There are many stories of people who have built up enough savings/investments to generate passive income that covers their expenses. These people are debt free, mostly own their own houses and often live an incredibly frugal life.

And I think it’s a hugely unrealistic goal and not something that we should be encouraging people to do.

The FIRE formula

Consider this formula, take your annual expenditure and multiply it by 25. This is the amount of money you need set aside to be ‘financially independent’. Our annual expenditure (including a mortgage) give or take a few pounds is around £42k.

So, I would need just over £1m set aside earning decent rates of return to provide me with enough passive income to cover my expenses. This is based on a 4% withdrawal rate.

Hmmm that’s A LOT of money that we absolutely do not have set aside in investments. The stories I have read are mainly people in their 40s who are now financially free. I am 42 and to be honest these stories make me feel a tad inadequate.

Unrealistic goals

In my view this is a completely unrealistic goal. Who, particularly in the south east, can afford to have their mortgage paid off by the time they are in their 40s? And who has earned that much money to have that much savings set aside?

If I think back to my 20s, I graduated with a 2:1 degree in maths and went straight into a job aged 22 with HSBC training to be an accountant. It was a good job, I was earning a great salary and I had prospects to develop my career and grow my earnings significantly. By the time I was 27 I was earning £40k a year.

I bought a house and started putting money into investments. And I enjoyed living my life. I had nice holidays, experienced beautiful food. Okay I probably (read as definitely) spent too much money on handbags but I wanted to live my life. Not scrimp and save and put aside 50% (as I have seen some FIRE people doing) of my earning into savings. Putting aside 50% would have been impossible, my mortgage has been £1,000 a month for as long as I can remember.

Life is for living

Particularly in your 20s when you maybe have fewer responsibilities and have the freedom to do whatever you choose. This view is not conducive to the FIRE movement. You must be frugal to extreme levels, spend very little money on yourself. You will be spending your spare time working a second job, side hustling to generate as much income as possible.

When I hit my 30s, I was earning a good amount of money, but was also working in London and living in the expensive south east. The mortgage has never been within reach of paying off. Even now at the age of 42, I still have 200k outstanding on my mortgage (I do have a very nice chunk of equity, more than the outstanding mortgage). I had three children, probably the most expensive thing I have ever done. I did very little during my 30s to add to my wealth.

Aged 37, I made a huge change to my lifestyle to enable me to spend much more time with my children. I quit my well-paid corporate job to set up my own business. I valued my time more than my earnings and of course this has impacted my financial position.

Most people are not able to get anywhere near this FIRE aim and I think it’s irresponsible to promote that goal. Surely, we should be encouraging people to start saving, encourage people to pay off expensive debt, to save money on their energy bills, to put money into a pension, rather than talking about an unobtainable financial position for 99.99% of the population.

And life must be for living. There must be a balance in enjoying life and saving for the future. Why restrict yourself in your younger years of 20s and 30s to allow you freedom when older? Choose a balance that is right for you.

The post Why I think the “FIRE Movement” for financial independence is unrealistic appeared first on Mouthy Money.

Perhaps that’s a bit strong – but that “free” money can be financially lethal, if not literally so. To this day, I see it as one of the most irresponsible things any business has ever done to me. Yet, it was commonplace at the time and for that reason I won’t name and shame the lender.

Oh screw it, it was Northern Rock.

I’d been working as a journalist for a national newspaper in London. This time I’m really not going to name names due to sheer embarrassment – the paper used to support the Nazis and is the only paper in the world to be banned as a credible source by Wikipedia. You know the one.

The rabbit hutch I’d been living in near Kensington High Street was being sold and, as a friend of mine – a biscuit designer – lived a short commute away in Brighton (this was before Southern Rail abolished the concept of achievable commutes), I decided to do a bit of sofa surfing on the south coast.

Once more, you’ll notice, I’ve declined to name a name – this time, the biscuit designer’s. I will continue unapologetically in this manner as I have no wish to keep London’s libel lawyers in gin and funny wigs. And if you think the people in this blog post are you, there’s an outside chance you’re wrong. But it’s slim.

