On 23 November the new Chancellor Phillip Hammond, will present his first Autumn Statement – it’s likely to contain a range of major policy announcements. As always the Treasury has invited submissions, and this year MSE and I felt it was time to take them up on the offer – we’ve submitted two. Here’s the first (the second...

Parents of students starting university in England in 2016, are facing a hidden 27% rise in university costs. We’ve been working on this for a few weeks, and as part of our campaign for a more transparent system of student finance, I have today sent an open letter to Jo Johnson, Minister for Universities, asking for him...

Update, 1 November: Santander has now slashed the headline rate paid from 3% to 1.5%. Read my Santander 123 slashed – should you ditch it? analysis for what to do if you’re one of its customers. The Santander 123 bank account has been my and this site’s top savings pick for four years. It pays 3% interest if...

Update note 14 June 2016: I wrote this blog in March and the logic still stands (I’ve also speedily updated the products and exchange rates) and if you click the links it takes you through to the current write-ups for each deal. The pound has tanked in recent months. Last year £1 bought you as much as €1.43, now...

Story time is one of the highlights of my day – yet mini MSE won’t let me get away with just reading them out of a book. I have to make up a story on demand (or often repeat an old one she was particularly fond of). Last summer, I wrote down her favourite, my the biggest...

In two months’ time there’ll be the biggest savings shake-up for a generation. From 6 April, the new ‘Personal Savings Allowance’ means every basic-rate taxpayer will be able to earn £1,000 interest from all savings without being taxed on it (higher-rate taxpayers get £500).

The papers are full of the row over the Government scrapping student grants. As usual when it comes to student finance, the political invective has clouded the actual practical financial impact on students and there’s huge confusion and panic among students and parents.

On Tue 2 February, we’re launching our new ‘Big Winter Energy Collective Switch event’, but we’re having to change the way our collective switches operate, so I wanted to bash out a quick blog to explain why.

Alongside hiring lawyers to look at whether the Government’s decision to retrospectively change student loan repayments for all students who have started university since 2012 can be legally challenged, I have sent the letter below to the Prime Minister asking for a meeting to discuss the moral issues of the change.

'Greed, pure greed!' Last September when Santander announced it would hike the fee on its hugely popular 123 account, many glued the horns of Beelzebub on it. Now the dust has settled, and the fee hike is nearly here – it hits next Monday 11 January – I want to do an updated number crunch to answer the most common question I'm getting, "Should I ditch it?"