How to save money at Christmas

The most wonderful time of the year has come again – but for many, it isn’t so wonderful for their wallets.

However, it doesn’t have to be that way! Here are our top tips on how to save money at Christmas.

Set a budget

The first and most important thing to do is to decide how much money you can spend. For example, if you’re hosting the family Christmas dinner, consider how many people you’ll be feeding and write your shopping list accordingly.

When it comes to presents, you could also set yourself a spending limit for each person – in addition to saving you money, this can also help you be more creative with your gifts.

Prepare for travel

If you live in London but your relatives are based around the country, you’ll need to prepare for the costs of travelling to see them.

Train tickets are almost always cheaper when bought ahead of time; usually the best deals can be found a couple of months in advance. For car travel, see if you can have your car serviced before you set out on a long journey to prevent any unexpected large costs.

Shop around

Once you’ve decided on a gift for someone, don’t just buy it in the first place you saw it – take a look around the shopping centre or go online to see if you can get a better deal.

Items like books, chocolates, and fragrances can vary a lot between outlets, so make sure you’re not cheating yourself out of some savings.

Be clever with delivery

It’s now increasingly common  to order presents and food online, but those delivery charges can add up. To avoid death by a thousand cuts, try to do all of your shopping on one site and at the same time: that way you can avoid paying several times for delivery fees.

Another tip for this is to try to order as early as possible, so you’re not paying extra for one-day delivery in a last-minute panic.

We hope you found this list useful, and wish you all a very happy holiday.