As fed-up customers set up their own Twitter account to blast the hapless Vodafone, the story of the couple who lost out on a mortgage over a bill...for £142. Cliff Savage, who lives with wife Sarah in Corby, Northamptonshire, was a customer of Vodafone on and off for around 20 years without a problem. That is until a couple of years ago when he upgraded his phone and the signal kept failing.

Nearly a quarter of families book their summer holiday this month due to a mix of post-Christmas blues and attractive low deposit deals. Here Tara Evans looks at ways of cutting holiday costs without compromising on quality.

Statistics from the Financial Conduct Authority since the launch of pension freedoms, crunched by This is Money, show 46.5 per cent of people accessing their pots between April and September 2015 withdrew the whole amount, but many did so without advice.

Ewan Taylor-Gibson, telecoms expert at comparison website uSwitch, says that the older children become, the easier they find it to outsmart usage restrictions that parents put in place. His comments come after Faisal Shugaa, from Crawley, West Sussex, spent more than £3,900 upgrading his 'dinosaurs' on computer game Jurassic World. The seven-year-old had memorised both his father's iPad password and Apple ID.

Kay Burley, the Sky News TV presenter, would force every worker in the UK to sacrifice up to 5 per cent of their salary to fund a pension if she were Chancellor of the Exchequer. Burley, who turned 55 last month, always aims to save the maximum £40,000 allowed into her own pension each year and has been saving for retirement since her early 20s.

In a sign of just how rapidly small company finance is changing, demand for PayPal Working Capital has tripled in the past year. It provides £2million a day. So far 60,000 small firms globally have secured funding.

M&S; Bank has cut the interest it charges on loans between £7,500 and £15,000 to just 3.3 per cent - the cheapest personal loan rate on record. It now costs just over £646 to borrow £7,500 over five years. Read this article for a full list of the best personal loan deals on the market.

People in the South are most likely to pump their money into classics, according to Carole Nash, as it reveals hotspots and favourite cars. And Britain's nation of classic car lovers is not throwing their money at Ferraris, Porsches or Lamborghinis; the most common classic is actually the VW Camper.

In November 1994, I bought a ticket for the first ever National Lottery draw. Unfortunately, in those heady days before the Lucky Dip's arrival, I had to pick the numbers myself. 'It could be you,' said Camelot. It wasn't. Yet still I played on, because what if those numbers came up?

I lent my ex-girlfriend £5,000 and we set up a written agreement over email that she would repay it within 28 days. Three months has passed and she's now ignoring me. I want my money back plus interest, but where do I stand? And how do I go about taking her to the small claims court?

TV presenter Kate Thornton - best known for fronting the X Factor and Loose Woman - has launched a cashback website aimed at women, with help from her celebrity friends.
But how does it compare to existing rivals TopCashback and Quidco? This is Money takes a look

Millions of Brits have a Santander 123 account, which offers up to 3 per cent interest and cashback on bills. But from next week its current account fee will surge from £2 per month to £5. Here are some alternative current accounts offering perks for Santander switchers.

Share shave tumbled, as a cocktail of risks - from a slowdown in China and higher interest rates in the United States, to tensions in the Middle East and nuclear tests in North Korea - has cast a shadow over the global economy.

Acting FCA chief Tracey McDermott, who recently announced she would not be seeking the job full time, was responding to claims that the shelving of an inquiry into banking culture represented a sop to the City and a bow to political pressure. An investigation into concerns that HSBC's Swiss subsidiary helped clients dodge tax is also not expected to be published.

How do you heat your home? More likely than not it's by turning on the central heating but a growing number of people are opting for renewable heating sources instead such as wood burning stoves or biomass boilers. These claim to not only be good for the environment but also a way to cut the cost you spend on your energy bills.

More than 15 million British adults say they never received formal financial education but wished they had. Some 7m haven't saved so much as a penny and 4m worry about their finances. The need for financial education has never been greater.

Mortgage lenders are trying to woo new customers. Nationwide and Lloyds are offering reduced rates and £500 cashback while Skipton Building Society has cut its big and small deposit deals. With many of us likely to fix our home loans in 2016, how do these rates stack up?

In the same week the US Department of Justice said it was filing a $61billion lawsuit against Volkswagen for cheating diesel emissions tests, the carmaker gave us a first glimpse at how it hopes to repair its reputation with a range of new electric cars.

Sarah and Ritchie Tough, who had hoped to buy a home in Bishop's Stortford, Hertfordshire, are the latest victims of a cruel online con that has hit homebuyers nationwide. Sarah, 28, says: 'It makes me sick to my stomach that someone could even think of doing something like this. We had been saving for ages - and now it is gone.' The £45,000 deposit they spent almost a decade building up was snatched in a cruel new scam...

In September, the fund was valued at £39,212, which I put down to market fluctuation. Friends Life kept banging on about an annuity and other options but I maintained I wanted to cash it in. I then started a new job that meant I would have to pay much more tax if I took all my pension as cash, so I contacted Friends Life and said I'd just like my 25 per cent tax-free lump sum. The next quote I received, in October, was £23,992.98. Where has my other £17,000 gone? While all this had been going on, I was sent five packages all relating to an annuity I never wanted.

An analysis of the FTSE 100 stocks show those with the best-paying dividends may actually be at greatest risk of having to cut them. Mining stocks have tumbled amid a commodity price rout, and Glencore and Anglo American have already culled payouts. Dividends from GlaxoSmithKline could also be under pressure.

Hundreds of thousands of inexperienced savers sold investments by salesmen in High Street bank branches have been left stranded, a Money Mail investigation can reveal. Our probe has uncovered how the life savings of loyal bank customers are left to languish in duff funds with high charges. Customers have been shut out of getting help with their investments because banks scrapped their financial advice services following a series of mis-selling scandals and the introduction of tough new rules by the City watchdog.

Dr Leah Totton launched her cosmetic skin after starring on The Apprentice. Her prize from the BBC show was £250,000 in start-up capital and business mentoring from Lord Alan Sugar, one of Britain's most famous entrepreneurs. Here she reveals why Lord Sugar proved to be the perfect business partner.

I regularly trade stocks and shares. I recently received an investment report recommending I buy penny shares. Shall I take a punt? We answer a reader's question on whether an eye-catching small cap idea is worth a gamble.

To clear the average national household debt of ?13,000 at 6% interest with a monthly repayment of ?100 will take around 17 years. There are, however, plenty of simple ways to make significant savings on your regular spending that could clear your debt - or boost your savings - in less than a year. This is Money's top 50 - updated - money-saving tips may appear light-hearted but are deadly serious.

Choosing the right DIY platform is crucial but a wealth of choice and changes to charges have left many investors scratching their heads. We pick some of the best. We also highlight why investing in an Isa makes sense, as it should protect your hopefully growing investments from tax forever.

A 0.25 per cent move up in the Fed funds rate has set a marker that the Bank of England's ratesetters will be measured against. Economists expect no move here until late 2016 and the money markets say no move until 2017, but the Bank's deputy governor Ben Broadbent says people should not rely on that.

For many buy-to-let looks an attractive income investment in a time of low rates and stock market volatility. Climbing house prices, rising rents and improving mortgage deals are tempting investors - although they will need a big deposit. Read This is Money's top ten buy-to-let tips

Musicians have seen pay rises averaging nearly 20 per cent in 2015, while cleaners are getting 17.8 per cent more, and window cleaners 12.3 per cent. Artists in general are earning 14.6 per cent more in 2015 than 2014, according to the huge annual data dump of pay scales by the Office For National Statistics highlights.