Britain’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) has fallen after months of stagnating, dropping 0.2 percent in the three months to November 2023. It comes after figures released in November 2023 recorded zero growth in the three months to September but saw a 0.2 percent surge in the services sector. But critics of the Conservative Party’s stewardship […]
The triple lock increases the state pension each year either by inflation, earnings or 2.5 percent, whichever is highest. It has greatly reduced pensioner poverty since being introduced in 2011. The mechanism also helped maintain the real terms value of the state pension throughout the recent inflationary surge, handing pensioners a 10.1 percent pay rise in April last […]
Chief executive Simon Roberts said over the 16 weeks to January 6, sales of its Taste the Difference range rose by 13% as customers opted to treat themselves at home. Sainsbury’s overall third-quarter till toll, excluding fuel, rose 6.5% and general merchandise 0.9%. Clothing, however, fell 1.7%. Bosses blamed the clothes decline on unseasonably mild […]
NS&I has announced it will be reducing the Premium Bonds prize fund rate from the March 2024 draw. The prize fund rate will drop from 4.65 percent to 4.4 percent, but the odds of any £1 Bond number winning a prize will remain the same at 21,000 to one. Andrew Westhead, NS&I retail director, said: “These […]
More than three million can expect an income boost in April as the Personal Independence Payment (PIP) rate rises by 6.7 percent. Chancellor Jeremy Hunt announced the plans during November’s Autumn Statement, and the uplift will come as much-welcomed news while inflation still runs high at 3.9 percent. PIP is a benefit distributed by the Department […]
The Premium Bonds prize fund rate will be slashed within months, meaning fewer big money wins will be available, NS&I has announced. Savings giant NS&I said the prize fund rate will be reduced, from 4.65% to 4.40% from the March 2024 draw. The odds of winning will remain the same at 21,000 to one, but […]
Retailer Boohoo added “Made in UK” labels on possibly “thousands of clothes” made in South Asia, a BBC Panorama investigation has found. Plain T-shirts and hoodies had their original labels removed at Boohoo’s flagship factory in Leicester between January and October last year. A spokesperson from the fast fashion retailer blamed the mislabelling on a […]
Almost 160,000 state pensioners narrowly missed out on the Winter Fuel Payment for this winter because they began their claim too late. The DWP is being urged to change the rules as 158,803 older Britons missed out on up to £600 through the scheme as they did not claim their state pension until after the […]
A Premium Bonds holder was pleasantly surprised if a bit confused after she discovered she had 23 unclaimed prizes despite never getting a notification about any of them. Twitter user Anne Hodgkins contacted NS&I to ask how she could transfer over her winnings. The retired woman asked the group: “Your app informs me that I […]
Until recently, men retired at 65 and women at 60. Today, neither will get a penny in state pension until they turn 66. From 2026, the retirement age will start rising again, to 67. A decade or so after that, it will rise to 68, and will carry on climbing after that. On current projections, […]
