The way I see it, the cost of living crisis is DEFINITELY NOT OVER, nor looks likely to be over in the coming months or years.

I believe the ongoing cost of living crisis is pushing up prices in every sector of the economy and the country as a whole is still suffering.

Around where we live petrol costs have crept back up again. (Were down to £1.35 p/l now back at £1.52). An average weekly food shop for 1 adult /1 child is coming in around double what we were paying back in early 2022. We've basically quit buying anything other than what meals we might like a few days at a time to avoid throwing away food that perishes easily. So no choice with fresh fruits or veg, dairy produce or fancy extras like dips desserts or pre prepared salad items. Even supermarket pizza is around £6 upwards. That's a pizza meant for 1 person by the way - at home.

We ate takeaway last week. I was shocked it came to £20 two meals. I had chicken cashew nut with fried rice, the sauce was watered down, the meal was full of large watery onion & green peppers with about 5 half cashew nuts in the entire serving?! Seems to me everywhere is feeling the pinch!?

I've had car insurance renewal up over £100 on last year's price which is an outrageous amount to have to pay. Thankfully I've shopped around to find cheaper but not easy to do.

Nothing is any cheaper. Quarterly water rates jumped up by £30 earlier this year!!!? Not just a few extra pound.

Obviously I've also seen an increase in energy bills over the last few months.

There's no increase in my payments to account for the extra costs. In fact it's been both in the news and social media that the government are looking to cut benefits for those with long term health conditions. I am livid with their measures. I jump through enough hoops to take their rigged tests already! If I could work I would. I loved my old job.

I have basically gone without so much of this last year just to afford to cover the day to day bills. I've been wearing old bikini tops as I haven't been able to afford new underwear as it's no longer fitting or falling apart. Does nothing for your self esteem at a medical appointment to not have clean well fitting underwear.

Once upon a time I could take my two youngest shopping and tell them, "no problem! We can afford the luxury products", at the supermarket!!! We didn't have to worry about the bank balance or the account having enough in it to cover meals out when I couldn't face shopping /cooking, or the cinema to cheer up up/end of the week treats, etc.

So in my view, no it hasn't gone away. The cost of living crisis is still very much alive and kicking and here to stay by the looks of things. 😤

Hiya all it was my son's first day of high-school yesterday I had to pay £10 for this week's bus fare, then have to pay £37 for a monthly pass, then it's £48.50 for school meals for the month, not including the £206 on uniform, branded shoes and branded coat, and If I didn't buy him branded there is a chance he could be bullied as this is a starting point – what a nightmare! The things we have to do to try and ensure your child doesn't get bullied, as this is my worst nightmare. He did enjoy it but only year 7 & 11 were allowed back yesterday, so waiting to see what today brings as all the years are back today, my anxiety is through the roof.

I'm excited to get my routine back, but nervous as my son is going to high-school, so everything will be new and it'll cost even more money as school dinners have gone up in price – also expecting the bus fares to follow.

That’s a very hard question to answer.

I make a lot of ideas up of things that I want to do or that need doing.

Some thing happens that ends up putting a stop to it.

I’ve dreamt of learning to drive over the past few years but then I just can’t afford to do the lessons and buy a car.

I have put a new plan in place in regards to controlling money better so it’s not spent wrong and hopefully that will allow me to save.

Partner started a new job back in May, which if he does really well there is a good chance of being on a higher wage and sorting our lives out

It's really hard to plan for the future financially at the minute because there's no excess funds. I was on at the media recently and they asked this question how do you feel about the government telling people that they need to save now for the winter? Well, I just couldn't believe it because at the end of the day, people are already struggling. I'm affected by the 20 pound uplift already that was taken away a long time ago, also by the hunger payments for free school meals. And literally there are no extra funding and no extra money. So how are people supposed to think about the future when they're just being forced and plunged into thinking about the now and the then and here and the now? It's literally crazy that even the government have these expectations of people to start saving now for even the winter. I mean, you can't. And with the lack of hunger payments for the free the people entitled to free school meals, I'm really struggling this summer and it's only going to get worse.

I'm worried already that I move my child schools because of his additional needs, but he's not that high up in the spectrum in order to get transportation help. So now I'm going to have this extra money every month that I don't even know where I'm getting it from, but I keep him in a school that doesn't cater for his needs because I can't afford to send them on a bus, or do I go on a bus with them and just suffer the consequences of the amount of money that it's going to cost? I'm not even laughing and saying this, but people are going to have to sell kidneys. You can't think of the future because there's just not enough money to go around and.

The future petrifies me.

I used to plan for things such as if my rent went up, school holidays, birthdays, children changing schools, if my car broke, mots and much more but right now I freeze. Its heart breaking not being able to plan and having to live hand to mouth day to day.

