Laura Caine said she has been left with no choice as she can’t afford to feed her kids
George Mathias and Kate Lally
08:39, 03 Jul 2024
A mum whose household income is £62,000 a year has said she has to use Klarna to be able to afford food shops.
Laura Caine, 40, receives £1,000 a month in Universal Credit payments, while her husband Martin earns £50,000 a year working as a games programmer. The couple has five children, aged 18 to nine, and say feeding their family three meals a day has become so expensive they have to use the buy-now-pay-later service.
Laura said that in recent months she has not been able to afford to pay for a big shop upfront. The mum said she and Martin have both maxed out their credit cards after their energy bill shot up to £450-a-month from £200.
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Laura, who lives in Huddersfield, said: “I’ve seen the struggles of so many families. I’ve been to food banks with mums and dads with their kids, waiting and wondering what they will be getting, it’s awful.
“The way I shop now, if I have £35 to spend for the week, I could get a £105 shop using Klarna and that’s £105 worth of food in your cupboards and pay £35 per month back for three months.
“If I do it this way it means I can take my kids to places once a month like museums or a train ride somewhere.”
Laura says she has been left with no choice but to use Klarna for her food shop due to her circumstances, but wouldn’t encourage others to do the same. She said: “The last shop I did I spent £1,050 and am paying £350 back each month.
“The same shop used to be £500 before covid which just shows how much costs have gone up. But it will last me a month and a half, which is not bad for a family of seven.”
Laura added: “I’ll get 10 packets of carrots at 65p a bag and prep them and put in the freezer. Potatoes I’ll get 10 bags and keep them in our cellar.
“I buy fresh meat and freeze it as well as flour and butter as I make giant tray bake cakes in the big tray for the oven, I also get crisps and squash.”
Laura said she also frequents wholesalers to buy bulk essentials like toilet rolls and flour to make bread. She continued: “Last year my benefits switched to Universal Credit, whereas before I was on Tax Credits, and it has given me a cash flow problem.
“Instead of getting paid once per week I got paid once per month, which made things even more challenging, which is why I’ve had to start using Klarna. It just means if an emergency pops up like having to pay for an MOT or gas bill, even though it is more money, in the long run it allows me to make ends meet.”
Laura cooks all meals from scratch and freezes prepped vegetables to ensure nothing is wasted. She said: “I’ve got big freezers, I home-school my five kids and always make sure there are three meals a day.
“For lunch time I usually make sandwiches with meat that I’ve cooked or sometimes cooked meat I’ve already bought. With seven people in the house having three meals a day that’s 588 meals a month.”
Laura says something needs to be done about the costs-of-living crisis which is still hurting families “every bit as badly”. She said: “Kids need to be fed and the older generation is also struggling. People need to be helped out much more by the government.”
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