MSE Poll: How much are your typical monthly bills?

MSE_Petar

Poll started 28 April 2020

As the UK lockdown continues, many are using the extra time at home to review household finances and cut costs where they can. This week, we want to know how much you USUALLY spend on household bills every month (ie, pre-lockdown) – and how this has changed since the pandemic struck.

Click here to vote in the poll

Did you vote? Are you surprised at the results so far? Have your say below.
If you haven't already, join the forum to reply.
Thanks!

digalumps

What do you mean by bills - which of these are you referring to:

 Gas electricity council tax mobile phone bill landline bill Sky bill TV icencevcar tax car insurance car repayments car servicing child support alimony care home fees mortgage rent netflix bill life insurance house insurance dental treatment funeral plan boiler servicing plan drain repair cover school meals petrol  groceries drink holiday fund membership fees overdraft fees store card repayments gardener cleaner bus fares season ticket ...

MSE_Petar

digalumps said:

What do you mean by bills which ofvthese are you referring to:

 Gas electricity council tax mobile phone bill landline bill Sky bill TV icencevcar tax car insurance car repayments car servicing child support alimony care home fees mortgage rent netflix bill life insurance house insurance dental treatment funeral plan boiler servicing plan drain repair cover school meals petrol  groceries drink holiday fund membership fees overdraft fees store card repayments gardener cleaner bus fares season ticket ...

Hi,

MSE Petar here. Good question!

You should hopefully see the list of bills we're referring to under the relevant question when you click through to the poll (but please let me know if you don't see this).

Just to clarify, for the purposes of this poll, we're taking household bills to mean the following: broadband, council tax, electricity, gas, home phone, mobile phone, TV (licence and subscriptions), streaming services and water. But not mortgage, rent, childcare, food or anything else.

Thanks!

Shakin_Steve

The vast majority stayed the same. Where's the surprise in that? It's exactly what I would have expected.

Frogletina

Impossible to answer. The gas, electricity and water usage has probably increased as I've another family member living with me, but it would take a while for the utilitiy companies to catch up on the increased usage. We use our own mobile phones. It's the food costs which have almost doubled, as I'm buying most of it, but you don't want to know about that. 

burner01

Pretty much all those bills would be static, possible exception being slight increase in electricity and to a lesser extent gas.

Zanderman

MSE_Petar said:

Did you vote? Are you surprised at the results so far? Have your say below.

No. No.
You can't expect an answer to this question yet - most people won't know whether their bills have changed for not yet. Which, surely, you must know without asking. 
I'm surprised it's an official MSE thread, it reads like one of those dodgy polls from one-time posters that appear here now and then.
Ask again, if you must, in 6 months time.
At present it's meaningless (and, with the extra info you're harvesting, it looks like a clumsy attempt to get some demographic data for MSE Towers).  

brewerdave

The largest proportion of that group of bills for most people, is Council Tax . For instance its 65 % of mine! And its gone up by 4.9%, like most households this year. So I imagine most people's bills in this group will have gone up regardless of covid 19

oldagetraveller1

"Are you surprised at the results so far?"

What results? I don't see any. I voted, don't know why, must be bored.

Most are taken via Direct Debit, in fact all, except food, which is about the same depending on weekly requirements. Therefore if any bills change that will not be known until any amendments to Direct Debits are needed, up or down, who knows?

As posted previously, this poll is meaningless currently. What's the reason for it anyway? Data mining?

northwalesd

brewerdave said:

The largest proportion of that group of bills for most people, is Council Tax . For instance its 65 % of mine! And its gone up by 4.9%, like most households this year.

Lucky you, I think ours went up something like 9.8%!

D3xt3r5L4b

Somewhere between £0 and £noneofyourbusiness