“We are what we repeatedly do; excellence, then, is not an act but a habit” - Aristotle
14th August 2020 / Issue #383
giffgaff Happenings
by bluemoonbaz
Monthly Agent update (July 20)
A very welcome return to the community after our fellow member @frpc suggested we kick start it again. Click here to read the update from @h_henna.
Changes and new features - helpers updates thread
A change in the current situation means that Royal Mail have now resumed with their international delivery service to Seychelles. You can read about Royal Mail’s update here.
We also have some changes coming to improve the best plan advice given to the members, read about it here.
Reminder the August £10 Bonus Credit Offer is still available to bring your friends to giffgaff
There’s no better time to start introducing your friends and family to giffgaff. Throughout the month of August, if you bring a friend on board, you’ll receive £10 bonus credit on top of the usual £5 Payback for a maximum of 15 friends that you bring on board by sharing the giffgaff love (www.giffgaff.com/share) between 1st August - 31st August 2020. Not applicable to giffgaff Super Recruiters this time. For more information and FAQs, head over here.
Our weekly roundup from your fellow members’ recent discussions and interesting posts
Say Hello!
by kathleen414
Please give our new member @tomasz1891 a big warm giffgaff welcome here 🧡.
Prosimy o nadanie naszemu nowemu członkowi @tomasz1891 powitanie wielkiego, ciepłego giffgaffa 🧡.
Another new member joins our community this week 🤗. Please say hello to @erikutea8292 over here and show them around giffgaff and how fab our community works.
Please say hello to a fellow member’s younger brother @halfd74 who signed up this week 🧡. Pop over here and see if they need a hand or just say hi 🙂.
Happy giffgaffiversary!
by ijustcantdoit
6th year “Thank you”
@lestingey says “Just had an e-mail, been with giffgaff 6 years, thank you for a great service and great goodybags.”
5 Years with giffgaff
@sha_shah1 says “Time is flying with giffgaff its 5 years for me today with giffgaff, I am very happy and enjoying here and never had any problem about service, payment etc in 5 years. I want to say big thanks to giffgaff, all community members and educators for your help and love.”
10 great years with giffgaff
@pauljohn7 says “I received my email the other day saying I’ve been here for 10 years. I must admit I was a little apprehensive about changing networks, especially to one that was a newcomer. I can honestly say joining giffgaff was the best move I ever made. Never looked back since. ❤️ Thinking of joining? - Stop thinking about it, Just do it!”
If it’s YOUR giffgaffiversary, please let the team know by sending a private message to @ijustcantdoit.
On This Day In History
by jammydodge
1908 Folkestone held the world’s first international beauty contest.
Source: The Huffington Post / Getty Images
1930 The Church of England approved the prudent use of contraception.
1969 British troops were deployed for the first time under Operation Banner in Northern Ireland. Initially only short and limited, the operation ended up lasting 38 years.
Source: BBC News
Photo Of The Week
by brulaw
This week’s featured photo is Love my garden by @lollsxx. Some of the comments included:
- “Beautiful garden you have… Thanks for sharing” (miche22542)
- “Lollsxx your garden is looking stunning. Love all the different colour flowers. You have done a really good job. It’s lovely to sit in the garden in the beautiful sunshine.” (mariamovs9)
- “I really appreciate seeing nice garden thanks so much for sharing it with us” (davie68964)
- “What a beautiful garden, well done” (aliaghas786)
- “You have a lovely garden” (team_leader)
- “That is stunning” (frenchielove)
- “That is a very nice garden… What does that plaque say that the gnome is holding up?” (jimvee288)
Another week has come and gone, the weather has been a little on the warm side and some of us have had the pleasure of thunder and lightning (not here in London though). As always, you’ve all been busy grabbing some excellent pictures and sharing them with us. Thank you and more of the same, please!
To Good To Go
by toxiic
Hi everyone. This week I thought I’d briefly cover the app ‘Too Good To Go’ which connects you with food locations like restaurants and offers a deep discount on food that’s unsold (that would otherwise be thrown).
The basis of To Good To Go is simple: you download the app, find a place that’s offering food, order and pay through the app then go and collect the ‘magic bag’ at a particular time slot set by the place. The key point here is that you only know basic details about what the food you’re picking up will be. Most places I’ve found on the app have a basic description of what could be in the ‘magic bag’ so you will have some idea of what you’ll be receiving (and you can use logic - a carvery is unlikely to give you sandwiches etc). What you get depends on what the place has a surplus or is unsold. Some people may find that exciting, picky eaters may find that scary.
Some big names use Too Good To Go such as Costa Coffee and Morrisons as well as other, smaller chains. It’s best to download the app and enter your location to see how many restaurants around you are on Too Good To Go. It’s safe to expect there to be many in cities but not very many (if any at all) in very rural areas).
