It's an open forum bob , no need for apologiesI was getting too personal and apologise. It is very sad but not my business and I am please that your present situation sounds better founded. Good luck for the future.
Levelling Up
- Thread starter kfpben
- Start date
- Location
- Limousin/Charentes toad land
Thought not .
If you're happy then everything's dandyI was starting to feel a bit dull, just making a living...
Just; farming
- Location
- Limousin/Charentes toad land
Actually, I often reflect on Dick Dastardly on the Whacky Races.
He was always fastest and winning but always stopped to cheat and sabotage the others - always backfiring and coming last. Sort of decided way back then, that for me, just plod along, honest, simple and innocent was the way to go
Polar opposite of trump you might say
Never had you down as a plodder , maybe the french way of life is affectingActually, I often reflect on Dick Dastardly on the Whacky Races.
He was always fastest and winning but always stopped to cheat and sabotage the others - always backfiring and coming last. Sort of decided way back then, that for me, just plod along, honest, simple and innocent was the way to go
Polar opposite of trump you might say
- Location
- Limousin/Charentes toad land
- Location
- Scottish Highlands
Sigh.
Start with this one, and follow the linked strategy to maximise AMEX sign up boni (I forget the order and I’m on an Amex holiday at the moment so not going to look it up for you).
The beginner's guide to collecting Avios — Head for Points
Welcome to the world of Avios points! This page answers a few of the questions that newcomers to Avios often ask. Click on the blue links to be taken to websites with more information or relevant Head for Points articles. We have a specific series of 175 articles explaining how British…
www.headforpoints.com
Once you get to a couple hundred thousand Avios then earn a 241 voucher and use that.
For non-AMEX spend (because some folks don’t take it) chose a hotel or cash back card that suits your plans and use that. You can manufacture additional spend by buying Premium bonds and cashing them in, using curve card as an intermediary (www.curve.com) and backed to a compliant point/ cash earning card. If you have a decent enough tax Bill, you can buy curve metal and earn on your tax bill too. Sometimes, I can even pay my Amex bill by my MasterCard, via curve.
That’s the starter, but you need to put in the effort to get the returns. My last two dozen long haul flights have all involved turning left on boarding, and I didn’t pay for the hotels when I got to destination. Conservatively, saving me £3k/year for the last twenty years.
Ah , you said you made 3k a year , not saved 3kSigh.
Start with this one, and follow the linked strategy to maximise AMEX sign up boni (I forget the order and I’m on an Amex holiday at the moment so not going to look it up for you).
The beginner's guide to collecting Avios — Head for Points
Welcome to the world of Avios points! This page answers a few of the questions that newcomers to Avios often ask. Click on the blue links to be taken to websites with more information or relevant Head for Points articles. We have a specific series of 175 articles explaining how British…
Once you get to a couple hundred thousand Avios then earn a 241 voucher and use that.
For non-AMEX spend (because some folks don’t take it) chose a hotel or cash back card that suits your plans and use that. You can manufacture additional spend by buying Premium bonds and cashing them in, using curve card as an intermediary (www.curve.com) and backed to a compliant point/ cash earning card. If you have a decent enough tax Bill, you can buy curve metal and earn on your tax bill too. Sometimes, I can even pay my Amex bill by my MasterCard, via curve.
That’s the starter, but you need to put in the effort to get the returns. My last two dozen long haul flights have all involved turning left on boarding, and I didn’t pay for the hotels when I got to destination. Conservatively, saving me £3k/year for the last twenty years.
- Location
- Limousin/Charentes toad land
Not here it isn't
- Location
- Scottish Highlands
Some years I take the cash by using points for hotel stays and then billing the money when on client trips. One year I did a shade over 100 hotel nights like that so cashed out nearly £10k. The saved figure in my example above is very conservative though, and is holistically better value for me on balance.
I think for 100 nights in a hotel you probably deserved the bonus
- Location
- Limousin/Charentes toad land
- Location
- Scottish Highlands
The joys of working on the client site - have managed well over that some years.
Danllan
Member
- Location
- Sir Gar / Carms
'Example'?
Take your pick of any number of former polytechnics and colleges who have been given University and degree-awarding status, a few deservedly, most simply because of policy.
Beneficial courses? This could include, but is not an exhaustive list: fashion, medicine, engineering (whatever kind), nursing and Russian. But it's easier just to write anything and everything the country needs.
There are many who'd argue that your first sentence has things the wrong way round, I'm not one of them. As for your last, those who had meltdowns may well feel the need for a psychologist. The rest of us won't, and will look on at the 'counselling' culture and wonder how on Earth the undeserving eighty and ninety year olds who lived through WW2 got by without it...
