hey Brits!

[mimzy]

hey all my british cyber friends! i need a quick favor

my friend from school is looking to do her clinical fellowship year over in England, but is really horrified/confused about the cost of living over there. She said that she was looking at apartments online and they were about 1.2k....a week.

is this right?? what is the average cost of living for a couple in a small apartment? and....(i know this is a long shot) but does anyone happen to know how much a speech language pathologist might make over there?

i know this probably has a lot to do with location, so any type of range you could provide would be appreciated. thanks!

 

[Pandora II]

Hi Mimsy,

In London, a one-bed studio flat or shared apartment will be between $800 and $1.5k a month plus bills/council tax etc per person. (The $800 being if you share with 2 or 3 other people). If you want a really nice area/flat it will be more. Most people under 30 will be looking for a 'student' type house - do not expect anything that looks particularly nice for less than $3k a month for a couple and if you are prepared to live in a not popular area.

FI and I are thinking of letting our flat next year - we have a two bed apartment on a council estate (90% of residents are on welfare) in Zone 1. We will be renting it for $3k a month not including any bills/council tax or service charges.

Our living expenses including bills/transport (tube/bus - car is not feasible in London), council tax and service charges is approx $5k a month between us.

My sister is a speech therapist - I believe she earns around $34k before tax. Will be a bit higher in London due to 'London weighting'.

In London in order to live at a level where you have enough money to pay for everything, buy cheap clothes and have a bit of spending money you need around $50k a year before tax.

Outside London will be cheaper.

It is HORRIBLY expensive here - see my thread on House Hunting Misery...

Best place to look is www.gumtree.com

 

[chizzy1982]

Hi Mimzy

London is really expensive but you can work aorund it.

Do you know what levle your friend is in terms of speech therapy? The banding and pay levels have recently changed - for example I am Band 6 physio which works out to a senior physio in old terms ( does that make sense?)
Her pay will have London weighting attached to it but again this varies from which part of Lonodon you work in. It is tax free. I get overall £3000 london weighting per year, and I work in SW16, i have a feeling it goes up if you work in inner inner london.
There is website called nhsjobs.co.uk which advertisies all nursing jobs, and aliied health professional jobs in England and she will be able to have a look at a basic salary figure. I know SALT have done very well in the new pay deal!
In terms of living I will do a bit of research and get back to you............

Lizzie

 

[Pandora II]

Oooh, another Brit!

Yay!

 

[chizzy1982]

Helllooooo from this side of the pond

- is there large british contingent on these boards?

Mimzy some more accurate details!

1: I got the london weighting figures wrong - its around £5000 flat rate for any public sector employee (e.g NHS staff, police, teachers etc) working within the M25 orbital, it is tax free - yipee!!
2: A couple of years ago there was a major shake up of the NHS pay scheme and something called Agenda for Change was introduced. Essentially peple are put on "bands" depending on their experince etc and then at their incremental date (start date) they go up a scale on their pay band.
For a band 6 Speech and Language Therapist the standard range is £28,149 - £37,558. For Band 7 it goes to £33,975 - £43,105. The idea is that a person never gets to the end of their pay band, they will have gone onto to a higher banding with promotion.
3: I would really recommend if your friend is going for the NHS she has a good look at Agenda for Change and soemthing called The Knowledge and Skills Framework (KSF). There is a KSF for every job in the NHS and it outlines what a person should be doing in their job and what specifics that employee should be doing inorder to fufil their role. The emplyoee needs to then be able to demonstrate that they are achieving these in order that they can then move onto the next scale within that band - I''m sorry that probably is really complicated, and totally not what you asked for but unfortuantley everyone in the NHS has to have some understanding of how it works and they will probably ask her about it in the interview (standard practice)
4: A few websites to look at for jobs just to get an idea of job descriptions, pay etc
www.jobs.nhs.uk www.nhsjobs.net www.nhsjobs.com
5: Living is pricy - I have found that if you are willing to live a bit futher away from a tube then it does get cheaper. Pandora suggested a great website www.gumtree.com ( a favorite with the Ozzie/SA/NZ contingent). Often the larger hospitals have their own accomodation which is a bit rough but VERY cheap. I did this for the first month I started my job before I found somewhere and it was £250/ month bills included which was great for me at that time.
Just done a quick search and a 1 - 2 bed flat is about £1000/month furnished in South West London and bills not included. I suggest looking at: www.rightmove.com

My goodness what a long winded message - sorry! I hope some of the info is helpful. If you need any more info about NHS, Agenda for Change, KSF etc please just ask!

Take care

Lizzie

 

[LegacyGirl]

Well looks like moving to London is out for me!

