deals

How to save £50 off iPhone 6s

With the recent announcement and release of the iPhone 6s, there’s the usual rush to buy the latest and greatest device. But there’s an easy way to save yourself a bit of money off the list price.

The 128gb iPhone 6s costs £699 if you buy it direct from Apple. But did you know that other retailers are also selling it for that price too?

Well, if you sign up for and use TopCashback and search for Very (the UK online retailer), at the time of writing you can secure between 7% and 8% cashback. On a £699 phone, that’s close to £50.

It’s exactly the same phone that you would have ordered from Apple or other retailers, and is completely brand new – only it’ll cost you less using this route. Simple! The only slight drawback is that they have slightly longer delivery times than going direct to Apple – but that’s to be expected with a phone that only began retailing last week.

Note: TopCashback isn’t the only cashback site offering these high cashback rates. QuidCo offers something similar – so it’s worth checking between the two to see which one offers the best rate.

UPDATE – actually, I’ve just had it pointed out to me that Quidco don’t pay cashback on VAT, so the actual price would be more like: £658.26

Do comparison sites cost us more?

They’re often heralded as consumer champions, giving individuals access to the whole (or a much larger proportion) of the market than they would have been able to access independently. But I wonder how much the presence of the comparison sites has actually inflated the costs we all pay as a result of the fees that they charge (to the insurers and other financial services companies).

The main comparison sites: Moneysupermarket.com, Compare the Market, Confused.com and Go Compare are all very profitable organisations in their own right. They must be making their money somewhere and since they don’t directly charge consumers for their custom, they must be making money from the insurers and other providers that they work with. And this cost must be funded somehow… so I believe this ‘cost of acquisition’ of a customer must be being passed on to the end user. It therefore has to be a false economy of some magnitude, arguably with inflated premiums for an end user to accommodate the extra costs the organisations are paying to the comparison sites. We may be getting access to a wider array of deals, so we can see the best rates in the market – but if the rates are all higher as a result, is that really benefiting anyone – other than the comparison sites?

To soften the impact of the inflated costs, there are different ways to benefit from the sales process that gives something back to the consumer. I’ve listed a couple of examples below that I’m aware of, where you’re additionally rewarded for using the services. I’ve used the cashback providers repeatedly and I’d highly recommend them.

The recently launched Meerkat Movies is a good example of one of the incentives these comparison sites offer to tempt consumers to use their services. On the surface, it seems like a great offer. Buy an insurance product after having compared through the comparison site Compare the Market and then you’re eligible to 2-for-1 cinema tickets every Tuesday and Wednesday for the following 12 months. It’s a better deal than the Orange 2-for-1 cinema deal that was only available on Wednesdays, and it’s valid for the whole year – but what’s the hidden cost? 

My car insurance recently came up for renewal and we all know the advice is to shop around for a better deal than the one your insurer offers you, as you’re typically able to better it on the open market. However, having seen the Meerkat Movies deal and thinking I’d like to take advantage of it – my search on the Compare the Market website returned a deal that was over 16% more expensive than the renewal deal offered by my existing insurer. I guess this is how they’re able to fund the Meerkat Movies deal!

Having said that – Hot UK Deals – a money saving / deals website where individuals report back on the best offers, savings and deals they find in the UK as they come across them – has reported a workaround for the Meerkat Movies, whereby you can simply purchase a one day insurance policy for as little as £1.37 and therefore be eligible for the Meerkat Movies offer. If this works, it’s a great piece of advice. Check out the link here.

Alternatively, to claw back some of the money the comparison sites make out of you, consider using one of the cashback sites, like TopCashback. Depending on the policy that you’re looking for, you could save a lot of money! At the time of writing, More Than insurance is offering £106.05 cashback on Landlords insurance, for example. Quidco is the other main cashback site in the UK – and they offer similar, although not always the same, cashback deals on insurers and other online retailers. So it’s always worth checking both of them to see where you can get the best deal. Through Quidco, for example, take out a life insurance policy via the comparison site Confused.com and at the time of writing, you’re able to claim up to £127 in cashback. It’s free money, so you might as well claim it. All you’re doing is sharing the commission the insurer would typically pay to any referring organisation.

It would seem the comparison sites are here to stay – for better or worse. Going to the insurers direct offers no better rates than through the comparison sites, and in many instances you’re missing out on exclusive deals or incentives that are offered through those referral sites. Couple those incentives with various cashback offers (from the cashback sites) and it can soften the deal somewhat, but I just can’t help but wonder if the presence of the comparison sites is actually just costing us all more in the long run.

