Today (Tuesday 6 September) is International “fight procrastination day” - the day when we should avoid putting off until tomorrow what we could do today. New insight from Aviva suggests we are masters of the art of procrastination, especially when faced with reviewing our finances.
In a survey of 2,000 people, Brits would rather vacuum (31.5%) or change their bed-sheets (23.9%) than review their finances (22.1%) when at a loose end on a rainy Sunday afternoon.
Women would apparently rather vacuum (31.2%), change bed sheets (27.5%), clean their bathroom (23.5%) or even tidy kitchen cupboards (20.3%) before reviewing their finances (19.2%). Men would rather work on their vacuuming (31.9%) than their finances (25.7%)
By age, all those under 45 would rather clean their bathroom than clean their finances. Those under 25 are twice as likely to choose to change their bed sheets (40.2%) than change their finances (19.9%). This may come as news to some student households.
Regionally, the English rank their finances third behind vacuuming and changing bed sheets; the Scots place it fourth; for the Northern Irish it's fifth and in Wales it's tied fifth with ironing.
Commenting on the findings, Alistair McQueen, Saving & Retirement Manager at Aviva said:
"It's natural to procrastinate, but as Abraham Lincoln said ‘you cannot escape the responsibility of tomorrow by evading it today’. This is very true when it comes to planning our retirement. Perhaps, when it comes to our finances, today is the day we should stop waiting and start acting.
"We all lead busy lives and we can often find a reason to leave our finances until the next day ... or the day after that. But our insight suggests that, while we may be looking forward to the cleanest houses, we may also be looking forward to retirement that disappoints if we don't make time to plan.
"A range of free online tools are available to help people take control their financial futures. For example, Aviva's Retirement Planner has been used over 200,000 times by people doing just that. In five minutes you can get a sense of whether you are on track for your retirement.”
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If you are a journalist and would like further information, please contact:
Aviva Press Office: Fiona Whytock: 07800 692 299 or fiona.whytock@aviva.co.uk
Aviva’s retirement spokesperson, Alistair McQueen, is available for comment/interview
Notes to editors:
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