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Last minute ISA choices could cost £4bn

Brits could lose out on a collective £4.3 billion worth of interest simply by leaving their ISA investments to the last minute, experts have warned.

With this year’s deadline for submitting ISA investments options fast approaching, Abbey Savings has revealed that interest lost from starting a cash ISA on April 5th 2009 over the start of the tax year on April 6th 2008 could be as much as £360.

And, with the UK currently boasting 12 million ISA savers, this could add up to £4.321 billion.

"Many people leave saving in a mini cash ISA to the end of tax year," said Reza Attar-Zadeh, Abbey director of savings & investments.

"However, people that leave saving in an ISA to the last minute face losing a significant amount of interest throughout the year. Additionally, the competitive deals that are currently available may not be available next year."

Recently, Prudential revealed that, in 2007, 17 per cent of all stocks and shares ISAs were signed up for between April 1st and 5th, with 38 per cent of deals going through in the five weeks prior to the deadline.

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5. Abbey announces new ”Zero” credit card offerAbbey has announced the launch of its newest credit card,...

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Katie Price to launch new credit card

Glamour model-turned TV host and best-selling author Katie Price is to launch her own credit card, it has been announced.

Coming as growing numbers of UK lenders cut back on the number of credit products they offer consumers, Price is to give her support to a "pink and girly" card bearing her name.

While celebrity-endorsed cards are big business in the United States, this is expected to be the first product of its kind to be made available over here, though for some years now consumers have been taking advantage of credit card offers from a number of sports teams, including Arsenal, Manchester United and Chelsea.

A spokesman for Price commented: "This is something we are in talks with financial companies about doing in the next year. It will be the Katie Price credit card and it will be her card rather than something Katie just puts her name to."

However, some personal finance experts have expressed their concerns that the light-hearted appearance of the new card could make it attractive to young people who are not very savvy when it comes to money matters and could therefore add to the nation’s collective debt.

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5. Credit card borrowing soarsThe outstanding debt on credit cards increased by £350 million...

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Borrowers urged to compare offers as lenders pull loans

Britons are being forced to carry out more research and shop around for longer in order to land an attractive offer on financial products, it has been revealed.

With new research revealing that, so far this year, 27 personal loans on the market have been changed as lenders look to offset the losses they have suffered as a result of the stalling economy, the importance of comparing the terms and conditions attached to such products is greater than ever.

Furthermore, a number of the UK’s biggest lenders have dropped out of the personal loans market altogether, the market research carried out by Moneyfacts has found.

This means that the average personal loan of £5,000 now costs £386 more than it did just one year ago when paid back over three years, the research carried out by Moneyfacts concluded.

“Unsurprisingly the personal loan market has not escaped the effects of the credit crunch,” explained Samantha Owens, head of personal finance at the company.

“In the majority of cases, [product changes] have been increases across the board, with lenders combining large one-off rate increases with gradual small rises the overall effect does not favour consumers looking for extra borrowing.”

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3. ”Consumers should still be taking advantage of credit offers”Despite the widespread warnings of lenders pulling products off the...
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Interest-only mortgages ‘can be a wise option’

Borrowers have been advised that they may be able to take advantage of interest-only mortgages.

Such deals have grown in popularity over recent years, driven largely by young professionals becoming increasingly financially-savvy and taking money matters into their own hands.

According to specialists Alexander Hall, while interest-only mortgages do come with certain risks, for some sensible borrowers, they can be an attractive option.

Andy Pratt, operations manager at Alexander Hall, commented: "If you know that you’re starting off in a career where the salary is limited to start with but you’re going to be coming into some bonuses later on, you have options."

"As the bonuses or increased salary comes along then you can essentially use what you need to live on and pay off lump sums of the mortgage through what you build up."

The comments come as the number of mortgage deals available on the market steadily shrinks, leaving borrowers with the task of shopping around for the best offers to suit their circumstances.

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Billing rules mean UK consumers unable to get best utilities offers

A significant number of UK households have failed to benefit from the recent changes to how the energy market operates, a new report from the National Audit Office (NAO) has concluded.

According to research carried out by the body, the government’s 2002 decision to remove controls on how consumers are billed has actually meant that many people are worse off, particularly the most vulnerable members of society such as the elderly or those on low incomes.

Specifically, anyone unable to take advantage of the offers available for paying over the internet or through a direct debit system are likely to be paying over-the-odds.

"It is the poorer and older members of society - those who would benefit the most from switching to a cheaper supplier - who are left behind,” stated Edward Leigh chairman of the Public Accounts Committee, which oversees the NAO’s work.

However, such a situation looks likely to change soon, with the chancellor Alistair Darling having used his first Budget to threaten the introduction of new rules to ensure that utilities offer the best rates to the poorest households, though consumers are still well-advised to shop around and compare the best utilities offers for the time being.