The discounts for the food are quite substantial. I’ve noticed that (at least in my area), food usually is discounted by about 70% and many places seem to offer £10 worth of items for £3. In terms of the size of Too Good To Go, it boasts on its website that it’s available in 15 countries around the world and has also saved a whopping 43.1 million meals (Source). To collect your order that you pay for via the app, you need to take your phone to the restaurant or shop and present the app to them which they’ll then swipe the screen of or get you to swipe when you get handed your order. Note that it seems you have to say that you have a Too Good To Go order to staff. It may say how to collect the order on the app before you buy the magic bag (Morrisons, for instance, says go to the kiosk - at least at shops near me). Note that you can download the ‘Too Good To Go’ app from the App Store and Google Play.
Disclaimer: Me, giffgaff nor The gaff Team have received any financial or non-financial benefits in return for covering this app. All opinions are my own. Please comment below any information inaccuracies.
Thanks for reading. If you’re interested, check out my content hub on the giffgaff forum here.
Tech Developments
by revilo10
Monzo Plus: Getting your fiver’s worth?
Any longtime reader of the gaff and Tech Devs in general will remember how extensively we’ve looked into new-age fin-tech (financial tech) and ‘new’ banks here. Last year I ran a series of tests where I changed my current account over from a big bank and purely used providers such as Starling & Monzo for a month, and explored every little part of using the banks on a day to day basis. Today we’re jumping back into that cycle, as Monzo has just launched a new account type called Monzo Plus, and I’ve been asked to dive into it and take a look.
Any current Monzo customers among you might know that Monzo did have a premium account programme before, but put it on hold to work on a new ‘revolutionary’ account service, which is Monzo Plus. Plus launched exactly a month ago, on the 15th of July and costs £5 per month. There is quite an extensive list of features to Plus and I will go through them all briefly and sum up whether or not I think it’s worth it or not. You can take a look at the Plus programme yourself here, bear in mind I am not sponsored nor endorsed by Monzo at all so this review is purely from the view of myself as a customer of Monzo and as a tech writer.
Plus in itself is basically an upgrade to your Monzo current account which adds some more features to your account to help you manage your money better. The first features of note are based in the app itself, with Plus you can add any other accounts you may hold with other banks in the Monzo app, centralising your money into one place, kind of like a Curve Card system. It is worth noting however that some big banks do this for free, I hold a savings account with NatWest and I can add any other current accounts that I hold to the NatWest app for no charge. In-app you will also find a credit score tracker, customisable spending categories & an offers page where you can get up to 15% off certain Monzo partner brands, such as Naked Wines, Hello Fresh & Fiit.
In money terms, Monzo Plus offers a variety of new features and expands on some basic Monzo features. Firstly the fee-free international withdrawal amount is raised from £200 (the cap for monthly international ATM withdrawals with a free Monzo account) to £400 per month. Some account providers have a fee-free service regardless, especially some credit card providers such as Halifax. However for a smaller bank like Monzo, withdrawals at any ATM are an expense as they don’t own and operate any ATMs worldwide, therefore charging fees or having a premium account service like Plus helps them subsidise those costs. To make your savings go further Plus also offers a 1% AER/gross interest rate up to £2000 on any money in your account and regular savings pots, so you can earn without even thinking about it. Standard Monzo accounts have access to an up to 0.91% rate on a specific fixed with at least £500 deposited in it. Monzo does offer other savings options, but it’s looking like Plus’ 1% rate, even through the pandemic, will be a massive draw for the programme.
Like many other account services, Plus also offers a round-up service on your spends so you can put money away when you buy certain things to save up for in the future, for example, if you buy a coffee for £2.75, Monzo will put away 25p and round up the purchase to £3, over time this builds up. Plus also offers the ability to export your transactions to a Google Sheets spreadsheet to help you get some perspective on your spending habits. Plus also offers one free cash deposit at any PayPoint across the country per month, with Monzo’s basic account this is still a paid service. Finally, in money terms Plus also offers a virtual cards feature for your online transactions to protect your actual card’s information from being leaked or compromised. It is worth noting other services like Google Pay already offer this feature for both physical transactions and online transactions for free. Finally, we go to the card itself. Monzo basic has a coral pink plastic card, whereas Plus offers a beautiful blue holographic card.
So, is it worth it? For £5 a month, it is pretty steep, especially when a lot of Monzo’s user base covers young people and students. The interest rate and financial benefits are interesting and seem somewhat worth it for the account, plus I won’t lie the card itself is very nice. I would only use Plus if you’re wanting to fully switch over to Monzo fully as your current account provider. It is worth noting that you commit to paying 3 months worth of subscription fees when you sign up, whether you cancel or not. Also, for those of you who are thinking of subscribing just for the card and then cancelling, Monzo forces you to cancel the holographic card and order a new coral pink card when you cancel.
Image courtesy of Monzo Bank Ltd.
Thanks for reading!
Previous Edition | Next Edition (21st August 2020)
