CAPE TOWN - SEVENTY-nine percent of South Africans continue to be financially impacted by Covid-19 in spite of the further relaxation of lockdown level 1 restrictions, a consumer survey for the week of November 1, conducted by TransUnion, showed.
This was up 2 percentage points from October, but lower than the highest level (84 percent) experienced in June.
Only 11 percent of consumers indicated that their household finances were going as planned through 2020, while 65 percent said their finances were worse than planned.
Concern among impacted consumers about their ability to pay bills and loans remained high at 85 percent, with 29 percent expecting to run into a shortfall within one month.
South Africans were still cashing out investments and retirement savings to maintain cash flow through the crisis, with 42 percent of respondents indicating this was how they would pay current bills and loans.
Thirty-five percent of impacted consumers have had their work hours reduced, and the percentage who reported job loss had increased by 2 percentage points from last month to 19 percent.
This was substantially higher than in April (10 percent), as businesses continued to feel the strain of previous lockdown restrictions.
In November, 57 percent of impacted consumers indicated they had cut back on discretionary spending, 43 percent had cancelled subscriptions or memberships. |
BUSINESS REPORT