I was a card-carrying, flag-waving, ocean-going member of the UK’s large subprime community.

They call Brighton “The Graveyard of Ambition” because when Londoners move there (it’s always Londoners), they never move away. But they carry on working in the capital before eventually getting sick of the unachievable commute and taking much poorer paid jobs locally so they can continue living by the sea.

I was immediately bitten by the Brighton bug and suggested buying a flat with my biscuit designer friend (I’m going to call him ‘Dave’ because I can’t think of any other names). At that point, house prices were rising as quickly as the credit was flowing.

So Dave and I decided to buy a two-bedroom flat together on the sort of whim that might persuade you to change up from Debenhams to Calvin Klein boxer shorts.

They gave us money for nice furniture. A year later we were still watching TV in two fishing chairs.

In terms of risk, I wasn’t 100% prime or even near-prime. I was a card-carrying, flag-waving, ocean-going member of the UK’s large subprime community. I viewed cash machines in the way normal people view fruit machines, whooping with joy on the rare occasions they paid out.

But no-one at the bank seemed to care about my credit-worthiness. In fact, the heart-warmingly generous lending manager reminded us we’d need something to sit on and asked us whether we might want a few extra grand for some nice furniture.

Fast forward a year and we were still watching TV in two fishing chairs – you know the ones with beer holders. There was no nice furniture.

So where had the money gone?

In the mildest of salutes to responsibility, we’d both paid off credit cards – and then started using them again. We’d also shrunk our overdrafts to almost nothing – and then watched as they rebounded enthusiastically into the red.

I asked Dave just yesterday if he remembered how poor we were.

“Don’t be stupid,” he said. “We were loaded; we lived like kings – well, for a while anyway. I was the only biscuit designer in East or West Sussex who had a plasma TV on my bedroom ceiling.”

He really did. No girlfriend – but a plasma on the ceiling. Class.

We also had the most expensive Sky TV package, the fastest broadband, and the most luxurious health club membership. We were living a bit like Withnail and I. Dave was the decadent and devil-may-care ‘Withnail’ and I was ‘I’, the worrier who reluctantly participated in the high life, nonetheless.

But reality soon caught up with us. We began missing payments on bills. Letters from phone companies, banks and credit card companies became a daily occurrence. Honestly, we had more mail than the BBC at one point. Luxury items, like the gym and Sky TV, were cancelled.

Everything turned to shit. You don’t realise how depressing it was until you look back at it.

I remember a particularly sad moment when we both ended our contract with the Grosvenor fine wines club. But the fiscal environment had worsened too. Dark clouds were gathering.

Interest rates had risen and the mortgage repayments, which were variable, climbed sharply. I was forced to change jobs and took a £10k pay cut. Everything turned to shit. You don’t realise how depressing it was until you look back at it. For the next few years, money was a constant worry. And it drove a wedge between Dave and me.

As I’ve implied, Dave was a little bit more irresponsible – or Withnailish – than me and always seemed to owe me money. Communication broke down until it was conducted almost exclusively by half-smudged Post-it notes.

If we’d just rented, like we should have, we wouldn’t have gotten into that mess.

And we *were* in a mess. Dave got really close to bankruptcy and eventually became the shamed-faced owner of an Individual Voluntary Arrangement.

Credit wonks will know what that is but, for the cooler kids, it’s a way of avoiding bankruptcy and involves brokering deals with all your creditors to come up with a single monthly payment that’s shared between them. You commit to pay consistently and, in return, they stop levying interest and charges.

Things took a turn for the (even) worse when Dave moved to Casablanca, saddling me with the whole debt.

What saved me from that was the mortgage holidays we took. Mortgage holidays, you say? Oh yes! You can stop paying your mortgage for a few months. But, of course, that too has its downsides. The interest from the monthly payment you’ve decided to take as a payment holiday gets added to your mortgage. If you’ve ever taken one of these holidays or inquired about them, you’ll have noticed that they add a few pounds a month to your future mortgage payments.

