Monthly Cost of living:
Accommodation : £400 - £1200 p.m. (for an independant living, with family. Shared accommodation for families are also available. This usually includes boarding, electric, water, kitechen utilities (oven, cooking range, gas supply) and bathroom (washing machine), where cleaning is offered once a week only.)
Council Tax : £70 - £150 p.m. ( If you stay alone you can claim a discount from them.) Age of the building, insulation etc. decide how much you pay to the Council. This is utilised for schooling, security and waste management in your locality.
Electricity : £60-£100 p.m. (usualy higher during the winter months, from October to March) . some of the famous electric suppliers in UK are : e-On, Scotttish Power, British Gas, npower, Southern Electric. Cost of repairs if you rent a house: http://www.whatprice.co.uk/electrician/
Communication : Telephone / cell / broadband / landlines: £30-£70 p.m. (BT, O2, Orange, Virgin, T mobile, Vodafone & 3 are some famous communication providers in UK.)
News papers cost 60p to £2.50 daily. (The Times, Daily Telegraph, Daily Mail & Gaurdian are some of the prominent printed dailies.). Books and periodicals can be accessed via the local libraries. Buying theme can be quite expensive.
Water : £50 - £70 p.m. ( Anglian, Yorkshire water etc.)
Food : £250 - 400 p.m. (for a family of 2 adults and a child), can be less by upto 50%, if staying alone in an accommodation.) Tesco, Sainsbury's, Morrison's & ASDA, which are major retail outlets of UK.
Travel : £50 - £120 p.m. (Taxis in UK can be quite expensive, they can cost £1 a mile to £3 a mile, in London, due to high congestion, they charge based on time.)
Check out National Express &
The Train Line for your bus & train travels in UK.
London Underground / Tube.
The cost of cars in the United Kingdom can also be significantly higher compared to getting them from their places of origin like Germany and Italy. A decent used (7-9 yrs. old) family car can cost upwards of £600. Having an International Driving License (with longer validity), working spouse with a driving license can help reduce the cost of car Insurance by half.
Driving in UK: Visitors with a foreign licence may drive in the UK provided their licence is valid for more than 12 months from the date of entry into the UK.
If you wish to continue driving after this period, you will need either to exchange your foreign licence for a British licence or to obtain a provisional UK licence and pass a UK driver’s test before the 12 months is up.
A provisional licence is the equivalent to the learner’s licence that you need to obtain before you can go for your driver’s test. To apply for your provisional driver’s licence, contact the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) directly at:
Email: drivers.dvla@gtnet.gov.uk
Website: www.dvla.gov.uk
Leisure : £20 - £your limit. p.m. (Sky, connections for cable etc.) A movie ticket can range abywhere between £4.6 to £10 per show. While theatres/ live stage shows are a rage in the UK ( esp. London.), costing anyweher between £10 to £100 each.
Taxi between Heathrow and Central London: £40-£70.
Currency: National currency is the British pound (sterling) (GBP), with one hundred pence to each pound. Notes are issued in the value of £50, £20, £10 & £5. Coins to the value of £2, £1, 50p, 20p, 10p, 5p, 2p, & 1p.
Value Added Tax (VAT) is @15.0% which is payable on most retail purchases. (reduced from 17.5% in November 2008, due to the recession in the UK and around the world, which was valid till 2010. Now 20% in 2016.).
Visit Office of National Statistics for economic releases on UK
Some Lastminute help, You can check lastminute.com, for a host of deals and bargains on Hotel, flight & accommodation in the UK.
Cost saving tips in UK:
There are host of websites which compare prices across various segments of the market from food, to cars to insurance to clothes. e.g. MySupermarket.co.uk can come handy, which compares prices across different websites. Gocompare for Insuarance etc.
Security:
It was in London where Big Brother ( also a famous reality show on TV ) was coined, owing to high number CCTVs ( Close circuit cameras, close to 600,000, highest in the world ) in public places, for security of the people. It is said an average person is captured 200 times by the cameras in London, making it one of the highest in security in the world.
Accommodation in UK
Have you found accommodation in the UK yet? If you are looking for a place to stay for the first couple of weeks after your arrival, we have a few sites for you to visit and on which to find accommodation.
- If you are sociable and who would like to meet people from all over the world, then why not stay in a hostel/backpackers lodge? They are inexpensive and will know all the great places to visit and clubs to go to, and there will be lots of lots of people to enjoy these activities with you. Click here to find a hostel.
- The YMCA also provides accommodation for people travelling to the UK. You can use them as a support base for the beginning of your stay. Have a look at what they can offer you by clicking here.
- Want to share a flat? Have a look on the Gumtree advertising website if you would like to organise a room for yourself in a flat share before you leave. There are many rooms available all over the UK.
Bank Account: There are various prominent banks in UK vis-a-vis HSBC, Lloyds TSB, ICICI Bank, Barclays, NatWest etc, who offer easy ways of opening a bank account. Usully needing your passport and address proof in the UK top open the account.
Credit Card: Credit cards may not be easy to avail of, as it depends on your credit worthiness and your roots in the UK. Ideally anyone who has been living in the UK for more than 3 years. Experian is one of the reputed & trustworthy names doing the credit Checks and providing vital information about your background. (having details on your address, loans, credit cards, employment, voting status, direct debit mandates etc.) Typical rates vary from 16% APR to 39% APR.
Loans: (Home Loans, Personal Loans, Mortgages) As is the case with Credit Card, securing loans too require excellent background and credit rating. However, unsecured Loans are also available but at exhorbitant interest rates, which can go upto 140% p.a., where you re-pay them weekly.
Cost of living for students: You can get more tips here : http://www.educationuk.org/UK/Article/Budget-planning-in-the-UK
Feb 2016
People who want to stay and work in UK, keep in mind that cities which may seem small are not necessarily cheap. You will need to pay attention on the university that city may have and how well it may be doing in terms of attracting international students. One such example is the city of York ( which was recently flooded in Dec 2015), is very expensive when it comes to housing, for the single reason of hosting the University of York. A single bedroom can start from £500 per month while a double beds are hard to come by for anything less than £600 per month. Also, for people who are not students, most of the time the accommodation is not available in around the University area.
