Can you help a family feeling the 'squeeze'..

[naomijshaw]

@curlysouffle If you're looking to change energy supplier, Octopus have a "refer a friend" bonus of £50 to both the refer and the referee in energy credit, and I've found them to be a reasonably priced provider over the two years I've used them.

 

[resjudicata]

@curlysouffle To go one step further, you both work in healthcare. Does one or both of you have Reward Gateway or some other discount platform (there's one on the NHS but I can't remember for certain).

Have a look on there. The cashback for utilities is higher on there.

If you shop at the the non-Aldi/Lidl stores, they usually have a rechargeable voucher card. Instead of paying 100 quid for a voucher, it sometimes will cost 90 or 95. Small discount but it racks up. You can discounts on clothing too there.

It's tricky on this, but good luck!

 

[resjudicata]

@curlysouffle We cut loads off our food bill by altering our diet to roughly 90% vegetarian. Kids don't care and when we do have meat they enjoy it more because we feel more comfortable buying nicer stuff because it's only once in a while. Porridge and bananas are your friend.

 

[amanda212]

@curlysouffle Drip feed into an emergency fund, not savings but emergency. Overtime it will grow and you will have a buffer for when you least expect it.

 

[anonomis]

@curlysouffle Sell one of the kids

 

[i7sharp]

@curlysouffle Your food and fuel bills sound pretty reasonable to me. We're a family of 3 (one teenage daughter) and spend a good deal more than that on our food/household products. And our fuel bills are north of £100 per month.

We shop at Tesco and buy mostly own brand and really don't buy luxury stuff much at all, so it's not like we splash out.

As others have said meal planning if you're not already but you say you're batch cooking already so you're on it by the sounds of it.

And I guess less meat could help but it isn't going to make a huge difference and you need to be careful you are still getting your required calories and vits and mins.

I reckon if we stopped buying meat full stop and replaced with alternatives it wouldn't make more than a handful of pounds a week difference and it sounds like you might be looking for more substantial improvements than extra loose change.

Are you slipping into debt or just feeling the pinch a bit more?

 

[curlysouffle]

@i7sharp thank you for your feedback. We're not into serious debt - but we often go into our overdraft before pay day. And we don't have much left for savings / holidays.

 

[i7sharp]

@curlysouffle Well that's good to hear, I really hope and trust you'll find a way through. I'm no expert and we are lucky enough that we've never been in your situation (we are by no means well off mind), but I suspect just being on top of things and knowing you have an issue to work through proves that you've got what it takes to make it work.

 

[ebolacamel]

@curlysouffle Do a food plan for the entire week, list out everything you need, then place a single click and collect order.

The benefits are:
1. No food is wasted, as you bought exactly what you needed
2. Doing a click and collect removes the temptation of impulse purchases from shopping in store
3. Less trips to the shop, more time to cook from scratch
4. You can take into account when writing the plan whether someone is out or you will be back late and plan accordingly, no more buying ready meals from Tesco Express

Other things we do:
1. Always cook double the quantity for dinner, you then have lunch for the next day
2. Eat less meat
3. Cook as much as possible from scratch

 

[resjudicata]

@curlysouffle

Our costs are mostly rising in our fuel, food and energy.

I doubt it. It's more like now we've come out of lockdown and all Covid restrictions you're returning back to normal spending habits you had before, things like going out every weekend and blowing £30 on McDonalds for the family which is £1500 a year just on that once a week.

First of all you need to find out where your money is going. Unless you know exactly where your money is going you can't even begin to sort things out. And by that I do mean every single penny, not just the direct debits and standing orders you remember, the spending you remember doing but every single penny, every single starbucks, every single freddo you buy for the kids.

If you total up what you think you spend, deduct that from your income and your bank balances haven't risen by what is left over or dropped by the same amount you've gone over by then you've got money you've spent that you haven't recorded and it's usually that money often spent on the little things you don't even think about which can make all the difference.

 

[doreenpayne]

@curlysouffle Checkout Outfox the Market Cheapest energy supplier I've found and to the point I've been with them for years now with no need to change. Each year comparison sites haven't been able to find anything cheaper.

 

[itspt95]

@curlysouffle Energy: There's no reason to stick with E.ON. Use one of the price comparison sites and find the cheapest deal - use your actual usage from the past 12 months to get the most accurate results. In general fixed tariffs tend to be slightly cheaper than variable tariffs, and they do give you a bit of certainty as well. It is worth pointing out that energy prices have increased across the board and therefore you might well find yourself paying a bit more than you are now. I note that if your current fix has exit fees, you might want to wait a little bit - but suppliers aren't allowed to charge exit fees for switching in the last 49 days of your fix.

It's also worth pointing out that your monthly DD is only an estimate of your cost - the amount you actually pay depends on your usage. If your DD is too high, your account will build up credit. If your DD is too low, you will build up debt (which it sounds like might have happened to you over the past year). So even on a "fixed" tariff, your DD might vary if you are under/over-paying based on your actual usage.

This does mean that another way to save money on energy is the "old fashioned" way of using less. There's lots of advice on the internet from places like https://energysavingtrust.org.uk/energy-at-home/

 

[curlysouffle]

@itspt95 Thank you very much. Right now I can see on E-ON that I am in £100 credit. However we have just had the summer months where I didn't the heating etc.

 

[micmac]

@curlysouffle Outfox The Market for your energy. Nobody seems to know they exist lol

 

[lsouza]

@curlysouffle Give intermittent fasting a bash.

It's basically food poverty but with a middle class spin.

In all seriousness though just have a qyick look at any plans and or extras on your sky deal etc.

Ditching Netflix, Disney+, Spotify and Sports and Movies packages etc. Can save about 50/60 quid a month. Get ome of those dodgy firesticks instead. For roughly 60 quid thats a years worth of all the above.

Start ebaying some old shit too. I sold some old trainers for a nice little sum. I occasionally enter raffles for hyped up trainers and sell them for double on ebay.

Try switching current accounts etc. Guys make about 300/400 a year doing it.

Have a council dinner once or twice a week. Egg chips and beans or waffles and turkey twizzlers its a fun meal kids love it and cheap as chips.

Change from that middle class bottle of wine 2/3 nights a week to a bottle of Aldi voddy and some coke. Miles more bang for your buck.

Once you start making cuts youll find your way about a bit.

Btw. I'm not even being Sarky i've done all this and more. Come up woth a serious budget but also look at little frivolous things that you can tweak to save cash.

 

[resjudicata]

@curlysouffle We moved into our new place in feb and the duel fuel bill is almost 40 quid more than our previous property. Eon, £120. We shopped around but it was roughly the same deal with every provider.

 

[resjudicata]

@curlysouffle This is certainly not something you can do on a whim but if you are looking to move houses look for recent ones.

Home isolation has advanced a lot, we barely have to turn the underfloor heating on and when we do the cost is extremely low.

In winter this is specially important and a lot of families will see 300£ month bills if we get a harsh one (and live in old properties)

 

[siansarah]

@curlysouffle How young are the children? Nappies and formula age?

I ask because you spend about as much as I do and we’re a family of 5 with two of them being almost-teens. You can probably cut back there quite easily. I do an online shop which saves me about £40 a pop - as in, if I shop in store it’s about £120 but I’m still doing top ups during the week.

 

[missestexas]

@curlysouffle LED Bulbs if you haven't already!

They have a payback period of ~1 year even for decent bulbs (depending on usage obvs, but that number is probably true for the average house). Look at IKEA. If you're on a tight tight budget, look at the areas which you use lights in the most.

It's simple and you should be able to do it yourself.