From 1st July, £20 noted with the image of Adam Smith, the Scottish economist, will be the only £20 notes considered legal tender. These notes were first put into circulation in March 2007.

Around 20% of all £20 notes currently in circulation are thought to be the old version – that’s around 150 million notes worth £3 billion. These older £20 notes were brought into circulation in 1999, replacing a design with the physicist Michael Faraday, which in turn replaced a design featuring playwright William Shakespeare.

If you do find yourself in possession of an old note after June 1st and your bank refuses to swap it, the Bank of England has said that it will honour the face value of the note, even with older notes.

All the old notes collected will be sent to official government incinerators where they will be burned. Alongside the old £20 notes, there may also be damaged notes and illegal tobacco also being burnt. The incinerators will generate thermoelectric power from this burning.

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Cashback websites make their money by earning commissions on any sales by referred customers or by on-site advertising. Some websites, such as Quidco, will pass on 100% of the commission they make to you in return for a small annual fee (in Quidco’s case, they charge a £5 annual fee and this is taken off the first £5 cashback that you earn).

Using cashback websites is easy – enter your e-mail address, choose a password, and choose how you would like to be paid. Usually, you have the option of receiving your cashback money through BACS, Paypal or a cheque.

From then on in, you can search on the Cashback website to find the retailer you are after. Click on a link and a harmless piece of information known as a ‘cookie’ is dropped onto your PC. This will track that the Cashback website referred you to the retailer and will allow the retailer to pass the comission back to the Cashback website, and therefore allow you to earn your cashback for your purchases.

Recent research by Kelkoo, a shopping comparison website, showed than around 40% of online shoppers had never used a cashback website and around 25% of people had never even heard of cashback websites.

To maximise the amount of cashback you get, it may be worth signing up to several different websites (although we don’t recommend more than 5 as it will start to get difficult to track and the annual fees you may have to pay may start to outweigh the cashback you earn). Different cashback websites will have different offers and retailers available therefore by signing up to a few, you maximise your chances of getting cashback on your purchases. Although most deals are available on all websites, occasionally some retailers will place exclusive offers on a website therefore you will need to be signed up to the cashback website to earn your cash!

And if you want to take things one step further, don’t forget to use a cashback credit card to make your purchase – partly because you are more protected when purchasing online and partly because you will earn even more cashback on your online purchases.

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Pension advisors are concerned that many people are looking to their properties to provide for their pension – however many people have large mortgages on their properties still and are also not looking to move in their retirement.

Aviva has said that around a quarter of “pre-retirees” has a mortgage and of these, a fifth still owe more than £75,000. There are many reasons why mortgages have not yet been paid off – in some cases, parents have been remortgaging to help out their children; others have been releasing equity in their homes over time to allow for luxuries such as cars or holidays, or to help fund a business.

The issue is compounded by the fact that some pre-retirees have seen their pension fund retirement income drop by 70 percent in the past decade.

Aviva has found that around 40 percent of pre-retirees are not saving any money at present and they have average savings (excluding pensions) or just £8,600.

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The Council of Mortgage lenders has said that government schemes to keep mortgage lending afloat end in 2014, leaving a funding gap of £300 billion.

Before all the economic problems of the last few months, the gap between what the banks took in savings versus what they lent out was covered my the wholesale market in mortgage debt. However when the world financial markets were hit in 2007, the UK government was forced to plug this gap with the special liquidity scheme and credit guaranteed scheme.

Once these schemes have expired, many experts believe that the wholesale mortgage market will not have returned to previous levels thus leaving a funding gap. This means that mortgage lenders are likely to not be able to offer mortgages to as many people and first time buyers are likely to be the ones who miss out.

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According to Consumer Intelligence, the average annual premium is £564.19, almost 20 percent higher than the same time last year – and is predicted to rise by 15 percent to £648.82 by January 2011.

