An Offer From A Bank Out Of The Disruptive Handbook
Banks don’t often copy the sort of marketing ideas used by the disruptive companies like Zopa and OVO Energy.
Both these companies pay users a bonus for introducing new customers.
Now Nationwide are saying that if you recommend a friend and they switch to the Bank, you’ll both get £100.
Nationwide does all I need from a money-transfer company. I should say that I don’t use any of their other services except for free travel insurance and a credit card, which is one that is recommended by various financial pundits, as it is very good in its use abroad.
This sounds like a good deal all round, for those who have simple banking needs like I do.
So if you’re thinking of changing your bank and Nationwide is on your list, get a friend to recommend you and you’ll both be quids in.
Devolution For Cornwall
This report on the BBC is entitled Cornwall devolution: First county with new powers.
It is not full devolution, but various powers have been given to the Council.
- Give Cornwall Council powers for franchising and improving local bus services
- Help Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly councils create a plan to bring health and social care services together
- Enable the council to choose what projects will see millions of pounds of investment
- Give the Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) more input on boosting local skills
- Make it easier for the LEP to integrate national and local services to help local firms grow
I suspect we’ll see a lot more powers devolved to the Council.
There is no mention of rail services, which are detailed here in Wikipedia, although I suspect these are covered by the Council choosing where to invest.
I suspect though that a lot of improvement in rail services has already been covered. I detailed the improvements for both Devon and Cornwall in The Japanese Are Going To Invade Devon And Cornwall.
I also suspect that as the economy improves in the Far West, whoever is operating the express and sleeper services to London, will upgrade the services to match the demand. The new AT300 trains, that First Great Western have ordered could even be used between Cornwall and Birmingham.
Just as Crossrail is going to give London and the South East a massive kick up the ladder, the electrification and modernisation of the Great Western Main Line is going to do the same for England west of Reading, And of course South Wales!
I see a sunny future for Cornwall!
Which English county is going to be next in the queue for devolution?
Is The Greek Tragedy Approaching The Final Act?
According to this report on the BBC, Greece has now voted through the bailout conditions, so that they can get further money from its debtors.
But will this be the end of the tragedy?
I doubt it!
The Greeks voted for the end of austerity in the last General Election and they have now got Austerity Plus. But they do get to keep the euro!
That sounds like a recipe for trouble!
If there is a lesson in the story of Greece and the euro over the last few years, it is that you must not fiddle the books, bribe the electorate and you must above all keep the finances in order and hopefully balanced.
Did anybody tell the Greeks that euros don’t grow on trees in Brussels?
At least the sun won’t go on strike! This is the one light at the end of the tunnel.
The Peer-to-Peer ISA Is Here
I don’t understand ISAs but I know a man or woman who claims they do. Read their article on the Zopa web site.
Are There Secondary Effects In The Budget?
I have a feeling that there could be some secondary effects from the budget and particularly the announcement of a National Living Wage.
Nowhere will this measure be felt more than at the bottom end of the employers. If you read the tabloids, you get the impression that dodgy low-quality businesses are the big employers of illegal immigrants, keeping them in squalor and paying them in cash, if they’re lucky.
With a solidly enforced living wage, will this make it more difficult for these companies and operators to survive, so this country might be less of a magnet for illegal immigrants. I don’t know, but a higher level of living wage gives the Tax Authorities a good reason to investigate the sort of businesses who rely on no-questions-asked labour.
I very much watch innovation in the media and also have been in touch several times with universities in the last few years. I think we’ll see companies using their local innovators to make sure they support their now more highly-paid employees. I know several universities are giving students real projects in local companies.
So will we be pushing our employment up-market? I think we will!
As an example, an industry that we all seem to use more these days are couriers to deliver the goods we’ve bought on-line. They have got so much better over the last few years and that is just not the delivery reliability, but the staff as well, who seem to be polite and very much on-the-ball. Incidentally, most staff who’ve delivered to me lately seem to have been British born and educated.
I don’t know what will happen in the next few years, but I have a feeling that the Chancellor’s announcements may be helping to move the country on from a low-wage, low-skilled and badly-supported work force to one where a job, where you work hard and efficiently gives you a real living wage.
Of course Labour think that the restructuring of Tax Credits will mean many will lose out. But then Labour’s solution to a low-wage, low-skill economy was to pay people at the low-end to do nothing or crap jobs.
The other thing the Chancellor must do to help, is make sure that our transport links are improved. It’s one thing to get a job and often it’s a much more difficult thing to get to that job every day. You just have to see what the Overground and the fleets of new buses have done for Hackney and the surrounding boroughs, here in London, over the past few years.
The Greek Finance Minister Had The Crash Helmet
What made me laugh yesterday was a picture of the now-resigned Greek Finance Minister, Yanis Varoufakis, riding away from the problems on his motocycle.
He was wearing a crash helmet and his bimbo-on-the-back had to make do without!
A Greek metaphor on the lines of I’m alright, Jack!
I think the video is on this page in the Guardian.
The Mail says the lady is his wife!
Do Politicians Make Too Much Fuss About Currencies?
The Needs Of People
I travel extensively across Europe and after trips like my Home Run From Krakow or my Home Run From Stockholm, I end up with a walletful of assorted zlotys, crowns etc.
But it won’t always be like that, as increasingly contactless cards and smartphones will take over from cash. How long will it be before a lot of public transport in the world uses the London model, where you just touch and go?
So I suspect cash will become very much a method of payment that will not bother visitors.