Oh, and then things got even worse. Swaggering like a modern day Humphrey Bogart, Dave literally moved to Casablanca, in Morocco, where the biscuit design industry was booming. He somehow persuaded me to take legal ownership of the whole negative-equity-ridden flat, saddling me with the entire debt.

Helen put a stiletto up my behind and told me to get a proper job.

But, look. I’m still here. I’m a survivor! So how did I pull through?

Love, actually.

Yes, I met my then future and now current wife, Helen, and moved in with her, enabling me to rent out the Money Pit so that it paid for itself. I also got a great job – in Brighton. So much for The Graveyard of Ambition. I think, looking back, that was Helen’s doing too, since she put a stiletto up my behind and told me to get a proper job.

So I was able, slowly, to pay off my debts and now, 14 years later, I owe roughly what the asking price of the house was when we bought it in 2005. But, of course, it’s worth a lot more – about £70k more – and provides a good rental income.

So what did I learn?

First, avoid mortgage holidays. In fact, if you need one – and there’s no serious change in your circumstances – you probably shouldn’t have a mortgage in the first place.

But, actually, you should think about whether a mortgage is right for you in the first place. Renting would almost certainly have suited Dave and me better.

Finally, be careful who you buy with. I don’t mean Northern Rock, in my case. I mean Dave. If you’re going to buy with someone – if you have a Dave or Davina in your life – make sure they’re not the sort of person who thinks a ceiling-mounted plasma TV is cool.

My experiences and the lessons I learned inspired me to pass on that knowledge that now seems embarrassingly obvious – but never was – to others. This was one of the motivations I had when creating Mouthy Money alongside the site’s editor, Amy Rowe.

As you can see (you’re on it now), it’s a money blog – or digital magazine – with some 20 writers telling inspiring stories about their every day money challenges and successes. There’s loads here about mortgages and house buying so, please, take a look around. Touch things, if you really have to. But don’t break anything.

We’re different from the typical money blogger site because we don’t target people who think they need financial advice. Our audience is people who enjoy reading about other people’s lives and learning from their mistakes and successes.

They’re people who hate reading about finance but love reading about people’s financial decisions.

Before I go, I’ll leave you with another quote from Dave. I asked him what advice he might have for people thinking of getting a mortgage.

He thought for a minute, took a swig from what I now imagine to have been a Malibu and Coke and said: “If you can afford it, do it. If you can’t, do it anyway. It’ll be all right in the end.”

And, speaking as Dave’s chief creditor, that is most definitely NOT the moral of this story.

The post Like giving crack to a cocaine addict: my life with a 110% subprime mortgage appeared first on Mouthy Money.

A good thing perhaps to not focus heavily on monetising the blog, it was more about creating lots of brilliant content – but I also needed to pay the bills.

I don’t blog for a hobby; the income is very much needed to, you know, pay the mortgage and put food on the table. And I can’t earn a few hundred pounds, it needs to be way more than that each month.  

I discovered matched betting as a way to generate extra cash at a time when I really needed money. I did my research and read all about it from others who had done it. I joined Facebook groups to learn strategies and methods.

It seemed so easy: a risk free, tax free way to make easy money. I spent a couple of months doing it and despite the odd mistake that did cost me money I made a profit of around £2,000. Matched betting is mostly based around football and horse racing, but there are also casino offers that could make you some money.

What got me hooked

It was the casino offers that got me. The flashing graphics, the exciting games and the buzz of a win or the hope of a win. I can still think of the excitement of getting a bonus spin and the potential of the money you could win.

I am going to be cynical and say that these sites hook you in with an initial win. Of course, they are meant to be based on luck and unbiased, but really? These sites are a highly profitable commercial model – they count on people coming back time and time again after getting their initial free bet and the buzz of a win.

I remember signing up to one casino site. It was a risk-free offer – set up an account to get a free £10 bet. I remember winning £300 on a slot machine game very quickly. Wow this was the easiest £300 I had ever gotten, and that was it I was hooked.

