That spending shows no sign of slowing down either; this year, Britons are planning to spend an average of \u00a3350 on Christmas presents<\/a>, making us the most generous gift-givers in Europe.<\/p>\n That might sound like a badge of honour, but all that spending comes at a cost. With presents, food, decorations and various celebrations, the cost of Christmas soon mounts up and we often turn to credit and borrowing to fund it.<\/p>\n A survey by the Money Advice Trust suggests that one in 8 Britons will struggle financially after overspending at Christmas, facing a mountain of bills and no immediate way to pay them.<\/p>\n The good news is that you don\u2019t have to max out your credit card to properly enjoy Christmas. All it takes is a bit of saving, a bit of savvy and a bit of willpower.<\/p>\n It\u2019s easy to get carried away buying presents. There\u2019s the pressure of making sure the kids get the latest toys and gadgets, the pressure of making sure everyone gets a present and the pleasure that giving provides. Giving feels good, and the more you give, the better you feel… until January, when you have to start paying off all those bills.<\/p>\n The only way to stop yourself from overspending is to set a strict budget and stick to it. To do that, you\u2019ll need a calculator, a spreadsheet and your bank balance.<\/p>\n First, divide your spreadsheet into three tabs: presents, food and decorations, and celebrations. You can add more if you want, but this is the simplest method.<\/p>\n In the ‘presents\u2019 tab, add the name of everyone you\u2019re planning to buy presents for. In ‘food and decorations\u2019, list everything you\u2019ll need. In the celebrations tab, add any parties or trips you\u2019re planning to celebrate.<\/p>\n Once you have your lists, take a look at your bank account and savings and devise a sensible budget based off that. You\u2019ll need to leave money for living expenses, emergencies plus a little extra for January.<\/p>\n With a rough figure decided, divide that money out between your various expenses. Scary, right?<\/p>\n Don\u2019t worry, though: now, we\u2019re going to look at ways to make savings and add a little bit extra to it.<\/p>\n Everyone knows that Christmas is a time for gorging. But how often do you end up with more chocolate than you could possibly eat, or in a near-food coma because you overdid Christmas dinner?<\/p>\n The first area of dinner to reconsider is the turkey. Yes, it\u2019s traditional but that means the prices get ramped up because of demand. If you\u2019re willing to do away with tradition, try something cheaper – pork or chicken are both decent options, and they\u2019re much less hassle to cook too.<\/p>\n If you\u2019re having the family round for dinner, ask them what they actually <\/em>want for dinner. If no-one likes sprouts, don\u2019t buy them and save. If no-one cares about swede (and let\u2019s be honest, who does?), that\u2019s a few more quid saved. It all adds up!<\/p>\n Oh, and whatever you do, don\u2019t bother buying chocolate for yourself! <\/em>You\u2019re guaranteed to be drowning in the stuff by Boxing Day anyway.<\/p>\n Christmas cards are lovely, but they\u2019re fairly useless, aren\u2019t they? We open them, smile, put them on the mantelpiece for a few weeks and then pack them away for good to join the rest of our household clutter.<\/p>\n We\u2019re not suggesting that you ditch Christmas cards entirely (Gran would be mortified!), but you can save a lot of cash by sending e-cards to your younger and more web-savvy friends and relatives. It\u2019s pretty good for the environment too!<\/p>\n If an e-card doesn\u2019t appeal, just a nice tweet or Facebook messages will do the trick too. Maybe include a funny festive meme to show you\u2019ve put in a bit of effort…<\/p>\n Christmas is a time for giving. But let\u2019s be honest: how often do you end up trawling round the shops or web trying to find a present for your second cousin who you last saw 10 years ago, only to settle on the classic Christmas clich\u00e9s of socks or chocolate?<\/p>\n It\u2019s time to get brutal and trim down that present buying list. Review the people you\u2019re planning to buy for and cut out anyone who isn\u2019t absolutely essential. That means close friends and family, and that\u2019s it.<\/p>\n Whatever you do, make sure that the people you aren\u2019t planning to buy for know in advance. Call them up or send a message making a pact not to buy for each other.<\/p>\n For those lucky people who made the present buying cut, re-consider what you\u2019re planning to buy. Often, people will appreciate something that has taken time and effort over something that you bought at the last minute in a sweat-drenched panic shop.<\/p>\n Potential ideas include a hamper of baked goods (yummy!), decorations and household accessories (if you\u2019ve got crafting skills) or a photo album\/collage of memories. The more personal it is, the better!<\/p>\n Visiting friends and relatives is the sneakiest of all Christmas expenses, creeping on you with surprisingly large bills.<\/p>\n Often, the cheapest way to travel isn\u2019t always the most obvious. If you book now, you should be able to get some great deals on train tickets. You\u2019ll avoid the horrific Christmas traffic as well!<\/p>\n If you don\u2019t mind spending a few hours on a coach, you should also check out National Express and Megabus for deals. It takes a little longer but the potential savings are massive.<\/p>\n If you do have to drive, find the cheapest petrol station near you with petrolprices.com<\/a>. If you\u2019re travelling alone or as a couple, you could also consider using Liftshare<\/a>. This app finds people willing to offer lifts to your location in return for splitting petrol money.<\/p>\n It\u2019s a given, but shop around no matter what you\u2019re buying. Consumers have more choice than ever when doing their Christmas shopping and retailers often resort to cutting prices or holding special offers to win business.<\/p>\n For gifts, use a price comparison website like Pricerunner<\/a> to get the best deal possible.