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The rest is just general spending for a family of 3. I just put almost all of my spending on a credit card where possible (for cashback/points/etc).
Noob question but, why?
I get rewards on my current account/debit card, are you getting much better rewards doing it your way?
There's no one true path to the best rewards, this is just how my financial setup has morphed over time. I get a bunch of stuff (AA membership, home emergency cover, holiday insurance, etc) from a paid bank account with Lloyds. When looking for a credit card (apart from my existing Lloyds Mastercard) the AMEX one I got was a good deal and gets me a BA Companion Voucher each year, which is useful to take the edge off holidays.
If I'd had a current account that gave me good cashback/etc then I probably wouldn't have gone with this credit card.
I suppose I could spend hours researching what is the best deal each year and switching around but it's just too much hassle. If my setup is ~70% of the best and hours of work/hassle for the remaining ~25% is not worth it IMHO.
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LFGSS and Microcosm shutting down 16th March 2025 (the day before the Online Safety Act is enforced)
the penalty is limited to a fraction of the turnover.
Indeed if the turnover is £0 not sure they can even do any fine.
That's not really fact checking. That's pure supposition.
LFGSS turnover isn't £0. The income it has from donations goes to pay the server costs. So any fine would/could have a significant financial effect - the money would have to be found from somewhere since there aren't piles of spare cash lying around.
Secondly the admin headache of having to deal with a possible Ofcom investigation should not be discounted. Nor should the possible legal costs that may be required to deal with a possible investigation.
Sure you can say it is "unlikely" but you can't guarantee that is not going to happen. Hence the risk.
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I think I've got ~£100 of business expenses on there a month (a co-working space I can expense).
The rest is just general spending for a family of 3. I just put almost all of my spending on a credit card where possible (for cashback/points/etc). Zipcars (we don't have a car of our own), entertainment and eating/drinking out, groceries for eating in, etc, etc.
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700% APR is not a feature of a useable credit card. It's really a charge card
I guess my post with actual figures crossed with this last one. It's not 700% unless you barely use it at all AND you don't make use of any of the benefits it provides.
If I got it and used it it'd be about 3% APR for me given my current usage.
And you have to spend 10 grand on it in the first 6 months for it to make any sense.
Plenty of people do though. Quote me in the Golf Club thread but my credit card bill averages about £2k/mo so £10k in 6 months isn't a problem. I wouldn't get the Platinum card as I doubt I'd make enough use of the specific benefits it provides, so I'd end up making a loss on it.
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You can use it as a credit card if you don't mind about paying the 700%.
If you get the card and don't use it all the APR is infinite because you're borrowing £0 and paying back £650 of fee (which, under advertising rules, counts towards the APR).
It may be easier to understand with some calculations.
The APR on purchases with the card is ~31% if you don't pay them off within the same month.
The annual fee for the card is £650.So if you spend £10 on the card each month, and pay it off in full each month, you still pay AMEX back £120 + £650 = £770 a year.
So for "borrowing" (albeit temporarily) £120 you pay back £770.
This gives an APR of 541.67% (to 2.d.p).
650/120 = 5.4167£120 * 541.67% is the £650 annual fee.
If you spend a more realistic £2000/mo on the card, and pay it off in full each month, then the APR works out at a lot less.
You "borrow" £24000 and pay back £24650. This is an APR of ~2.71%.
If you spent £2000/mo and didn't pay it back in full each month, but paid it back delayed by one month the costs would be:
- £24000 to pay back the principal
- £2000 * 31% APR = £620 interest/year (or £51.67 per month)
- £650 fee
This comes to £25270 for the year, so that £1270 extra you pay equates to an APR of 5.29%.
The 700% figure is highly misleading, but I'm glad credit card companies are forced to calculate the APR this way and display it prominently on their advertising.
- £24000 to pay back the principal
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It's a credit card.
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With a Charge Card, you have no pre-set spending limit, which means the buying power you have access to can adjust with your use of the Card. You are required to pay your Charge Card balance in full every month.A Credit Card gives you a set credit limit, so you know how much you can spend each month. With a Credit Card, you are not required to pay your balance in full every month; you can carry your balance from one billing cycle to the next, though a minimum payment is required each billing cycle. Any unpaid balance at the end of a billing period will incur interest charges.
"Here's the page for the Platinum Credit Card in question that starts with a £1200 credit limit. Note it quotes the 701.4% APR Variable.
Here's an example of an AMEX Charge Card: https://www.americanexpress.com/en-gb/charge-cards/basic-card/
No spending limit. No talk of APR.