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Credit card offer

Are you a big spender or incur expenses on behalf of your company?
Rewards that can be exchanged for flights can be worth far more than any cash back offer, and they’re tax free! Read on to find out more…

For example, if you and a friend flew together First Class to Los Angeles using BA Miles and a free companion ticket, you will have used tickets that would cost in the region of £16,000; and you would only have had to pay for any applicable taxes, fees and surcharges (less than £500 in this instance*). Not bad for just using the British Airways American Express© Credit Card to pay for products and services!

*The ticket price of £16,836 includes taxes, fees, charges and surcharges per person of £242.00 each

This example assumes that the British Airways American Express© Premium Plus Card is used with cumulative spend of £100,000 and that £10,000 is spent in a year to qualify for the free companion ticket. A typical cash back card will offer 3% cash back, which in this scenario would be £3,000. So there is a net advantage of more than £13,000 in value in this particular scenario.

STOP PRESS
You may also purchase up to 19,000 BA Miles each year for £319. So if you purchased 19,000 BA Miles in years one and two, then rather spending £100,000 on the credit card, all you need to spend is around £75,000 if you wish to travel First Class sooner to, say, Los Angeles. So as you can see, travelling First Class is also attainable for smaller spenders. However, don’t forget Business Class travel is even easier to attain as the BA Miles required are lower. In the LA example above you would need to accumulate 100,000 BA Miles to travel Business Class.

Apply online now for the British Airways American Express© Premium Plus Card or get their money back card which offers up to 5% cash back during the first three months.

My personal favourite is the British Airways American Express© Premium Plus Card. This card awards 1.5 BA Miles for virtually every £1 of spend on the card (see web site for the few exceptions). It should be noted that there is annual fee for this card but in my circumstances the annual fee of £120 is worth it due to the additional miles earned (see my comments below to help explain why). Otherwise American Express© do offer a free standard British Airways American Express© Card where you will still be awarded 1 BA Mile for virtually every £1 you spend on the card.

“Booking free flights with British Airways using your BA Miles is easy. Simply log on to BA.com and search for available flights. You can quickly establish which of the available flights suit you best ”

In addition, as a British Airways Executive Club member, you can earn bonus BA Miles on purchases from retailers like Currys, John Lewis, Dell, hmv and loads more when you shop through their BA Miles eStore.

For example, If you purchase a new LCD television from Currys you will earn 2 BA Miles per £1 spent. Therefore, using your British Airways American Express© Premium Plus Card to purchase a 42″ LCD television for £800 you will be awarded 1,600 (2 x 800 + 1,200 (1.5 x 800) = 2,800 BA Miles.

Therefore if you spend £4,000 per month and pay using the British Airways American Express© Premium Plus Card, each year you would be awarded 72,000 BA Miles per year, plus any additional BA Miles awarded from purchases from the BA Miles eStore. Furthermore, once you reach £10,000 spend on your British Airways American Express© Premium Plus Card in a year, you will receive a complimentary companion ticket (see American Express© web site for more information).

“Up to 6,000 bonus BA Miles when you first use your card”

Alternatively, American Express© offer a moneyback card that offers up to 5% during the first three months (see American Express© website for more information)

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2. 5% cashback using American Express Credit CardDo nothing but use your American Express card and get...
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4. Credit card companies are becoming more ”repossession-happy”An expert has warned that credit card companies are becoming...
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SONY KDL40D3500 40″ HD Ready 1080p digital LCD TV

If you wanted to buy the SONY KDL40D3500 40″ HD Ready 1080p digital LCD TV then your options include:

• Comet - £799 including free delivery and 1 year warranty (5 year cover available for £219.99)
• John Lewis - £799 including free delivery and free 5 year warranty
• Dixons - £749.99 plus £19.90 delivery. 5 Year warranty available for £269.00
• Currys - £799.99 with free delivery. Additional product cover is available for £7.99 per month

Applying the discount code AWOFF50 to Currys offer, the price falls to £749.99. So Currys ends being cheaper than Dixons by £19.90, the cost of delivery!

BUT WAIT A MINUTE. Comet also have a discount code (expires 31st March) - 10TVOFFER. This entitles you to 10% off, so their price falls to £719.90.  Not to be outdone, Dixons also offer £20 off until 31st March if you use the discount code AW20, reducing their price to £749.89 including delivery.

So to conclude, the cheapest offer in this instance is from Comet at £719.90, but you should also consider johnlewis.com as their offer at £799 also includes a free five year warranty. Although £79.10 more expensive you are getting a five year warranty, whereas a 5 year warranty from Comet would cost you an extra £219.99.

