How are you faring?

Kate54 All those recommendations must surely be linked to companies in the hope we will all go out and buy new stuff.

Are you receiving all you’re entitled to madeleine?

I live alone on a pension. There is much advice on how to save money etc. However you cant give up what you have never had so where do we go from this? I hang washing out, no tumble dryer, rarely buy clothes and apart from underwear they are usually from charity shops if I can wash them. Dont smoke, dont have amazon or anything nor netflix so it is difficult to think what else I give up. I have a secondhand mobility scooter which lets me go shopping when I am unable to walk. My biggest spend is on my second hand car, which allows me to go further afield than the local highstreet, and keep in touch with family and friends, but every trip has to be thought about and saved for. I no longer just go out sort of ad hoc. i do go mad once a week and spend £4 to play whist in a warm church hall and have two raffle tickets. It lets me use my brain, meet others to socialise a bit and have a coffee and biscuit, which is good value I think. It is held in a village so go by car, no buses go there, all of 3 miles. Last of the big spenders eh? Eventually expect I shall have to give the car up but that will be very limiting as to where and when I can travel. I am unable to prebook things as I cant know until the day how I am , and whether I can walk far etc. The cost of electricity is my biggest worry as it is the only heating here, no gas so if there is a power cut have got nothing instead, and I cannot guess what the cost will be this time. It is all too depressing to think about and so right now can only live day to day, have been glad to watch the rugby and keep my mind off this situation which I can do nothing about. Hopefully we get some good weather to enjoy and save the power in the summer.

Unbelievably, a jar of my usual coffee, price held steady for longer than I remember, has gone down by 25p. Not on offer either.

Yes, everything going up. State pension increase rise will hopefully help. And DH gets his state pension in June, so that's an extra income. We are fortunate to have some work pensions, two of which will increase by the 10.1%, so we consider ourselves very fortunate. I feel desperately sorry for the younger folks who aren't getting big increases in pay. My son and DIL have only had small increases.

Cabbie21

Our Council Tax will be £207 pm, (for 10 months).

mine is going up to £208 pm for 10 months. Single occupancy. My bins are emptied, no lights etc

My council tax is going up £85 pm and that is for single occupancy, no streetlights, pavements or mains sewerage. Makes me so angry!

Grantanow

It seems the local library has to have subscribed to Pressreader. Alas, ours hasn't!

Ask your local MP to put pressure on the library to subscribe? Good luck. It's an amazing resource.

Our Council Tax will be £207 pm, (for 10 months).

Quaver22

I just checked Pressreader and I can access it via my library for 30 days and after that it is £27 a month.

No. It signs you out automatically after a month. You just sign back in using your library card number, and it's still free. I've been doing this for almost 2 years.

I just checked Pressreader and I can access it via my library for 30 days and after that it is £27 a month.

I subscribe to the i, a great little paper, and therefore it’s half price. I had to laugh yesterday, though, at a feature on how we’re all ‘guilty’ of hanging on to things for too long.
If we followed their recommendations, we’d be even worse off financially!
Here they are:
* wash cleaning cloths after every use and replace every month
* change mascara and make up brushes every three months
* toothbrush or electric toothbrush head every three months
* change pet bowls every three months
* wash hairbrush every month and replace every six months
* replace bras every six months
*shower curtains and toilet brushes every six months
* chopping boards every year (I’ve got a bread board, used daily, I went to university with in 1972)
* replace Tupperware every few years
* bath mats every two years
* towels 1- 3 years
*shampoo carpets every six months and replace every five years
* toilet seats, if properly cleaned,five years
* wash duvets every six months and replace after five years
* non-stick pans - five years
* change mattresses every five years (says Hannah from Silentnight!)
A lot of this advice is verging on the irresponsible, methinks!

It seems the local library has to have subscribed to Pressreader. Alas, ours hasn't!

PamelaJ1

One of my DH’s loves is his daily newspaper but we have been away for 2months so I changed our subscription to online only.
He is becoming used to reading it this way and, although I agree with him that it’s not quite the same, I think we may stick with it and save about £70/month.

It’s a lot of money for news, DP likes a paper but has cut back now to one mid week and one at the weekend.
We save money by shopping at Aldi and the Co-op now and again.
No new clothes just cos we fancy them either.All bills rising so you have to do what you can.

happygirl, thank you very much for the useful pressreader tip, I shall download that this evening

Swampy I am with you on the unfairness of the standing charge increase. Mine will actually double so all in all I am prepared for quite a shock in november, it is all very tricky on a fixed income. Council tax increase notification came today, I notice that some get their council tax paid and the rest of us struggle to keep abreast of the rises

Just sat here this morning (as I do most mornings) checking bank accounts and moving money around to cover bills.
I have increased the Gas/Electric payment to take account of the £66 shortfall due next month which as with all the general increases eats into our disposable income which is not large by any stretch of the imagination.
DH is still waiting on his backdated pension of 18 months which due to his former employers having gone into receivership is a nightmare at the moment along with a useless pensions administrator (who do nothing in between our regular hectoring) and in December when he officially retires will get his State Pension rather than the ESA he currently gets - fingers crossed and bills not withstanding our income will increase a little.
All our bills are paid from a separate account and the balance of our income literally covers everything else from food, petrol, car repairs etc. So some months can be little tight depending on what's happening day to day..
Our food shopping bill has increased due to looking after GCs. One three days a week and two boys after school twice a week. We do this to help out our ACs as they too are struggling but this is given freely as we all help each other where we can. We are more likely to call on the ACs to help out with stuff we find hard to manage in the garden and around the house rather than pay for work to be done and looking after GCs is a lot of fun.
We have a meat delivery every couple of months and shop in between on an as and when needed basis - Tomato sauce being a regular purchase with the two boys!! (but not Heinz!!) But I imagine at this point in time that if we needed to have a few no-spend weeks we could survive a few weeks on what is in the cupboard/freezer.
I was watching Martin Lewis last night and find it so annoying that even though Gas/Electric costs may reduce slightly that the daily standing charge will still increase - so even if you spend virtually nothing on these the costs are still increasing even if you try and cut back. But he did say that fixing rates may be on the way back so will wait what happens there.

