With the cost of living crisis about to get even worse in the UK, I feel your pain. I am a struggling working mum trying to make ends meet! That’s why I’ve carried out a bit of research and put together some top money saving tips for cost of living crisis in the UK for families and struggling households. I hope this helps make your money go further. Please in turn share your money saving tips for others in the comments below.

1. Free Food: Use the Olio App

Use the Olio App for surplus food offers from your neighbours and local businesses. The app allows any surplus food you may have to be shared rather than go to waste. This could be spare home-grown vegetables, bread from your baker, the snack you bought the kids that they hate, or the groceries in your fridge when you go away. You can arrange the pick-up of the items via private messaging and it’s all free. It’s not just food either! Neighbours are listing all kinds of things.

As an example, when I look at my app now the available listings include a jar of coffee (just 1 mile from me – the only food item in my radius), kids’ extra large birthday helium balloons (age 4), a damaged but working tumble dryer, kids sand pit, mamas and papas baby bath and lots of books and lots of clothes – all for free and a short distance away.

Free to use, free to download, free to list and free to pick up! Perfect for anyone struggling this winter.

2. Discounted Food: Use the Too Good To Go App

I love this app. The Too Good To Go app is easy to use. Once you’ve downloaded the app and signed up, you can search for unsold food near you. This can be from supermarkets or restaurants. For example near me listed right now, I have Budgens ‘Magic Bag’ for £3.33. I can collect it today between 19.30 and 20.30. I have no idea what will be in the bag but it will consist of food that is due to expire soon and would have gone to waste. There’s also a local brewery that has a 12-pack of their wheat beer for £15, the Harvester Salad Bar Magic Bag for £2.99 and Starbucks Magic Bag for £5 – can you imagine the cakes in that one?! All of these options are just a walk or short drive away (and I live in a small town)!

It is of course a bit of a lucky dip. Everything is valued much higher than what you’re given but you have absolutely no choice about what’s in there. It’s a selection of what otherwise would have gone to waste. It is a brilliant idea and a great way to avoid food waste and help struggling households.

3. Discounted Food: Go Shopping after 7pm

If you go shopping later in the day you may well find reduced items. It’s also a nice time to shop as less busy!

4. Free Food: Go foraging

Have you seen how expensive blackberries are in the supermarket?! They are FREE outside. Just grab a bag and your wellies and go pick a load. You can freeze some and make a delicious smoothie throughout the year. Wild garlic and sweet chestnuts are another foraging favourite.

When foraging, make sure you know what you’re picking and eating. Don’t take risks as it could be dangerous and there are some things that need to be avoided. Blackberries are a safer bet!

5. Cut Energy Usage: Switch to LED Bulbs

Change all your bulbs to LED before the energy hike. LED light bulbs are much more energy efficient than traditional incandescent or fluorescent light bulbs. In fact, they can save up to 90% of electricity and last 8.5 years. The best part is, you can buy them in lots of high street shops and online.

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6. Cut Energy Usage: Boil kettle just once and use a Thermo Flask

Kettles can use a surprising amount of energy, especially if you’re using it throughout the day. One money saving tip is to boil the kettle once each morning, fill up a thermal flask and then use that flask throughout the day.

7. Cut Energy Usage: Heat your body not your home

If you have health issues including asthma, infants, elderly or the vulnerable this may not be viable so please be careful. Also if the weather is extreme this is not the best option and being cold can impact your mental health. However, one way to cut on energy usage is to head the body not the home. Our much loved Martin Lewis has been sharing advice from his readers on how to heat the human. This includes using:

• Heated throws/blankets. Martin shares that a single electric blanket has a running cost of £1.92 a week.
• Use a hot water bottle. Martin shares that a 1.5ml hot water bottle has a running cost of £1.43.
• Keep hands warm with USB gloves. Martin shares that plugged into a USB the running cost will be 7p a week.

There’s some good tips on my hot to heat a tent blog post that might actually be helpful for the home this year!

8. Cut Energy Usage: Keep your feet warm!

Having cold feet always makes all of me feel cold! Keep your home cosy, and your feet snug by having lots of warm fluffy rugs, fleecy socks and slippers.

8. Improve your home’s ventialation: Fitted Curtains

According to some sources 27% of your yearly heating bill goes to make up for heat loss through windows. Kuppa Co-Founder Kirsty Kenney says, “At Kuppa we know that thermal lined curtains can result in big benefits; reducing heat loss through your windows by 27% and saving an average home up to £291 a year on energy bills. And that saving will increase if energy prices go up again. Choosing well-fitted curtains is key to saving big this winter.”

Stitched founder Elinor Pitt says, “Curtains aren’t just an aesthetic feature in your home, and using them in the wrong way could be multiplying your already rocketing energy costs. The great thing about made-to-measure curtains is that they are the perfect fit for your windows and can be tailored to include a lining of your choice – making an immediate difference in insulating your homes and keeping your rooms warmer in the colder months”.

