Money blog: UK recession confirmed; Taylor Swift tickets scam (2024)

Official figures published at 7am have confirmed the UK entered a recession inthe second half of last year.

As we explained when we reported the recession news in February, the figures were subject to revision - but the Office for National Statistics has now confirmed there were two consecutive quarters in which the economy shrank.

There was a 0.1% contraction between July and September, and a 0.3% fall between October and December.

Data and economics editor Ed Conway said: "This is probably going to be one of the shallowest recessions we've ever seen.

"When we use the R word, we usually associate it with high unemployment, a really big fall in gross domestic product, which is just total national income.

"In this case, unemployment is still relatively low. National income has gone down a bit.

"But none of this changes the fact the overall picture is pretty bleak, especially for a lot of people."

Chancellor Jeremy Hunt said in response: "Last year was tough as interest rates had to rise to bring down inflation, but we can see our plan is working.

"Inflation has fallen decisively from over 11% to 3.4%, the economy grew in January and real wages have increased for eight months in a row."

They're the most sought-after concert tickets for a generation - so it's no surprise scammers are trying to take advantage of the appetite among Swifties to see their favourite artist.

The Money team has seen first-hand an incredibly convincing scam in which a friend's Facebook account is taken over.

A day or two after taking control of the account, the scammers post about having bought tickets for one of this summer's UK shows - but that something has come up which means they can't go.

Often, they try to sell the tickets at face value.

One of the Money team almost got scammed themselves until the impersonator presented bank details with a different name.

When questioned, they said it was their business partner...

The con is made more convincing by fake screenshots of tickets the scammers send...

Those whose accounts are taken over report their email addresses and contact numbers - meaning getting their profile back can be tricky.

People have reported to us that they've been through all the recovery steps and their account has still been disabled.

In another trick, scammers infiltrate Facebook groups, selling their fake tickets to unsuspecting members.

People across the world have reported falling victim, from Victoria in Australia to Ipswich in the UK.

Suffolk Trading Standards issued this warning: "We are seeing scamposts across Facebook from fraudsters posing as individuals selling tickets for the June and August 2024 Taylor Swift concerts.

"Posts indicate that they have spare tickets that were 'panic bought'or they now have 'conflicting commitments'. All posts ask you to private message the seller.

"Please report posts to the adminof the group to have the post removed and individual blocked."

The best advice if you're one of the thousands (millions?) of Swifties who've missed out on tickets is to use official resale websites.

To keep your Facebook account secure, create a strong password, enable two-factor authentication and be suspicious of messages asking for personal details.

We asked Meta for its response and they told us it was an industry-wide issue, with scammers using sophisticated methods to defraud people, both in person and online.

Despite numerous reports of people losing out to con artists via Facebook, it said it had systems in place to block scams.

It said people could report suspicious activityin a few clicks and it urged them to use the Security Checkup feature.

Anyone concerned they may have been hacked can visit Facebook'shelp centre to secure their account.

Property sellers are accepting an average £10,000 (3.9%) discount to the asking price to secure a sale.

March's figure is a marked improvement on the £14,250 average discount (4.5%) seen in November 2023.

The Zoopla data also shows that more sellers are returning to the market, with the stock of homes for sale up 20% on this time last year.

At the same time, the property website says falling mortgage rates and rising wages are increasing consumer confidence - both factors in feeding into the improving levels of housing market activity.

The strongest growth in sales activity continues to be in areas with more affordable house prices such as Yorkshire and The Humber (+11%), where the average house price is £185,600, and the North West (+13%), with an average house price of £194,500.

The strongest growth in new sellers listing homes is in the South West (+28%) and North East (+26%).

"We don't believe that house prices are about to increase more quickly but there is more buyer interest," Richard Donnell, executive director at Zoopla, said.

"Sellers need to remain realistic on where they set the asking price if they are to take advantage of improving market conditions to secure a sale and move home in 2024."

Spills of raw sewage into England's rivers and seas reached their worst on record last year.

Discharges of untreated sewage by water companies doubled from 1.8 million hours in 2022 to a record 3.6 million, according to new Environment Agency data.

The number of individual spills also soared by 54% - from 301,000 incidents to 464,000.

Read more here...

Insurance companies have been told they must offer full value to settle claims relating to written-off and stolen cars after further "shortcomings" were found by an industry regulator.

A review by the Financial Conduct Authority found that some firms were offering customers less than their vehicle was worth and, in some cases, only increased the offer when a customer complained.

Read more here...

The competition regulator has urged UK fashion businesses to give accurate information about how environmentally friendly their clothes are after three fast-fashion firms signed a new agreement.

The Competition and Markets Authority initiated an investigation into Boohoo, ASOS and George by Asda over concerns about the way products were marketed as eco-friendly.

Its initial review of the fashion sector identified concerns of possible greenwashing - making items appear environmentally friendly when they are not.

But the firms have pledged to provide clear, prominent and transparent information about any environmental claims made.

Read more here...

A multibillion-pound electricity cable running from Scotland to England that will power two million homes has been given the green light.

The high-voltage "electricity superhighway" will connect Peterhead in Aberdeenshire to Drax in North Yorkshire when it is completed in 2029 at a cost of £3.4bn.

It will carry clean energy 500km from Scottish wind farms, allowing them to operate at a greater capacity.

Some wind farms that could be producing energy have to shut down because there is not enough grid capacity to carry their power to places where it could be used.

Because of the way their contracts work, they are paid when asked to shut down due to what could be described as congestion.

So far this month nearly £50m has been paid to farms for shutting down, according to the UK Wind Curtailment Monitor.

