What are your top tips for saving money at university?

My top tip is to bring a refillable water bottle. There are various drinking fountains in uni. Not only it saves you money, but it helps you use less plastic!

1. Get accustomed to the food here in the UK. Buying and keeping up with the food from your country might be too costly.

2. Try charity shops. The money spent there is used for charity and you could get good quality for really low prices.

3. Plan your travels and trips. Use the buses and trains more. You can save costs with day ticket savers for both.

4. Have a budget for bills, spendings, rent and plan.

5. Save more, spend less.

Try to shop at a cheap supermarket. I usually do my main shop at Aldi then I will go to B&M to pick up anything else during the week. Also try to prepare lunch in advance so you don’t have to spend out on campus.

My simplest tip for saving money is to only spend money when you really need too. Prioritise your essentials over everything else. So food, transport, and toiletries. In terms of spending money on luxuries like going out or eating takeaways or going to restaurants I would really recommend getting a job. I’ve only gotten a job at the end of first year, but if I had gotten a job at the start of the year I would’ve been able to be less careful about how much money I was spending etcetera. There’s always jobs in bartending and the food industry around Ormskirk.

My top tips for saving money at university would be:

- Eat in as much as possible. Packed lunches are such a good option when money saving.

- Do some research into easy, cheap and tasty meals at university and you will find some that would for you. My favourites are chilli con carne, beans on toast and pasta : )

- Don’t drink a lot of alcohol at bars. Drinking out can be really expensive. My advice if you want to drink would be to either have a drink before heading out or just have a few. Lime and soda are such an amazing and cheap alternative to alcohol and are so much cheaper. No one will even know! I always have had lime and soda nights out when money has been tight :)

- Try to be flexible about brands, Aldi’s own brand is fabulous.

- Consider getting involved in free activities at uni. Not every social occasion has to be super expensive! Edge Hills Student Life Portal can be used to find out about all the fun and free events we have going on campus:) For example, I recently attended a free Comedy Night at Edge Hill with my friends with I really enjoyed and was something a bit different. Look out for things like this you can get involved in on the portal.

Student Life also arrange free trips which are amazing to get involved in! Examples of last year's trips included Ikea, the Trafford Centre and the Lake District. These can be such fun days out where you don’t have to spend much!

The gym have the gym classes which are a fun thing to do with friends or on your own which are included in your gym membership.

- Speak to our Money Advice team. They are fab and can help with all things saving from banking, budgeting and funding. You can also chat to them if you are having money worries and they will do their best to support you. They can give you more information about our Student Support fund which can be granted as an emergency support to students facing financial difficulty.

: )