9. Improve your home’s Ventialtion: Draught Excluder

Another way to improve your home’s ventilation is to buy a draught excluder. A draught excluder works efficiently by stopping cold air from entering your home and warm air air from leaving your home!

10. Save Money: Use Charity Shops for clothes and presents

Anyone who reads my blog knows that I love a good charity shop haul! Charity shops can be like Aladdin’s cave – you never know what you might find! You can get amazing clothes for a fraction of the price. Charity shops are also great for presents. You can often get new (still in the packet) gifts. Or how about a lovely set of wine glasses or china tea cups, handbags or scarves? If you cleverly wrap these they will look like a wonderful gift. Plus you will be doing your bit for the environment too.

11. Save Money: Use Slow Cooker or Air Fryer

The slow cooker and air fryer use up less energy than a conventional oven. Plus you can batch cook now and freeze for meals throughout the winter when the energy prices rise. We have the Ninja Foodi. It’s lasted us over 3 years and is still going strong. We use it most days at least once a day and it even goes camping with us!

An oven has been estimated to cost with the new 22p/kWh as 52p an hour whereas a 200w slower cooker is 10p an hour.

Batch cooking is a great way to save as well. You can bulk up meals with lots of vegetables to make it go further. Freeze portions for another dinner.

12. Save on TV Subscriptions: Switch to Sky Q basic

Sky q basic is the cheapest package from Sky. It offers a lot of benefits to its customers and it’s worth considering if you want to save money.

The Sky Q Basic package is the cheapest way to get Sky TV. It provides all the channels you would expect from a basic package, such as BBC One, ITV, Channel 4 and Channel 5. It also has a number of exclusive channels like Sky Sports Main Event and Sky Cinema Premier.

It’s perfect if you don’t want to spend too much money on TV or if you just want to watch the basics.

13. Save on TV Subscriptions: Subscribe to Disney using Tesco Clubcard Points

There are a number of ways to get subscription services such as Disney without having to pay out from your valuable finances. You can turn every £6 in vouchers into £18.00 to use with Disney+ 3-month subscription. Or alternatively, if you’re new to O2 or upgrading, you can get up to 6 months of Disney+ on them. Enquire when joining their network or renewing.

14. Save on Books and Toys: Borro them from the Library

If your child is learning to read or just loges stories, don’t spend a fortune buying them. Go to the library. The books are completely free to borrow and most libraries have an amazing selection these days. Some libraries even have toys you can borrow so pop to your library to learn more about what’s available in your area.

15. Save Petrol Costs: Walk to School

It looks like we’re going to have to use our legs more! It takes me about 35 minutes to walk my son to school and back. Time is precious so I take my headphones for the walk back and try and listed to an audiobook or affirmations.

16. Save Petrol Costs: Find the cheapest fuel

When it’s time to fill up have a look to see where is the cheapest place for fuel in your area. Check petrolprices.com to find the cheapest fuel.

17. Save Petrol Costs: Download Petrol Station Apps

Some petrol stations have their own apps and some of these have offers for customers. We saved 10p per litre the other day using the Shell Petrol App.

18. Make Money: Sell on Vinted, Ebay, Music Magpie and Facebook Marketplace

It’s not just about saving, it’s about ways to make money too! If you have clothes your kids have outgrown or you no longer love, if they are still in good condition, then list them on Vinted or Facebook Marketplace. If you have a load of old books you no longer read, check out apps like music magpie or ziffit. Car boot fairs are a great place to sale all kinds of things you no longer want or need in your home. Or if your kids are older why not try selling your baby clothes, equipment, toys and accessories at an NCT Nearly New sale.

19. Make Money: Take part in surveys

Whilst you’re not going to get rich filling in surveys, if you have some spare time it is a way you can make a bit of extra cash or convert survey points to Amazon vouchers.

Things to know, if you’re doing surveys as a hobby your first £1000 of earnings is tax free. Anything above this you will need to pay tax on. If unsure about what you need to pay tax on check with a professional. Also never pay to take part in a survey. You are the one who should be getting paid. If they are asking for money it is possible it’s a con.

Some online survey sites to get you started are Swagbucks and Ipsos iSay

20. Learn about Money

If like me you didn’t learn about how to manage your money at school, and well, feel a little bit clueless as to how to save money, don’t worry. It’s not too late to learn. There are some great books available on this subject and I also have a blog post, on the best books on how to save money. To save money get them out from the library. Or take a look on YouTube as there are some really good videos offering money tutorials. Always remember when it comes to money though to be careful and do your won research.

Conclusion: Money Saving Tips for Cost of Living Crisis in UK

I hope these money saving tips have been helpful. I will be sharing lots more advice over the next few weeks especially around making Christmas affordable this year so please subscribe to my blog.