I was rather tickled this weekend to see that the Bank Charges Reclaiming intro video guide I’ve done, topped the UK Google Video download charts. Considering the next ten were… 2. Woman’s dress gets torn off 3. Lesbo 4. Karate Lesson! Hilarious 5. Internet is for porn Discuss this blog

I went to the BBC ‘Talent’ party on Thursday, which is a thank you from the BBC for its on-air staff. It’s an interesting do, with more famous faces than OK. I always feel a wee bit of a fraud at these things; and as you’re not allowed a plus one walking in is always very scary....

I’ve just watched the budget and Mr. Brown. Interesting stuff politically – an obvious push to set the agenda towards the next election. Many of the announcements come into effect not this April but the April after. From a MoneySaving perspective the cash ISAs allowance going up to £3,600 (and overall ISA limit to £7.200) is interesting,...

The MSG and I were having lunch out, at a nice bar near Little Venice, over the weekend. After ordering, I was asked to ‘give me the credit card’ (it’s a cashback card of course) so it could be held over lunch. I asked why and was told “some people tend to leave without paying.” I refused...

I’ve been reading a thread about the murkier side of eBay in the Forums, and I’m interested to see some MoneySavers are starting to cunningly take advantage of people’s ‘peccadillos’. It seems slippers get a lot more money for some if they’re ‘used’. Interesting how this tiny bit of marketing can make such a price difference isn’t...

When bank charge reclaiming publicity was at its most frenzied, I had requests to be interviewed by US radio, Hong Kong TV, NZ papers, Irish radio and Australian magazines amongst others. I did a few of them (e.g. this interview for US public radio), though it wasn’t a priority. It seems the world has been interested in...

Having worked at home this morning to meet my Sunday Times column deadline, I fortuitously got a call from BBC Spotlight (South West Regional TV) wanting an interview, no fee, as is the way of these things. Now rather luckily BBC TV centre is roughly mid-way between my house and MoneySaving towers; so I said ‘certainly’. It...

I was doing a quick interview for a Tonight with Trevor last week (sometimes I present, sometimes I’m the in-house expert) presented by the very cool Johnny Maitland. Part of the issue was about SAMs (shared appreciation mortgages) a complex mortgage product which has left many in misery. The producers were unsure they’d calculated the APRs right...

Last week the MSG interviewed Coleen McLoughlin for Five News. Now the MSG, as you’d expect (it stands for MoneySaving girlfriend to the uninitiated), is a good MoneySaver, she shops at Primark, generally eschews buying designer clobber (not a problem as in my eyes she looks gorgeous in anything of course – and when she needs posh...

Don’t worry I haven’t been tripping to number 10 for tea with Tony. I’ve just re-read the complete Yes Minister and Yes Prime Minister books from the BBC TV series of the 80s. Frankly it is the most beautifully written, funny, insightful comedy. Yet it was also intuitive about today’s political system; some of the stories, based...