What’s the cost of real value?

Everybody knows you don’t get change out of a parking meter.  Doesn’t matter whether it’s at the side of the road or in Sainsbury’s car park, you don’t get change.  Have you ever stopped to wonder why?  You could bowl down the street and get the right money.  But you’re too busy, right?

 

If its 60p for half an hour and £1.20 for an hour, you’ve got to go and find the right change.  Maybe trip down the road to buy something like a chocolate bar or a packet of mints.  Of course you run the risk of missing the warden giving you a ticket you while you're away and you'll get fatter.  Incidentally, have you checked out the price of mints lately?  They’re 60p, 70p, 80p a packet of extra strong ones, and 18 in a packet.  That’s 10d in old money.  (It was always ’d’ after the amount…. 6d, 2d.  Can’t remember why?).  No way, eh?

 It’s the little things in our lives creeping ever upwards in price which con us into thinking we’re getting value for money elsewhere.  After all, if a house costs £200,000 then 80p for a packet of mints is reasonable, right?  Value for money is a strange and subtle beast and we don’t comprehend it most of the time.  Sometimes we know we've been overcharged, sometimes we’re sure we've got a bargain.  Most of the time we shrug.  That’s the price.  But we’re ripped off time after time.

I spent, if I remember correctly, around £4.50 on a pot of tea for two in Penzance station café recently.  I thought at the time it was great value, just what was needed on an icy spring afternoon.  They even had Thomas the Tank Engine steaming round and round at pelmet height for a bonus!  I think I had three cups, Helen two.  Boiling hot.  Fabulous!

But wait……...  Later the same day it cost £75 to stay in a hotel a couple of miles from Land’s End.  For that price you get hours and hours of privacy and comfort.  You get clean, several times if necessary, and they'll even provide the soap.  You get to excrete, (sorry to bring it up, but it’s a valuable commodity!), 'til you're blue in the face.  Personally I've not tried that, but it’s got to be worth a tenner at least.  You can make yourself some tea and coffee, with biscuits, more or less as many times as you like.  Watch the telly, read a book, share the view, change your clothes, make love…..There's no end to the fun.  Connect your phone or laptop to the internet.  Make a packet soup.  The list is endless and you can clear it all up with toilet paper, towels and fancy tissues.

 Is that it?  Am I finished?  No way!

Come the morning you get somebody to cook you a whacking great breakfast as well!  You can have cereals, pastries, fruit, yoghurt, toast, butter and jam, a huge Cornish fry-up, fruit juice, and, and, and…….yep…….as much tea as you can drink!!

 Let’s break it down for one person, so we can see the real value;

 

Couple of Hot Showers                                                                                    £5.00

Visits to the loo, (now 40p in Birmingham New Street!)                                    £2.00

Tea and a Coffee                                                                                            £4.50

Flask of Coffee made to take with you                                                            £3.00

The Kit to make Hot Soup                                                                               £2.00

Clean bed, night’s sleep, and TV in a warm room and no cleaning                  £25.00

Internet for an hour or two                                                                           £10.00

Toilet Paper, Tissues Soap and Towels                                                            £5.00

Big Breakfast, (might even make a packed lunch from what’s on offer)          £14.50

 

Total of what it’s worth to me                                                                       £71.00

 

….and we paid £75 for two people!!  Now that’s what I call value.  18 hours of comfort for two people at £2 per hour each.  Wow!

 Back then, to the parking meter.  The technology is great.  You chuck in your coins and it decides how much you’ve put in.  Then it prints a ticket with the time you must leave by, how much you paid, who you’re paying and your shirt size.

 How difficult would it be if, say you put a £1 coin in, to allow you £1’s worth of parking?  Adjust the time you can stay until, based on how much you pay.  Stunningly simple!!  You get your money’s worth and they get paid.

But no…….

 They want you to pay more than the going rate.  If they can take £1 for 60p’s worth of parking they’re quids in.  I wish I had a business like that, where I could charge nearly double for something, just because I didn’t have the change to hand.  These people aren’t crooks though.  The local Council are fine upstanding fellows.  They work for you.  You voted for them!

 So, I’m afraid, you’ve only got yourself to blame.