How do you save for Xmas presents?

[AlwaysHopefull89]

Next year I am thinking of me and DH contributing to a joint savings account and using it for Xmas 2026 gifts!

how does everyone save for Xmas? Is there a saving scheme/ rewards scheme?
has anyone heard of chase?

Or is park worth doing?

Park vouchers. Direct debit every month. Couldn't do it otherwise

Interesting thanks. Do you get the whole amount back to spend or do they take a %?

Do you mind me asking how much you put away each month?

my friend is an agent for a company similar to Park. I save £50 per month and get a pre paid debit card in November. I used to get the vouchers but the debit card is handy for shopping online

A six month regular saver would be a good idea. Principality have a 6 month saver with around 7.5% interest. You can save from £1 to £200 each month. I open a couple of regular savers each year, one for money towards a holiday and another for Christmas (which matured end of October).

I do Park- you get it all back, every November. I couldn't do it without!

Wouldn’t a savings account be better? At least you’d get interest on it too.

I've seen a Park type company, Farepak(?) went bust previously. I would be worried about losing my money paying into a company? Wouldn't it be wiser just to save up that money yourself throughout the year? I don't understand the benefit of Park. Unless someone could enlighten me, I'd happily listen!

Realistically it's probably better to put it in a savings account where it will earn interest, but I started doing Park when the DC were small and I didn't have much spare cash (and likely would have raided savings when something came up), but even though I'm not so skint these days, I've just never cancelled it and every year it turns up like a little pre-Christmas bonus.

This isn’t rocket science - most Banks and BS have regular saving Accounts that pay high interest. I have several - Nationwide, Aldemore, Santander…

I have a Christmas saver account with my local Credit Union, I save £80 per month and withdraw it in November

Yep we have a regular savings account we pay into each month.
Wouldn’t touch one of those payment plan companies with a barge pole! If the company goes bust you are stuffed.

Start by working out roughly how much you spend on Xmas and just spread it across the year.
We still sometimes spend over what we have saved but atleast the whole lot isn’t coming out in one go!

I have a salary sacrifice to the credit union at work - so the money goes in to my savings before I get paid into my hand (or bank account). It’s easy to forget about it that way, and have a nice chunk for Christmas. And as I get any pay increases, I can increase the amount easily (I let myself have 1 paycheque to enjoy the bonus, but as I was managing on the lower amount before, I increase my savings amount in the 2nd paycheque).

But if I need more day to day, I can lower the amount going in - but leave the lump sum in there.

Husband has a share save option at work so we put money into that monthly and get it mid-October, it pays for Christmas and a holiday in the summer

I have a Monzo pot and put away into that every month.

my online bank allows me to create a virtual card that I can then transfer savings to - so it's still in my account if I need it but is separate at the same time. I can also arrange to "round up" to the next pound every time I use the card, so if I spend 50p on something it'll round up to a pound and put that 50p on my virtual card. I've managed to save £200 on the card since February, so that's our Christmas sorted!

I think it depends how you spend , if you
do all your shopping Nov / Dec maybe park works but that doesn’t work if you see a bargain in say July . Personally I’d save in a normal savings account to have access when I’d like to.

No absolutely not

I wouldn’t do things like park- just open an account especially and keep transferring in

Regular saver accounts. This year my Nationwude paid 7% interest.

Check out your local credit union.

Regular savings account with my bank. In fact various savings accounts for different purposes but one for Christmas and birthdays.
I put money straight into those on payday so it’s ready and waiting when I need it.

Re park etc aren’t you only able to spend in certain places? It’s vouchers isn’t it? So you couldn’t for example buy from Etsy or a local gift shop?

It's set vouchers and you only get them in November, so if there was a sale on in say October, you'd miss it.

I have 3 budget catagories for Xmas & save all year.

One for each of the DD's and a general Xmas catagory which covers any other gifts, a Xmas show etc. By the time Xmas comes around everything is covered.

I put much effort into avoiding the last minute Xmas "twitch" - not always successfully, but I never overspend or incurr debt for Xmas.

I don't buys gifts for many people - everyone has enough crap they don't want/need. My fa/mily are all abroad as we dont usually do gifts. Our lives are full of unwanted stuff that causes us all so many struggles, & unless I see a "oh that is perfect for XX" item I dont buy much for others unless its a consumable.

Park is only good if you want to use the shops their vouchers/cards are for (or if you buy the anywhere mastercard you pay an extra 10% on top which you xould be spending ongifts etc instead)

Save for yourself with whoever you bank with and just pay into it every month as soon as you are paid