In re' degrees, the 'come-backs' to what I have written are always either the question you have asked or that 'it's the ability shown in studying to degree level that matters, not the subject', valid if the institution and course are of merit. In the real world, and whether or not we care to admit it, we all have a pretty fair idea as to what is truly useful, and that assessment is based on two things: what is of practical utility e.g. medicine for being a doctor, law for the Bar, material science for its application etc.; and, where there is no direct applicability, what will get the student a job.
In answer to both you and @Hindsight, I've been, with some partners, reviewing and interviewing people for jobs and can write from personal experience that the quality of applicant is reflected very clearly in the place of study and the course. Some people with 1sts from some places were significantly less able than people with a 2:1 or even a high 2:2 from other places - in some cases, people with verifiable 'First Class Degrees' were incapable of writing either coherently or grammatically, and this in the age of spell-check etc....
With specific reference to your brother, I've no idea if his PhD on chickpea fungi is relevant to the UK, but I guess it could be very much so elsewhere, and so it could have seen a benefit returned. And your history degree... if it was given by a credible institution and helped you get a job, great. Same if you just did it for fun - provided you paid.
Let me make myself clear, I have no problem with anyone studying any subject they wish, be it English Literature or Black Studies or whatever, wherever; provided they pay for it, it's none of my business and of no concern to me, whereas if my tax-money is being directed toward it, it is of concern to me. So, what I advocate is the full subsidisation of the most able students on the most beneficial courses to the country, that's all.
Who says they are privileged, you? I think educational grants should be made on the basis of two things in combination: the relevance of the course to national requirements, and the academic ability of the individual student.
The second part of that post demonstrates a remarkable ignorance of the success - or lack there of - of so-called 'aid', be it from the UK or elsewhere... Experience has demonstrated time and again that there is only one way of successfully 'Raising the prospects and prosperity in poor countries...' I've mentioned it on here before several times, and our current PM has raised it publicly in just the last few days...
The only thing guaranteed to see any place improve by every metric, and it works every time, is very simple and requires no money at all, just an improved mindset; it's no secret, it's the emancipation of women.
- Location
- Limousin
Who says they are privileged, you? I think educational grants should be made on the basis of two things in combination: the relevance of the course to national requirements, and the academic ability of the individual student.
The second part of that post demonstrates a remarkable ignorance of the success - or lack there of - of so-called 'aid', be it from the UK or elsewhere... Experience has demonstrated time and again that there is only one way of successfully 'Raising the prospects and prosperity in poor countries...' I've mentioned it on here before several times, and our current PM has raised it publicly in just the last few days...
The only thing guaranteed to see any place improve by every metric, and it works every time, is very simple and requires no money at all, just an improved mindset; it's no secret, it's the emancipation of women.
Why should the taxpayer fund students in higher education whose families can already afford to support them, after all they are the ones who will directly benefit financially? It's a very narrow view of what makes a modern sophisticated society, if you only see it in the terms of rewarding someone who can fix your plumbing or body. Civilisation not only moves forward on them, but on the backs of artists, musicians and pure mathematicians et al and in fact it is probably easier to argue their case in a continued University environment than more applied subjects that could often be better served by an apprenticeship as was often the cases several centuries ago.
A agree with your sentiment on the emancipation of women. But this is a goal to be achieved and to claim it's just a mindset is a factious statement as it cannot be achieved without education, giving independence and therefore money.
- Location
- Scottish Highlands
Ressurecting an old thread to give you two a tip that might be of interest, if you put any of your shopping through Amazon. Right now, my bank account is offering 10% cashback on certain spends, including Morrisons (they are probably trying to boost the revenue figures in preparation for an uplift in the sales offer). A similar 10% cashback on Morrisons can be found on airtime rewards (an app that gives you cashback on debit card spend v/v your mobile phone bill and the slightly quirky 'Virgin Shopsaway' website is offering variable rates of Virgin points against spend at Morrisons on registered cards too. Triple dip is possible for £100 cash to your bank, £100 off your phone bill and (for me, at 8/£) enough points for a case of decent wine or half a night in a semi decent hotel, all for spending £1000 in a supermarket. Best bit is it says you can't get the credits on buying gift vouchers, but you do, so no need to buy any stuff from them.
An effective 25% or so back on your shopping, perhaps a bit less if the phone bills usually go through the books and you need to make an adjustment for tax.
Danllan
Member
- Location
- Sir Gar / Carms
I'd forgotten this thread... taking a squint at it now, I wonder if those belittling the importance of protecting the elderly from covid - implicitly supporting a laissez faire / herd immunity policy - were at the front of the queue to attack Boris and Co. when they were advocating such an idea at the start of the outbreak - if only I could be bothered to trawl through the posts...