The above table after applying discounts now looks like this:

• Comet - £719.90 including free delivery and 1 year warranty (5 year cover available for £219.99)
• John Lewis - £799 including free delivery and free 5 year warranty
• Dixons - £749.89 including delivery. 5 Year warranty available for £269.00
• Currys - £749.99 with free delivery. Additional product cover is available for £7.99 per month

So the final question for yourself is, is the extra cover worth £79 to you? If so, then the best buy is from John Lewis.

Here is a list of current discount codes

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Easyjet ticket sale

Easyjet are offering up to 20% off flights from the UK to the following destinations:

• Budapest
• Bucharest
• Gdansk
• Krakow
• Ljubljana
• Prague
• Sofia
• Tallinn
• Warsaw

This offer is available on every seat, every day, on the above routes for travel from the 5th May - 2nd July 2008. So you can even grab a flight bargain in the May bank holiday and half term school holidays .

This offer ends midnight Tuesday 1st April 2008.

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3. Disneyland Resort Paris ticket offersDisneyland Resort Paris special offers. Offers range from child discounts,...
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5. bmibaby to offer Cardiff to Barcelona cheap flightsLow-cost airline bmibaby has announced that it is to offer...

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Ethical financial products growing in popularity

Brits are choosing to put their money into ethically sound financial products in increasing numbers, personal finance experts have reported.

According to the latest figures published by the Ethical Investment Research Service (EIRIS), some £8.9 billion was invested in green and ethical retail funs by the end of 2007, with this figure likely to soar over the coming months.

Significantly, as Lee Coates, director of Ethical Investors, has argued, "the ethical market is being led by individuals not the investment industry", though as more people become interested in the sector, a growing number of more competitive offers and deals are being made available.

He added: "If you look at the way the ethical investment market has expanded of the back of the fair trade produce , it’s something that people are increasingly looking at in their daily lives via the shopping basket - fairtrade, better, greener products - and then transposing that to another product they buy , which is financial services."

The latest figures also show that there are currently some three-quarters of a million ethical accounts open in the UK in comparison to just 137,000 ten years ago, when less than £1.5 billion was invested ethically.

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Cold Easter prompts rise in last-minute getaways

A near-record number of Brits are taking advantage of last-minute holiday offers and escaping the UK in an attempt to make up for the bad Easter weather.

With those who chose to holiday at home over the long weekend having been disappointed with almost Arctic-like conditions in some parts of the country, travel observers are reporting an increase in enquiries for holidays in April.

Driving this increased interest is the fact that, as Easter has fallen early this year, many schools have staggered their holidays, giving families the chance to grab a last-minute offer.

According to the website lastminute.com, Turkey and Greece are the most popular destinations for Brits looking for a late Easter sunshine break, while Dubai and resorts on Egypt’s Red Sea coast are also proving a hit among holidaymakers.

"The unusually cold weather has led to incredible demand for late Easter sun holidays," reported the firm’s UK Managing Director John Bevan.

"With Easter falling earlier than normal this year, families have realised it could be their last chance for a break before the end of the school term."

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Nintendo launches new Wii contest

Gaming fans are to be offered the chance to win a new car and hundreds of pounds worth of other prizes as Nintendo celebrates the launch of its Mario Kart game for the Wii.

With the game set to be released in the UK in the second week of April, the Japanese gaming giant has announced that it is to hold a nationwide tournament to find the country’s best virtual go-karter.

On April 5th, some 30 venues across the UK will host their own contests, with the best players from each town and city to go forward to a grand final which will take place at Mercedes-Benz world in Brookalnds.

The prize for the best Wii gamer overall is a special-edition Mario Kart VW Beetle convertible car, while runners-up will receive £250 worth of vouchers to spend on experiences such as paintballing and real-life karting.

It is expected that Nintendo will launch a new package for its popular Wii console to come with the new game, which has been a hit for around two decades now.

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Home offices set to increase as workers look for better lifestyle

Business chiefs predict that growing numbers of Britons will opt to work from home so as to improve their work-life balance.

This is likely to lead to an increase in people investing in setting up a specially-designed home office as well as in up-to-date communications technology, such as high-speed broadband and IP telephony.

Of those workers questioned in a recent study undertaken by the Durham Business School, 43 per cent who worked from home for at least 20 hours a week suffered from stress in comparison to around 65 per cent of those who were stuck in the office all the time.

"It seems at least for managerial and professional employees in knowledge-based industries that working from home is an antidote to the stresses of office-based working," concluded Tom Redman, professor of human resource management at the school.

In addition, the British Chambers of Commerce has stated that the growing uptake of the internet and email technology has fuelled a rise in the establishment of home offices and improved flexibility within the workplace.

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Borrowers urged to shop around as lenders get tough

Borrowers are being forced to shop around for good-value personal loans more than ever as cheap deals become increasingly rare, personal finance experts have explained.