Once you win money you have to adhere to rules and roll over the winnings a few times before you can withdraw it from your account. This just prolongs the time playing the game, hooking you in further and further. I followed the roll over rules and was able to transfer a nice chunk of winnings.

I worked my way through the risk-free offers for the casino sites and could feel myself being dragged into the world of online casino gambling further and further.

I discovered one site called Casumo that was ever so clever at hooking me in. There were regular bonus offers, free spins, competitions, games that were fun. And I started to deposit my own money and play the games.

Online comparison made it worse

To make things worse, I am part of an online community with many people who write about matched betting and there would be the occasional slot machine win from a group member splashed across social media. These added to the addiction and the hope that if it could happen to them it could happen to me as well.

I did my best to keep track of the losses and wins. Of course there were more losses than wins and I found myself chasing the wins. I would wait until everyone in the house had gone to bed to play the games so nobody could see what I was doing. I was depositing £30 each day which went up to £50 as time progressed. It was embarrassing, it was my dirty secret that I didn’t want anyone to know about.

It was an addiction that when combined with my seasonal affective disorder had the potential of becoming very expensive. I was playing the Casumo slots in Nov/Dec 2016 and again in Nov/Dec 2017.

I didn’t gamble the house away but it certainly cost me a few hundred pounds maybe £1,000 in total.

It had to end

December 2017 was when it had to end. I admitted to a friend what I had been doing and she said very plainly and simply it had to stop. I had one final biggish win of around £300. And felt I had made back enough which wasn’t going to repeated and I stopped it.

These companies are clever in how they reach you. I was bombarded with adverts for the Casumo on social media, in newspapers and even on TV. Eventually I was able to block or tune out to the adverts and stopped my addiction.

I have an addictive personality and should have known that matched betting could lead to this. Hence my advice to anyone trying matched betting, thinking about it. Do not go near it, if you have this type of personality, if you feel like you must chase your losses. I managed to stop my addiction after losses of hundreds rather than thousands, but I can easily see how it could have been much worse.

If you can control your behaviour and ONLY benefit from the risk-free money from these firms then  go for it but to be honest with you, I wouldn’t. I will never be going near matched betting again.

The post How I got hooked on matched betting and why I will never do it again appeared first on Mouthy Money.

I have a credit card that I pay off in full every month (it costs me nothing in interest, but I do get a lovely cash back kick back once a year of around £300). I put all the regular spending on it from petrol to groceries to things for the boys, anything Christmas related went on there too. That bill is just about to hit my current account so needs to be paid next week. It is coming in at £2,000, this is £1,000 more than a regular month. Ouch. Double ouch.

I estimate that Christmas has cost around £1,500 in total and this is even with us agreeing with the wider family and friends to not buy presents. I know that many people are in a similar, maybe worse, position and are feeling the pressure now the festivities are all over. Many people cannot afford to repay the Christmas bill in full.  

Why not do something different this year. Save up for Christmas starting now and have a nice fund built up that will cover the costs and you can start January afresh with no debts from Christmas.

Automated savings

I have been trying out a couple of automated savings tools. Chip is an app on my phone that automatically saves money for me every week depending on my spending habits and balance. Plum is a Facebook messenger tool which again saves money for me depending on my spending habits and balance.

Both tools are link to your bank account, and transfer amounts depending on rules you have set up. For example, you may want to have savings switched off when you are overdrawn.

I have been using Chip for around 6 months now and really love it. I don’t even notice the money leaving my account and when I do remember to check there is a nice balance sat there. There was £500 in there to help pay for my Christmas after the six months of transfers. The other great thing about Chip is that my interest is set at 3% and this can grow up to 5% if friends join.

Plum is slightly different as it helps me with budgeting and spending awareness. I get a message every day telling me my balance and a weekly message telling me what I have spent, categorised as well. I really like this daily awareness of how much is sat in my current account. Plum also make automated savings for me, albeit at a much smaller amounts than Chip.

