Debt management required for 50 to 64-year-olds?

People aged between 50 and 64 years old could soon find themselves in need of debt help as it has been revealed individuals in this bracket face the highest rate of inflation.

According to figures from the Alliance Trust Research Centre, it is the ninth consecutive month consumers of that age have been hard hit and the rate for these consumers now stands at 4.5 per cent.

Such a position has been reached and maintained primarily because these people spend more of their disposable income on transport, which is where inflation remains at the relatively high level of nine per cent.

Moreover, fuel price inflation is currently at 16 per cent.

Another group to be adversely affected in the last month was the over-75s, whose rate escalated from 3.3 per cent to 3.6 per cent and was due mainly to higher food prices.

However, these individuals still faced the lowest rate of all age categories.

The headline rate of inflation overall, though, fell in the month of June from 3.4 per cent to 3.2 per cent.

This showed a continuation of the declining trend that was initiated a month earlier in May.

Shona Dobbie, head of the Alliance Trust Research Centre, noted: “Food price inflation has started to increase once more, as have the costs of some household services; contributing to this month’s increase in the inflation rate facing the over-75s.”

Figures recently released by moneysupermarket.com found the British public to have a lackadaisical attitude towards their monetary situations, as 35 per cent are not concerned by the prospect of a debt collector appearing on their doorstep.

By Joe Shervin