A manager at LOM Asset Management is on a mission ? to get Bermudians to save as much as they can from as early an age as she can get them.

?I just want the world to save,? said Sue Wyatt, general manager at LOM Asset Management said yesterday.

Miss Wyatt said that saving changed people?s lives for the better, and the earlier they got down to it, the potential to accumulate wealth was amazing.

?The simple effect of compounding is quite something,? she said. ?If you start saving at 40 for your retirement instead of 35, you have to put in double the amount to get the same returns. It is amazing what the cost of delay can be.?

And she would like to see school leavers at the age of 18 start saving ? even if it is just a little bit every month and get in the habit of saving before spending. Miss Wyatt said that there were many ways to save and LOM has plans that can help individuals. She said that one of the most successful tools they have is the LOM Employee Savings Plan, which was started in November of 2002.

She said that this scheme, which sees employees sign up to have money taken off their wages at source (i.e. at payroll) had been a huge hit, with new-found fans of saving signing up to save more and more each year.

?The most common thing I hear is that people get used to not having the money to spend and do not notice it after a while,? she said. ?But the saving itself is not the biggest part ? it is the discipline of putting it in every two weeks or every month. And after one year most people have increased the amount they save because they don?t notice the amount any more.?

She said that the joy of saving can almost become addictive, from those who save just $25 a month to those with larger disposable incomes, who get hooked on seeing their savings grow steadily. ?We have some people who are down to the bone, such as single parents who can save just $25 a month ? which is a stretch for them, to couples who live together and say share a rent and have more money to spare.

?But if you are looking to your future, in 20 years that can really add up.?

She said that she has clients who now chastise her for not making them save more when they were younger, as they are now seeing the benefits of prolonged savings.

?The idea is you pay yourself first... you save first and spend what it left,? she said. ?And you can still enjoy your lifestyle. If you save for a car and then buy it outright or pay for a holiday up front, it feels much better.

?And you should save as soon as you can. Don?t wait until you are 50 to start. That is not to say that if you are 50 you cannot start... it is never too late in my opinion.?

LOM?s savings plan is similar to popular plans around the world which allow savings to be taken off at the same time as say insurance or taxes such as payroll. Argus last month launched a similar scheme which it said would help residents start a savings plan. LOM?s plan has four categories, from low risk to high risk, depending on the kind of investment the savings have seen. Latest figures for the year to March 1 show the risk averse category grew by 0.5 percent, the conservative, by 2.5 percent, the moderate by 24 percent and aggressive by 36 percent.

Their savings projections, however, are based on an average increase of 7 percent.