Cost of Living Help
This time is extremely difficult – with energy bills rising, fuel costs rising, rental prices and more. We have therefore tried to pull together some of the local grants being offered in our area as well as some other good money hacks that can also save you a fair bit of cash.
If there is anything new to share we will add it to this page, so please bookmark this and refer back to it – and please share this information with others who might find it useful.
Local funds/schemes you may be eligible for:
- Household Support Fund – £250 fund for low income households – apply here: https://www.northnorthants.gov.uk/benefits/household-support-fund
- If you are retired or over 66 you could be eligible for pension credit, which can be £65 a week on average (and also unlock other savings eg. Free TV licences).
- Family incomes under £30,000 could be due benefits – speak to Accommodation Concern on 01536 416560, or pop in to see them at 1 Meadow Rd, Kettering NN16 8TL.
- If you are upgrading your boiler, or considering it, check out the Government boiler upgrade scheme which could offer you “a grant to cover part of the cost of replacing fossil fuel heating systems with a heat pump or biomass boiler” – https://www.gov.uk/apply-boiler-upgrade-scheme
- Boiler broken in your council house? You can get 2 free temporary fan heaters and £6 per day to help keep you warm.
Useful deals available to everyone
- £2 BUS FARES from Jan 1st to March 31st – this price cap is a very exciting thing, and it’s only until March. Using this if it is useful for you will help prove that if buses were better/cheaper then more people would use them.
- Heat the human, not the home – Martin Lewis, Money Saving Expert created a brilliant cost of living guide: https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/family/cost-of-living-survival-kit/ Within this one of his tips was that heating people is more efficient than heating the air around us – suggestions include having an electric blanket at your desk, hot water bottles, and reusable handwarmers that you can boil. This sort of thinking has also sparked other inventors to share things like DIY induction heaters: https://youtu.be/sZ0CagqamJ4
- Check you are on the cheapest broadband and mobile deal via a comparison site – take a look at https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/compare-broadband-deals/ and https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/cheap-mobile-finder/sim-only/
- Free period products in Morrisons, just ask for ‘Sandy’.
- Get up to £175 for just switching bank accounts. Sadly none of the banks that we would usually recommend you switch to such as Triodos, Monzo or Starling offer this, but Santander, First Line and TSB do. However, these banks are still funding fossil fuels in a big way, so if you do switch to one of these, we’d recommend moving shortly afterward to one of our recommended banks – so you can feel as good as your bank account!
- If you’re struggling to pay your energy bills, contact your supplier. They can work with you to set up a repayment plan and some can offer small grants.
- Get free burgers, doughnuts and more from food apps and clubs, and cheap/free food from other apps like Too Good To Go, Olio and Karma. Greggs also do a free donut on your birthday, Burket King are offering a free burger and chips for signin up to their app, and Subway have been known to give away free subs on world sandwich day. Find more here: https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/shopping/how-to-get-free-or-cheap-food/