LONDON (Parliament Politics Magazine): According to research, shoppers have been stung by the greatest price increases in nearly ten years, with retail inflation nearly doubling in the last month.
As per the BRC-NielsenIQ price index, retail price inflation increased from 0.8 percent in December to 1.5 percent in January.
As fuel prices and utility bills rise, many families are facing a cost-of-living crisis.
According to the most recent official numbers, inflation is at its highest level in 30 years.
In the first week of January, research firm NielsenIQ and the British Retail Consortium (BRC) looked at price changes in 500 commonly purchased items to determine inflation in UK retailers.
Shop pricing increases were at their greatest since December 2012, according to the report.
Costs are rising
The British Retail Consortium’s chief executive, Helen Dickinson, said that shop price rise nearly doubled in January, owing to a strong increase in non-food inflation.
Furniture and flooring, in particular, showed unusually high demand, resulting in price increases as shipping costs rose due to rising oil prices.
Food prices were continuing to rise, particularly for domestic products, which had been [affected] by labour shortages, rising global food prices and poor harvests.
Ms Dickinson also stated that this will have a direct impact on the cost-of-living situation, stating that it would be hard to shield consumers from any future increases in prices.
Retailers are being affected by increased supply issues, greater transportation expenses, and global energy prices with many of these costs being passed on to customers.
Due to Brexit and the epidemic, staff shortages are a particular challenge in the UK, leading some firms to raise salaries, which can add to inflation.
Inflation in the United Kingdom reached 5.4 percent in the year to December, the highest level in 30 years.
However, food poverty activist Jack Monroe claims that prices of common necessities are rising faster than the official inflation rate, putting the poorest people at risk.
Struggling families are coping with expense hikes, particularly skyrocketing energy prices, as a result of a global shortage of gas and energy sources.
Wholesale gas prices have reached previously unheard-of heights. They set a new record of 450p per therm at the end of December, which experts believe could potentially take the yearly fuel bills to £2,000 in the coming year.
Over the last 18 months, raw material and shipping costs have risen for construction supply companies.
BBC Radio 4’s Today programme was told by Timco that a shipping container used to cost around $1,000 (£739), but now costs more than $10,000.
Timco’s finance director, Alex Stephens, said: “The cost of shipping as a percentage of the whole product could have been modest back then, maybe a single digit percent, but now it’s guessed to be somewhere between 20% and 50% of the price.
Right now, they were bringing in containers from the Far East, where the transportation cost is almost identical to the cost of the products we’re bringing in, he explained.
To tell you the truth, nothing had become better. Things were actually worsening, he said.
