tesco clubcard vs nectar

[Clip]

This guy retired at 31 by living off $7000 a year. His "typical" meal is described here:

http://earlyretirementextreme.com/how-i-live-on-7000-per-year.html

Id rather enjoy my life and food and retire later on. He must have been a misery

 

[Bletchleyite]

Id rather enjoy my life and food and retire later on. He must have been a misery

Don't know about that, but my lifestyle certainly *doesn't* involve spending most evenings sat at home watching TV etc. I'd find that rather boring. And yes, I enjoy my food as well - I could live off beans on toast, but it'd be no fun. Even as a student I tended to cook properly (albeit with cheaper ingredients than now).

Anyway, if you reasonably enjoy your job there's no need to rush to retire (not that I want to work forever). I'm sure he could have found one he didn't hate *that* much.

 

[radamfi]

Id rather enjoy my life and food and retire later on.

But how much later on? If you retire at 31, you have several decades where you can do whatever you want while you are still young. Stating the obvious, retiring later means working longer, and a lot of people would rather work as little as possible. The question everyone should ask themselves is, "Would I do this job if I didn't need the money and I wasn't getting paid?"

Most people toil until retirement age because they don't know how to manage money and they have been indoctrinated that happiness comes from the acquisition of material possessions such as houses and cars and by living a consumer lifestyle. The author of that blog was like a normal western consumer until his mid-20s, but after he did the sums he realised that if you avoid falling into the consumer trap and spend your money far more efficiently, you can retire in a few years.

 

[The Planner]

Clubcard for me, especially in the past when it was 2 points per £ and 4x value on the deals. Not quite as good anymore, the fuelsave offer they do has saved me a few quid though.

 

[Busaholic]

Sainsburys had a good scheme of their own before they ditched it in favour of the generic Nectar. It was called Reward (yes, I know the name's been used more than once) and it worked like this - go round the store and in each aisle typically 2 to 4 items would bear a notice stating that, if you bought it using your Reward card, you'd get 50,100,200 or whatever extra points. If you bought judiciously you might find you'd got £8 or £9 worth of points on a £50 shop, which could be converted into £2.50 vouchers - suffice to say I spent a lot more in Sainsburys twenty years ago than I do now.

 

[Kite159]

Sainsburys had a good scheme of their own before they ditched it in favour of the generic Nectar. It was called Reward (yes, I know the name's been used more than once) and it worked like this - go round the store and in each aisle typically 2 to 4 items would bear a notice stating that, if you bought it using your Reward card, you'd get 50,100,200 or whatever extra points. If you bought judiciously you might find you'd got £8 or £9 worth of points on a £50 shop, which could be converted into £2.50 vouchers - suffice to say I spent a lot more in Sainsburys twenty years ago than I do now.

Used to get those sort of vouchers at the till at Sainsburys, X points when you buy product Y, good way to get extra points if it is a product you need and is reasonable value for money (i.e. not something which you can pick up for £1 from pound universe and Sainsburys is selling it for £2).

Seems the days of the till coupons are pretty much gone, all that comes out is rubbish "Free Sims" vouchers or money off when you spend a random amount which is a lot more than the average spend

 

[radamfi]

What about those "offers" from electrical retailers that give you some of your money back. For example, buying a £799 laptop and then getting £100 back. Is this a great deal? This is not really any different to Clubcard or Nectar. You pay a higher price to start with to enable them to give you some of your money back later.

 

[ExRes]

What about those "offers" from electrical retailers that give you some of your money back. For example, buying a £799 laptop and then getting £100 back. Is this a great deal? This is not really any different to Clubcard or Nectar. You pay a higher price to start with to enable them to give you some of your money back later.

I saw one of those wonderful offers recently in the awful PC World and then, while looking around John Lewis in Exeter, found the exact same laptop cheaper than the 'discounted' price PC World were offering

 

[Busaholic]

I saw one of those wonderful offers recently in the awful PC World and then, while looking around John Lewis in Exeter, found the exact same laptop cheaper than the 'discounted' price PC World were offering

Then, John Lewis is 'never knowingly undersold' so if the PC World was in the Exeter area they'd have to match the price. By the way, Exeter being 100 miles away for me but the John Lewis there being my nearest, how comprehensive a department store is it? I might just pay a visit one Sunday, combining with a couple more things en route, if it's a proper one. I only ask because I believe it's on the site of the former Debenham's, and that was by far the worst Debs I've ever been in.