 

[mimzy]

thank you girls SO much for the information! i''ll pass it along.

she''ll be starting out as a clinical fellow, so i would imagine it would be around "band" -1 because we aren''t clincially certified at that point, so the pay does look bleak (over here we start around 40k).

thanks again!!

 

[gwendolyn]

Hi there! I''m not a Brit, but there''s a salary calculator link that I found really helpful when trying to get an idea of what salaries are average for a particular area of England in your chosen field. It''s got the national average salary as well as region specific salaries to get an idea of cost of living and stuff, and might be useful if trying to figure out if a certain area would be affordable (assuming the numbers are right

). Here''s the link: http://www.reed.co.uk/CareerTools/SalaryCalculator.aspx

 

[Rhea]

I work in Zone 1 and live right outside the 6 zones for this very reason. I have a 1.5 hour commute to work each day and live in a small one bedroom flat with my partner. It''s not big by any stretch of the imagination and I really had to change my house ideals when I first looked for a flat here. Not that I recommend spending 3 hours a day commuting but it''s all we can afford right now, plus it''s closer to DH''s work. We''ve been living in the same place, above a high street shop which we live for convince, for 2 years so it''s not too small.

I live in a rather expensive part of Essex and pay:
£550/month rent
£100/month council tax
£35/week travel costs to and form work (I go from a station within the 6 zones to make it cheaper)

I have a friend who lives in Zone 1 and pays £1150/month for the same size flat that we have and has a 30 minute commute to work.

In addition to gumtree, I also suggest checking out rightmove.com.

I have no idea about her salary range but if she needs any ideas about working the charity sector I''m here.

 

[Pandora II]

Date: 4/1/2008 4:02:52 PM
Author: chizzy1982
Helllooooo from this side of the pond

- is there large british contingent on these boards?

There are a few of us:

Me - London
Addy - London/Essex
Maisie - Newcastle
Mrs Mitchell - Scotland
Chocolate Fudge
Lord SummerIsle
Samantha Red

Then there''s Delster and bee* who are in Ireland.


Gwendolyn is from the US and in Cambridge.

Am I right in thinking that Lorelei is a brit?

I''m sure I''ve forgotten a few others - apologies if I have!


We really need a London GTG and an assault on New Bond Street!

 

[Lorelei]

Date: 4/3/2008 7:44:11 AM
Author: Pandora II

Date: 4/1/2008 4:02:52 PM
Author: chizzy1982
Helllooooo from this side of the pond

- is there large british contingent on these boards?

There are a few of us:

Me - London
Addy - London/Essex
Maisie - Newcastle
Mrs Mitchell - Scotland
Chocolate Fudge
Lord SummerIsle
Samantha Red

Then there''s Delster and bee* who are in Ireland.


Gwendolyn is from the US and in Cambridge.

Am I right in thinking that Lorelei is a brit?

I''m sure I''ve forgotten a few others - apologies if I have!


We really need a London GTG and an assault on New Bond Street!

I am indeed!

 

[Po10472]

me too, I''m in Scotland!

 

[Lorelei]

Date: 4/3/2008 8:43:24 AM
Author: Po10472
me too, I''m in Scotland!

THATS who I forgot!! Hiya Po! Pyramid is also another Brit!

 

[chizzy1982]

So there are a few of us - has there ever been a London GTG?

 

[Lorelei]

Date: 4/3/2008 12:54:42 PM
Author: chizzy1982
So there are a few of us - has there ever been a London GTG?

Not to my knowledge, as only now do there seem to be a few Brit regulars, but it would be good to have one sometime perhaps!

 

[Pandora II]

I''m up for one!

 

[chizzy1982]

Ditto!

 

[Phoenix]

I too am a Brit

, but living in S''pore. Haven''t lived there since 1995 but I do come back to visit family at least once a year.

I''d love to get together with fellow British PS''ers if I happen to be in London at the time of the get together, and definitely yes to an "assault on NBS"!!

London IS horribly expensive and the strong pound doesn''t help either. To answer the OP''s Qs, we have a 600sq ft one-bedroom flat in Limehouse that we rent out for about GBP300 a week. I haven''t a clue about salaries though (my siblings are rather secretive abt theirs). All we know is that every time we go back, our money just goes soooo fast!!

 

[Krissie]

Chiming in to this thread a bit late - but my fiance is British and I just returned to the States having lived in London for a couple of years! My housing was firm-sponsored so I was able to have a great 2-bedroom flat in north London for 675GBP per week (including taxes). Most of my (lawyer) friends there double-up and have roommates so that they can live in London and still afford it! My fiance lived in a 3-br house (a real hole) in a nice neighborhood in London, and each paid 550 GBP/month.

If anyone is up for a London get-together in November we will be working there for a couple of weeks