Can you make your money work better?

WELL, that’s 2020 behind us now and I think very few of us will be sorry to see it go.

Next week, I’ll be discussing how we can look forward to 2021 and ensure that we make the best use of our money in this new year. But I thought I’d give you a few things to think about as you enjoy the last few days of the festive season.

We don’t think about our money often enough. We use money because we have to. Earning it, spending it, saving it and borrowing it, without really ever thinking about what we’re doing.

Many of us could, for example, get better deals on our electricity, gas, house insurance, life insurance, car insurance, phone bills, broadband packages, travel money, holiday flights and accommodation; the list is almost endless.

But we don’t, partly because so many of the financial products and services that we interact with are made to be much more complicated than they actually need to be, and partly because most of us are pretty apathetic when it comes to our money.

Before we start to look at how you’re going to make a better job of using your money, take a bit of time between now and then and think about how you actually used your money last year.

Is your current account good value for money? Do you pay too much in bank charges or are all of the charges you pay justified because your account gives you travel insurance and a free £500 overdraft?

Do you keep too much money in your current account that earns no interest? How much extra money could you have made last year if you had cleared out your current account at the end of each month and put the surplus in a savings account?

Again, the list of questions you could ask yourself is almost endless. See what you can come up with yourself to work out how good you were with your cash in 2020 and next week we’ll start to look at how much better you will be in 2021.