Australians cut back spending amid cost-of-living pressures

A new report from the National Australia Bank showed that Australians are beginning to cut corners on their budgets to deal with growing cost-of-living pressures.

The survey report published on Sunday showed that Australians, of 2,000 surveyed, had recently cut their spending in a number of key areas to make their money go further.

Half of all respondents reported having switched to cheaper brands of alternatives, 28 percent reported having cut back on subscriptions to apps and news services, and 22 percent cut back on outsourcing home services like house cleaning and lawn mowing.

"We can see the impact of inflation starting to show with prices moving up and we know many Australian households are already feeling cost-of-living pressures," said NAB Group Executive of Personal Banking Rachel Slade.

Costs have increased across the board with inflation passing 5.1 percent in the most recent Consumer Price Index announcement from the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

Furthermore, back-to-back interest rate increases mean that many Australians have seen their monthly mortgage payments increase by hundreds of dollars each month.

Therefore, banks offered several promotions such as free internet with home loans, fixed interest rates and cash bonuses, looking to capture customers that are shopping around for their home loans.

"There are options available to customers to help them stay in control of their money, whether that be creating a budget, bucketing funds, immediately transferring savings into a separate account to reduce the temptation to spend or making accounts invisible," added Slade.