For an introvert, like myself, End of Financial Year is one of the friendliest times of year. People in clip on ties and tight polo shirts want to sell me things.

Soon to be last year’s model of car, laptop or mobile phone is a mere weeks from instant decrepitude and sales forces around the globe are being mobilised into crack units of smiling commandos.

It’s the one time of year these people aren’t quietly assessing my questionable fashion choices as I hover nearby, willing me away from their shop front.

On the contrary. One second, you’re fumbling with the tiny red lid of a fish shaped soy sauce container, the next you’re looking up into a solid white wall of teeth and facing a bombardment of pleasantries from a sales rep that wasn’t there seconds before, imploring you to consider his or her wares.

“How is sir this morning?” “Would sir care to look over our range of flat screen TVs?” “Tracksuit pants and crocs, a bold choice sir. How long has sir been dressing himself?”

Everything must go, is the ubiquitous mantra of every store I pass and for once, that doesn’t include me.

The other great, though less personally satisfying, trial of life that raises its head this year is, of course, taxation. It feels like a test. An exam on how useful a member of society I am and like every other exam I’ve taken, I struggle under the weight of expectation.

I start off well enough. I fly through the personal details section with unparalleled ease. I have, after all, known me my whole life. But as soon as the Deductions section stares me down in contempt, I do what any middle-aged man with decades of earning experience does…I ask my wife:

“Honey! Apparently, you can claim laundry expenses. Is that true?” “Honey, what does Tax Free threshold mean? How many days should I write down?”

My wife endures this every year, calmly dispensing solid fiscal advice whilst folding my track suit pants into neat piles, until I’m inevitably stuck on some finer point (like addition or subtraction) and I summon my going-out crocs and leave her to clean up the formalities so that I can head back to our shopping centre, to be once again be fawned over by my new fiends in retail.

The great news is that Financial Year Planners aren’t just about this maniacal time of year. They are every bit as much for big and small business alike as they are for the home.

Keep track of holidays, pay days, important anniversaries, financial or any other important commitments that you decide you need a visual reminder of.

Notely’s 2025/2026 Financial Year Planners have arrived and like all of Notely’s range are 100% recycled, look great and compliment your lifestyle perfectly.

Order today and organise your days in a way that allows you make more of your time, allowing you to focus on the difficult things, like opening those soy sauce containers. Seriously, those things were designed to explode every time I open one.

- Jamie Simmons