OXFORD STUDENTS SPEND THE MOST ON TAKEAWAYS

The 2024 NatWest Student Living Index, published in mid-August, shows that students in Oxford on average spend the most on takeaways, averaging at £78 a month.

What we don’t know is whether this reflects the high cost of takeaways in Oxford or something else.

Someone in the office suggests it might reflect intense study habits linked to tutorial deadlines, but we’re not so sure. It might instead indicate greater income or greater surplus income after rent payments that have been subsidised by colleges that allow generous amounts of living in.

It could equally imply compulsive food offerings such as late-night kebabs on Broad Street or up in Summertown.

Or it might show a desire to break out of self-catering and college butteries.

The study in question is commissioned by UK bank Natwest and takes data from more than 6,000 university students. It paints a ‘real-life picture’ of living and studying over the past academic year, in this case 2023-24.

Rent for students in Oxford is on average £763 per month, £74 higher than the UK average, and Oxford students spend on average £148 on supermarket shopping.

In contrast, students in Belfast spend the least on takeaways at £32 per month and have the cheapest household bills at £57 per month.

One of the really big trends nationally is a 154% increase in time spent earning money through part-time employment, to offset costs that have spiralled steeply since the COVID pandemic.

The average student now works 46.39 hours per month, up from 18.3 hours per month in 2023.

We don’t know how that works at Oxford, where traditionally an eight-week term at the University is ideally kept free of paid-work but the long vacations allow employment as well as internships, paid or unpaid.

Students in Salford, Ormskirk and Derby spend the most hours in part-time work, each averaging more than 60 hours a month.

Figures like that are reflected in less time spent studying, to the point where it’s no longer clear what the right mix is – max out debt and get the best possible degree result or settle for a poorer degree result and less debt?

Rents have increased again this year, and faster than inflation, with an average increase of 17 per cent, with the national average monthly rent for students now standing at £689.43.

Incredibly, London has now broken through the £1,000 mark for average rent per month, at £1,032. Sheffield is the cheapest coming in at £481 while Oxford comes in at seventh place at £763, some of that figure no doubt reflecting college subsidies. It might have otherwise rivalled London.

The average cost of a pint has increased by six per cent this year, and London continues to be the most expensive, with students in the capital expecting to pay £5.74 per drink, and 21 per cent often paying between £7 and £8.

More than half of students have found themselves running out of money by the end of term – up from 46 per cent in 2023.

According to the study, only a fifth of students are confident in their money management, and this year’s most popular student activity is having a night in without alcohol, with almost two-thirds of students doing this at least once a fortnight. That's making the brewers a little bit anxious.

Jaimala Patel, head of NatWest Student Accounts, said: 'Students are proactively making changes to increase their income, through part-time work and reducing spending when socialising with friends'.

Perhaps the most worrying statistic is that a quarter of students have fallen prey to a postal or courier delivery scam, and many more for other sorts of fraud.

But back to the takeaway theme.

If you have a golden memory of a takeaway at Oxford let us know and we’ll collate and republish, just to keep the mood buoyant. Almost as interesting are the disasters, one of which involved losing a front bike wheel to a crater-sized hole riding across Port Meadow from The Perch at alcohol-fuelled speed, mid-winter at night, in search of one of those magical burgers served by Walton Street’s Peppers – still open we note, and that anecdote dates from 1992!