 

[ExRes]

Then, John Lewis is 'never knowingly undersold' so if the PC World was in the Exeter area they'd have to match the price. By the way, Exeter being 100 miles away for me but the John Lewis there being my nearest, how comprehensive a department store is it? I might just pay a visit one Sunday, combining with a couple more things en route, if it's a proper one. I only ask because I believe it's on the site of the former Debenham's, and that was by far the worst Debs I've ever been in.

We found it to be good enough but, as we used to visit Oxford Street or Peter Jones before we moved down here, I wouldn't recommend a 100 mile journey unless you were doing it as part of a trip. One big bonus is that it has a multi storey right next door, the former King William Street, which saves an awful lot of hassle

I have to admit that, generally, we would be more likely to go down the 'order from John Lewis online and collect from Waitrose' route

 

[bb21]

What about those "offers" from electrical retailers that give you some of your money back. For example, buying a £799 laptop and then getting £100 back. Is this a great deal? This is not really any different to Clubcard or Nectar. You pay a higher price to start with to enable them to give you some of your money back later.

Beware that some of those deals do not offer you "cash" back. The discount would be in the form of a prepaid Mastercard, for example, or other such cash equivalent.

 

[Busaholic]

Good old M&S - spent nearly £100 in their food hall today, in honour of which they gave me a voucher for a 'free tea or coffee' in the cafe: I almost thought 'fair enough' until I saw the condition attached, 'when you purchase any breakfast item' which, as I frequent their stores within an hour of closing ....

 

[jon0844]

Beware that some of those deals do not offer you "cash" back. The discount would be in the form of a prepaid Mastercard, for example, or other such cash equivalent.

Yeah, I got one of these once. Just bought the value of the card in Amazon gift vouchers, so it effectively became as good as cash.

Otherwise it would be a PITA as you'd have to try and spend exactly the right amount (or start to top it up, which I guess is what the card issuer hopes you'll do).

 

[Stonesourscotty]

Nectar are currently doing 50% back on ebay purchases eg spend 10 get 5 back in nectar

 

[neilmc]

I've got both Tesco Clubcard and Sainsbury's Nectar cards - but find the Tesco one better. Basically they are offering a 1% "cashback" and hope they will recoup that and more by locking you into shopping with them. But you should make the scheme work for you and not them:

1) We also have a Tesco Clubcard-linked credit card which earns 1 point per £20 spent. Again not a lot but we tend to put most of our spending - including at rival supermarkets - on this card so it all adds up. We pay it off in full each month so pay no fees.
2) We do shop quite a bit at Tesco but vary with other stores so we can maximise the bargain-earning in each store, and often keep an eye out for date-reduced items later in the day.
3) We use our own carrier bags - 1 point per bag used - which can boost the point numbers especially with cheap but bulky items.
4) Tesco send extra offer coupons in the post - some money off, some extra points and some "double points on your shop". The extra points ones are almost always worth using and the double points ones we save for a big shop.

We always convert the points used into vouchers for partner deals rather than use them in the supermarket - they can be worth up to four times face value and we've ordered days out, jewellery, meals tokens, National Trust membership and hotel weekends for free. I'm going to renew my Senior Railcard this way too - this is real money saved.

Hope this is helpful.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Sainsburys had a good scheme of their own before they ditched it in favour of the generic Nectar. It was called Reward (yes, I know the name's been used more than once) and it worked like this - go round the store and in each aisle typically 2 to 4 items would bear a notice stating that, if you bought it using your Reward card, you'd get 50,100,200 or whatever extra points. If you bought judiciously you might find you'd got £8 or £9 worth of points on a £50 shop, which could be converted into £2.50 vouchers - suffice to say I spent a lot more in Sainsburys twenty years ago than I do now.

Nectar was born out of Sainsbury's Rewards, and indeed is implemented using Sainsbury's IT systems.

