2020

Furious Ryanair customers – likely numbered in the thousands – have jumped through hoops to apply for cash refunds from the budget airline, only to be sent vouchers... which include details of how to reclaim cash. In response, MoneySavingExpert.com has today made formal complaints to the Civil Aviation Authority and Trading Standards.

Insurance firm Admiral is to give all of its car and van policyholders a flat-rate refund of £25 for each vehicle insured, in recognition of the fact that most people are staying at home and driving less during the coronavirus lockdown. And customers of Admiral's other brands – Bell, Diamond and Elephant – will also get the refunds.

The two top-paying easy-access savings providers Marcus and Saga cut the interest they pay new customers to 1.2% last Friday, and existing customers will also see rates drop. But after rival bank Aldermore also cut its rates over the weekend, Marcus and Saga remain the best buys.

The Government's Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme opened for applications this morning, with businesses now able to claim money from the state to help pay for staff salaries.

A total of 130,000 Metro Bank customers will receive average payments of about £86, after the bank failed to warn them properly about unarranged overdraft charges.

The financial regulator has proposed a new set of payment freezes for customers struggling to make payments on car finance deals, payday loans, buy-now-pay-later agreements and other credit products due to the coronavirus pandemic. 

The Government's Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme, which allows firms to furlough employees, is to be extended by one month and will now run until the end of June at least.

The Premium Bond prize rate is to remain at 1.4%, after NS&I announced today it is cancelling the rate cut it had planned in May, in order to "support savers during the coronavirus pandemic".

In a new piece of video analysis, MoneySavingExpert.com founder Martin Lewis explains that while more employees may be eligible for support from the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme after the eligibility date was extended to 19 March 2020, the change may not help quite as many people as the Government claims.

Tens of thousands of employees who've recently started a new job and thought they'd missed out on being furloughed are now likely to be able to get support through the Government's Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme, after the eligibility date was extended to 19 March 2020. But the move won't help everyone and is unlikely to aid 200,000 employees, as predicted by official estimates.