It's almost the beginning of a new month and we're all scrambling to fill up our cars, while those fortunate enough to have pre-paid electricity meters are stockpiling units. Being one of these lucky people, I have, however, been in two minds whether or not to buy copious amounts of electricity units... simply because I've been told by the cashier "No, you can't have R100 electricity..." as the auxiliary tax that's been accumulating since my last top-up is going to burn about 90% of that blue bill. Yessiree Bob, just for the courtesy of not schlepping down to the store to top-up my meter, I essentially get 'fined' R2.10 per day. But then, things could be worse: I could be one of those poor chumps who get billed once a month and are actually looking at forking out 20% more than the rest of us when the increase comes into play. Yet again, if we thought this was bad, let's not forget that things could be even worse. We could be Zimbabwe, whose currency is probably not worth the paper it's printed on. So while we moan mightily that the petrol price is going up by another 70c per litre (roughly Z$956,833), let's just be thankful that we don't have to save up an entire month's worth of cash withdrawals from the ATM just to fill a tank. So while Uncle Bob gets sworn in for another term of economy-crushing and destruction in Zim, let's say our thanks that some rate and fuel price hikes are all we have to deal with.

Shan Radcliffe, Retail editor