In April 2006, TalkTalk launched "Free Broadband for life" for customers of their home phone tariffs. There are several different tariffs - best value seems to be Talk 3, which offers:

• Free broadband - speeds up to 8Mbps
• Inclusive and unlimited anytime local and national UK landline calls
• Free calls to other TalkTalk customers
• Earn 2 Nectar points per £1 spent on your TalkTalk bill

This package costs £8.99 a month, in addition to the phone line rental of £11 a month). Compared with BT's £43.49 a month for (BT option 3, line rental and BT broadband)

Visit www.talktalk.co.uk to check for coverage and for full details.

• Orange launches new tariffs, but just what are the characters all about - More on the canary (weekend and evening chatterbox), racoon (more free minutes), dolphin (for texters) and panther (for 3G wireless Internet addicts). www.orange.co.uk
  
  
• If you're a o2 customer - don't forget to sign up for your free treats - either extra minutes or some freebie texts. www.o2.co.uk
  
  
• Vodafone has launched a SIM-only deal offering 1000 free text messages a month - for life. Keep your existing mobile and take out their £20 a month plan for this value-for-money deal. Best bit - you're only tied into a one-month contract! www.vodafone.co.uk
  
  

A summary of a few other offers worth a look:

• Not getting a good deal from your bank? Time for a change. Top recommendation is First Direct, and you get a free £50 for signing up. Details
  
  
• Girlies - Up to 70% off Elle McPherson, DNKY, J-Lo and other lines in the online Figleaves Spring Sale. Free returns policy in effect. www.figleaves.co.uk
  
  

In our last show, we looked at TalkTalk's "Free Broadband for Life" offer - telecoms companies have been fighting back. We look at the latest offers, and see how they shape up :

• TalkTalk Free broadband. Speeds up to 8Mbps. Inclusive and unlimited anytime local and national UK landline calls. Free calls to other TalkTalk customers. Earn Nectar points. Cost £8.99 a month, in addition to the phone line rental of £11 a month. More at www.talktalk.co.uk.
  
  
• Virgin Media: From February 2007 cable firms Telewest and NTL merged with Virgin Mobile into Virgin Media, combining forces to offer TV, Internet, landline and mobile services. When our show was recorded, they've also just announced a free-to-view rival to Freeview - 36 free channels over their cable network
  
  
• Sky TV: Now offering Free broadband to Sky subscribers. Speeds are up to 2Meg - you can pay £10 a month for a faster connection with no usage cap - speeds up to 16Meg,Given that they offer the largest number of digital TV channels in the UK, their Free Broadband offer is exceptionally good value. www.sky.com
  
  
• BT / BT Vision: They plan to launch their TV service, BT Vision, in the autumn, and are already offering phone and Broadband. It looks like Philips will be manufacturing the BT Vision set-top box, which will receive Freeview, will be HD-ready, have a 14 day electronic programme guide, and support Ethernet and USB. It'll need to be connected using the BT Home Hub. Video-on-demand services will be available over broadband. BT Total Broadbandcustomers, and the box will be below £140. bt.com/btbroadband
  
  
• Orange: Offering free broadband (speeds up to 2 Megs) to users of the Orange mobile phone network spending over £30 a month. Details at orange.co.uk
  

• Top offer on the Sony Ericsson v630i from Vodafone. Half-price line rental for six months, plus a free music centre worth £60 on the Anytime 125 price plan (£10 a month) or above. Until 31st August 2006. www.vodafone.co.uk
  
  
• Get up to 1000 free texts a month with www.o2.co.uk
  
  
• If you want to connect your laptop to the Internet while away from home or the office, look at T-Mobile Web ' n' Walk offering - Their 3G network covers a reasonable amount of the UK. At the time of writing, their Web 'n' Walk Professional tariff provides high speed mobile Internet access using a USB modem or a 3G data card. The USB modem is free when you take out a 12 month contract. Speeds of up to 1.8 Meg available.
  

• MBNA Points Card - The MBNA Points MasterCard comes with a top rewards programme. Earn at least one point for every pound you spend.
  
  
• Here's one not to miss out on. First Direct will give you £50 to open an account to open an account with them. First Direct has to be the most recommended UK bank out there, with an exceptionally high customer satisfaction rate, and some good services such as 24 hour "real-person" phone banking, excellent online banking, and free text message mini-statements. More on our first direct page.
  