With lenders tightening their belts in the wake of the global credit crunch, rates are steadily going up and the Financial Services Authority has stated that the days of cheap and easy credit look like they are coming to an end.

That means consumers need to make sure that they shop around and compare the best offers on both personal loans and credit card products, the financial advisory servive Needanadviser.com has stated.

"Lenders are running scared of the credit crunch," explained Jo Roberts, a director at the firm.

"We have not seen such a large [rate] rise in secured loans because lenders are now looking to get their money back."

The company also predicted that the impact of the credit crunch is likely to be felt for at least the next 12 months, with consumers urged to get financially savvy or else end up paying the price in the long-run.

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Offer may be withdrawn without notice

Drivers to benefit from UK’s largest ever hire car fleet

Two of the world’s largest car hire companies have announced that they are to merge their UK fleets in a bid to cut back on costs, with consumers likely to benefit from a host of new offers.

Coming soon after Europcar acquired rival National Car Rental, the two firms are to pool their resources to form the UK’s largest rental fleet, comprising of some 60,000 vehicles, including around 6,000 vans.

Under the deal, it is hoped that Europcar customers will benefit from a wider choice of prestigious, luxury cars, while those who usually favour National will be given access to vans and other vehicles.

This latest initiative should also give UK drivers more affordable access to Europcar’s fleet of nearly 200,000 vehicles across Europe, with the company especially strong in France and Germany.

The companies will also have a presence in 143 countries across the world.

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Offer may be withdrawn without notice

Extra warm duvets

Although nearly April the sudden cold snap has seen us diving under the covers for warmth. John Lewis are offering a Duck Down 13.5 Tog Double Duvet made with 90% duck down and 10% duck feather, making an extremelysoft comfortable and very warm duvet. The tog rating of a duvet indicates its warmth and the higher the tog rating the warmer the duvet will be.  In this instance, the duvet has two layers (a 9 and 4.5 tog) which can be used separately in the warmer months or together in winter.

Available in 4 different sizes, ranging from £70 to £130. More information

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Offer may be withdrawn without notice

Fashionable bags may be health risk, experts warn

British women may be putting their well-being at risk by copying one of the latest fashion trends, health experts have warned.

Over recent months large bags, often bearing designer labels, have become highly fashionable as British women follow the fashion trends set by the likes of Katie Holmes, Victoria Beckham and Eva Longoria.

However, despite looking good, many are putting themselves at risk permanent damage, osteopath and acupuncturist Garry Trainer has warned.

“If a heavy bag is carried constantly on the same shoulder then it can compress the muscles on one side while stretching the muscles on the other,” he told the Daily Mail.

“Ideally weight should be carried across both shoulders close to the body.”

It is now believed that the average British woman carries around 5.2lb worth of possessions in her handbag - twice the weight carried by their mothers.

View shoulder handbag offers

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UK skiers heading to the States for best holiday offers

Near-record numbers of British skiers are taking advantage of a weak dollar and heading across the Atlantic to enjoy a week or two of winter sports action, it has been reported.

In addition to Canadian holidaymakers crossing the border to hit the slopes in the United States, resorts are reporting that growing numbers of Brits are opting to splash out on a long-haul flight in the belief that they will ultimately be saving money on their holiday.

According to a recent report from Vermont Public Radio (VPR), some resorts have seen between a ten and 12 per cent increase in international visitors so far in 2008, with many staying for more than a week.

Furthermore, the radio station also stated that growing numbers of Eastern European holidaymakers are taking advantage of the large number of special deals currently available in the US rather than stick to the slopes in their region.

These latest reports come soon after travellers were advised of the importance of taking out an adequate travel insurance policy prior to going on a skiing trip.

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Offer may be withdrawn without notice

Broadband offers only just beginning, EC minister suggests

A relative lack of competition within the UK is hampering the growth of the domestic broadband market and costing consumers dearly, it has been claimed.

According to a new report from the European Commission, the UK is falling behind a number of EU states when it comes to broadband penetration levels.

Denmark, Finland, the Netherlands and Sweden were all reported to have achieved penetration levels in excess of 30 per cent by the end of 2007, while the UK currently stands alongside Belgium and Luxembourg with levels of just over 20 per cent.

However, the European authorities nevertheless expressed their confidence that consumers will benefit from steadily improving broadband offers as the market opens up to smaller operators.

"The European regulatory model is designed to increase competition in the telecoms market and this certainly is starting to pay off," noted telecoms commissioner Viviane Reding.

"We must intensify our efforts to reduce the regulatory borders in Europe. Only by opening up the single market for business will Europe become competitive and will consumers benefit from a wide choice of rich and affordable services," she added.

Some 19 million broadband lines were added across the EU in 2007, the report also revealed.

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