Credit cards: Back away from the microwave

Saving may be the new black and money the focus of every women's mag on the shelves this month, but the fact is that your will to stop spending is sometimes not as strong as your urge to splurge. And a credit card is what's known as an 'enabler' in this situation.

So, what to do? The trick is to put some distance between you and the card. You could try the old credit card in the freezer trick - but you only need to see the trailer for Isla Fisher's new film 'Confessions of a Shopaholic' to see how ineffective that can be. It only takes a large hammer and a few stress points and you're away.

At least she didn't try to microwave the card: there's more than one sheepish credit card addict out there who's discovered that the quickest way to render a card useless is to try to defrost it in the microwave.

You could give your card to Dad/older (grumpy) sister/disapproving boyfriend, forcing you to weigh up the benefits of the purchase versus your loss of pride. You could simply leave the card at home when you shop, assuming the long and difficult journey back to your place puts paid to impulse buys.

Or you could, gasp, cut the damn thing up until you've paid it off.

The only way to make serious inroads into credit card debt is not to use the card. Cut it up and your problem is solved...Unless, of course, you work out you can still use the number to shop online.

But that's a whole different story.