The average Brit will spend £686,000 on household bills over a lifetime, a study has found.
The poll of 2,000 bill payers found the average household will fork out £11,379 a year on energy and water bills, mortgages or rent, insurance and loans.
That amounts to £686,125 over the average adult lifetime, with £57,982 of this spent on energy bills alone.
A spokesman for Compare the Market, which commissioned the study, said: “Bills account for a large amount of our outgoings, and yet a number of Brits don’t even know what they’re paying for.
“Whether it is their energy bills or another supplier, some people even confess to not reading bills as a result of the complexity of understanding them.”
A whopping £48,800 is spent on entertainment and communication, as we allocate funds to TV packages and telephone contracts.
Protecting ourselves with insurance payments are costing £52,106 over a lifetime, with car insurance creating the biggest dent in wallets of all of these payments at an average of £16,187.
Council tax payments are coming in at £118 each month, totalling a whopping £85,450 during an adult life.
A further £66,144 is frittered away on loan repayments over a lifetime, which results in it’s own own vicious lifecycle as almost a quarter admit to using credit cards or loans in order to help pay the bills.
And 14 per cent will turn to their parents for financial support.
Worryingly, a number of Brits don’t know what they are paying for, with a third unaware of what their electricity bill covers.
It also emerged almost one sixth of adults reckon payments are harder to understand today than in previous years.
This difficultly in understanding energy invoices means one in six won’t even bother to read their statements.
And half of bill payers would back an appeal for energy suppliers to make bills easier to understand.
In spite of this, just 12 per cent have moved suppliers for statements that were easier to understand.
Nearly two thirds agree they would like to see a variety of household bills simplified.
The research, conducted via OnePoll.com, also found mobile banking was the most useful innovation to help make life easier, followed by contactless payments and online grocery shopping.
Surprisingly, voice assistants came out as one of the least beneficial modernisations in recent years.
A desire to simplify energy bills has prompted comparethemarket.com to start a petition, backed by John Penrose to see a change made, which can be found here: https://www.change.org/p/ofgem-making-energy-bills-easy-let-s-make-our-energy-bills-simple-to-understand
John Penrose, MP for Weston, Worle and The Villages said: “I am supporting this petition with Compare the Market as I believe that energy bills need to be simplified.
“There are millions of individuals and families across the UK left at a loose end when trying to decipher their energy bills. This is the first step to a more transparent energy industry.
“Once we have tackled this, it will give both families and individuals alike the sovereignty to make informed decisions when both changing energy supplier or querying their bills.”
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