This week (6-10 November) is Talk Money Week. The aim is to encourage you to be more open about your finances with family and friends, as well as getting advice from experts if needed.
Blackbullion
We’re partnered with Blackbullion, a resource for students to improve their finances. Blackbullion has courses you can join and articles including how to build an emergency fund and top 10 money tips.
Help with budgeting
Your student maintenance loan only stretches so far and doesn’t always cover all the essentials. So, it’s important to make sure you’ll have enough money to see you through to your next instalment. Martin Lewis, Money Saving Expert guru, has lots of advice and templates to help, check out here how to create a student budget.
As always, if you are experiencing financial hardship and budgeting just doesn’t cut it, please get in touch for financial support and advice.
Don’t get caught out
University students can be a target for criminals. If something sounds too good to be true, it usually is:
- Money mules – recruiters may try to befriend you and ask you to transfer money between accounts for them, giving you a small cut for doing so. You may think you are doing someone a favour, but you could be transferring criminal money. If you get caught, you could get a criminal record. Find out more about money mules.
- Online scams – Protect yourself from online scams with these tips from Dr Jason Nurse of our award-winning Institute of Cyber Security Research Group.
- Be suspicious of unsolicited emails, texts or calls asking for personal information.
- Be cautious of messages that try enticing you into take some action (e.g. clicking a link or transferring some money).
- Be careful with what personal information you share online, using data from previous breaches fraudsters trick people into thinking it’s genuine.
- Use unique and strong passwords across online accounts – use a reputable password manager app to keep them secure.
- Use multi-factor authentication whenever possible and keep the software updated.
Additional resources and support around your finances