I’ll start with coffins. They charge thousands for something that you either burn or put in the ground. What a rip off, when I kick the bucket I don’t even want a funeral. Just dispose of my body and have a party to celebrate my life.
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I’ll start with coffins. They charge thousands for something that you either burn or put in the ground. What a rip off, when I kick the bucket I don’t even want a funeral. Just dispose of my body and have a party to celebrate my life.
I said to my Wife just chuck me in the wheelie bin, arse up, I dont care
When my Mum and Dad passed within a few weeks of each other we were able to combine the two costs, roughly £8000 in total if I remember correctly as none of them had insurance we had to foot the bill for the cremations etc
Having Brothers and Sisters and some of whom worked and others that didnt was probably more emotionally challenging than the losses themselves
I could have afforded to pay the lot and have the kin pay me but as I didnt get on with one or two of them then I thought **** it, I left it to one of my Sisters to organise, I paid what I was due and left the rest of them to deal the rest balance, its ****ing costly enough without being left out of pocket by a couple of lazy *****
Agree with the coffins/funerals stuff, it's a joke that people are expected to pay so much to burn or bury a coffin.
Bottled water is another con, maybe in some places the tap water is crappy, but here it's fine.
Food shopping really annoys me the way manufacturers have really pushed prices sky high and also reduced the size and quantities they are providing compared to say a year ago. A couple of examples, McVities digestive biscuits, a twin pack was roughly £2.00 not so long ago now £3.00 and certainly feels like the size and quantity has reduced. Richmond Sausages which were in packs of 8 now packs of 6. There’s too many more to list.
My mate Geoff noticed that as well as his favourite spoons breakfast going up in price he was getting far less beans and only half a mushroom so he complained next time he was in.
He counted the beans, there were 18 and a tiny mushroom. The guy behind the bar wasn't that sympathetic but took the plate off him, a few minutes later it was back smothered in beans (cold) the same mushroom was there and he had lost his hash brown[emoji23]
He ate the lot and said nothing, a couple of weeks later the spoons was on their closures list. I don't think it had anything to do with giving away too many beans to tight erses though.
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Thank you cards. I have a realistic alternative and that’s saying the words thank you in person. It’s not just thank you cards, there seems to be a card for almost everything these days.
I like a thank you card.
Quite a few people send my bairns Christmas and birthday presents that don't live in Edinburgh. We always send a text or make a phone call but I think a hand written note is a nice touch on top of that. I get it's not for everyone though.
I'm going to throw 'sales' into the mix. I worked in the warehouse at Next for 2 years whilst at uni and there were truckloads of stuff boxed in specifically for the sale. It was largely utter ***** that was unsellable. A handful of said items had been stuck in the back corner of the shops with the biggest floor space for the mandatory period to then claim the sale price was genuine. Stripped out again, boxed up and sent across the country marked as '50% off'. There was the odd genuine bargain (usually hoovered up by staff the night before) but most of the stuff had never been seen by anyone in the store before and wouldn't be seen again until the next Next sale. Sales are great of you genuinely find something you were going to buy at a reduced price. So much of it is manipulative marketing though designed to get you to spend £25 you never intended to because you are 'saving £25'. In that scenario you are really £25 down.
Don't even get me started on Black Friday.
The tins of sweets (now plastic) that are sold at Christmas, Roses, Quality Street, Heroes, etc. The amount of chocolates and size of container is laughable compared to years ago, decreasing every year.
Up there with Easter Eggs and selection boxes for being a total rip off compared to buying the equivalent loose chocolate.
This did my head in when I was looking into covering the cost of planting/burning me, so my sister has as little as possible to do. Even the cheapest wooden coffin is expensive for what it is. So I looked into donating my body to medical science, I have lived in a teaching hospital city all my life, been poked and prodded by many a med student in my time so I thought they can have me as a cadaver when I croak it and save my sis doing anything! Turns out they only want healthy bodies, yeah it is weird but by all accounts they want fit bodies with no chronic illnesses, which rules me out straight away. I then remembered watching a documentary about a body farm, where entomologists study the insects on dead bodies to help with forensic science. So I looked into that, turns out there are no body farms in the UK, they are almost totally exclusive to the USA! So I ended up getting a small funeral plan, cardboard coffin, nae service, nae notices and a burning for a small amount per month. That even peed me off a bit because I have to get the largest coffin size because by all accounts cutting my feet off to fit me into a smaller one is "not a service that we can offer" by all accounts. It is an interesting thing to look into and grossly expensive if you let it be.
Begs the question though, why do we even have to go in a box whether cardboard, reed, wooden or ****ing made of cheese. Surely for even the basic cremation or burial they could just fire a sheet over you and be done with it, if that was your choice of course. Obviously about money, if folk chose that way then they would still find a way of screwing you
I think it's just a tradition based on historical practice. There's no legal requirement to have a coffin for cremation in the UK, not sure about for burial. Whether individual crematoria would accept a body without a coffin of some sort I don't know.
Historically western society held funerals several days after someone died, still do obviously, and the coffin provided protection for families preventing them witnessing decomposition. On cultures like Islam where burial takes place within 24 hours that wasn't and isn't necessary hence burial without a coffin being standard.
Boiler insurance - you pay £400-500 per year for a service. Especially when people insure brand new boilers. By the time they need even a part they could have had 2-3 new boilers with their insurance premiums.
Try an donate your body. No cost and helping science
I pay £12.99 pm for boiler cover and a service.
https://hometree.comparethemarket.co...type=Homeowner
We got some new garden furniture delivered today. It came in several cardboard boxes, one of which my wife commented was "coffin sized". I've bagsied it if I die before it decomposes.
I’ve recently started working for boiler insurance for BG (I know everyone has bills to pay mind 😉) you would get full central heating cover with the service annually for about £340 with no excess to pay maybe down to £280ish with an excess, if ur already with them get on the phone every single renewal and they’ll move the price, there are other cheaper options as well as mentioned by others sometimes they come with an excess to pay so mins and check that, and the price will probably go towards the prices I’ve mentioned after your first year once they have a ‘profile’ of your boiler and age etc you can continue to move every year though taking up new customer type offers save you a couple hundred a year possibly
The inflation in car insurance…dunno why but mine seems to be looking like at least 50% higher this year! [emoji24]
Following on from this: multicar/house/all in one policies from insurers. I saved £130 by ditching admiral and signing up to separate policies for 2 cars and the house. It took all of 5 more minutes by the time I’d phoned admiral to ask why our renewal premiums were higher than last year and then told them I won’t be renewing with them.
The energy standing charge is a complete rip off. Nearly doubled over the course of the energy crisis, but our infrastructure hasn’t changed one iota.
When prices drop do you think the standing charge will drop?
Will. It. ****.
And petrol still hovering at 1.43ish. Was about 1.10 a year or so ago. Okay it’s come down a bit but looks like 1.4 is the norm now.
All of these energy companies and supermarkets making huge profits whilst the normal working person struggles with all of these increases. It’s a sad state of affairs that it’s just allowed to happen
Not an expert in the matter, but I think our high standing charge is to cover those investors/companies that lost out when the power companies went bust over the last 2 years.
I can't think of another market like it whereby a company over extends itself, goes bust, and the costs get lumped on to the customers of the other more successful companies!
Damn spot on ! What a weird set up, can't think of a more anti competitive state of affairs.
The former directors of these bust energy providers knew that the government would have to step in even before they went out of business....
similar to so many private OAP homes that went bust too. A real pet hate.