Commuting habits across Britain, and many other nations worldwide, have certainly changed over the past year and are no doubt set to remain the same for a very long time. The past few months have seen more people than ever working from home, saving people hundreds of pounds a month on travel and transport. With this in mind, what is the true cost of a normal commute to work, and can we be saving this money up for other things in our life?
Motorbike insurance specialists, Devitt, conducted a survey of over 2500 Brits, concluding how much time and money we normally spend on our daily commute to the office or workplace.
How long is our normal commute?
Our commutes may be shorter than we think. The results from Devitt’s survey found that 41% have a daily commute of just 0-10 miles. But despite these short lengths, they’re still costing us a fortune, with two-thirds of Brits spending over £100 a month on getting to and from their workplace.
Interestingly, 25% of people said their journey distance was between 11 and 20 miles, with only 1% saying they’re travelling over 80 miles or more to get to work. Do we think we’ll ever go back to working in the office or our normal working environment? We doubt it, especially if we’ll be saving as much money as these results suggest.
What are we saving a month?
With 33% of us spending between £100 and £199, 15% spending between £200 and £299 and 3% spending a staggering £500+ a month on our commute, working from home can really save us a lot of money. Whether it’s spending money on rail or underground fares, flights or even petrol/diesel for our cars, not having our daily commute could mean we’re saving anywhere between £1200 and a whopping £6000 a year!
Just think of all the things you could be putting that additional money towards. You could save up for your dream car, a deposit for a house or even to turn your hobby into a side-hustle.
Are people starting to realise that time spent commuting could be used for so much more?
Think about your time spent working from home. Have you missed sitting in traffic or hopping on a packed tube carriage? We didn’t think so. Not only will you not have to lose hours of your week battling the morning and evening commute, not making the journey into work has so many other benefits.
From getting an extra hour of sleep and taking some well-deserved “you” time, to sitting and reading a book while enjoying your breakfast, you may find that you’ll never go back to working from the office or workplace full time every again!