Full Amazon Prime finally in the UK

How good is this? The UK version of Amazon has finally announced that they’re introducing the same features as the US version! This means free access to the Kindle library of 500,000 books, unlimited movie & TV streaming, and next day deliveries from Amazon’s stock. The usual price will be £79 per year, but if you sign up before 26th February (you can take a free 30 day trial if you’re unsure) – then you can get it at the reduced price of £49. The service will go live fully in 5 days. Follow the link HERE to find out more.

The best discount dining card

A relatively recent phenomenon to hit the UK’s high street is the proliferation of vouchers, daily deals and discount sites that effectively offer money off and savings across a whole range of products and services. One particular niche related to these sites is the ‘discount dining card’. There are a handful of major players in the market and having tried them all, I reckon I’m in a good position to advise on which one(s) I think are the best.

So, the 3 main players are:

Gourmet Society – www.gourmetsociety.co.uk 

Gourmet SocietyThe Gourmet Society is probably one of the better known dining discount cards, in that it is frequently promoted in the quality newspapers. Accepted at over 6,000 restaurants, it offers a good coverage of venues across the UK.  There’s an iOS and Android app available, although I’ve had a few niggles with the Android app crashing from time to time, and the location search is sometimes a little flaky. Having said that, they do also offer a digital version of the Gourmet Society card, so you can just show your phone to the restaurateur as opposed to remembering to take your card with you every time you go out. Subscriptions are advertised on the site from £69.95 for 12 months access, although there are frequent trials available online for anywhere from 1 to 3 months, and quite often they’ll be discounted membership too. As with the other major dining cards, I would expect to pay anywhere from £29.95 to around £40 for a discounted version of this card.

Deal: Get a 2 month free trial HERE

Read more

Why TopCashback.co.uk is worth using

 – classes itself as the UK’s leading cashback site, and there are a handful of reasons why I’m inclined to agree. I joined recently and through very little effort, I’ve already racked up earnings of nearly £60 in just under a month. The beauty of it is that I’m not doing anything I wouldn’t already have done – other than clicking on TopCashback before I go to the online merchant or shop I was going to use. You can Join Top CashBack by clicking on the link. It’s quick and easy to set up, and even easier to use.

What are the key selling points?

  • It’s free to join
  • They guarantee to pay the highest rates of cashback
  • Commission returns of up to 110%
  • No annual fee like on some other cashback sites
  • More than 3,300 online merchants
  • A variety of free payment methods – including PayPal, Amazon vouchers or direct into your bank
  • The option to earn referral bonuses of £10 for each friend that is referred (subject to them then earning £10 cashback too).

The site’s not a new thing either – it’s been around for ages, having been reviewed by the likes of The Independent, The Guardian, The One Show and Daybreak.

How to use the site

TopCashback requires just 5 simple steps to use their site.

  1. Browse through the list of online merchants (or use the search facility to find a company by name)
  2. Select the company or online shop you want to buy something from
  3. You’ll see a “Get Cashback Now” button – so click on that, then just shop as normal on the main site
  4. You have an Account area, where you can track the status of your cashback
  5. Once the Account area demonstrates that cashback is payable, you can request the money in the way that’s most suitable for you.

So what are you waiting for?! Join Top CashBack today

Premium Press offers 50% off WordPress themes

Premium Press, the company behind the WordPress themes of DirectoryPress, ShopperPress and CouponPress are offering 50% off their themes as part of a Halloween special. Just click on the link below and then when you get to the purchase screen, use the code “halloween”. I’ve used DirectoryPress as the system upon which I’ve based Recruiter Network Directory (which you can see here: http://www.recruiternetwork.co.uk/directory/) and on Oil and Gas Recruiter Directory (which you can see here: http://www.oilandgasrecruiter.co.uk/directory/).

 

In terms of out of the box functionality, the themes can’t be faulted. They’re easy to install and include an abundance of payment gateways so that you can straight away begin to monetize your site. There’s lots of powerful features too, but once configured you can almost sit back and let the sites manage themselves. The only intervention required is for WordPress updates or responding to contact form enquiries. 

Cheap UK web hosting

Cheap UK web hosting

Read more

Cruise vouchers – 2-4-1 every Friday!

I’m really liking the Moneysupermarket.com voucher web site for teaming up with Cruise, Chester to give away 2-4-1 admission every Friday. All you need to do is print the voucher off from this page: http://www.moneysupermarket.com/vouchers/store/cruise-nightclub-chester/1231/1/ and take it along with you. Valid from 8pm till 1am for 2 people, excluding race days and only on Fridays. Not a bad deal though!

Moneysupermarket.com

The voucher part of this site is better than a lot of the other ones out there – and the aggregated information about different financial deals are also among the best. The TV adverts might not have the same catchiness of their competitors, but that aside, they’re the market leader within their sector in terms of aggregating deals from the widest variety of sources. In particular, with the car insurance sector – they’re also up against similar aggregators who aren’t exactly independent – as they’re backed by car insurance providers!