MORE WAYS TO GET HELP

Register for free childcare

It costs an average £138 a week for a part-time nursery place for a child under the age of two**, and prices continue to rise year on year.

But if your child is between the ages of three and four you can take advantage of 30 hours of free childcare per child. It’s available if you live in England (there are different schemes in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland), you are working and neither you nor your

UNIVERSAL CREDIT

If you’re on Universal Credit, you may be able to claim back up to 85% of childcare costs for a maximum of up to £646 for one child and £1,108 for two children, per month. You need to use a registered childcare provider and have proof of the costs that you have paid for. Find out more at gov.uk/help-with-childcare-costs/ universal-credit.

SCHOOL UNIFORMS

Kitting out a child for secondary school can set parents back by an average £300.*** But if you are low income and on certain benefits, there may be help worth up to £200 from your local council. See more at gov.uk/help-school-clothing-costs.

FINANCIAL SUPPORT

Take a look at entitledto.co.uk or turn2us.org.uk to make sure you’re not missing out on any benefits. A shocking £15 billion of benefits go unclaimed – some of that money could have your name in it.

If you are struggling financially, you can also speak to debt charity Stepchange (stepchange.org) to help you get back on track. partner earn more than £100,000 each.

Even if you don’t qualify for 30 hours’ free childcare, you can still get 15 hours of free childcare per week for three- to four-year-olds.

Go to gov.uk/30-hours-free-childcare for details.

✱ Kalpana Fitzpatrick is the author of Invest Now: The Simple Guide to Boosting Your Finances (out December 2022, £9.99, Heligo Books).

A new approach

Sitting in our local Tesco coffee shop, we concocted our plan and decided we could do a better job ourselves, and change people’s perceptions of what private investigators looked like. So, in March 2020, we set up Verity Henton to do things and set about doing things differently. Our lives as glamorous private investigators began, sitting in our car discreetly following cheaters around Essex and London. We used covert techniques and specialist equipment, and even got to follow our targets into swanky bars and restaurants. But it wasn’t all glam, especially trying to find somewhere to go to the loo on a covert tracking mission!

But now, even though infidelity makes up the majority of our workload, we’re increasingly working with the victims of online romance scams. Following a boom in online relationships during the pandemic, women approach us wanting confirmation