2021

Students in England can now sign up to the Student Finance England mailing list and get an email when applications for the 2022/23 academic year open. The invitation to sign up comes with just weeks to go before the UCAS application deadline for undergraduate courses on 26 January 2022.

Today, campaigning journalist Martin Lewis – founder of MoneySavingExpert.com and the Money & Mental Health Policy Institute charity, and the presenter of The Martin Lewis Money Show on ITV – has been awarded a CBE for services to broadcasting and consumer rights in the Queen's New Year Honours.

Facebook has launched a paid-for postal service for its Marketplace, which matches buyers and sellers on a range of items. While the service is free for now, the buyer or seller pays a delivery charge plus the seller faces a 2% fee of total costs. But users can avoid these fees by continuing to arrange delivery or collection themselves.  

Nearly 5,000 bank branches have been closed since 2015 - or are scheduled to be shut - according to data from Which?, leaving millions of people at risk of being cut off from vital banking services.

EE is to start charging new and upgrading customers a flat £2/day roaming fee to use their monthly allowance in Europe from March 2022. The mobile company had said the fee would begin in January but this has been pushed back by two months, meaning rival Vodafone will become the first to enact a roaming fee from the start of next year. 

Even if your car and home insurance is not up for renewal, everyone should get quotes now as in just a couple of days new rules may mean costs will spike.

As another difficult year ends with bad news aplenty, we wanted to lift the mood by warming your cockles with inspiring MoneySaving successes from people who used our tips in 2021. These include a £17,500 chargeback refund after a bathroom botch, an £8,200 overpaid council tax reclaim and £3,000 for flogging rubbish on eBay.

Households across the country are set to face an income hit of £1,200 a year due to rising energy prices, tax increases and wage stagnation, according to a report by the think tank Resolution Foundation.

Aldi, John Lewis and Sainsbury's are among the major retailers bucking trends by closing stores this Boxing Day. However, shoppers hoping to grab a bargain in the traditional Boxing Day sales can still do so with some shops starting in-store sales from 27 December and others launching online sales from 24 December instead. 

Many people whose old energy firm has gone bust are having direct debit payments taken by both their new and old firm. This shouldn't happen and is leaving many short of cash – so why is this happening and what can you do?