There are two main factors contributing to the rise – the first are no-win no-fee solicitors whose ads on TV have seen many more people deciding to pursue personal injury claims after crashes, pushing up the amounts insurance companies have to pay out and therefore increasing premiums.

Given that many people are struggling with their finances at the moment, it is also believed that more people are driving without car insurance.

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If your flight is cancelled due to industrial action (aka a strike) EU regulations state that you should either be provided with an alternative flight to your destination or your plane ticket should be refunded in full within seven days of the cancellation.

If you have bought a flexible or refundable ticket, you can cancel the ticket ahead of the strike action and rebook your flight. If your plane ticket is non refundable, you should not cancel the ticket until strike action is fully confirmed as you will not receive a refund.

If you have booked your flights through a tour operator, the tour operator will be responsible for making alternative flight arrangements on your behalf, however they may also choose to issue you with a refund. If you are concerned, get in touch with your tour operator to discuss the options available to you.

If you are abroad when strike action happens, the airline should be responsible for providing travel arrangements for you, as well as overnight accommodation or transfers, if required. You should also be issued with vouchers to pay for expenses such as meals.

Travel insurance may or may not cover you if your airline strikes so read your terms and conditions of cover carefully. Some insurers will only pay out for cancellations which have been made at short notice – so if the strike has been publicised for a long period of time, you may not get any recompense from your insurer.

Also, travel insurance companies tend to only pay out if you are delayed for more than 12 hours. If you have been delayed for more than 12 hours, you may be required to get a letter from the airline confirming this before the travel insurance company will pay out.

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1. Free samples
Let your product speak for itself – send out free samples to your target demographic. If your product really is as good as you claim it is, sales should follow. The one caveat is that you should target your audience as much as possible to maximise sales – there’s no point sending out samples to uniterested parties as the sample will rarely convert to a sale.

2. Free trial
Similar to the point above, consider offering a free trial of your services so that people can see how fantastic your company is. The caveat here is that you must give them excellent customer service and an overall favourable opinion of your company otherwise they will not sign up past the free trial period.

3. Referrals
Offer a referral scheme to existing customers – if they refer a new customer to you, you will reward them. A discount off their next order is useful as it ensures that they will continue to buy your products or services, however you could offer cash, vouchers or an actual gift instead.

4. Bulk Order Discount
Offer quantity discounts – that is discounts if the customer orders a high number of units or spends over a particular amount of money. This way you are encouraging them to spend more money with you.

5. Discount voucher coupons
Offer customers discount vouchers for future purchases if they spend money with you over a particular time period. This way you are giving them an incentive to come and spend money with you again in the future and they are also more likely to spend money in the short-term too to get the voucher in the first place.

If you are going to offer any form of incentive to try and encourage higher sales, it is important to analyse your current customers to ensure that you make a profit in the long-term – it is all very well encouraging turnover, but you need to make a profit. Sometimes making a small loss in the short-term is OK as long as the customers are likely to give you boosted profits in the longer-term, however analyse your sales figures carefully to ensure that any promotion you do will not be detrimental in the long-term.

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A new tax rule states that there will be a 50% tax on bonuses over £25,000 – a tax which wil initially only be for a year. The Conservatives have said that if they win the General Election they will scrap this new tax.

Although the new tax is predicted to bring in around £5 billion, Johnson believes that it could have a massive detrimental effect on the City and could undermine London’s status as one of the World’s financial capitals.

High earning bankers face a double whammy as they will also be subject to a new 50% tax earnings over £150,000.

Johnson has written to John McFall, chairman of the Treasury Select Committee, calling for the influential body to launch an urgent inquiry.

“One bank told my office that 1,600 of its staff had asked since the Pre-Budget Report for help in relocating from London,” his letter reads.

“Even if institutions decide not to move out of London entirely, many will choose to relocate key functions and personnel in other places around the world perceived to be more welcoming.”

