Experts have revealed the best way to make money from home by taking part in online focus groups, surveys and trials, as well as how not going out during the lockdown could be saving you over £500 a month.
Personal finance expert Emma Drew, who has won the title of ‘Best Money-Making Blog’ for three consecutive years and runs a six-figure business, spoke to FEMAIL about the various ways those who aren’t able to work from home – and those who are – can continue to make money.
Emma revealed that you can make as much as £100-a-pop for taking part in an online focus group, while apps like Shoppix will pay you for snapping and uploading photos of your receipts, Sweatcoin will reward you for walking and you can make £50 a month for completing surveys.
Meanwhile an expert at Quidco told FEMAIL the best way to save money was to cancel subscriptions you can’t use such as your gym membership, see if you’re eligible for a mortgage holiday and get a refund on any cancelled events or travel tickets.
Elsewhere experts at the Dreams app revealed how not commuting, having your regular coffee and trips to the pub could be saving you as much as £559-a-month.
Experts have revealed the best way to make money from home by taking part in online focus groups, surveys and trials, as well as how not going out during the lockdown could be saving you over £500 a month
Emma Drew’s top money-making tips
Whether you are at home due to social distancing, self isolation, your workplace is no longer open or you have been made redundant, you might be looking for some real ways to make money from home.
The good news is that all is not lost, and once you have made financial arrangements such as applying for Universal Credit and mortgage holidays, you can start looking for some ways to boost your income from home.
Personal finance expert Emma Drew has won the title of ‘Best Money-Making Blog’ for three years and runs a six-figure business
Focus groups are a great way to boost your income by giving feedback on a variety of topics, from your personal banking to testing out new apps. These studies pay anything from £20 – £100 plus for your time and feedback, depending on the complexity and the length of the study.
My husband completed a video diary study that took him about 90 minutes over two weeks and he earned £60 for taking part.
A lot of these studies usually happen face to face, however with the COVID-19 pandemic studies are moving online to be completed by the participants remotely. There are still plenty of studies going ahead at the moment which have already been budgeted for, so it is a great time to get involved.
Sign up to Research Opinions, People4U and People For Research and complete your profile to be invited to studies.
Make money from your smartphone
These days there are plenty of apps that allow you to make money from your smartphone.
Whether it is playing games, scanning your receipts or completing surveys, there are earning apps for everyone.
- Shoppix, Receipt Hog and ZipZero will pay you for snapping and uploading photos of your receipts
- VYPR, iPoll, Momox, VOXPOPME, OnePulse, Enlightly and Streetbees will pay you to complete surveys, questionnaires and short video studies
- Airtime Rewards will allow you to connect your bank and credit cards and then receive cashback at certain stores. This money is then paid towards your mobile phone bill
- Sweatcoin will reward you for walking
- Chip will help you to stash away cash for emergencies or towards your financial goals
- Manifest and TRIBE will pay you for posting to your social media
- FishingBreak will pay you for playing their fun fishing game
Be sure to download these apps and check them regularly – or turn your notifications on to be notified when there are new earning opportunities.
How the apps work
Shoppix, Receipt Hog and ZipZero: These apps ask you to take pictures and upload your receipts before you complete a short survey on the service received. In return you will get tokens you can redeem with retailers.
VYPR, iPoll, Momox, VOXPOPME, OnePulse, Enlightly and Streetbees require you to answer short surveys and gather points. Once you’ve reached their points goal (10,000 for VYPR) they transfer money to your PayPal account.
Airtime Rewards asks you to link to your cards to their app and whenever you shop at the major retailers they have partnered with, you get discount off your mobile phone bill.
Sweatcoin rewards you for walking by letting you collect points every time you log your steps and gives you coins to use at retailers in return.
Chip connects to your bank account and works out what you can safely save each month, helping you build your savings account.
Manifest and TRIBE will partner you with brands who will pay you for posting to your social media and advise you how to – but you will need at least 3k followers.
FishingBreak offers to pay you $10 every time you advance to a certain level, though reviews suggest it’s pretty hard to do so.