Just recently I got a nail in my tyre on the school run, I have no expendable income and I had to beg and plead with family members to help me. After food and bills I have nothing spare to save for such incidents and that is the difference between independence and being stuck with no transport and 3 children in 3 different educational settings

It's really difficult to deal with additional school costs because already the uniform is so expensive. And anybody that says that just because your child is entitled free school meals, their school is free, it's not. So not only do you have stationery costs, et cetera, but the trips, the school trips in June were horrendous because over in Northern Ireland there were budget cuts. It meant that something that would have cost £3 cost £15. We're talking about a free trip to the museum, which is free. The museum is free to get into the Ulster Museum in Belfast. But the cost of the transportation was £10 which I thought was horrific because it's a bus and therefore I did not know what to do. But I have to do it because then my child would feel like he wasn't valuable or that he felt different or he didn't feel worthy enough to go on this trip. I just can't believe the astronomical cost. The schools used to be able to fund part fund. Then my daughter had an attendance trip, which is amazing. She's in secondary school, my son's in primary school, and again it was, oh, your child has won an award because they have an attendance trip. And yet it was so expensive. The bus was the same price as what my son's bus was, but they were like 3 hours away. My daughter and my son was only in the center of Belfast, about 15 minutes away, so I paid for that. And then they needed like, costs for getting on all the rides off the Fun Park. So these extra costs, of course, they're not compulsory, as in don't send your child in the trip, but then your child is the only one that's not going on trip. So then what do you do? So I'm not really coping well, to be honest, with the extra costs. And there's hidden costs everywhere. Like, my son can't eat certain foods and on those days I have to give him pack lunches.

So fed up today got paid on the 25th June, nothing left and somehow have to pay 157.50 for rest of term childcare, then this switches to £140 per week in 6 week’s holiday, I have to pay my car insurance, I have my MOT running out in a week and have school dinners, petrol, food, etc I need to buy… How do we go about selling legs or kidneys because I’ve maxed out credit cards. I’ve no options left, can see me having to give up my car but then I’ll loose my job.

It as a single parent that works full time. My child's care comes to 400 pound in term time. However, in school holidays it triples. So for the six week holiday, I'm about 1200. So it's hard to say a monthly income when you've got kids, because you have times of the years that fluctuate. On average, I would say rent being 600, childcare being 600. On average, you got your council tax, gas and electric. Gas and electric is 210 pounds a month at the moment. It's ridiculous. I don't think anyone could survive on less than 2500, especially when you have to drive to work, put petrol in and buy food. This world is just not built for people to survive anymore. I cannot afford to get my car MOT and repaired because I have got nothing extra and I work full time. It's beyond a joke.

Buses.

Our local town is in a political battle of blame over buses. Our town has one bus provider, Arriva, and they're saying they'll cut buses to essential places (including no longer servicing the bus stop by the mental health hospital) by early July cos local council won't give them enough in subsidies (shockingly it's mostly the routes that service the elderly and disabled that are getting cuts, the ones full of concessionary bus fares). Local council has gone public saying the bus service is using cutting routes to hold council to ransom with most vunerable users cos they want more money that every other bus service in the outta area has happily accepted. While they fit for tad on who's the blame and will council pay more or will arrica cut these essential services. And I'm sitting here, trying to figure out how I'm meant to get to therapy without the bus, taxis are £10.50 one way to mental health hospital, I can't afford a two way trip once a week. Let alone all the other groups and services I attend to help manage my mental and physical health.

I applied for a concessionary bus pass, in April, still not heard from them.

It seems like such a small problem to most, but it isn't to those of who trapped and restricted by these service cuts left right an center.

I hope either arriva back down and keep the services, or council pays then to keep it. I'll be angry at arriva for the latter, council tax is already so high as it is and it's not like we have any other choice there are no other bus services except arriva in out town.

Oh but don't forget while all this goes one people get blamed for using their cars and clogging up the roads, gov and drs and who knows who else say "use the bus, ditch the car, save the planet" and that's pointless with no buses to use, or when those buses can use the vunerablity of elderly and disabled service users to bully the council into paying them more. If they do get paid more they'd still up their costs and not pay their drivers enough. Greedy fits.

Been a really hard day was told it would cost over £1100 to fix my car after a terrible MOT, only paid £1400 originally, but with living in a rural area we need a car. Its so annoying, I cant seem to find a cheap car just to get us by, my partner has mobility issues but we are still waiting for mandatory reconsideration from PIP, its just so frustrating. I am unable to see how with the cost of living and everything else how we are meant to make ends meet.

This is a hard one, because it would depend if it included rent as well, with UC it includes your rent payment, also depends on how many children you have and then add on disabilities in the household, it would be wrong to put a figure on this as i would not like to come across as greedy, but due to circumstances right now, we have just lost our car due to MOT and there is no price you could give to allow me to have a car where we live, as we live in a rural location that only has a bus every hour in the day. So with all these issues i could not put a value on this. See adequate is different for everyone. So i am unable to put a figure.