PamelaJ1

One of my DH’s loves is his daily newspaper but we have been away for 2months so I changed our subscription to online only.
He is becoming used to reading it this way and, although I agree with him that it’s not quite the same, I think we may stick with it and save about £70/month.

If you are a member of your local library, you can read all newspapers for free every day using the Pressreader app. You just log in using your library card number. Your favourite magazines are available too. Saves a fortune.

I try to add to the food bank on a regular basis and yesterday I decided to buy a jar of coffee as a treat. Luckily I looked at the price, over £8 so I am afraid it stayed on the shelf.

I shop online at Morrisons and thankfully I looked at the cost of the butter I wanted, a fiver. It also stayed there.

I am dreading July when my fuel contract finishes. Soon it will be cheaper to emigrate to a warmer climate.

I have one annual subscription I must cancel. I feel sorry for the company as it is on its legs now without my and others' assistance.

I am coping!!! My fixed EDF rae finished in Janujary, as I am not able to have a smart meter here, will not know exactly how much that is costing now per month until August. BUT.....I have worked on having similar usage as previous years and upped my monthly DD to take tht into accont. As I got rid of my car well over a year ago, really thankful now that I did, I am able to ignore the emails from so many companies telling me how much it will cost to insure it now.

I have a Sainsbury delivery for three weeks in each month and do an 'in-person' Tesco shop on the fourth week. Very large Tesco about a quarter of a mile away. Food prices horrify me - not so much on my own behalf, but for families. Many store-cupboard items have actually doubled in price over the last few months (much more than the 17 or 18 percent being quoted in the media). I do not see how families with one or two teenagers (always hungry), are starting to manage, particularly those with low salaried working parents.

But our wonderful government has chosen to give so much more money to the very high earners and the rich, and nothng whatsoever to those families.

I can still manage a few items each week to go into food bank. can keep myself comfortable and warm at home, never been one for holidays, visits to and from my kids and g.children and friends are what I choose. Television is my constant company, no subscriptions (except, I suppose Prime, although rarely used for tv). I enjoy attending (most days) social groups and these usually cost the price of a pot of tea at the places we meet.

I know I am one of the fortunate ones, have no concerns for any of my adult children - and know, that in any real emergency the older two would be happy to step up to help me out financially.

As Pensioners, we, are at least getting that 10% increase next month which will help out with increased expenditure - but families are not ketting that and are still having to pay those same sort of bills.

I am faring well here thank you, I knew rises were coming so I tightened my belt three months ago, hardly spent anything on extras or wants and am now accruing savings to stay on an even keel

I stopped amazon prime and am working through my large stockcupboard and stored stash. My small garden will be very productive with berries, rhubarb, apples etc which will all be processed for the freezer or bottling. I don`t have netflix etc I do get an organic veg box every week

I started three regular savers at >5% interest, to mature by christmas and they will be very helpful, my energy fixed rate finishes in november. I am stocked up with fuel, enough to keep my stove burning all through next winter and beyond

My mindset thankfully, is now de-programmed away from the endorphins caused by buying. Now I take cash out with me and am no longer tempted. I am about to start withdrawing cash from the bank again, to re-build what I have used

In the meantime I am only paying £23 pm into my octopus account so will increase that from next month, to start accumulating credit, now that the £67 pm is stopping

The plumber did some work for me and I will soon be getting his bill, once that is paid then there will be no nasty surprises. My hand written spreadsheet will be updated later today, to take account of all the rises

Our biggest expense is the energy bill. DH needs the house to be warm all the time. He is also not good at switching lights and appliances off. Our fix has just ended so we are waiting to see what the next bill will be with trepidation. At least we can pay it.

Our fixed rate on Gas/Electric has just ended.
BOTH have more than doubled. The standing charges are up a lot too. Our bills are very high in the first place even though we have cut our usage down quite considerably - it's still a lot of money to spend.

This is really bad news for us and will undoubtedly mean problems later - but I do know it's worse for those totally dependent on benefits.

I don't see anything much in the budget for us unfortunately.

At the moment we are OK but my husband has just turned 65 and thinking of retiring and quite honestly it's a scary thought. For a few years now we have not had to worry what we spend within reason we are by no means rich.

One of my DH’s loves is his daily newspaper but we have been away for 2months so I changed our subscription to online only.
He is becoming used to reading it this way and, although I agree with him that it’s not quite the same, I think we may stick with it and save about £70/month.

I cancelled my sky some months ago and make do with Freeview.
I also have Amazon Prime and have started paying for films on there rather than going to the cinema as it is much much cheaper and some films are actually free and the films are usually pretty up to date as well..