Online surveys
Completing online surveys won’t make you rich overnight, but you can expect to make £50 or more per month for completing them in your spare time.
Online surveys to try
Prolific: prolific.co
YouGov: yougov.co.uk
OnePoll: onepoll.com
Pinecone: pineconeresearch.co.uk
Valued Opinions: valuedopinions.co.uk
Companies are looking for your opinions on everything from politics to new products they are launching, and in order to cover your time they are willing to pay you for your opinions.
There are plenty of online survey websites out there, and you can get paid in cash via BACS into your bank account or Paypal, or choose from a selection of gift cards including supermarket gift cards.
Many of these studies are agreed in advance and therefore there is already funding in place to pay participants, making it a great time to sign up and earn from online surveys.
Online tutoring
With school closures in place, many parents and guardians are looking for extra tutoring support for their children. If you have skills that you can teach then online tutoring could be a great way for you to make extra money.
It helps if you are already a teacher or if you have experience with the age group you are planning to tutor. It doesn’t always have to be teaching experience – volunteering at a youth club or a teaching assistant would help.
You also need to make sure that you are at least one educational level above the students you want to tutor. This means if you are planning to tutor English at a GCSE grade, you need to at least have an A Level in English.
You can find potential students through social media, setting up your own website or using a service such as TutorHunt (tutorhunt.com/), where potential students pay to see your details.
You can carry out sessions using video conferencing software and apps like Skype, Zoom, FaceTime and WhatsApp.
Between £20-£35 per hour is the going rate for online tutoring, making this a great way to boost your income.
You can make as much as £100-a-pop for taking part in an online focus group, while apps like Shoppix will pay you for snapping and uploading photos of your receipts
Freelancing
If you have skills to sell then freelancing from home could tide you over during this pandemic.
Think about the skill set that you already have and how you can offer that to others, like small businesses. It could be anything from social media management to article writing.
You can get started by using a freelancing job board website like UpWork (upwork.com/) or PeoplePerHour (peopleperhour.com/) to either advertise yourself or bid on existing jobs.
Whilst companies are making cut backs and redundancies they might be looking for freelancers to bridge the gap until their businesses bounce back.
The amount of money you can make depends on the services you are providing and how many hours you work for. You should expect to make at least £10 per hour from freelancing.
Oh My Dosh
OhMyDosh (ohmydosh.co.uk) is a ‘get paid to’ website where you can earn money for taking trials, making purchases online, entering competitions and so many more.
OhMyDosh also have a ‘Lightning Offers’ section where you will be paid within three working days for completing offers, making it a great income stream for when you need a little cash injection.
They also have bundles where you can earn a bonus for completing every offer in a certain bundle – for example the new home bundle will normally earn you £90 for completing the offers, but if you complete all four offers you will get an extra £10.
There is a minimum payout of £10, and once you have reached it you can request your cash to be paid into your bank via BACS or paid to you via Paypal.
Declaring extra income
You are allowed to earn £1,000 per tax year from these side hustles (apart from matched betting which is tax-free) before you need to tell HMRC and complete a self-assessment.
Be sure to keep track of your earnings from extra income sources, and if you find yourself approaching the £1,000 limit then you will need to register for a self-assessment with HMRC. It is really simple to do. Once registered try to keep aside 20 per cent of your extra earnings for paying your tax when it is due.
How staying at home could be saving you £559
An expert at www.getdreams.com, who have helped over 450,000 users save over £250 million with their savings hacks, told FEMAIL how cutting back on expenses such as take-away coffees, gym membership, and entertainment could be saving you hundreds every month.
- No cinema/theatre tickets: £20 (based on 1/month)
- No drinks at the pub: £100 (based on 20/month)
- No take-away coffee: £60 (based on 20/month)
- No gym membership: £50 (based on 1/month)
- No commuting: £199 (based on TfL card zone 1-4 London, 1/month)
- No haircut (or DIY): £50 (based on 1/month)
- No football games or other acitivity: £40 (based on 2/month)
- No taxi: £40 (based on 2/month)
Total: £559
Quidco’s money saving tips
Quidco.com’s latest research estimates that the UK is saving on average £1.8bn per week on daily costs from commuting, eating and drinking during work hours.