<\/p>\n For food, use mysupermarket.co.uk<\/a> to compare deals across the major supermarkets. You\u2019ll probably have to shop around to get them all, but it\u2019s worth the savings. Just remember to balance any potential savings with the cost of travel.<\/p>\n If you only follow one piece of advice in this post, make it this one: avoid payday loans. While the offer of a short-term cash injection is tempting, the industry average APR of 1,737%<\/a> means you\u2019ll end up paying back much more than you borrowed.<\/p>\n If you do need a bit of extra cash though, there is an alternative to payday loans…<\/p>\n You knew this one was coming, didn\u2019t you?<\/p>\n With our new fast same day payments, we\u2019re one of the easiest ways to earn a little bit of extra cash before Christmas. Simply get an instant price for your CDs, DVDs, Games and Electronics using our Val Engine or FREE app, pop them into any box you like and send them for FREE!<\/p>\n As soon as we receive your items, we\u2019ll issue your payment and it\u2019ll clear the next working day. The sooner you send your stuff, the sooner you\u2019ll get paid!<\/p>\n If you\u2019ve got clothes to sell, try an app like Depop or Schpock, or give eBay a go.<\/p>\n Cashback websites almost sound too good to be true: how on earth can you get paid <\/em>for just shopping?<\/p>\n Well, it\u2019s fairly simple actually. You navigate to the website through a link on a cashback website. When you make your purchase, the cashback website will receive a referral fee, which is then passed onto you. It\u2019s more or less free money.<\/p>\n Unfortunately, you won\u2019t get your money straight away so it might not be ready to spend on Christmas presents so think of it as an investment instead (and a great way to start saving for next Christmas).<\/p>\n If you can\u2019t afford to buy it, why not try and win it instead? ‘Comping\u2019 is a bona-fide internet phenomenon, with a dedicated community of ‘compers\u2019 (to give them their proper name) trawling the web for opportunities to win prizes.<\/p>\n If you\u2019ve got a bit of spare time, you could easily enter a couple of competitions every day and the only thing you\u2019ll need is an email address. While there are no guarantees, the odds are pretty good if you enter enough comps.<\/p>\n Check out this excellent guide from MoneySavingExpert for some top comping tips<\/a>.<\/p>\n Remember what we said about retailers wanting to win your business? Well, discount codes are another tactic they use to get you shopping with them – and it\u2019s worth taking them up on the offer.<\/p>\n There are countless discount code websites, the best of which you can find in this article<\/a>.<\/p>\n It\u2019s also worth keeping an eye out for flash sales. The best way to do this is to sign up to email alerts from any retailer you\u2019re thinking of shopping with. While you\u2019ll get a lot of marketing material, you may get the odd sale alert too. Be quick though, because everyone else is on the hunt for bargains too!<\/p>\n Kickstart your Christmas shopping fund today by selling your old CDs, games, movies<\/a> and tech<\/a> with musicMagpie – It’s smart for you, smart for the planet!<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Christmas is less than two months away – hooray! Britain absolutely loves Christmas; you only have to look at the amount we spend every year for evidence of that. According to a report, UK shoppers spent \u00a3680 each on festive goodies in 2013, totalling a mind-boggling \u00a343 billion. That spending …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":4995,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[471,474,204],"tags":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.musicmagpie.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4993"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.musicmagpie.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.musicmagpie.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicmagpie.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicmagpie.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4993"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicmagpie.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4993\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17230,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicmagpie.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4993\/revisions\/17230"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicmagpie.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4995"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.musicmagpie.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4993"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicmagpie.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4993"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicmagpie.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4993"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nStep #1: Set your maximum budget<\/strong><\/h3>\n
![\"money-2\"](\"http:\/\/192.168.3.178\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/money-2.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n
\nStep 2: Making Savings<\/strong><\/h3>\n
Reconsider your Christmas feast<\/strong><\/h4>\n
\nCut the Christmas cards and go digital<\/strong><\/h4>\n
![\"Christmas](\"http:\/\/192.168.3.178\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/christmas-cards.jpg\")
<\/a>Image credit: UnknownNet Photography on Flickr<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n
\nTrim your present buying list<\/strong><\/h4>\n
\nMake, don’t buy (or buy less)<\/strong><\/h4>\n
\nPlan the cheapest way to travel<\/strong><\/h4>\n
![\"Trains\"](\"http:\/\/192.168.3.178\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/trains.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n
\nShop around<\/strong><\/h4>\n
\nStep #3: Maximising Your Budget<\/strong><\/h3>\n
Don\u2019t be tempted by payday loans!<\/strong><\/h4>\n
\nSell your stuff! <\/strong><\/h4>\n
![\"Fastest](\"http:\/\/192.168.3.178\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/Fastest-Way-Christmas.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n
\nCashback websites<\/strong><\/h4>\n
\nEnter competitions<\/strong><\/h4>\n
\nUse discount codes and keep an eye out for flash sales<\/strong><\/h4>\n
\n