Student Budgeting

Student experience 21 January 2020

First year undergraduate student Alisa writes about how she budgets as a student at the University.

Hi! Today I will be discussing my finances and how I have been budgeting my finances.

1. Member Cards
I didn’t do this when I first arrived but eventually, I made a card for most of the stores which I shop in. For example, Boots, Superdrug, Sainsbury’s, Subway and more. These are very useful in the long run as points add up and you get discounts or free gifts.

2. Student Discounts
Wherever you go, ALWAYS ask whether they have student discounts because, chances are, they do and you will miss out. You don’t realize it at the time, but even the smallest discounts add up!

3. Compare Prices
When shopping for groceries, initially, I just picked what I saw first in whichever store I entered (Sainsbury’s, Morrisons, Tesco, Lidl). However, after going to a couple of them you realize that certain stores have cheaper meat (Sainsbury’s, Lidl), others have cheaper vegetables (Morrisons, Lidl), and some are just better when buying a lot of things (Lidl). I noticed that Lidl is usually the cheapest for most things. However, because of convenience, I usually end up in Sainsbury’s and Morrisons as it is on the way to my accommodation!

4. Rail Card
I often travel to London to meet my friends from back home. Therefore, a railcard was a great investment, because the first trip from Manchester to London basically equals out when buying a railcard and paying for a ticket or simply just buying a ticket at full price! Unfortunately, I didn’t think the three year railcard was as useful at the time and I do regret that decision now.

5. Part Time Job
While I haven’t yet done this, I do believe getting a part time job in my second semester would be beneficial and also provide some experience. However, I didn’t think starting in my first semester would be as useful as I wanted to get a feel of my workload and courses.

By Alisa Khaninya