During economic downturns, it’s crucial to be intentional about saving money, as it’s just as important as during good times. High interest rates and high borrowing costs make it the best time to save more, as consumers can get more bang for their savings compared to when goods and services are expensive.
Ester Ochse, Product Head at FNB Integrated Advice, provides simple yet effective insider tips for saving for short- or long-term financial goals to help individuals begin their journey towards financial health by Savings Month 2025.

Start small

Saving money is crucial for financial fitness, but emotional and psychological barriers can hinder progress. The thought of saving money or being behind can be overwhelming. To make the journey more manageable, start small and focus on the present rather than the future.
“Imagine you want to lose some weight, and you’ve set a certain goal that you want to reach by a certain time, so you decide to go on a diet,” says Ochse. “In this case, what’s more sustainable than telling yourself you’ll never eat dessert again is committing to only eating dessert once a week.”
“It’s important to take the same approach to your savings journey, for it to be sustainable in the long run. Once you build small habits, like reducing how many energy drinks or takeaways you buy in a week, you can incrementally turn up the ambition and intensity as you move along in your journey to better financial fitness.”
Establish small goals, establish regular habits, and maintain them to enhance your muscle memory of saving.

Make budgeting central to your plan of attack

Budgeting and saving are crucial aspects of life, impacting each other equally. Starting small and having a clear understanding of your money’s monthly expenditure is essential, starting with a set budget. Both are essential for maintaining financial stability and achieving financial goals.
“Trying to start a savings journey without a budget and insights into exactly how you already spend your money month-on-month is a bit like going on a road trip without Google Maps or Waze,” adds Ochse. “You’ll soon find yourself going around in circles and not making any progress because you are essentially directionless.”
Luckily, budgeting your personal finances has become much easier over the years. There are myriad resources out there, like mobile applications in your device’s application marketplace dedicated to budgeting, and even budgeting-focused features and tools in your banking app.
“At FNB, we help consumers by making budgeting really easy, through the intuitive tools available on our banking app, like Track My Spend and Smart budget on Navi Money.”

Automate everything

Some innovative people in the financial services industry seemingly understood just how difficult it was to take that first, and even subsequent, step to becoming a habitual saver. As such, banks have made cultivating the habit of saving so easy that we’re running out of excuses not to save.
“Think of automating your savings as if you were holding a financial remote control. You could simply walk up to your television and touch some buttons to increase the volume, brightness, or contrast. But these days, you don’t have to walk up; you can do everything with your remote control. Automating your savings through your banking application serves a similar function, but with slightly more stakes than simply turning up the volume to hear your favorite comedian’s joke,” Ochse emphasizes.
Setting up automated transfers from a main account to a savings account takes away the fuss of needing to remember to do it and eliminates the actual admin, making consumers habitual savers with very little effort. It also goes back the old adage of ‘save and then spend’.

Maximize loyalty programmes

Rewards programs are crucial for financial freedom, as they allow individuals to maximize their cash flow by using virtual money instead of real money, similar to the monthly time for saving habits.
“How many times have you, in a crunch, reached out to your FNB eBucks folder to buy electricity, data or airtime?” asks Ochse.
Loyalty programmes can often be our saving grace in our day-to-day lives and even more so as you scale back on our spending and save. “You can potentially put back thousands of rands into your pocket just by diligently following guidelines on how to use your different banking accounts and facilities in order to earn eBucks to buy essentials like electricity and so much more.”

More jedi mind tricks

The more distraction-free one’s savings environment, the more successful one can be on their path to financial wellness. “Much of it is in the mind. But also, out of sight, out of memory,” Ochse explains.
The FNB banking app allows users to hide certain accounts from their main accounts view, preventing them from dipping into their savings account when their main account is running low, as explained by Ochse.
“You can also rename your accounts. I have one simply titled ‘Car’ and that’s where I store funds every month for upkeep of my personal vehicle.”
Ochse suggests that by the next Savings Month, individuals can become financially unrecognizable through small, intentional changes, which will add up over time and lead to financial independence and freedom, regardless of the weather.The post Top 5 Tips to Transform Your Finances by Savings Month 2025 first appeared on IT News Africa | Business Technology, Telecoms and Startup News.