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Money Box: Inflation and the cost of living crisis

26/03/2022

Inflation and the cost of living crisis

BBC Radio 4 - Money Box, Inflation and the cost of living crisis

Inflation, tax, National Insurance changes, refunding fraud, funeral plan collapse.

Inflation, tax and National Insurance changes, refunding fraud victims, the extra cost of living crisis faced by people with disabilities and the Safe Hands funeral plan collapse.

Inflation is the rise in the price of everything we buy. This week the Office for Budget Responsibility predicted prices would rise more than 7% this year, peaking at nearly 9% this winter. We hear from Isabel Stockton of the Institute of Fiscal Studies, on tax changes and the worst inflation most people have ever seen.

Some very vulnerable people are facing an even worse cost of living crisis than the rest of us. The amount of money that working age disabled adults are allowed to keep from their benefits - the "minimum income guarantee" - has been frozen for 7 years, even though prices have risen. Money Box reporter Dan Whitworth investigates. And we hear from a family affected, and from Jackie O'Sullivan, Executive Director of Advocacy for the learning disability charity Mencap.

The Chancellor is raising the income level at which employees start paying National Insurance. From July, anyone earning less than £12,570 will not pay NI contributions. How will this affect your state pension at retirement age?

Money Box has reported sad stories of people who are manipulated by thieves into investing in what they thought was cryptocurrency. Most retail banks follow a code intended to ensure that victims are refunded where they are groomed into transferring their savings to crooks. However, banks often refuse to refund the money stolen by these psychological techniques. But one bank, TSB, refunds almost everyone. We hear from Paul Davis, TSB's Director of Fraud Prevention. 

And a major funeral plan provider, Safe Hands, goes bust with too little money to honour its promises. What faces their 45,000 customers now?

Presenter: Paul Lewis
Producer: Paul Waters
Reporter: Dan Whitworth
Researcher: Marianna Brain
Editor: Emma Rippon

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