCESS: Do you want it or do you need it? That was one of the key questions put to primary school children in a financial lesson which my colleague Adele Cooke reported on earlier this year. It struck a chord, and maybe it comes to everyone over 50, but this is the year I stopped wanting stuff. Things. Which may come as a shock to our local auction house and John Lewis.

I’m starting to think about legacy, what I can leave behind that won’t gather dust or take up room in someone else’s house. And I began this week by planting a tree in our garden, a Christmas gift I won’t be returning.

FAILURE: To turn a late train into a material win – my colleague Rachel uses the money returned in the Delay Repay compensation scheme to buy something specific, something cheering. She dined out on one occasion and bought flowers on another.

I have failed to claim a penny back. I am so irate and late by the time I flee London’s Charing Cross that the last thing I want to do is fill in a form, albeit on my phone. With the clock ticking, my head is catching up with my own delayed timetable. What a pitiful waste of ‘free’ money I’ve missed out on this year, given my weekly ticket costs £149 (without Tube!).