That’s more than £7billion every month by not travelling into work every day.
However, it seems not everyone would take commuter savings over office comradery, with 81 per cent missing their workplace and 64 per cent missing their commute.
Check you’re not overpaying on energy
It might not be the depths of winter – thankfully – but that doesn’t mean you can ignore your energy bills for the next couple of months. Take the extra time many of you have now to search for the best deal so you can sit back and relax.
The best way to ensure you get the best deal is to use a comparison site. You simply pop in your details – where you live, estimates on how much gas and electric you use, etc., and the comparison tool does all the hard work for you, popping out the best deals from hundreds of suppliers. You can then compare each supplier and select the one you fancy the look of the most. And in the process, save hundreds of pounds of the course of a contract.
Cancel subscriptions you can’t use
Do you have a subscription to a streaming site that you never use? We spend millions every month as a nation on subscriptions, many of which we don’t need or seldom use. So now is the time to figure out which of your monthly subscriptions can be cut.
The same applies to gym memberships. If you signed up at the start of the year and haven’t been since the end of January, cancel your membership. Similarly, if you are an avid gym goer but obviously can’t go right now, email them and ask what is being done about your membership. Many gyms are putting member accounts on hold so aren’t collecting fees, but it doesn’t hurt to double check.
Check if you can have a mortgage holiday
We are undoubtedly in unprecedented times, so unprecedented measures have been taken to ensure we come out of this stronger. For that reason, millions of people in the UK are eligible for mortgage holidays to help them through the next couple of months.
Although overdrafts are there for emergencies and should be used with caution, some banks are now offering 0 per cent overdrafts up to a certain amount to help ease financial pressure on individuals and families. It is worth checking the T&Cs here though so you don’t get caught out when the 0 per cent rate ends.
What are we saving on commuting?
Quidco.com’s latest research estimates that the UK is saving more than £7billion every month by not travelling into work every day, with Londoners saving the most and Birmingham dwellers the least.
A survey of more than 3,000 of the UK’s workforce from across the country and when key and usual remote workers were removed, showedm the average worker is saving a little over £300 every month.
Londoners are making the biggest savings – almost double of most other major cities – pocketing £153.24 each per week, while those living in Birmingham are racking up the least, with an average of £65.63 saved per week.
Even though workers are pocketing huge money savings, more than 81 per cent of workers who are now confined to their homes throughout the day said they miss going into work.
More men said they missed both their workplace and commute than women, and Generation X revealed they spend the most on food and drink during a typical work day – debuffing the myth that Millennials spend the most eating and drinking out.
Chris Hutchings, CMO at Quidco, said, ‘We all whine about the daily grind – particularly our commutes – but it seems that when that’s taken away, it’s actually something we value. I know I value the time to plan out my day, listen to a podcast, or even just have a bit of time to myself.’
Get refunds from cancelled events and travel
As events have been cancelled for the foreseeable future, you should be able to get a refund on booked tickets, so check with the company you purchased from. Similarly, if you buy a season ticket for any travel, you will be able to get a refund for the bit you are unable to use from the travel company.
Get cashback and use vouchers
Despite the financial worries many of us are experiencing at the moment, the chances are you will need to buy some things; whether it be groceries, supplies to help with home schooling, or anything else you need to keep you going over the lockdown period.
And although this can cause a lot of anxiety, there is one way to ensure you don’t pay over the odds – cashback.
Cashback websites, such as Quidco.com, give cashback to shoppers on everything they buy online. The amounts vary and are either a set figure or a percentage of the purchase price. There’s over 4000 retailers on site, including all your favourite brands – and a few you might not have heard of.
Quidco also has hundreds of voucher codes available which also work with cashback, offering stackable savings to those looking to make their money stretch.
