A struggling single mum has no choice but to work two jobs in order to feed her son and keep a roof over their heads. Clare Ransom owns a cafe and works three days a week as a teaching assistant at a secondary school, but doesn't earn a penny from her business due to soaring energy bills amid the cost of living crisis.
She now faces losing her business due to being told by British Gas, her energy supplier, that she has seven days to pay a £995 energy bill, Derbyshire Live reports. Clare's electricity bill almost quadrupled in the space of a month when she changed supplier earlier this year, putting the café at risk of bankruptcy.
Things have got so desperate that Clare, 49, also has to apply for Universal Credit, which provides her with £624 a month, but £600 of this is immediately taken out to pay for the mortgage on her house where she lives with her eight-year-old son. As a result, the pair - who live by themselves - get food from a foodbank, with Clare now saying she is "out of tears".
She said: "I'm struggling to pay my mortgage at the moment. I don't earn a penny from the café so I get £624 a month in Universal Credit, and my mortgage is £600 a month, so I've had to take another job. But, I'm waiting to find out if me doing three days a week of teaching will take my Universal Credit.
"If they cut the electric, we will have no choice but to close the café, as everything will have to go off. It would have a huge impact. We can't open without electricity. If they cut me off, the business closes, that's it. I'd be devastated, absolutely devastated. I'm out of tears, they've dried up, I'm numb to it. I can't believe that there is no help or support for us still, none of us are in this situation through our own fault, it has been dropped on us by everyone else in the world.
"Why should I have to close the business, because the government have let us get to the state that we're in? I've not worked my backside off for the last six-and-a-half years to say 'well, the government has let us down, let's close it'. I'm afraid, I'm a fighter, and I won't go down without a fight."
Clare moved to Belper 16 years ago and moved from teaching deaf children to becoming a business owner in 2016. She has now built up a strong community of regulars, some of whom are elderly and vulnerable who rely on the café for socialising and getting out of the house.
But the cost of living crisis, as well as causing a rise in the cafe's electricity bill, has seen the business' food bill triple to around £360 a month. That is before wages are taken into account for Clare's hard-working team of staff, who are relied upon by many customers in the local community in and around Belper for support.
The business is hampered in particular by the need to pay back the loans given to it to support it through the coronavirus pandemic. Clare believes that if she did not need to pay back those loans, on top of rising day-to-day costs, her finances would be much more positive.
Customers at the cafe are also noticing Clare's plight. One even gave Clare £100 to allow her and her son to have a weekend away in Blackpool in October, in an attempt to get away from the stress, which doesn't only affect her, but also her lad.
Clare said: "My emotions are all over the place. I literally go from smiling to crying, in the same second. The instability of everything means I have no idea whether I'm coming or going. I'm having to rob Peter to pay Paul. I suffer with anxiety anyway, and it's heartbreaking, absolutely heartbreaking.
"Ted is a very kind, caring little eight-year-old, he is empathetic and worries about other people, and he is suffering as well at the moment as he sees me go up and down. How unfair is that? He is eight, he should be living his best life, but he's worrying about his mum as his mum can't afford to do things or buy food.
"It's so unfair, as his mental health is suffering. He isn't sleeping at night, he gets stomach aches as he's stressing. How unfair is that, for an eight-year-old to be worried about the cost of living? There is only so much I can shelter from him, but the rest he sees as it affects me so much."
A spokesperson for British Gas said that the company reached out to Miss Ransom on July 13, this year, to confirm her energy statement and said that they advised a balance may build up after Miss Ransom cancelled her direct debit.
The company said that discussions had taken place in late August over spreading payment over a six-month period, costing £428.46 a month, but no payment plan was agreed, and a follow-up email in September was not responded to, which Clare says was never received. British Gas also said that notifications of the outstanding balance, and monthly bills, were sent by email at the end of each month from June to October.
The spokesperson said: "We have kept Miss Ransom informed of her usage and balance. We understand the difficulty she is facing and are in contact to agree a payment plan."