A year of these two automated accounts working for me saving money is going to create a fund that will pay for Christmas 2019.

Manual cash/coin methods

I have seen lots of ways of saving up cash over the year using a coin jar. A good way to save if you can trust that you won’t dip into the jar if you need the money throughout the year!

There is the penny method, where you save every day starting with 1p for day 1, 2p for days 2, £3.65 for day 365. If you do this consistently for 1 year you will have £668 saved, not bad at all! But you must remember to put the money in the jar every day.

Or what about a weekly method with you start saving £1 in week 1, £2 in week 2, working up to £52 in week 52, this method means you will end up with £1,378 saved! Although its going to be tough at the end of the process when you need to be saving £50/51/52 per week!

Whichever method you choose I urge you to start saving now for next Christmas and relieve yourself a huge amount of pressure for next year that you may well be experiencing now. It will make a huge difference to know you are starting January afresh without the debt from Christmas hanging around your shoulders.

What if the debt is too much?

If your debt levels, feel out of control and you are unable to make payments please don’t despair. Make it a priority to speak to one of wonderful debt charities who can help you to get in control and work out a plan. Speak to Step Change, Citizens Advice Bureau or Christians Against Poverty. All are wonderful organisation who can help.

The post This might sound weird but…start saving for Christmas 2019 now! appeared first on Mouthy Money.

If you’re anything like me, you make your Christmas budget, and then promptly blow it. ‘It’s Christmas’, we say, ‘let’s go all out!’ And then come January, when your bank account looks bleak and the credit card bill rolls in, we don’t feel quite so joyous. So this year, I’ve decided to be sensible and try to save money without scrimping on the festivities. Here are my top ten tips to avoid a financial hangover this Christmas:

1. Make your budget… and stick to it. It’s easy to make a budget and ignore it, so be firm and abide by the budget. The Money Advice Service have launched a Christmas money planner, which is a fantastic tool to help you plan. It budgets everything from presents to decorations, so definitely give this one a go.
2. Keep your Christmas money in a separate account. As with any big purchase, it’s sensible to keep the money separate so it doesn’t get mixed up with your day-to-day living costs. Plus, it’s way easier to track your spending this way.
3. Take a look at who you’re buying presents for… do you have to buy for everyone? If you’ve always sent a gift to the friend you never see, ditch the present and suggest a date to catch up over lunch in January. Huge family to buy for? Why not suggest drawing a name out of a hat so that everyone buys one great gift.
4. Online all the way. It’s no secret that online is usually cheaper, but I personally find it easier to shop around and keep track of my spending. If you have a specific gift in mind, take advantage of one of the many price comparison tools. I like Idealo and Pricespy for speedy results.
5. You can make cash as you spend, so get cashback savvy and sign up to Quidco. Simply head to their website or app, search the retailer you are about to buy from, and click through to your website of choice. You’ll get anything up to 20% of what you spend credited to your Quidco account, which you can transfer to your bank account or upload to an eVoucher. I’ve made £200 in cashback this year so far.   
6. Always search for a discount code before you shop. Head to Vouchercodes.co.uk for codes that are tested and working, and sign up to emails for subscriber offers. There are always plenty around Christmas.
7. Get crafty. Now, not all of us have time for handmade presents, but if you have a creative streak and some extra time, a handmade present is always well received. It can even be something simple like a Christmas cake! Head to Pinterest for the lowdown on some genuinely nice gifts.
8. Christmas is the perfect excuse to eat like a king for at least three weeks, and we’re all guilty going overboard on the Christmas food shop. Save money by shopping at budget supermarkets, like Lidl, Aldi, and Iceland
9. Trial Amazon Prime for free, and get free, unlimited one-day delivery on everything. Just don’t forget to cancel your trial.
10. Book your festive travel in advance. The cheapest train tickets are released up to 12 weeks before your planned travel, so book early for the biggest discounts. Check out Trainline.com for easy comparison.