Other developments will also help.
1. Using Coins
Vending machines, toilets, left luggage lockers and other places that need small cash payments will get intelligent and probably respond to the local currency and a selection of others, like one and two euros, pound coins and dollar quarters.
So a visitor to Europe, would just make sure they topped up their one euro coins.
2. No-Commission on Credit Cards When Used Abroad
The credit card I use abroad, is a Nationwide Select Credit Card and this page on their web site, describes its use abroad. And so far, they’ve done what it says on the tin.
As the card was recommended by one of the Personal Finance Experts on the BBC, it can’t be that much of a con.
All credit cards should be like this!
3. Late Rooms et al.
On my trip to Poland, I used lateroom.com to book accomodation and some of the hotels were paid in zlotys. But I paid in advance in Pounds Sterling.
All of these systems are giving both the seller and the purchaser a bill in the currency they want.
Summing Up The Needs Of People
All people want is a system that buys that drink, meal or rents that room or sun lounger giving them a good rate with no hassle.
The Needs of Business
When it comes to business, I’ve just paid two overseas bills using SWIFT from my Nationwide account. I got charged £20 for each one, which was a bit steep in my view, but these days you can transfer money pretty easily.
The Greedy Bankers
So I come to the conclusion, that on a small transaction basis and that probably means anything under a couple of grand, transactions should be possible on what we have today.
Just look at what you can do with PayPal and an eMail address.
But would greedy bankers and their friends in Central Banks allow multi-currency transactions to become the norm for money transfer between consenting adults or companies?
The Innovators
Just look at how finance has changed in the last few years.
Nothing is cast in stone and who’s to say what will be the financial flavour of 2016.
Every problem is an opportunity for an innovator. And this type of disruptive innovation often hurts established players!
Summing Up The Needs Of Business
A business just wants money transferred to a client or supplier at the best rate instantly, for the lowest possible commission.
So Who Needs A Single Currency?
The only advantage of a single currency like the euro or the dollar, is that you know easily what you are paying and that accounts and paperwork are simpler.
Politicians also say it creates jobs as it encourages industries like tourism.
It may do, but the UK gets masses of tourists and not being in the Eurozone doesn’t seem to be a problem. Visitors are happy to use their credit cards or prepay for everything in their own currency, so it probably illustrates that if you have a good product, then the tourists and money will roll in.
I think it is probably true to say that politicians also like a single currency as it’s a big idea, with which they might leave their mark on history.
I was probably in favour of a single currency for Europe at one time, but I think now, that so many innovations will get round the rules and create lots of jobs, that it is rather an outdated concept.
I much prefer a simple process that allows me to spend pounds everywhere with the best exchange rate and no commission.
In some ways this will be an unrealistic idea, as politicians will protect their useless banks.
But they will have to legislate a ban to stop it.
Remember that politicians don’t understand new technology. Look at the mess they;re all in over Uber.
Asking The Oracle At Delphi For Help On The Greek Bailout
In the on-line copy of The Times, in an article on the latest episode of the Greek Bailout saga, there is this reader entered comment.
I have just texted the Oracle of Delphi re the referendum. I have had a most impressive and quick response from one of the delightful ladies of Apollo Land.
As you know, I cannot give my answer until the seventh of this month but the gut feeling here at the Shrine is that the “No’ might just win. People must remember that the Islanders are dead worried that their special low rates of VAT will be increased to mainland levels. The good folk of Rhodes and Crete are especially annoyed as they were told pre the most recent General Election by this Tsipras Johnny that no fiddling with the Islanders VAT would take place.
Our political wing has for the last three thousand years advocated making the larger Islands self sufficient – do you think the IMF will consider a loan for this much needed independence? And here’s another suggestion – the EU’s migrant problem could be solved by dumping the poor b….ers on one or more of the many uninhabited Islands and use them as cheap labour to reclaim the land to grow fruit and veg and the profits used to pay back our debt.
Surely, if the Oracle at Delphi gave good advice the Greeks wouldn’t be in the financial mess they undoubtedly are.
Why Would You Create A New Digital Bank In Durham?
I’ve only one regret about my investment in Zopa and that is that I didn’t invest earlier. I could only have invested a few months earlier, as the financial web site hadn’t been created.
Recently, I’ve seen mention of Atom Bank in the press and this afternoon I went to have a dig around the Internet at what has been trailed as a new form of digital bank.
I found this article on the Finanser web site, which is an interview with Mark Mullen, who is the CEO of Atom Bank.
The interview contains a lot of sensible and surprising facts.
They are creating the whole digital bank from scratch and Mullen has a refreshingly blunt attitude to consultants (He doesn’t use them!), which I wholly agree with. So much so, if I was developing a bank with my old Chairman at Metier,we’d probably do it the same way.
As an example of Mullen’s thinking, I’ll copy his reasons for basing the bank in Durham.
There is a lot to be said for being outside London, not least because it’s an expensive place to base a business. If you don’t need to be in London it doesn’t make sense to place a business where the ground rents and employment costs are so high, and where the markets are so massively competitive. Durham is appealing as the real estate is less expensive; but cheap land gets you nowhere when you’re building a high end company. So as importantly there are also fabulous universities; a huge population catchment area; and the city is well connected by trains to north and south. Equally, there is actually not that much in the way of alternative financial institutions, so we are offering an alternative employment proposition in the local market. That’s quite an attractive thing to do.
I shall be watching Atom Bank with interest.
Read This!
This article is a must read!
The Anonymous Widower 