Dear Listener

I’ve been worried about my digital legacy this week. It’s easy enough to make a will leaving your property – real and movable – to your heirs. But what about your imaginary property? And I don’t mean that fantasy villa in the Alps. I mean your Facebook identity; your Yahoo group; your Flickr account; your email; and, if you have one, your own website. What rights do your heirs have to those?

The truth is no-one knows. Most of these companies say that heirs will be locked out – especially of any places marked as private. But should they be? That policy prevents your heirs from inheriting the copyright on any words you have written or images you have created.

It also ignores the more public question – should we not be preserving these things for posterity? After all today’s drunken tweeter on the floor outside a nightclub might turn out to be a great literary or political figure in 20 years time and the subject of learned theses in 2100.

Of course, it’s not a new problem. After the penny post made letters cheap and reliable (and almost as quick as email in London with eight deliveries a day) the Victorians put more in writing than any previous generation. But they also spent a lot of time burning those same letters to protect their privacy. A scene where a document is – or is not – burned is a staple of Victorian fiction.

One hundred and fifty years ago this month Dickens made a bonfire of all the letters he had ever received – many of course from the famous literary and political figures of his day. And after that conflagration he routinely burned almost all the letters he received until he died.

As he watched the flames in September 1860 Dickens said “Would to God every letter I had ever written was on that pile.” Fortunately for us more than 15,000 of the letters he wrote were preserved by their recipients. But if it had been on Twitter….

***ON MONEY BOX THIS WEEK

Here is what we hope will be on the programme. I say that because last week’s newsletter contained at least two items which never made it to air for various reasons. One of them will be back this week. But first….

Council Tax – are you paying too much? Now we know there will be no national revaluation in England (nor in Scotland but that was announced a little while ago) we should all consider if our home was wrongly banded originally. In 1991 estate agents famously drove down streets valuing homes without stopping, The result was that many homes were wrongly banded. And it is not too late to get it rebanded. Which could save you a hundred pounds a year or more.

If you have a nest-egg should you lay it in a hedge? Retail investors are being given the chance to spin their money on the hedge fund wheel from 1 October. But is the price for entry too high? And is the chance of success too low? Two views – one planting a new hedge and a commentator who would grub them up.

Are you a customer of Royal Bank of Scotland in England and Wales? Or NatWest in Scotland? If so, you will soon(ish) become a customer of Santander, willy-nilly. We reveal what you can do to stick with the bank you know – and perhaps even love.

We will be returning to KeyData and its investments in traded insurance policies. Some customers of Norwich & Peterborough Building Society were persuaded to put tens of thousands of pounds into them and fear they may have lost the lot. What is N&P doing to compensate its customers?

Those four items should take us to that sad moment when Radio 4 says ‘enough’. So don’t miss any of our precious 24 minutes and tune in just after noon on Saturday. If you do miss it there is always the repeat at nine pm on Sunday, or you can listen any time on our website www.bbc.co.uk/moneybox. There you can also read web pieces, download transcripts, follow links, and send us stories or ideas you want us to look into or comment on today’s programme by email moneybox@bbc.co.uk.

Best wishes,

Paul

PS don’t forget the programme trail on Breakfast on BBC 1 between 0845 and 0900 on Saturday.

e-mail Paul Lewis