The two gigawatt cable, approved today by Ofgem, the energy regulator, will run mainly on the bottom of the North Sea, but around 70 kilometres of it will be buried underground.

A new route from Manchester Airport to Luxembourg Airport will be available from 1 April.

Luxair is slated to provide three flights a week on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.

The journey, which takes a little under two hours, is the latest in a string of additions to Manchester's timetable.

Easyjet will launch flights to Paris Orly Airport on 27 March, while Jet2 has promised to get travellers to Porto from 4 July to 3 November.

The boss of British Gas owner Centrica saw his pay nearly doubleto £8.2m in 2023, accounts show.

Chris O'Shea said previously his pay of £4.5m in 2022 was impossible to justify.

Mr O'Shea, who has led the firm since 2020, earned a £810,000 salary, around £1.4million in annual bonuses and £5.9million in longer-term bonuses.

"As Mr O'Shea himself admitted a few weeks ago, it's not really credible to argue the work that he does is at all proportionate to a pay award even half this size," Luke Hildyard, of thinktank the High Pay Centre, said.

Anyone worried about what artificial intelligence (AI) means for the future of the workplace woke up to some bad news this morning...

Up to eight million UK jobs are at risk from the rise of AI, according to a report warning that the low-skilled would be worst affected.

It said that back office, entry level and part-time jobs were at the highest risk of being disrupted during the so-called first wave, with women and young people the most likely to be affected as a result.

Read the full storyhere...

A comedian has been forced to remove a picture of a hot dog from posters promoting his stand-up tour after falling foul of Transport for London's (TfL) advertising policies.

Ed Gamble used an image of the popular barbecue staple in advertising posters for his upcoming Hot Diggity Dog tour.

But when the billboards were sent to TfL for display on theLondon Underground, the stand-up comic was told to alter the poster because it failed to comply with the organisation's advertising policy on junk foods.

So the 38-year-old, who recently starred as the host of the Traitors: Uncloaked, improvised by offering to replace the hot dog with a cucumber.

"I actually don't have a problem with the TfL regulations, they make sense to me," he said.

"But the new posters promote something way more harmful - the idea that cucumbers pair well with ketchup and mustard."

A disgruntled rail passenger has gone viral after pointing out that it would be cheaper for him to get a return flight to another continent than going by train from London to Scotland.

Chris Thomson shared screenshots showing rail prices over £100 for London Euston to Motherwell on Trainline, while flights to Essaouira in Morocco began at £54 on Skyscanner.

His post on X has had more than 12,000 likes.

The response to Chris's post has been mixed, with some agreeing that the prices are "wild"...

Train ticket prices are wild. Tried to get from Glasgow to Birmingham and back, they wanted 350 quid. Just booked a bus for 25 quid instead.

@RussleSprout88

Others suggested it was Chris at fault for trying to book last-minute...

Yet I'm currently travelling to Glasgow from Crewe for £29. Maybe because I didn't look for the most expensive, flexible, late notice rail fares and compare them to cheap, inflexible, advance air fares.

@MggW

Rail fares will rise by 8.7% in Scotland next week, after the Scottish government argued previous fare freezes were not sustainable.

For those in England and Wales, fares rose by 4.9% on 3 March.

When an email landed in our Money team inbox this morning about the calorie count of Easter eggs, our instinct was to roll our eyes, click delete and make a round of coffees to wash down the Mini-Eggs we just had for breakfast.

But with an NHS doctor today getting stick for urging people not to eat an Easter egg in one go (see 9.11am post), we reluctantly decided to take a second look.

Sports nutrition provider Bulk.comhas swept the supermarket shelves to find the lowest calorie chocolate egg.

They found the Moo Free Bunnycomb Easter egg was the least calorific - coming in at 454 calories for the whole thing.

Not far behind was the Kinder Surprise egg at 579 calories in total.

If you check out the other end of the scale - a KitKat Caramel Cookie Collision Incredible Egg was found to be the most calorific supermarket Easter egg at 2,691 calories.

Here are the other options with price tags included...

Some advice

"It's important to keep in mind that overindulging in chocolate over the Easter period is unlikely to completely ruin any weight loss goals you may have," a Bulk spokesperson said.

“Weight gain tends to happen over a much longer window of time, so even if you are eating over your body's daily caloric intake for several days, you are unlikely to observe any noticeable fat gain.

"However, if you still intend to be mindful of your chocolate consumption this Easter, consider buying several smaller Easter eggs rather than one large one.

"This way, you can eat the whole Easter egg in one sitting, without feeling as guilty, while still satisfying your sugar cravings."

Remember...

Calories are a way of measuring energy and shouldn't be directly equated to how "healthy" a certain food may or may not be. You should also take fats, sugars and additives into account if looking for the healthiest options. Many of us in the UK consume too many or too few calories than is optimally "healthy", so carry out your own research to find what works for you.

For context, the average woman should consume around2,000 calories per day, while the typical man should be looking for closer to 2,500.

We've been banging on about Monday's energy price cap change for some time - and for good reason.

The average household bill will drop by £238 a year due to the changes, but some might not get full savings in their April bill unless they take crucial steps.

That involves taking and submitting meter readings by Monday.

(If you have a pre-paid or smart meter, stop reading - you can kick your feet up and relax.)

Why do I need to read my meter?

Energy companies can bill you based on usage estimates. Anyone who has received an outlandish bill before knows these estimates can be inaccurate.

So, taking a reading on or around 1 April ensures any estimates are taken with the correct, lower price cap from that date.

A small note

With so many of us doing the same thing and submitting readings via sites or apps - servers can often crash.

Don't worry if that happens, as you can backdate meter readings anywhere from five days to two weeks later (check with your provider for details).