h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

The advice on credit cards doesn't work.
The B******s just laugh and stuff you for another load of interest so you owe them more money.

And they up your credit card limit at the same time, without being asked . Mine was doubled two weeks before Christmas. Nuff said

The credit card chappies have started to send me extra brochure thingies with my bill. They also keep upping the limit.This presumably means I am using the thing to much, and/or putting far too much on it. This also proves that they have very short memories, as I defaulted on my very first payment. Being out of the country at the time I couldn't pay my Five pounds of admin charge, which then led to a very panicy phone call along the lines of; If you don't reactivate the card, I can't buy a bus ticket to get to the airport to come home to pay the bill!

A lot of people are under the impression that banks and credit card companies like you more if you owe them less. This is not actually true.
Like all good service providers they don't like you at all; they just like your money. Since the more you owe them the more interest you pay, it stands to reason that they will therefore like you more.
The only time they don't like you is if they suspect that you can't pay...at which point you switch it all to another company and avail of their reduced rate.
(I realise this doesn't fit with conventional "scrimp-and-save" and "owe nowt and proud of it" but when you factor in the fact that money has absolutely no value whatsoever unless you spend it you'll see how this makes sense )

Shouldn't you therefore owe several thousand pounds and have a car you can drive rather than just admire as you walk past it on its blocks in the morning?

Hmm - yes, but I do owe several (well, nearly 2) thousand pounds for a car which is about 500 miles east of here and I therefore can't drive.
That said I also have about £18k in my offshore account/pension (taxman, stop reading now ) which I can get at after April without incurring a 40% tax penalty - so if I use that to get the car fully restored it is almost as if the government is going halves with me .