Future Ready: Money Skills for Success

Money Skills for Success

Whether you're a current student or thinking about joining UWS, our Funding and Advice Team share their top tips to help you manage your money while a student and stay future ready!

It’s a pretty well-known fact that time as a full-time student can be financially challenging for many; just think about the cliches around surviving on baked beans and pot noodles. While this is true for many students, we’re talking about a small period of your life, where the ends will justify the means, and there are ways to manage on your student income that won’t always involve baked beans!

Your time as a student will also give you the opportunity to develop new skills that will stand you in good stead in the future. If you can learn how to budget and make ends meet while on a stretched student income, you will be better prepared to manage anything that the future might hold. 

Preparation is Key

Planning ahead is the best thing anyone can do before diving into a new experience headfirst. Starting your student journey in the know, and with your student funding in place, is a much better experience than being on the back foot.

Make sure to research the student funding that is available to you for your studies and make sure to apply as early as possible. If anything doesn’t seem right, you then have plenty of time to triple check and correct any issues.

There is a wealth of detail on the UWS website about the student funding that might be available to you, and how you apply.

And if you have any questions about the world of student funding, the UWS Funding and Advice Team are on hand to help and can answer enquiries from both prospective and current students. Email us at fundingadvice@uws.ac.uk

Once you have got to grips with the student funding that you can access, you can start to consider how this impacts your budget. Whether you are new to budgeting, or need to re-evaluate your budget due to changing circumstances, we have lots of guidance to help you do this.

Choices Matter – need v want

Sometimes budgets just don’t add up, and you have more going out than you have coming in. There are 2 ways to fix this.

One is to increase what you have coming in through the likes of part time work, and by applying for additional funds that might exist to help top up student support.

The second is to re-evaluate your outgoings and cut back where possible. This is where choices matter, and we might need to make tough decisions about what we prioritise, or where we need to spend a little time shopping around for the best deal on our bills.

We have lots of advice online to help you re-evaluate your spending, and make your money stretch as far as possible.

Managing Debt

Being a student doesn’t mean you are exempt from the normal costs of living that many people face. This may mean that, in addition to your student loan, you borrow money from commercial lenders, perhaps you have an arranged overdraft, or a credit card for emergencies.

If you find yourself in this position, it’s important to understand how borrowing works, how much it costs, and the impact this can have on your wider finances.

Our top tips for borrowing, to ensure the least amount of negative impact on your future are:

• Try and avoid borrowing as much as possible, and certainly don’t borrow to supplement a lifestyle
• If you do borrow, make sure to stay up to date with payment. Missed or late payments incur charges, which add up, and impact your credit rating. This can impact you in the future when you might be trying to borrow to buy a home, for example.
• Really keep an eye on who you owe, and make sure repayments are considered as part of your budget. Make sure to prioritise debt repayments over other expenses that might not be a priority.

Finding trustworthy advice

Being good with your money is a great skill, and fortunately for us in the UK, free access to lots of advice and guidance is part of our culture, so you’ll often be able to seek help and support, whether that is online materials or in person advice services. But it’s important to recognise when that advice comes from a trustworthy source, particularly in an age where social media can make it easy for anyone to claim to be an expert.

While you are a student, the range of support services available to you from within the University should be considered trustworthy and expert. Staff in these teams are professional and experienced.

Outside of the university, when it comes to money, you should consider these organisations to be trusted sources of consumer and money saving advice:

• Money Helper - free, impartial guidance that’s backed by government
• Citizens Advice – A reputable and well-respected organisation providing support to consumers across the UK
• Money Saving Expert - the UK's biggest consumer website, helping people to be a savvy consumer and get the most out of their money.