To avoid festive debt save up for next Christmas
THE big day has passed. The presents have been opened, the stockings are empty, and the turkey’s been reduced to leftovers.
But if you are like most people, swept up in the flash flood of festive debt, it has all been loaded onto a maxed-out credit card.
If you struggle with the financial strain of Christmas, now is the perfect time to reflect on how you could do things differently in the coming year.
There are plenty of companies offering schemes to squirrel away money for next year’s festivities. Like the children on Saint Nick’s list, most are nice, but some are a bit naughty.
They give you a decent interest rate of about 4 to 5 per cent, and allow you to set up regular payments as your pay comes in. Most importantly, the money is locked up until the start of November, so the temptation to blow it any earlier is removed.
Clearly, the hands-off approach works. Police Credit Union members managed to save an average of just under $1000 each last year. us they wouldn’t be able to manage without our help,’’ it says.
Nevertheless, it is an enormous business. Chrisco would not confirm sales figures, but in 2009 it was shipping between 300,000 and 400,000 hampers.