  

A summary of a few other offers worth a look:

• Marks & Spencer has an introductory offer on furniture - equivalent to 20% off
  
  
• Save on selected haircare products at Amazon
  
  
• Special money-off vouchers from mobile phone retailers The Link. Sadly, shortly after recording our show, The Link withdrew their discount vouchers. Check our Offers Page to see if there are any current offers from The Link

The UK Broadband war continues, with the big names continuing to fight for our Broadband business. In the show, we looked at four of the top offers from the big players:

• BT Total Broadband - Offers speeds of up to 8 Meg broadband for as little as £8.95 for the first six months. BBC Watchdog's viewers recently rated them number one. You can also get a BT Home Hub, free wi-fi minutes, Broadband Talk, and now digital TV with BT Vision (which we reviewed in show 12 of our podcast FrequencyCast). More at bt.com/btbroadband
  
• Sky Digital is offering over 100 satellite TV channels (that's all six of its Mix packages), free evening and weekend calls, plus 8 Meg broadband for £26 a month - competing with Virgin Media. Sky also offers up to 16 Meg download speeds in certain parts of the UK. More at www.sky.com
  
• Virgin Media's basic Internet offering is £18 month for speeds up to 2 Meg. At first glance, less competitive than BT, but their basic service offers unlimited downloads, vs. BT's 5 gig monthly allowance on their basic package. Virgin gets more competitive when bundling their cable TV and home phone service. Also, Virgin offer speeds of eg over their cable system, beating BT's 8 Meg. More at www.virginmedia.com
• TalkTalk's "free broadband" offer is still a contender. With their £8.99 "Talk 3" home phone service, you get up to 8Meg internet with a 40 gig monthly allowance. With lineup to 20 M rental, this equals £19.99 a month for net and phone, which is cheaper than comparative BT, Tiscali and Virgin packages. More at www.talktalk.co.uk.
  
  

If you've ever been charged by your bank for going overdrawn or having a cheque bounced, you may find that you're able to reclaim some or all of the charges. There's been such discussion of this in the press recently, and it seems that if you challenge the big banks that their fees don't represent the cost of their work, the banks aren't willing to go to court, and will often settle.

If you've ever been charged unfairly, for example £20 for an overdraft letter, or £30 to bounce a cheque, then try to get your money back. There are a couple of sites offering downloadable letter templates that you can use, and millions of these letters have been downloaded. If you think you've been unfairly charged in the last six years - do what thousands of others in the UK have done, and try to claim those charges back.

Here are some useful links to set you on your way to getting back your fees.

• MoneySaving Expert - Great step-by-step guide, with template letters
• Bank Charges guidance from Thisismoney
• BBC - Claim back your charges , includes letter template
  
  

• Alliance & Leicester is still one of the top current accounts around, offering great interest rates, and at the time of recording, £50 if you refer a friend.
  
  
• If you're a Nectar Point collector, consider the Nectar Credit Card from American Express. You can earn 5000 Nectar points when you first use your card and spend £200 - you also get up to 4 points for each £1 you spend.
  
  

For all those girls out there looking for a new phone there are 2 great girly models on the market at the moment:

• The Samsung E570 is a beautiful pink and silver phone packed with features - like a built-in megapixel camera, music player and Bluetooth for handsfree calling, you can get this free on contract with Virgin Mobile.
  
  
• You can also look at the LG Shine and have a mirror with you where ever you go. The LG Shine is all about seeing and being seen. Its stunning looks and huge screen are combined with serious features, including a 2 Megapixel auto-focus camera and multi-media player. This is free with 02 on their Online 30 package - see shop.o2.co.uk.
  
  
• If you're looking for something to carry your new phone in we love the Radley Moccasin Grab Bag which you can pick up from John Lewis for £80. Smooth soft leather with features a zip top fastening, woven front pocket and interior zip, and of course, the little Scottie Dog.
  
  

Some other mobile phone news:

• If you're a fan of getting Internet and Email on the move, you may want to look at T-Mobile's Web-and-Walk. This offers unlimited net surfing on your mobile for £7.50 per month, or 25p a day. A lot cheaper than some network operator's we could mention. More at www.t-mobile.co.uk
  
  
• Free SIM cards from o2. You can get your hands on up to 2 FREE O2 SIMs, each with unlimited texts when you top up just £5 a month. More at freesimo2.o2.co.uk
  
  

A summary of a few other offers worth a look:

• Regular Amazon shopper? Before your next order, take a look at Play.com - top range of books, CDs, games and electricals with free P and P. www.play.com
  
  
• Comet money off vouchers - See our UK Offers section.
  
  
• TomTom One SatNav, an amazing steal at £141 - See our UK Offers page.
  
  
• Slingbox, which lets you access your home TV over the net, is now available with cash off - UK Slingbox Info.
  
  
• Pigsback - Enjoy hogging your Internet connection? Now you can make money by surfing. Pigsback is an online reward scheme that lets you bank Piggypoints by filling in surveys, shopping online and writing reviews. The points can be exchanged for vouchers to be used at Waitrose, John Lewis, Boots and Costa Coffee. Sign up at www.pigsback.com.

Check our Offers Page for other UK bargains and deals