The Fool has posted their 10 Stingiest Money Saving Tips, which is a slightly humerous look at being frugal. Here are the ten tips, along with my thoughts and my unique “stingy rating” from 1 to 10 on each:
- Bath with a friend – ah, this old excuse for jumping in the tub with someone else. “We were just saving water and money, honest!”. Of course you were. Now where’ve you put that loofa? Stingy rating: 4
- Reuse teabags – as if the tea we get at work at bad isn’t bad enough, you’re now suggesting that we recycle the tea bags? The thought of a weaker and weaker cuppa throughout the day isn’t that appealing, but I guess it could work. Stingy rating: 3
- Shaking the printer cartridge – this method of getting a bit more life out of those expensive printer cartridges has been proven to work, just as long as it’s the right type of cartridge, and as long as you don’t mind ending up lookig like Dick Van Dyke in Mary Poppins afterwards. Stingy rating: 2
- Get a breadmaker – most households have them, you’ll probably find it stuck at the back of the kitchen cupboard, behind the Pampered Chef and Tuppaware that you’ve also only used once. If you can be bothered with the mess, the bread produced can be good. Stingy rating: 1
- Magnets on the energy meter – fancy a bit of time in the nick for the sake of some cheaper electricity? This old trick might be the way to  do it. Stingy rating: 5
- Balancing your budget – learning to say “no” is such an important part of life. Stingy rating: 3
- Wear more clothes to cut your heating bills – “Get your coat on love…” “why, are we going out somewhere?” “Nope, I’m switching the heating off.” Stingy rating: 6
- Runner bean surprise –Â apparently, this is an extremely versatile veg, and can be made into soup and curry amongst other things. Stingy rating: 7
- Wee in the shower – admit it, we’ve all done it. Haven’t we? Ahem, we’re not on a water meter so there would be no point doing it. Just remember, you can probably get away with it in the shower, but don’t try it when you’re bathing with a friend (see #1 above). Stingy rating: 10
- Free petrol – by using the correct pump at a petrol station, you may get a fraction more out of the pump. The reason  is that not all the pumps give exactly the same petrol for your money, as they must be accurate on average. Therefore it’s thought that the pump furthest away from the shop, which gets used the least, will dispense the most, averaging out the other more frequented pumps which dispense less and are closer to the shop. Of course, we’re talking minute differences here, so this hit-and-miss tactic is largely a waste of time and brain power. Stingy rating: 9
Do you have any more stingy money saving tips? If so, let us know in the comments below.
photo credit: Ernst Moeksis