I am in the market for saving some money - a monthly saver. As usual, I shop around a bit, getting interest rates from a number of different places. I popped into Halifax on the off-chance they have a good rate (possibly trying to encourage savers, given their financial problems of late) and they suggested I could get a better rate if I chatted to one of their FA’s. And the guy was an idiot - or rather, the advice that he gave me was written by an idiot. Quite frankly, if anyone who does not think about finance very much acted on the advice given, then there would serious risk of mis-selling.

I told the guy that I simply wanted a safe place to save some cash for a rainy day. I currently have a range of investments, covering a wide spectrum of investment classes, including international and national shares, commodities, FX, property, bonds and cash equivalents. Luckily, I have not been hit by the current economic problems, as I chose fairly carefully. In fact, in the some of the shares that I own, I have made nearly 50% in the last 6 months and in other investments, I have not lost or gained very much at all. However, now I want to save some cash for reasons that I will not go into here. But it was explained to this chap. Another thing that I explained to him was that tax was not an issue, as it could be in my wife’s name who does not pay any at the moment, so ISA’s are not necessary.

What was his advice? I should invest in a stocks and shares ISA with the Halifax, which would be fine as I could tune my attitude to risk by choosing anything from “low-medium” to “high” risk. Um, did he not listen to what I said? However, the most ridiculous thing he said was related to the risk ratings of investments.

Apparently, funds of UK bonds are always low-medium risk, whereas individual bonds, individual UK equities and funds of international equities/bonds are medium-high risk and individual international equities are high risk. And that assessment is independent of market conditions at the time of purchase! When challenged on this, he simply repeated the mantra, explaining the Halifax Pyramid Of Investment Risk to me once again, saying that if anyone invested and it made a loss, all they needed to do was wait until the market recovered. He completely did not understand that timing is everything in this game and that if he had given this advice to someone more vulnerable at the wrong time, it would result in heart ache and misery.

The second thing he said to me was that because I was a monthly saver, it didn’t matter if the market went down, as the following month’s purchase would be cheaper as the market had gone down, explaining that I would still make a profit if the market went up again. Again, completely not appreciating the need for timing.

The dodgy advice about what is and isn’t risky was clearly from the Halifax itself - but is the not listening to what I asked for from the Halifax or just that particular adviser? Filling out an online questionnaire resulted in the following:

Q: Compared to other people, how would you describe your typical attitude when making important financial decisions?
A: Very Cautious

Q: I am looking for high investment growth. I am willing to accept the possibility of greater losses to achieve this.
A: I am uncertain

Q: I would prefer small certain gains to large uncertain ones.
A: I am uncertain

Q: I want my investment to be safe even if it means lower returns.
A: I am uncertain

RESULTS OF YOUR ATTITUDE TO RISK
Your answers indicate you have a MEDIUM attitude to risk.

You would be likely to accept moderate risk with your longer term investments for growth or income if this would give you the potential for higher returns. You would probably feel comfortable with an investment that includes a high level of Stock Market linked investments, including some overseas shares. You understand and accept that the value of your investment may go up and down and that on final encashment you could get back less than you have invested.

Um, I thought my attitude to risk was either very cautious or uncertain? So there appears to be at least some institutional bias for me to put my money into shares etc., but perhaps more importantly, the FA probably gets little or no bonus for selling me what I want - a cash savings account. After all, they get “unlimited” earnings if they perform well:

Bonus Scheme
The bonus scheme gives you unlimited earning potential and is made up of several elements that are directly influenced by your personal performance.

And what is worse is that it was explained to me that because he was a FA tied to a bank, he was salaried, and therefore his advice is less likely to be swayed towards the higher commission produce that an IFA might suggest.

So Halifax, this is what I did with your advice when I got home:

Apparently,

In the early 1980s a council tenant’s average income was 73% of the national average. Today two in three tenants living in “social housing” are among the poorest 40%.

These two numbers are NOT COMPARABLE. One is a measure of the average income, the other is a measure of the proportion of poor people. Idiots.

Stuck in traffic. Drove 20m in 20 mins. The last thing you want to see is people driving on the wrong side of the road in order to jump the queue…

Well Mr Vauxhall driver - caught on camera. And if you think you were trying to persuade everyone you were turning right instead of left, does anyone else see the same care in the photo below?

When we have a situation where men are affraid to help children who have hurt themselves, where mothers are banned from kissing their daughters goodbye, where parents have to have their criminal records checked before their children are allowed to play together, where the state bureaucrat bans a market trader from even giving away his fruit, let alone selling it, because it is the wrong shape.

This is the country, dear readers, that you have brought about. This is the country where state control over our every day lives was brought about by your votes. So just remember, next time you read about something like the above, that you voted for Labour and you only have yourself to blame. People wonder why I have become a supporter of the opposition. I wonder why they have to ask.

Ken has recently embarked on another class war - this time against the drivers of “poluting” cars. A new “environmental” charge will be levied on vehicles with emissions greater than 226g/km of CO2. And that got me thinking. Just how much of an environmental tax is this new “environmental” charge? And how much is it a thinly disguised class war? Those on Labour Home seem to be in support of Ken and his war (on whatever it is, whether the environment or something else), and it appears that as soon as anyone comments in favour of car driving, the insults are thrown at them.

So just how polluting are London buses? According to an anti-4×4 campaign group, a common double decker London bus emits 1406g/km of CO2 and the bendy buses apparently emit 1585.7g/km - yes somewhere between 6.2 and 7 times more than Ken’s tax threshold. However, on the surface, one might expect there to be more than 6 people on a bus at any given time, so it doesn’t seem too bad at all. Until, of course, you check the figures.

According to Ken’s own propaganda, the average London bus has an occupancy of 15, meaning CO2 emission is something between 93 and 106g/km. So it would only take 2 people to be in a car above Ken’s threshold before it nearly pays off, or three to be saving on emissions. Considering the average occupation of a car in London is 1.6, it would not require a very large increase in occupancy before we break even. And you know what - if those 3.6L petrol Porsche Cayennes have three people inside, it would be more environmentally friendly than a bus ride, and the journey would be much more pleasurable.

So will Ken be giving a discount to those in large 4×4’s if their occupancy is high? Hardly. In the bid to be more environmentally friendly, will Ken discontinue those buses with an occupancy of less than 7? Hardly. Will Ken embark on a publicity campaign to encourage car sharing? Hardly. Is this a thinly disguised class war? It’s looking like it, isn’t it? Will Ken be kicked out in the next elections? Let’s hope so.

Today I had the misfortune of being sent some data in Excel. I never use Excel for anything scientific, but for the easy management/organisation type tasks. The data in question was spread about all over different sheets, so I thought I would manually copy/paste the relevant data to a new sheet and save it into a text file. That way I could plot it with something sensible (like Matlab). This took about 30 minutes and I saved it as a “space delimited text file”  which means a space should be put between the different columns of data. And here is the result: Yes that’s right - Microsoft have f*cked up. What simple part of “space delimited text file” can they not understand? It means: PUT A SPACE BETWEEN THE ENTRIES IN EACH COLUMN. It does not mean put a space sometimes. It does not mean put random carriage returns between rows. It does not mean create a file that cannot be read by any other application. Why oh why do people use Microsoft products?