Irish Independent personal finance editor. Regular on TodayFM’s ‘The Last Word'. Campaigning journalist of the year for breaking tracker mortgage scandal story.
Stop telling me your insurance is up for renewal and the quote is higher than last year. The renewal quote is almost always higher than the previous year, because it’s a try-on. Insurers know many will just pay up. You have to check out the market yourself for better value.
Just recovering from two-weeks of
#covid
-19 hell. Lost a stone in weight, but wouldn’t recommend Covid crash diet as it involved fever, black-outs, high temperature, breathlessness, vomiting and diarrhoea in my case. Managed to avoid hospital. This is me during the worst if it:
A Good Samaritan called Laura came to the aid of my daughter when she fell and bashed her head in Hawkins Street in Dublin today. Laura rang me on my daughter’s phone. Didn’t get her surname. If she sees this we are most grateful. My daughter was taken to hospital and is ok.
A pharmacist just let slip to me that she is buying disposable face masks for 63c. She said VAT has to be added. So that comes to 77c. The masks are selling for €2. I pointed out that is a huge mark-up. Are pharmacists not making enough money at the moment?
AIB has caved in and suspended the planned introduction of maintenance and transactions fees for customers who keep a minimum balance of €2,500 per fee quarter. Customers who received correspondence from the bank can disregard the changes to fees and charges advised.
Ulster Bank tracker mortgage customers should do nothing. If you switch lender you lose the tracker. Whoever buys the UB tracker mortgage book will have to honour the tracker rate.
Sinn Féin's
@PearseDoherty
deserves huge praise for pursuing this relentlessly down the years:
Ban on insurers punishing loyal customers to come into effect in July
Lidl Ireland says it will reduce the price of milk in-store effective from tomorrow, bringing the price of a 2-litre carton from €2.29 to €2.19. The supermarket chain says it is the first Irish retailer to reduce the price of milk. We need to see more of this.
@lidl_ireland
I know, I know....I am a fool. Was persuaded to get this labrador, Toby, by the three women in my life. Tried trading the teenagers for him but the breeder was having none of it!
AIB is ploughing ahead with plans in May to impose maintenance fees on all customers. As part of this, it is taking away the exemption from fees for those who keep a balance of €2,500. All this despite the Covid-19 disruption.
So three insurance companies in this market - FBD, RSA and Aviva - made combined profits of almost €200m last year. Remind me again who is taking the hit.
So FBD doubled its profits to €39m in the six months to June. Tell me again who is suffering from the insurance crisis: consumers, businesses? Because it is certainly not insurance companies, or ambulance-chasing lawyers.
AIB is in talks to buy €6bn of Ulster Bank trackers. If the deal goes through remember AIB can’t change the tracker terms and conditions. My performing tracker was sold to vultures and there has been no change in terms. DO NOT SWITCH YOUR MORTGAGE, or you will lose the tracker.
ESB Group makes a profit of €357m for the first six months of the year. It is pushing up prices again next month. Yes, it needs to make a profit but it really needs to consider its customer pricing.
State-owned health insurer Vhi is to reduce the cost of its premiums and give back between €75 and €300 per adult due to a fall in claims. It says it is the third time it has waived a portion of premium for its customers since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Aldi has announced a new suite of price cuts across a range of popular products. Prices have been reduced by up to 23%, it sad, and will see the price of a typical trolley of the most popular goods reduced from €121 to €106.
Will be on
@RTE_PrimeTime
tonight talking about our messed-up energy system which is simply not delivering for consumers. Why are we so reluctant to sanction regulatory interventions that would benefit consumers in this country?
The State’s competition watchdog has made preliminary findings against AIG, Allianz, Axa, Aviva, FBD, along with Brokers Ireland and AA Ireland, alleging that they engaged in anti-competitive co-operation.
“Drivers with clean licenses, no claims and no penalty points regularly report big hikes in renewal quotes, while insurance companies fail to provide reasonable reasons for the increases.”
Was persuaded to go to the pub for a few pints last night. Have a hangover now. The pub staff should have known that I had a few glasses of wine before I went to the pub. Negligent of them not to ask.
I must take a personal injuries case.
Applegreen, one of the latgest motor fuel retailers in the State, is to slash its petrol and diesel prices by 10c. I have been pursuing the industry all week asking why prices have not come down with crude crashing by 50% this year.
About to break on : Private hospitals have been accused of “appalling” behaviour after it emerged they are imposing new charges for Covid tests for people before they can attend the hospitals. The fees are up to €250, and not covered by health insurers.
This
@centralbank_ie
graphic says it all. Ten years after the banks dumped on us, we are still paying with the highest mortgage rates in the Eurozone. And when I first exposed this a few years ago they told me I was wrong.