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That particular one is a credit card not a charge card. AMEX do both now. (They tend to do both charge and credit card versions of each card.)
I've had an AMEX credit card (just blue thanks) for years but I'd never have the charge card version as I can never guarantee to pay back the balance in full each month.
The APR on actual purchases is 31% for that card but the advertising rules have a specific way of calculating APR based on a low monthly spend so the monthly payments include a contribution to the high (£650) annual fee which makes it look like you are paying way more to cover the costs of those low monthly spends. If you use all of the benefits of the card then you'll make that £650 back easily. AMEX relies on people paying for the platinum card status and then not reaping all of the benefits.
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What options have people here pursued for a degree qualification later in life when they have a pretty demanding job?
I did a Maths degree (Bachelors) with the OU many years ago (2005-2012). All whilst working full-time and becoming a father.
You can get it done in faster than 6 years but it depends on the course and the dependencies, usually 4 years is the minimum time possible for a Bachelors degree.
I took 8 years to do mine because I wasn't in a rush and did an extra couple of courses that I was interested in.
As others have said it's about ~£22k at the moment for a typical Bachelors degree with the OU (some courses will be more if there are materials or other requirements). No problem doing it from abroad. Go to https://www.open.ac.uk/courses/fees-and-funding and click the "Change location" button and you can select the country you're in.
How much workload it is depends on you and the course. For my Maths degree I already had a reasonable grounding in Maths (Further Maths A-Level) and had done some 1st year Maths with my existing Comp Sci degree.
The OU does say:
"One credit represents about 10 hours of study. You’re awarded credits after you successfully complete a module – for example, a 60-credit module awards 60 credits."
So they seem to say that a 60 credit module (effectively half a year of a degree) is ~ 600h. Which is bonkers. For the typical time between start and exams that's about 16-18h/week. No way I did anywhere near that.
I did pretty much the bare minimum to get through mine:
For the first year modules I'd rattle off the assignments (4 for a 30 credit module) in under 2h each, often without reading any of the material beforehand. I'd start with the question paper and, if stuck, look through the course booklets for the relevant stuff and smash out the answers.
So for a 60 credit worth of 1st year module(s) I'd spend 16h doing assignments (8 assignments at 2h each) and then a bunch of hours looking at past papers in the weeks before the exam. So probably 25h in total.
Second year it probably went to 3-4h per assignment, and a bit more time looking at past papers, so probably 50h in total for 60 credits worth of modules.
Third year it was 4-5h per assignment and quite a bit more time on past papers. Probably 75h-100h for 60 credits worth of modules (most 3rd year modules were 30 credits each).
I recognise that I'm an outlier here. I have a natural affinity for Maths so had to do less work than many others.
Most of the time I'd start the assignment the night before the last posting date, smash it out late into the evening (starting at 11pm and finishing at 3am wasn't uncommon), copy it out more neatly, photograph it (as a backup), stick it in an envelope and then post it the next day (getting proof of postage).
Occasionally I left it so late I had to do it on the actual deadline day and then cycle it round to the tutors house to hand deliver it.
Obviously things are a bit more modern now and electronic submission makes things a lot easier (especially if studying internationally).
If I did a completely different degree (I don't know, Geography, Sociology or Psychology, etc) I'd be needing to do a fuck load more work each week as I wouldn't be able to just blag it so easily.
If you have time to spare then it's easy to fit it in and isn't that much of a burden.
The odd thing about the UK undergraduate degrees is that they're way more expensive than postgraduate degrees:
- The 3 year (4-6 years in reality) Maths Bachelors degree with the OU is ~£22k
- The 4 year (6 years in reality) Maths Masters degree with the OU is ~£12.5k
You can't just jump straight into a Masters degree though. Some will be very hard without suitable grounding before hand, there may be foundation options to help bridge the gap, but a single year of undergraduate study before starting the Masters will bring the costs up to the same as a full undergraduate degree.
Any idea what you'd be interested in studying?
tl;dr is that it's quite expensive (~£22k) and takes a long time (4-6 years) but it's doable with a job/family/life.
(Also I paid about £4k in total, including a week long residential course in Nottingham. Absolute bargain. Would have carried on doing OU courses but the course fees went up from ~£750/full-year to £3000/full-year and then to £7000/full-year).
- The 3 year (4-6 years in reality) Maths Bachelors degree with the OU is ~£22k
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Be happy that £184k in and only £425k out, plus the rent (minus costs/insurance/maintenance/etc), over 24 years is a pretty poor return on that money given the hefty CGT bill they'll have.
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I've never been asked to, but that's not stopped me.
Asked to start or asked to stop?
Endurance idiot.