It can be really easy to go overboard at Christmas, but with a little bit of financial planning you can ease the January financial blues without missing out on all the festive fun.

The post How to avoid a financial hangover this Christmas appeared first on Mouthy Money.

In order to make a claim for the delayed (failed) delivery, I was required to provide information, evidence, times, dates, receipts, tracking numbers, addresses, and telephone numbers for all parties, as you might expect. I opted to make my claim online, using a pro forma on the company’s website. I could have opted to send my claim by post. Oh, the irony! I will be keeping my fingers crossed that the claim yields results. In the meantime, here are my tips for a smooth and satisfactory compensation claim. Good luck!

1. Keep your receipt and proof of posting in a safe place. Take photos as backup.
2. In the case of damage to your letter or parcel’s contents, take photos of the evidence and keep the damaged packaging. I once received a printer ink cartridge in damaged packaging. The ink cartridge (worth £75) fell through the cardboard and crashed to the floor, leaving a huge puddle of jet black ink on the carpet. My claim involved sending photos of the packaging, the resulting stain and a receipt for the carpet cleaning service, which resulted in a successful claim.
3. Claim as soon as you can. Parcelforce, for example, only accepts claims made within 30 days of the posting date.
4. Try every tool in your arsenal before resorting to a claim. Make a plea via Twitter, or send an email with as much information as you can, with the parcel or tracking ID number, in case they can help immediately.
5. Most postal or courier services have an online claim procedure. Check out some of the main providers here: DHL, Royal Mail, Hermes, Parcelforce

6. Before posting, consider the value of the contents, and how urgent the parcel is. Select a service that insures your goods to the required value, otherwise standard compensation still applies (and is often limited to a refund of the postage cost).
7. Ensure you follow the guidance for packaging issued by the service provider (check their websites for specific packaging and labelling requirements). If posting overseas, most will insist on a sturdy box that is taped securely. Compensation is likely to be denied if guidelines weren’t followed.
8. If your compensation claim falls through, you can appeal the decision.

The post Parcels gone astray? Letters lost? How to claim compensation appeared first on Mouthy Money.

I’ve recently decided to close down one of my businesses. When I started it, it was just before the trend of DIY weddings and I launched just in time – all-be-it a rushed launch as I was informed of another business launching via a very recognisable BBC2 television show! I’d used the concept of film-your-own wedding at my own wedding and after a couple of people asked me to edit their wedding footage, I thought there was something in it. I was right. After the launch, I soon took loads of bookings and things were looking great. I invested in extra equipment as, with summer wedding season in sight, I had enquiries for the same dates. While I wasn’t charging a lot of money, I was covering costs and making a small profit, while having a great time exercising my creative juices. It was the perfect side business to my other jobs.

The potential for stress was getting to me and the monetary reward wasn’t big enough to make me want to stick at it.

Fast forward five years, and things changed. The booking enquiries slowed down. Word of mouth was always the best way to get bookings, followed by recommendations from other wedding businesses. Wedding magazines never worked for me, however much they promise and pester you to spend money with them. I realised that my equipment is now out of date and so I asked myself the question, ‘do I really want to invest money into two or three new kits of up to date camera gear’. I had a couple of issues with couriers messing up deliveries or people not being in when they said they would be, and even though I covered myself in my terms and conditions, those issues created stress. The world of weddings changed over five years; the market became saturated, and trends altered. People have amazing cameras on their phones now and would rather save money and just use footage from friends. My wife also said I’d fallen out of love with it.

The insurance, music licensing, and website URL were all up for renewal at around about the same time and that’s when I decided to announce that it was closing. Stepping away is hard! It’s difficult to write those words and press the ‘post’ button for it to go live on your Facebook page, but it’s better than the alternative.

The potential for stress was getting to me. Whenever I sent out a package, the creativity in my mind wasn’t there and I was just doing it for the sake of it. The monetary reward wasn’t big enough to make me want to stick at it – I never charged a lot for the service as I wanted it to be affordable. However, when you add up to the cost of all the business rates and trying to take a wage out of it, it’s not worth the while. It was supposed to be freeing, but over time I felt like it was starting to tie me down.