We need a probe into our dysfunctional and expensive energy system that is not delivering for consumers. And why is it taking the Central Bank so long to put in place rules to hold senior bankers personally responsible for their decisions. Discussing with
@cooper_m
on
@lstwrd
.
Cut your variable mortgage rate again AIB. You made pre-tax profits of €1.5bn before exceptionals last year. You are fleecing variable and fixed-rate customers. Oh, and you pay no corporate tax.
Will be on
@RTE_PrimeTime
later talking about increases in the price of the pint, the cost broadband and TV services going up from Monday, health insurance hikes and petrol and diesel going up from April 1. It’s never ending.
If I get another email from a motorist telling me their renewal quote is up on last year I will scream. Renewal quotes are a try-on, you have to challenge them by scouring the market for better quotes. Drivers need to stop assuming insurers will reward their loyalty. They won’t.
You clowns
@APCOAConnectIE
. I paid electronically and you still clamped me at my train station. You sent me a receipt too. And now you expect to pay €120. Get your act together.
So we business journalists are of some use sometimes. Last night the annual Business Journalists’ Association raised €40,000 for the Dublin Simon Community. That’s €640,000 raised for Simon from the annual corporate quiz in almost two decades.
There is something very suspicious about how a 142-page study was issued late yesterday evening, deep in Christmas week. So please retweet this news report on it to frustrate whoever is trying to bury it:
Remember that Eir hit half a million customers with a price rise in June, and said it will now increase its prices by the rate of inflation plus 3% every April.
So households may have to pay even more for electricity because we have more data centres than we can power: Threat of tea-time blackouts and price rises if peak-time electricity use does not fall
Fair play to
@CWeston_Indo
for all his work on this.
First of the big energy companies cuts its electricity and gas prices by up to 20pc
Energia will reduce home energy prices by up to 20pc, effective from October 3.
#CostOfLivingCrisis
#electricity
Holy smoke. Insurer FBD has told the stock exchange it expects to report profits before tax of €100m for last year. That is double the profits for the previous year.
Have you been left hanging on the telephone by
@eir
? Its customer service has been described as shambolic. The telecoms regulator has also come under fire. Will be discussing with
@cooper_m
on
@lstwrd
before five.
The Spanish are coming and they are planning to offer cheaper mortgages. Pictured is chief executive of Spain’s Bankinter Maria Dolores Dancausa, whose Irish operation will be offering mortgages with a rate of less than 2pc. Discussing with Frank Geaney on
@lstwrd
before five.
Bord Gáis Energy.
Some facts.
Owned by British giant Centrica - which operates Whitegate power station.
Restored dividends to shareholders this year following huge increase in 1st half profits.
BGE revenue was £784m in 1st six months. From £484m a year earlier.
What to do?
Price shock:
@ElectricIreland
to increase electricity charges by 23.4%, and gas by 24.8% from May 1. Standing charge for electricity up 35%. This all means average electricity customer will pay an extra €300 a year, and €220 for gas customers.
You have to feel for consummate professionals like
@lawlor_aine
who just used a series of excellent questions to
@BrianStanleySF
that got to the heart of RTE’s governance failures on Ryan Tubridy’s under-the-counter payments. RTE is full of superb journalists.
@morningireland
Circle K, the largest chain with 410 outlets, is understood to be now planning to cut prices by up to 10c per litre across a large number of the sites that it operates.
Applegreen responds to criticism with price drop
Why there is pain at the pumps on the way for motorists, and how come we have the most expensive electricity in Europe? Does there always have to be a ‘Paddy Premium’? Discussing with
@cooper_m
on
@lstwrd
later.
ESB Group has reported improved results for the six months to the end of June after its operating profit the same time last year was negatively impacted by Covid-19.
Now Lidl says it is cutting the prices on more than 100 items. It says there are reductions of up to 35% across a wide range of products, from fresh food to cupboard staples to bakery treats and home essentials. It comes a day after Aldi said it was cutting prices by up to 23%.
SSE Airtricity is pushing up its electricity prices by more than 35pc and its gas costs by 39pc, from October. It will mean electricity customers paying an extra €590 over a year, with an extra €511 for gas customers. Dual-fuel customers face hike in annual costs of €1,100.
Joe on
#roomtoimprove
speaks for every man in Ireland when he says he thought the house was fine before Mary decided to change it. And every man then has to admit she was right in the end!
This article is really upsetting some men. One guy emails to say it is fake news, another is reporting me to the editor, and others accuse m of distortion. Hilarious. Misogyny lives.
Maria Bailey leaves us with more questions than answers in this:
‘Nobody was drunk... I just wanted my €7k medical bill paid - Maria Bailey TD on swing fall