Example of Value for Money What is Value?
Say, as an example, you have £500 and think of spending it on clothes. Value for money doesn’t mean that you should get as many clothes as possible for £500. Actually the very first question you need to ask yourself is: Do I actually need any more clothes? If the answer is yes, then the next question is: What clothes do I really need? You may come up with the following list: a shirt; five items of underwear; jogging bottoms; a winter coat The next step is to write down the prices for these items. Here we are looking at prices for good quality items not just the cheapest bargains which will need replacement sooner than later. So our list is now priced as follows: 1 x shirt – £85 5 x items of underwear – £50 1 x jogging bottoms – £75 1 x winter coat – £250 In total, £460. We even have a saving of £40 from the original budget of £500. You get what you need and even keep some money for other uses because having a budget doesn’t mean that you have to spend it all. A budget means that you must not spend more than you have available to spend. If something is left over simply allocate it to some other use, for later.
In Summary: First budget your expenses, decide what you really need, estimate the prices, spend the money only on the essential things you need, and (important!) do not exhaust your budget for unnecessary things purely because you haven’t used all of the available money.