If Johnson’s predictions are correct and 9,000 bankers do leave, it is estimated that the treasury will lose around £1.2 billion in tax and National Insurance contributions.

Many analysts are backing the mayor’s predictions and have called the new tax regime ‘ill-thought out’ with dramatic long-term negative implications possible.

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Stephan Schwarzman: $702,440,573
Stephan Schwarzman is co-founder of the Blackstone Group private-equity firm. According to CNN money, he took home $702,440,573 (in salary, equity and bonus) in 2009 increasing his total net worth to $7.8 billion.

Larry Ellison: $556,976,600
Larry Ellison is CEO of computer firm Oracle. In a year when executive pay fell 11% and a year where Ellison pledged to take a pay cut, he still earned $556,976,600, much of which is in Oracle stock of which he owns 23.4%

Oprah Winfrey: $275,000,000
Chat-show host Oprah Winfrey collected a cool $275 million in 2009. Oprah has created a media empire that is now said to be one of the most powerful brands in the world.

Ray Irani: $222,639,705
Occidental Petroleum CEO Ray Irani collected a yearly compensation at over $222 million – with his five year compensation totalled over $740 million. The 74 year old executive derived only $1.3 million of 2009 pay from his salary, getting another $3.6 from bonuses, $33 million from “other” sources and $184 million from appreciation in company stock.

Tiger Woods: $110,000,000
2009 saw a turbulent end for the sporting superstar however he still managed to earn more than twice the earnings of any other sports star despite not being able to play for eight of the twelve months of the year due to knee surgery. Around $11 million comes from golf winnings; the rest is down to a golf course design business and sponsorship deals with the likes of Nike, Gillette and Accenture.

Madonna: $100,000,000
The to-selling female artist of the twentieth century earned a massive $100 million in 2009. Most of this money was from her massively successful ‘Sticky and sweet’ world tour, grossing around $80 million.

Tyler Perry: $75,000,000
Tyler Perry is smart in that he retains full ownership of his films and puts his name in front of every title he is involved with. Therefore Perry reaps large quantities of money from every project he invests into. Perry has added to his movie repertoire by writing and touring with around a dozen stage plays.

Harrison Ford: $65,000,000
The movie superstar Harrison Ford earned a cool $65 million thanks to the 2008 movie ‘Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.’ Most of his money came from his stake in the profits from the film which grossed $786 billion at the Box Office.

Adam Sandler: $55,000,000
Adam Sandler’s films are reported to have grossed around $413 million at the box office. The success of this funny-man’s films mean he was paid a massive $55 million for his roles in several films including ‘Bedtime Stories’ and ‘Don’t Mess with the Zohan.’

Kobe Bryant: $45,000,000
Kobe Bryant is one of the top players in the NBA with his number 8 Lakers top being one of the top sellers.

Nicolas Cage: $40,000,000
Despite rumours of financial problems and reports that this Hollywood superstar would have to sell some of his property empire, Nicholas Cage has starred in six films over two years resulting in a $40 million pay-cheque. Cage has added to his income by also selling off some of his cars and a comic book collection worth around $1.6 million.

Dale Earnhardt Jr: $35,000,000
Dale Earnhardt Jr is one of NASCAR’s most popular drivers, despite winning just the one race in the last two seasons. Rumour has it that he sells twice the amoutn of merchandise of any other driver. Because of his less than stellar race record, the bilk of his earnings come from sponsorship deals with companies such as Polaris, Wrangler and Adidas.

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The biggest public sector recruiter is the NHS which employs 1.6 million people.

6.09 million people are now said to be working for the State – the equivalent of 1 in 5 people of working age.

One of the major reasons behind the rise in public sector workers has been the reclassification of the Lloyds Banking Group and Royal Bank of Scotland which are now part-owned by the taxpayer.

Pay rises in the public sector have also out-stripped private sector raises – public sector workers were given an average pay rise of 2.8 percent in October compared to just 1.1 percent for those in the private sector.

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