 

[dcsprior]

3) We use our own carrier bags - 1 point per bag used - which can boost the point numbers especially with cheap but bulky items.

One downside of carrier bag charging coming in is that we no longer get these green clubcard points in Scotland. I expect it'll be the same down south from October

 

[34D]

We always convert the points used into vouchers for partner deals rather than use them in the supermarket - they can be worth up to four times face value and we've ordered days out, jewellery, meals tokens, National Trust membership and hotel weekends for free. I'm going to renew my Senior Railcard this way too - this is real money saved.

Hope this is helpful.

I've not noticed anything on there that's better than double for a while.... Is there anything current?

 

[Clip]

But how much later on? If you retire at 31, you have several decades where you can do whatever you want while you are still young. Stating the obvious, retiring later means working longer, and a lot of people would rather work as little as possible. The question everyone should ask themselves is, "Would I do this job if I didn't need the money and I wasn't getting paid?"

Most people toil until retirement age because they don't know how to manage money and they have been indoctrinated that happiness comes from the acquisition of material possessions such as houses and cars and by living a consumer lifestyle. The author of that blog was like a normal western consumer until his mid-20s, but after he did the sums he realised that if you avoid falling into the consumer trap and spend your money far more efficiently, you can retire in a few years.

I still do whatever I want so I don't see your point - we have holidays around the world and the UK, we eat well , we go out, see friends and do every thing that we want to do as well as holding down a job.

I actually enjoy my job funnily enough and it pays me to do all the above and more. Being frugal and living on 9p tins of beans sounds bloody depressing just so you can spend 30 years doing nowt but watching the telly.

 

[radamfi]

I still do whatever I want so I don't see your point - we have holidays around the world and the UK, we eat well , we go out, see friends and do every thing that we want to do as well as holding down a job.

I actually enjoy my job funnily enough and it pays me to do all the above and more. Being frugal and living on 9p tins of beans sounds bloody depressing just so you can spend 30 years doing nowt but watching the telly.

People who retire early do so because they want to do other things with their short time alive than go to work. If you read the guy's blog, he has done a lot of different things. There's a lot you can do that doesn't require spending lots of money. If I recall, I don't think he even has a TV.

People in developed countries have been conditioned from an early age that they need to earn a middle-class wage and spend it all sustaining a middle-class lifestyle. They are "consumers". They don't know why they do it, they just do it without thinking. It doesn't even lead to improved happiness, so what's the point? The blog teaches that if you spend your money more efficiently than the average western consumer, and learn how to do simple tasks without needing to pay other people to do them, than you can live a comfortable, happy life without needing lots of money. People who feel that they need to earn lots of money experience worry about the possibility of losing their job. Even if you are working, being financially independent is a great feeling, because you know that it doesn't really matter if you lose your job as you don't need the money.

Again, would you continue to do your job if it was unpaid and you didn't need the money? If working is "your thing", then if you don't need the money you have a lot more jobs available to you if you don't need to be paid for it. For example, you could campaign full-time for something you care deeply about.

 

[DarloRich]

I have both clubcard and Nectar. Clubcard is better.

I only shop at Harrods

Fortnum's dear boy always Fortnum's. Harrods is just SO nouveau riche

 

[northwichcat]

Just noticed 500 Nectar points can be exchanged for £5 off a trip on the Orient Express with a maximum redemption of 10,000 points per booking :roll:
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

Nectar was born out of Sainsbury's Rewards, and indeed is implemented using Sainsbury's IT systems.

The founder of Air Miles purchased the reward schemes for Sainsburys, BP* and Barclaycard and merged them in to one generic scheme branded Nectar. Debenhams also joined the scheme initially but hadn't previously had their own scheme. It was purchased by Groupe Aeroplan (now Aimia) in 2009.

Having worked on projects for Nectar in the past I know that Nectar hold all the personal information you provide when you register a Nectar card. Sainsburys are unable to update that information and unless you opt in to receive offers from Nectar partners Sainsburys won't even have access to your email address or postal address as a result of you having a Nectar card. If you do opt in to receive offers from Nectar partners then you could be contacted by a range of companies not just Sainsburys.

