That’s right. It’s funny news season. It turns out that insurers are really thinking of cranking up the premiums for households that make use of social networking. The concern is that too many people announce to the world when their houses are empty and ripe for plundering.

The director of pricing and underwriting at Legal & General, Malcolm Cooper, told the Daily Mail that;

“It’s a challenging one for the insurance industry. Just because someone is burgled, you can’t prove that it’s down to details posted on Facebook.

“It could be that we start asking how many youngsters are in the home for example.”

The comment is worth thinking about. Legal & General must associate social networking with youngsters.

It may be that older people are just as common on social sites (there’s debate as to whether teens even bother with Twitter at all) and just as likely to announce when they’re on holiday.

Earlier this year an American couple announced they were off on holiday and had a 10 hour drive to their 2000+ followers on Twitter only to come back to a burgled house.

Related personalfinanosaurus posts:

1. Volcano-Friendly Travel – Insurance and Pets
2. Life insurance fears following the London bombings tragedy

The new ad will feature an opera singer called Gio Compario. The website gio-compario.com has been registered by GoCompare but, at the time of writing, isn’t currently in use.

The first ad airs tomorrow on UK TV and will feature Gio Compario signing the classic Over There by George M Cohan but will insert the words “GoCompare” into the lyrics.

The new ads will replace the current run which keeps the focus on GoCompare’s star rating system. The stars are actually quite controversial as they edge the “price comparison” service closer towards giving out financial advice. Financial advice is a dangerous thing to give out and requires all sorts of checks and passes (one of the reasons why Cashzilla never does it).

… and for the curious, here’s the actual chorus to Over There. We imagine Gio Compario may simply switch “Over there” with “Go Compare”.

Over there, over there,
Send the word, send the word over there
That the Yanks are coming, the Yanks are coming
The drum’s rum-tumming everywhere
So prepare, say a prayer,
Send the word, send the word to beware
We’ll be over, we’re coming over
And we won’t come back till it’s over, over there

No related posts.

When Roger came to ask for mortgage for a $385,000 property in Mapua the bank refused. On top of his NZ $190,000 in cash Roger was also going to sell his $110,000 campervan. That would leave the bank with about $90,000 to loan and that’s well more than the %20 deposit they require.

So why did Westpac refuse the mortgage? They pointed out that Roger Griffith is an artist without a regular income and therefore doesn’t qualify at all.

The last straw for Roger Griffiths was when Westpac lost $110 million in a loan to Lane Walker Rudkin. He told press;

“They can lose $110 million with LWR but turn down a normal customer who has never missed a loan payment,” he said. “If they don’t have the trust in me after 25 years, there’s a problem for Westpac.”

Roger’s response was not only to withdraw his entire $190,000 savings but to do it in $20 notes.

After a discussion with the bank they finally agreed to have all the money ready in his local branch for 9am. They counted each note out and provided bags for the artist to takehis money away. He did so and carried to the Nelson Building Society.

Griffith’s reason for picking Nelson was that he felt it was part of the community. His final message to Westpac was;

“If you don’t support the community, the community won’t support you.”

Related personalfinanosaurus posts:

1. Tories label bank charges as unfair
2. Bank of England rate has risen yet again

As of the 27th Google Checkout will stop accepting Maestro cards. Maestro is run by Mastercard. Mastercard credit cards are unaffected and can still be used. There are more than 500 million Maestro debit card holders around the world and so this is a significant move from the Googleborg.

It’s odd that Google would want to ditch the card. It’s also odd the Google are doing this at such sort speed. In the last week they’ve been sending out this email.

Thank you for using Google Checkout, the fast, secure way to shop at stores across the web.

As of 27th July, Maestro cards will no longer be accepted as a payment method by Google Checkout. You are receiving this notification because your default card is a Maestro card that will no longer be supported.

To ensure that your Checkout account is ready for purchases the next time you shop, you will need to select a new default credit/debit card. Accepted payment methods are listed at http://checkout.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?hl=en-uk&answer=105916

You may update your payment information now by clicking ‘Edit payment methods’ after signing in to your Google Checkout account at http://checkout.google.co.uk

If you prefer, you also have the option of updating your payment information when you make your next purchase.

While you will be unable to place new orders with Maestro cards, refunds and chargebacks for previous orders will be unaffected.

We apologize for any inconvenience. If you have any further questions, please visit our Help Centre at https://checkout.google.com/support/?hl=en-GB

Kind regards, The Google Checkout Team

As savvy Cashzilla readers will know there are certain risks in storing too much money in sites like PayPal. If someone tricks you out of your password or the company decides to freeze your account then you’re in trouble.

Purchases made this way don’t have the same sort of protection as direct credit card purchases either. Most of all; if you store money in PayPal then it’s not in the bank earning interest.

Related personalfinanosaurus posts:

1. Google Finance – a really serious article for once. Sorry.
2. Don’t let the bank use the postal strike as an excuse to take your money
3. Warning – credit cards can damage your wealth

Zoopla has bought Thinkproperty.com from the Guardian Media Group. In a sign of the teams you could read about this consolidation in the UK property portal market in the Zoopla blog.

Zoopla don’t just get a great brand. They’ve managed to secure themselves as the exclusive search partner for the Guardian.co.uk.

We agree with the wise words of Property Owl who hoot that there are still too many portals and that Zoopla now face the challenge of the integration. In particular Property Owl’s suggestion that an industry wide standard on property feeds would is an interesting idea and worth looking at.

What does all this mean to you?

It means that there are still loads of places for you to discover houses for sale. The fact there is need for consolidation suggests that the current levels of competition are just not sustainable so we might see some reduction in choice and incentives over the next few months but savvy ‘zilla house hunters will still be checking online for years to come.

Related personalfinanosaurus posts:

1. It pays to query your credit card APR
2. New Year, same housing situation?
3. Choosing a different kind of security

Interesting news stalwart Cory Doctorow at BoingBoing is to be thanked for bringing this to our attention.

Visa have recorded a $23, 148, 855, 308, 184, 500.00 charge on a prepaid card.

The Consumerist, who broke the story, point out that’s 2,000 times larger than America’s national debt of $11 trillion and that the ever-vigilant billing team at Visa remembered to add the $20 charge for being in the red. Yes; the card was also suspended.

Prepaid cards are an interesting idea. They work in a very similar way to credit or debit cards except you can only spend the balance that has been assigned to the card. In theory this means it is impossible to run in to debt (as there’s no overdraft option) and therefore ideal for giving to teenagers.

Cards are usually assigned a PIN number and can be used at ATM machines, online or even over the telephone.

They’ve become popular with travellers as they’re seen as being a handy as plastic but much less of a risk. They’re often more discreet than cash as well. Normally, that is, unless a drug store tries to charge you all the money in the world and the bill ends up on the internet. When that happens they’re not so discreet.

Related personalfinanosaurus posts:

1. It pays to query your credit card APR
2. Don’t let the bank use the postal strike as an excuse to take your money
3. Credit card interest free periods may not be all they appear