Debt & Anxiety

OFFICE FOR NATIONAL STATISTICS – OPINIONS AND LIFESTYLE SURVEY

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Financial anxiety in the UK is a growing problem. For companies and corporate engagement teams it is a silent killer of productivity and company culture and the most recent Office for National Statistics survey, in 2023, confirmed the continuing trend as the cost-of-living crisis bites, inflation remains above the Bank of England target rate and geo-political concerns continue to weigh on sentiment.

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A look at the report shows the trend most clearly:

- Between 25 January and 5 February 2023, a fifth of adults (22%) said that they had to borrow more money or use more credit in the last month, compared with a year ago.

- This is significantly higher than between 19 and 30 January 2022, when 17% of adults reported this.

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While this does not necessarily reflect people experiencing problem debt, those needing to borrow money or rely more heavily on credit might be under increased financial pressure.

- More than a fifth (22%) of adults who reported borrowing more money or using more credit between September 2022 and January 2023 reported a low happiness score.

- This is twice the percentage of adults who had not relied more on borrowing or credit (11%).

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Those who were borrowing more were more likely than those who were not borrowing more to report a high anxiety score. More than 4 in 10 adults who were borrowing more money or using more credit had high anxiety ‍

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KNOWLEDGE IS POWER

For corporate wellness teams and those executives charged with addressing and arresting the decline in Financial Wellbeing, there are some simple steps that should be considered. At Prift, our experience is that financial anxiety can be greatly reduced when employees have their finances all together and can view them in an easy format in a real-time environment. Educated communication starts with knowledge and it’s far easier for an individual, or even in some case the employer, to begin the journey to financial security when all the fact are there. ‍

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THE PRIFT PLATFORM

Prift is a secure digital platform that sits at the very heart of your corporate employee benefits package and is designed to help all employees at all levels of your organisation.

With highly personalised financial guidance and using all of the advantages of Open Banking whilst tapping into the nascent advances in Open Finance, Prift is delivering the ultimate Financial Wellbeing platform at a price point that makes securing a financial future and gaining financial literacy, available to all.  ‍

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AND REMEMBER WITH PRIFT...

• No technology integration required into corporate systems,  
• Employees can immediately start to plug in their current and savings accounts, loans, credit cards, ISAs, pensions, mortgages and even house valuations to get a real-time view of their finances and, crucially, a projection into the future.  
• Employees can also benefit from immediate savings on every day household expenses through shopping discounts at a vast array of high street retailers, restaurants and services. ‍

Prift should be the digital platform at the heart of your employee Financial Wellbeing programme.

For more information, contact us