Friday 15 June 2012

Banking, Beds and Bartering

Now I wholly agree with most sound financial advice in that it is madness to have savings while you are in debt, you should throw everything at your debts to clear them, as paying interest is quite literally throwing your money away.  However it is important to plan and bank some working capital, this is money put aside for big annual bills as well as a contingency fund to pay for the unexpected.  Today we had to pay for the unexpected.
On Wednesday I broke our bed, now I say I broke, obviously this is our marital bed which gets equal amount of usage plus a doggy who normally sleeps at the bottom,  the fact is the bed broke but as it was on my side of the bed, it has been agreed I broke it J.  A comfortable bed is an absolute necessity in my world and we decided to take the opportunity to upgrade from a king size bed to a super king size bed (divan with a quality pocket sprung mattress).
Now it pays to do your homework, I checked out all the main bed company sites, plus wholesalers and for a quality super king with a good mattress we were looking at around £1200 yikes.  On checking out the deals on Bensons for Beds I found a bed in the “sale” (I am always dubious about so called sales) for £799.99 which seemed perfect.

On checking the small print they charge £39.99 for delivery, some companies do offer free delivery but again I always believe nothing in this life is free and they just add that cost onto the goods.  For example Dreams offer free delivery but the nearest bed for spec / quality that I could find was £400 more expensive so they can keep their free delivery.  So we were anticipating paying £840 inclusive for the bed. 
We decided to pop along to our nearest showroom to test the bed out to make sure it was right for us and the price in store was £840.99 plus delivery on top so £880.  This is where it pays to do your homework, when I pointed out the online price the sales assistant immediately said they would honour that (too right) now down to this delivery charge.  I am married to a husband who believes there is always a deal to be done and a haggle is to be had.  Needless to say we left the showroom with a bed, to be delivered in 12 days with a mattress protector and 4 pillows for £800 all in.  Best of all it wasn’t put on the credit card (like days of old) and sinking us ever further in debt, it was paid for in cash from our working capital fund.  That will ensure I sleep like a baby J 

2 comments:

  1. We too got a super king this year. We love it, love it, love it! The best thing ever although we now don't touch at all as we are so far apart. Sadly they do seem to charge a premium for super king bedding so let me know if you find any bargains.
    Good for you getting a bargain, we should all barter a bit more in the uk. I'd rather have the few extra pounds in my pocket.

    Sleep well.

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  2. Fantastic, it really does pay to do homework because anyone who hadn't checked online prices before hand would have automatically been paying the inflated price. Well done, hope you have some comfortable nights sleep on it!

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