Life is much more important than keeping a business afloat, especially a business which isn’t really needed in the world any more.

When you’re only doing it for love, it’s hard to see through that love for life. Life is much more important than keeping a business afloat, especially a business which isn’t really needed in the world any more. I have one more booking later this year which I agreed to do as they were really keen and booked a couple of years in advance, but, after that, all the equipment will either head to eBay or sit in a drawer.

A business you’ve set up, turned from an idea in your head into a real thing, offering a service in this world, really is your baby. But, when the world changes, trends move and technology advances, it’s hard to keep up. Of course, I’ve also had two babies of my own which are far more important to me, and I suppose I’m a different person five years down the line, too! When you start to question your business, weighing up the decision of sticking at it or saying thanks for the memories and goodbye, it’s very tricky. But some things just need to be done, and the latter option so often comes out on top.

The post Sometimes you’ve just got to close your business baby down appeared first on Mouthy Money.

How much are you worth?

One of my temping agencies woke me up the other week asking me to work on reception that day. Within seconds, I was pulling out my (one and only) suit jacket from my ‘office’ (it’s actually a cupboard under the stairs, akin to Harry Potter’s bedroom, but still…) and preparing to forgo breakfast and run to the tube, as I asked the compulsory question:

‘What’s the hourly rate, please?’

‘Seven pounds an hour.’

‘Seven or seventeen?!’

‘Seven.’

‘For a corporate company in Mayfair?! That is not even minimum wage!* No, thank you.’

I kept my integrity of not endorsing exploitation (and did not get any other work that day).

How much can your moral values come into it when there are mouths to feed?

An acting friend of mine – let’s call him Robert – is a strict vegan and has two children. He was offered an advert for a fast food chain and did not mention any dietary requirements as the money was in the thousands for one day’s filming. He landed the job and was given chicken to eat on set. He did it (and spat the chicken out between takes!).

Another friend – let’s call her Matilda – who recently had a baby, was called on a last minute casting job for another commercial. As her fiancé was working, there was no one to look after their daughter, so she left her asleep in the waiting room. She was in the audition room, in the middle of being filmed, when her daughter started to cry. Without a second thought, she ran out of the room and so could not be considered for the job. So, in both cases, children came first – whether that meant getting the job/sticking to previous values or not.

How much do you need to enjoy your job?

My friend Elliott has this to say:

‘Twice I realised I was selling my soul. Once selling cigarettes (an industry that I am against) but I wasn’t aloud to “sell” them. I had to stand in the corner of gay pubs and make eyes at men until they talked to me. Then make them buy cigarettes from me. The other time was for Jack Daniels where we went into a Uni on freshers week and gave free a stupid amount of JD to the freshers. “You can have the first one for free” sorta thing. I now try and lead with my conscience or how can I expect a politician to do the same?’

How much is your health worth?

Up until this weekend, I hadn’t had a day, evening or weekend off for about a month. I was lucky enough to be offered enough work to not be worrying about the rent and I accepted it all, but those jobs meant my chances of sleep, cooking meals and seeing friends were few and far between. I’d temp all day, rush home and have a Skype meeting about budgets for my theatre company and then be writing tenders for potential contracts until midnight before getting up six hours later to do it all again. I made mistakes – signed in to the wrong school to do a workshop, forgot to send important emails and invoices that were overdue, and worst of all went back to copious intakes of sugar just to stay awake!  Four weeks of this resulted in acute headaches, stomach cramps, exhaustion, looking ten years older and feeling fifty years older. I ended up cancelling three jobs last week and losing half a week’s wages because I wasn’t even well enough to get on the tube. I guess the lesson I’ve learnt from that is that my health is worth more than being out of my overdraft, although ideally I would like both!

