IN this age of high inflation, national debts, recession and international economic vacuum, it remains with the individual to be penny wise but not pound foolish. Just how do you nurture your little nest egg in the face of the financial vultures that encourage you to part with your money at every turn?
Once you've got a reasonable grip on not overspending and avoiding unnecessary purchases (which is primarily a personal strength exercise), pocket change can be your biggest boost to monthly savings.
Rather than fish around for exactly the right money or use all those pennies you have for the little things, only spend paper money or large value coins. Take all the change you get at the end of each day and just stash it away into a jar, piggy bank or a sock. Then, at the end of the month, assuming you do a reasonable amount of cash transactions (and not debit card payments), you'll have a nice little stash of money.
I ended up saving £18 in £2 coins over the past couple of weeks which I took to the Llandudno Extravaganza and Colwyn Bay Prom Day. With my savings stash I was able to pay for my twin nephews to go on a couple of the extortionately priced fair ground rides and buy food and drink over the weekend without touching my bank balance.
Saving slummy coins this way you'll barely notice the shift in your spending from coins to notes, and over the span of a year or so, you'll have a significant amount saved, if you don’t spend it like me.
There are now coin sorting machines in many supermarkets that will sort your change very quickly, and give you a receipt to get notes at the cash register. This method does take a small portion of your money (usually 8%) as a processing fee.
At the moment I have a rather nice old glass jar in my living room with a substantial build up of copper coins and those annoying 5p coins, which I’m not going to touch until it’s full and I also have a little silver piggy bank, which my friend Sarah bought for me, which I collect £2 coins in, but they always end up getting spent before I get to £20.
I’ve even got *loml in on the act by getting him his very own shrapnel coin jar as a present, which has a convenient electrical counting function built into the lid, this morning it was registering £82! The first time it reached the £100 total he took me shopping and bought me a Nintendo DS with the money- bless him. He finds it very handy towards the end of each pay month for either an emergency petrol top up or for a cheeky beer purchase.

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