* I think BP had an unusual scheme whereby you collected points at BP but redeemed them at Argos but you couldn't collect points at Argos or redeem them at BP.

 

[Busaholic]

Just noticed 500 Nectar points can be exchanged for £5 off a trip on the Orient Express with a maximum redemption of 10,000 points per booking :roll:
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---


The founder of Air Miles purchased the reward schemes for Sainsburys, BP* and Barclaycard and merged them in to one generic scheme branded Nectar. Debenhams also joined the scheme initially but hadn't previously had their own scheme. It was purchased by Groupe Aeroplan (now Aimia) in 2009.

Having worked on projects for Nectar in the past I know that Nectar hold all the personal information you provide when you register a Nectar card. Sainsburys are unable to update that information and unless you opt in to receive offers from Nectar partners Sainsburys won't even have access to your email address or postal address as a result of you having a Nectar card. If you do opt in to receive offers from Nectar partners then you could be contacted by a range of companies not just Sainsburys.

* I think BP had an unusual scheme whereby you collected points at BP but redeemed them at Argos but you couldn't collect points at Argos or redeem them at BP.

Thank you for that - as I said previously, the Sainsbury's Reward Card offered a lot more than Nectar does, especially now you have to spend twice as much per point. JS made a big mistake ditching their own scheme - I used to get mailshots from them with coupons which were often useful: with Nectar I get nothing other than a quarterly statement, which is useless to me as I spend the points immediately they became available to exchange for money off. As you say, Sainsbury now have no idea about my buying habits, a good thing in one way but not from their point of view.

The only card which provides benefits other than the negligible that I am aware of is Boots' Advantage, particularly if you're an oldie (there's got to be an upside!)

 

[northwichcat]

I used to get mailshots from them with coupons which were often useful: with Nectar I get nothing other than a quarterly statement

You have to register on https://mycoupons.sainsburys.co.uk/ for those kind of offers at Sainsburys now but they aren't personalised on your spending habits like the ones Tesco quite often send out to Clubcard holders are.

 

[Busaholic]

You have to register on https://mycoupons.sainsburys.co.uk/ for those kind of offers at Sainsburys now but they aren't personalised on your spending habits like the ones Tesco quite often send out to Clubcard holders are.

I might just go and do that.

 

[radamfi]

It appears that Clubcard is preferred over Nectar in general on this thread. Suppose Nectar was changed so you got 10 points per pound, giving you 5% off future shopping. Would you prefer that?

 

[Clip]

People who retire early do so because they want to do other things with their short time alive than go to work. If you read the guy's blog, he has done a lot of different things. There's a lot you can do that doesn't require spending lots of money. If I recall, I don't think he even has a TV.

People in developed countries have been conditioned from an early age that they need to earn a middle-class wage and spend it all sustaining a middle-class lifestyle. They are "consumers". They don't know why they do it, they just do it without thinking. It doesn't even lead to improved happiness, so what's the point? The blog teaches that if you spend your money more efficiently than the average western consumer, and learn how to do simple tasks without needing to pay other people to do them, than you can live a comfortable, happy life without needing lots of money. People who feel that they need to earn lots of money experience worry about the possibility of losing their job. Even if you are working, being financially independent is a great feeling, because you know that it doesn't really matter if you lose your job as you don't need the money.

Again, would you continue to do your job if it was unpaid and you didn't need the money? If working is "your thing", then if you don't need the money you have a lot more jobs available to you if you don't need to be paid for it. For example, you could campaign full-time for something you care deeply about.

I think you're looking into this a bit too deeply there. All I said was that what that bloke did would make me miserable all just to retire 20 years early. I didn't really need a dissertation on peoples alleged conditioning of the mind and merely pointed out that I still do enjoy my life to the full whilst actually being in work, including not starving myself.

 

[neilmc]

I've not noticed anything on there that's better than double for a while.... Is there anything current?

Quite a lot of restaurants offer 4x, so do days out and Goldsmiths jewellers and many travel offers are 3x. Look under the "Boost" pages.

Many of the featured partners offer their own deals of course so it's worth checking on the partners' own websites before booking with Clubcard vouchers.