My friend Nicola sums it up nicely:

‘Integrity is very personal. I found mine in being unafraid to say no; to jobs that I quite wanted as well as jobs I didn’t. Even the best work is still work, and as long as I can pay for the things I need then I’m never going to regret working too little when I’m old and tired. That may mean realising that there are less things that I “need” every now and then, but there’s nothing more important to me than time to myself and with people I love.’

*Minimum wage is £7.20/hour for over 25 year olds in the UK

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A recent study by Oxfam showed that the total wealth of Britain’s wealthiest 1% is more than 20 times the total of the poorest fifth. In numbers, this is approximately 643,000 people having accumulated assets that add up to more that 20 times the assets of the poorest 13 million people. This makes the UK one of the most unequal countries in the developed world. This has resulted in a country divided by an ‘us’ and ‘them’ attitude, between the ‘have’ and ‘have-nots’ – with the have-nots feeling helpless and valueless to the decision makers up high. The report, published in September last year, called for the Prime Minister to address the inequality between the richest and poorest in the country. By curbing excessive pay and bonuses, having more representation on boards, and extra funding for skills training, they can ensure that more people get into work and off the poverty line. I wonder though, can this really work, or are we destined to live in an unequal society forever?

An Oxfam report, released in January 2017, highlighted that eight billionaires control the same wealth as the poorest half of the world’s population. This is terrifying.

You see, although the UK is leading the way with earnings inequality, it is not unique. A further report by Oxfam, released in January 2017, highlighted that eight billionaires control the same wealth as the poorest half of the world’s population. This is terrifying. And the richest will stay rich because a precedent has been set, and companies will pay the big bucks to get the best people in to run the show. However, it hardly seems fair that these companies make their money from exploiting their lowest paid workers. Is it any wonder people are rebelling?

Theresa May seems to have a lot going with negotiations and deals, but let’s hope that she has some consideration for the folks at the bottom end of the pay scale. When people are forgotten, they become restless and angry. When people feel they are being treated unfairly, they become restless and angry. It seems that the time for people accepting their ‘place’ is over. Something needs to happen, and soon. We’ve seen the response of the unhappy and underpaid masses in the election of Donald Trump – when a billionaire can make himself seem like ‘one of us’ to the poor, you know there’s a huge problem. May needs to learn from the USA, that if you’re not considering the entire range of your constituents, there’s usually someone extreme with ‘Everyman’ rhetoric, waiting in the wings to step up to the plate.

And that’s enough to put you off your dinner!

*genuine menu items may differ…

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However, when I got to Stormfront, the nice lady behind the counter informed me that there was in fact, nothing that they could do to help me. She then went on to explain that just a month prior to my visit, Apple had declared my five year old MacBook Pro to be ‘vintage’. This confused me, because the definition of vintage is an item that is at least 20 years old. The woman explained that, to Apple, ‘vintage’ is a product older than five years old and so they won’t make spare parts for it anymore – and it was clear that my computer needed a spare part. She told me that, although they couldn’t help me, an independent computer shop across the other side of York might be able to.

Apple had declared my five year old MacBook Pro ‘vintage’. This confused me, because the definition of vintage is an item that is at least 20 years old.

So, my mother gave me a lift over there. They charged me £300 for a new battery and a charger, before declaring that, in fact, this wasn’t the problem. The actual problem was the keyboard (as the power button was water damaged) – Apple had stopped making these so there was nothing that could be done. I wasn’t completely convinced by this, and so, promptly searching eBay for a new keyboard, I found one for about £18. I was also informed that a couple of years after Apple declare their tech to be ‘vintage’, they then proclaim it to be ‘obsolete’, which means that they will cease to provide any technical assistance to it whatsoever. You know how every time you call up Apple care you have to read out your serial code to the technician? It’s so that they can check whether they’re allowed to help you. This is definitely something to bare in mind if you’re ever thinking about buying a refurbished Apple product.

In the end, my computer was fixed, but it got me thinking – what happens when my expensive computer actually dies? Apple have made so many disastrous changes to the MacBook Pro line in recent years, should I forgo it all together and switch back to Windows?

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