Welcome to the Money blog, Sky News’ consumer and personal finance hub. Today, we investigate a reader’s dispute with two airlines who, between them, left her without her wheelchair. We also look ahead to Wednesday’s inflation data and report on a new congestion charge in Oxford.
Tuesday 21 October 2025 18:35, UK
Finally today, American Express customers can claim £50 from stays at selected Hilton Hotels as part of a new cashback deal.
The bank is offering its users the cashback sum if they spend £200 on their card with the hotel chain by 31 December.
Cumulative spend is included in the deal, meaning that customers do not need to fork out £200 in a single transaction.
Existing bookings are included, provided they have not already been prepaid.
Customers should get the cash credited to their account balance within 30 days of the transaction being made, but Amex has said it could take longer. 
Where can I find the deal?
The deal will appear on the Offers page in your American Express app, which you need to select to add to your card. 
The deal is valid once per card for the first 40,000 customers. 
What destinations are included?
The deal includes more than 150 Hilton hotels across the UK and a handful in the USA.
It also applies to 30 other countries across Europe, the Middle East and Africa, including Egypt, the Seychelles and South Africa.
You can check the full list of participating hotels here. 
Betfred warns it will shut all its shops if Reeves makes tax change
The bookmakers – and one of the biggest taxpayers in the country – has said it will close 1,300 high street betting shops if Rachel Reeves increases gambling taxes at the budget.
In an interview with The Sunday Times, chief executive Joanne Whittaker said she had written to the chancellor and culture secretary Lisa Nandy to warn of the consequences. 
“If the impact to us is that we lose the whole estate, that’s the same for all of our counterparts,” she said.
Reeves is reportedly considering increasing duties on sports betting from 15% to 30%  and on machine and online slots from 20% to 50%. 
Anthropologie to open three new UK stores
The US clothing and homeware brand is due to open stores in Liverpool, Glasgow and Manchester next month, according to Drapers. 
The openings will create at least 38 jobs, and take the brand’s UK store estate to a total of 20, according to Drapers.
Renowned pastry chef closes gourmet doughnut brand 
Graham Hornigold has confirmed the closure of Longboys after some “incredibly tough months”. 
The chef, whose life became the subject of the Netflix documentary Con Mum, said rising inflation, changes to national insurance and “spiralling” product costs had caused the closure. 
“Like so many small independents across the UK hospitality industry,  we’ve felt the impact hard. You may have seen that we made the difficult decision to close all Longboys sites in the hope of reopening. Sadly, we won’t be able to bring them back,” he said on LinkedIn. 
We spoke to him about his life after being conned by his mum earlier this year… 
Many of us are facing up to the reality of having to put the heating on as winter approaches – but there are ways to minimise the impact on your bank balance.
For instance, 27 fixed energy deals are now cheaper than the current energy price cap, comparison site Uswitch says.
The company – which, it should be said, has a vested interest in us changing our tariffs – says households switching to a fixed energy deal from a standard variable tariff could save up to £233 – or 13% compared to the October price cap.
Ben Gallizzi, from Uswitch, said: “If you haven’t fixed in a year or more, you’re probably on a standard tariff and paying more than you need to.”
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More than 1.1 million pensioners are facing a tax bill for interest earned on their savings, new HMRC figures show. 
Some 1,160,000 people aged 66 and over are due to pay income tax in the current financial year, according to the figures obtained by AJ Bell.
That’s up from 1,090,000 last year and 953,000 in 2023-24.
The investment platform said pensioners account for nearly half (44%) of the 2,640,000 taxpayers expected to pay income tax on cash savings interest earned.
It highlighted concerns about the growing number of people paying tax on savings income due to rising interest rates and frozen tax thresholds.
Charlene Young, senior pensions and savings expert at AJ Bell, said: “Most people have a personal savings allowance – £500 or £1,000 for higher and basic rate taxpayers respectively – which offers some protection from the taxman’s clutches. Likewise, ISAs and pensions are the perfect way to shield your savings and investments and maximise your returns.”
Inflation is tipped to come in at its highest level since January last year on Wednesday morning.
A 4% figure is expected to be revealed by the Office for National Statistics- up from the current 3.8% rate.
Inflation measures the pace of price shifts across different sectors of the economy on a rolling 12-month basis. Those shifts are then used to create a headline figure.
The increase in the consumer prices index measure this time, economists say, is likely to have been driven by fuel prices rising last month when they fell sharply during September 2024.
Other factors may include rising prices for second-hand cars.
The good news, however, is that most believe inflation will peak at this level and start to fall sharply in the coming months, barring any economic shocks.
This does not mean that prices will fall, just that they’re not rising as fast as they were.
A slowing, or expected easing, in inflation will give the Bank of England more scope to cut interest rates from the current level of 4%.
LSEG data shows 90% of financial market participants expect no change to the Bank rate when policymakers meet early next month.
However, there is a greater chance of an early Christmas present for borrowers at the meeting slated for 18 December.
