JEFF PRESTRIDGE: Inflation and their own banks are ravaging depositors!
First, good news. Savings rates are rising, reaching levels not seen more than a decade ago. However, don’t get too carried away. Savers seldom get this bad, given the rampant inflation.
With inflation hitting a 41-year high of 11.1% last week, I turned to Rachel Springall, a financial expert at data review firm Moneyfacts, to run the numbers. Back when the Bank of England’s base rate was her 3% last time (November 2008), I asked her to track her four key rates and chart them.
Interest rates are the base interest rate, the average Standard Variable Rate Home Loan (SVR), the inflation rate (measured by the Consumer Price Index), and the average interest rate for easily accessible savings accounts.
The results are shown in the graph on the other side and tell their own story. Not only are savers’ deposits devastated by inflation, eroding their real value, but the savings rate is deliberately suppressed by banks trying to maximize profits. The less interest a bank passes on to depositors as the base rate rises, the more profit the bank earns.
So, going back to December 2008, Springall said the average easy access savings rate was 2.58% and the average SVR mortgage rate was 5.68%. Inflation he had 4.5%.
Today the numbers are 1.25% (scandalous), 6.49% (exorbitant, but most mortgages are now locked in) and 11.1% respectively. In blunt financial terms, savers are now being duped by their banks as they see inflation eroding the real value of their savings.
If you want more proof of this, read our review of the investment fund JOHCM UK Equity Income. The fund’s manager has held significant positions in banks, particularly Barclays and NatWest.
This is because they believe that the higher interest rates remain, the more profit companies will make, and they will be able to profit from the difference between the interest that banks charge borrowers and the interest they give to savers.
For the record, NatWest is now paying 0.5% on Internet Saver and Barclays is paying 0.25% on balances up to £49,999 on Everyday Saver. The everyday savings scandal.
You could argue that you would rather buy their shares and earn both capital and income returns than become a bank depositor, as JOHCM UK Equity Income did.
Dangerous, yes. But as they say, luck favors the brave.
A deep dive into running hero Kevin
I have done some crazy things in the past to raise money for worthy causes. ).
But all this hard work — a total of 46 hours running around Windermere in the Lake District — seems trivial compared to what rugby league legend Kevin Sinfield has just done.
Yesterday, during the half-time interval of the men’s Rugby League World Cup final, he was shaken after running more than 300 miles in seven days at Old Trafford in Manchester. He did it to raise money for a number of charities that help people with motor neuron disease (just last week former Top Gear presenter Sue Baker died from it).
If you would like to donate, please visit the website. https://donate.giveasyoulive.com/fundraising/ kevin-sinfield-ultra-7-in-7-challengeDon’t forget to add a gift aid. I sponsored Sinfield last week and will be running the Rob Barrow Leeds Marathon next May (Rob is Sinfield’s former teammate and is currently at the hands of the savage MND).
I am powerless compared to the mighty Sinfield, but I am determined to do whatever I can to help defeat MND and help those involved in caring for sick individuals.
Amazon, wrong pants and very rude toys
Surprise: Wizard Kit Instead of iPad
My sincere thanks to all the readers who have reached out to me over the past few days to share their stories about Amazon’s plight.
This follows on from my article a week ago about Hampshire-based Mike Oliver, who ordered two iPad Pros from the US tech giant and replaced them with rolls of chicken wire and Felix’s cat food. received. It wasn’t until Mail on Sunday was involved that Mike got his long-fought refund.
Nottingham native Paul Eden Smith had a similar experience to Mike’s.
He ordered an iPad Pro and keyboard from Amazon. The keyboard arrived in a separate parcel, while the other box contained her two random children’s toys, a wizard in training clothes and a frisbee. He’s been exchanging emails with Amazon’s infobots over the past few weeks, a process he says is “worse than crawling through thumbtacks and razor blades.”
Only in the last few days did Amazon finally admit responsibility for the misdelivery and agreed to refund him for the iPad Pro he didn’t receive.
“It was a tortuous deal with Amazon,” says the 63-year-old. “You can’t talk to humans because online conversations often end without rhyme or reason.”
Earlier this month, another reader ordered Mammut walking pants (UK size 8) from Amazon, but only received 12 (US size 8). She returned them and re-ordered them, in addition she received another size 12.
She went back to the post office and reordered for the third time. She got her £145 reimbursed and was told to keep (dispose of) her trousers.
Another reader ordered an Apple iPhone and received a 6-pack of Nivea deodorant. She is still fighting for a refund because she wants us to return the phone she never received.
But nothing beats the unexpected birthday gift a 76-year-old wife received from her husband. What he ordered wasn’t a Dyson hair dryer, but the kind of filthy sex toy Gwyneth Paltrow likes to advertise.
On Friday my husband said he was fully refunded. As for her toys, they’re currently “in the back of my wardrobe because I don’t know what to do with them.”
There are more Amazon mishaps I can report, but you get the gist.
I simply believe that the company’s planned five-figure layoffs won’t affect their already creaky customer service.
quite a week on the train
It’s been quite a week on the train. No strikes, but lots of delays. You have to deal with fog (Monday) and rain (most weeks).
As I waited patiently for the 6:27 a.m. train to arrive in Wokingham on Tuesday, a drowned rat came to mind.
At least the rain didn’t leak through the roof of the train, as one commuter experienced on the way from Chichester to London.
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