UPPER WIDDLECOMBE —
An Upper Widdlecombe man has spent most of the year optimising every purchase he makes, sources confirmed Thursday, and has so far earned a total of $3.12 in cashback, rewards and what he calls “passive yield”, at a cost of roughly 400 hours of the estimated 4,000 weeks a human being gets.
Gareth Muncaster, 34, began his “moneymaxxing era” in January after watching a short video in which a man in a gilet explained that anyone not earning points on groceries was “basically setting fire to cash.” The man in the gilet has since bought a second gilet with the ad revenue.
Muncaster now carries seven payment cards, each assigned to a category of spending. One is used exclusively for petrol. Another is reserved for supermarkets on Tuesdays. A third exists solely because it offered a free umbrella, which broke in April, during the only rain he has enjoyed this year.
“People laugh,” Muncaster told reporters, beside a whiteboard covered in arrows. “But every pound I spend is working for me. Some are working very slowly. One may have retired. It’s the only one in this house that will.”
His spreadsheet, “WEALTH ENGINE v14,” contains 31 tabs, conditional formatting in five colours and a pie chart his partner, Leanne, calls “the most emotional thing he’s ever made, including the wedding speech.”
“He called the broadband company for an hour and a half to get three dollars a month off,” Leanne said. “Then he celebrated with a forty-dollar takeaway on the card with the best restaurant multiplier. It earned eleven cents. He framed the receipt. It’s in the hallway. Our wedding photo is in a drawer.”
Independent analysts were cautiously supportive. “In strict terms, the man is up,” said Dr Fiona Plaskett of the Centre for Marginal Gains, a think tank operating above a vape shop. “If you value his time at zero, which he does, and which his employer also does, this is a triumph.”
Muncaster plans to reinvest his earnings in a high-yield savings account, where, at current rates, the $3.12 will become $3.27 by 2028 and enough for a modest headstone by approximately 2390.
At press time, Muncaster had stood at a self-checkout for nine minutes deciding which card would best reward a single banana. The banana had gone brown. Leanne had gone home.
This article is satire. The people, places, quotes and studies described are fictional.