At 4%, the pace of inflation would be double the Bank’s target rate and prohibitive for a rate cut.
Inflation data covering October and November would need to deliver significant progress for a further rate cut to materialise by the year’s end.
Economists are more split on this, with some warning that it could be the second half of next year before the Bank rate can be cut.
Much will depend on factors such as winter energy costs and what Rachel Reeves puts in her budget at the end of November.
The chancellor’s first budget was blamed for businesses raising prices to help offset rising employment costs. This was seen mostly at supermarkets.
International Monetary Fund forecasts last week saw the UK enduring the highest inflation across the G7 both this year and next.
It isn’t the sort of headline that supports an interest rate cut in the near term.
Drivers will have to pay £5 to travel along six roads in Oxford’s city centre from next week. 
The new “temporary” congestion charge will come info force on 29 October and will apply to cars of all fuel types and motorhomes.
ANPR cameras will track drivers, with those who fail to pay the charge stung with a £70 fine (reduced to £35 if paid in two weeks).
Those who fail to pay the fine within 28 days will see it increase to £105. 
Drivers will only have to pay once a day to travel through the zone, which covers: 
The scheme is being enforced until a traffic filters trial – which will limit through-traffic in the city – begins in August 2026, according to Oxfordshire County Council. 
However, there is a provision that allows the congestion charge to be in place for up to two years. 
The council says the scheme will improve bus services, reduce traffic, make walking safer, and cut local air pollution. 
Not everyone will have to pay the charge, with several permits available. For example, people living in the zone and Blue Badge holders can travel in the zone for free. 
You can see the full list of exemptions here. 
Councillor Andrew Gant, Oxfordshire County Council’s cabinet member for transport management said: “The congestion charge is being implemented as a temporary measure to ease traffic in Oxford while Botley Road remains closed and we are unable to implement the approved traffic filters trial. 
“A reduction in congestion creates a healthier, more accessible and attractive Oxford – opening the door to new businesses and jobs, economic success and increased opportunities across the county.
“With the money the charge raises, we can fund better public transport options, including free city park and ride bus travel with a valid parking ticket, giving people more choice and flexibility.
“The scheme will bring benefits for businesses, reducing traffic across the city overall that makes daily movement slow and unreliable. Trade vehicles are exempt, and life for mobile traders will be vastly improved as they will spend less time stuck in traffic.” 
An organisation called Open Roads for Oxford has opposed the measures, launching a GoFundMe page to back a legal campaign against the scheme. 
“The council has chosen to launch the scheme on the eve of the crucial Christmas trading season, risking devastation for Oxford’s independent businesses. Car-borne customers are not incidental; they are essential – carrying shopping, making significant purchases, and sustaining the city’s cultural and retail life,” it said on the page. 
It also argued that it will disproportionately affect older people and those on low incomes.  
“This is a fight for the future of Oxford. If we act now, we can stop these punitive schemes from going ahead. Together, we can protect our city’s economy, culture, and community from irreversible harm,” it added.
Oxfordshire County Council said it had received a letter from the campaign group and was considering its contents. 
If you ever fly to Washington DC, look out of the window as you land at Dulles Airport – and you might snatch a glimpse of the single biggest story in economics right now.
There below you, you will see scattered around the fields and woods of the local area a set of vast warehouses that might to the untrained eye look like supermarkets or distribution centres. But no: these are in fact data centres – the biggest concentration of data centres anywhere in the world.
For this area surrounding Dulles Airport has more of these buildings, housing computer servers that do the calculations to train and run artificial intelligence (AI), than anywhere else. And since AI accounts for the vast majority of economic growth in the US so far this year, that makes this place an enormous deal.
Read my full piece here…
Pizza Hut has confirmed the locations of 68 restaurants set to close after its UK parent company fell into administration. 
It will also shut 11 delivery sites as part of a restructuring which will put 1,210 workers at risk of redundancy.
DC London Pie, the firm running Pizza Hut’s UK dine-in restaurants, appointed administrators from corporate finance firm FTI on Monday.
Here are the locations that are due to close…
Worldwide, £9 separates the most expensive average pint of beer from the cheapest, according to a new analysis.
The UK finds itself 11th most expensive on the list of 155 countries – at £5.50 nationwide and £6.83 in London.
Finder has compiled data from cost-of-living sites Expatistan and Numbeo (accurate as of February this year), using an average from both sites to find its figures.
It was able to list countries worldwide by an important indicator – the price of their average pint of beer.
How much???
The most expensive pint was found in Doha, Qatar, setting you back an eye-watering £9.95.
This was significantly more than the cheapest average pint – from Antananarivo, Madagascar – which cost only 68p.
Rounding out the most expensive five were:
On the whole, Middle Eastern and northern European countries have the most expensive pints.
Antananarivo was joined by Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (70p), Lome, Togo (71p), and Kigali in Rwanda, Vientiane in Laos, and Lagos in Nigeria (all 74p), as the cheapest places.
Of the 10 countries with the cheapest pints, eight were in Africa.
Find out the price for each country on our map…
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