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Life

30th Mar 2015

Here’s the most popular ways Irish people save money and the county we think is most frugal

There's some interesting points here

Paul Moore

There’s some interesting points here.

Unless your uncle is Scrooge McDuck or Mr Burns, the chances are that you’re like everyone else in the world when it comes to saving money.

We still haven’t cashed in those bus receipts just yet though. That only happens when you’re really struggling to pay rent or feed yourself.

Like all Irish people. JOE’s always delighted to see payday come around because we’re usually like this.

We really don’t want to know how much money we’ve given HB Ice Cream over the years, curse them and their tasty treats, so they seem like the perfect people to reveal exactly how Irish people save and spend their hard earned cash.

They’ve conducted a nationwide survey into our saving/spending habits and the results are pretty interesting.

Here’s the top 10 methods that people use to save some coin.

For example, 71% of the survey said that they waited on sales to start spending and so forth.

How many of these relate to you?

1.       Waiting for the sales to splurge – 71%
2.       Stealing toiletries and biscuits from hotel rooms and take them home – 67%
3.       Collecting money off coupons – 66%
4.       Cutting the bottom off cream/moisturiser tubes to get that last bit – 52%
5.       Eating food that’s gone past its sell-by-date to save it from the bin – 36%
6.       Asking for a doggy bag in restaurants –  34%
7.       Dying their hair at home – 30%
8.       Taking the trip North of the border in search of bargains -27%
9.       Cutting their hair at home – 10%
10.   Avoiding tipping service people altogether – 10%

We don’t think any of you will end up like this though.

There’s other areas where Irish people save money though and it’s particularly interesting for those people that work in the services industry.

How good are Irish people when it comes to tipping?

Of those surveyed, 89% said that they actively tip the preferred amount.

Waiters (73%), hairdressers (49%) and taxi drivers (48%) are the top three benefitting from tips while mechanics and hotel staff weren’t so lucky with just 4% and 14% of people reporting that they tip these groups.

They deserve all their money for their brilliant service.

With regards to the spending habits of counties, people hailing from Cavan will be disappointed to learn that they’re considered the most frugal county (20%) followed by Dublin (15%) and Cork (7%).

The final interesting piece of research relates dating etiquette and it seems that chivalry isn’t dead.

60% of men think that they should be the ones to pay for the first date. See ladies, we’re not that bad.

71% of women reckon that the bill should be split equally while 28% of the ladies surveyed feel that their date should pay.

Don’t worry guys because HB also announced that a new Cornetto’s is going to cost just €1 so there’s no need for this sort of gluttonous behaviour on a date.