Bradford chip shops talk of struggle to stay open amid rising energy costs

One has even said that it has had to change its opening hours to be able to afford the bills.

The concerns come after the energy price cap that energy providers can charge the average paying customer increased by £693 on April 1.

Andrew Webster, Owner of Webster's fish and chips -  which has several shops across the district said: “I’ve started turning the pans off in the afternoons to save gas and just I’m hoping the customers will come in before dinner, or after dinner or tea time because it's not worth keeping the pans on.”

 “The bills have gone up. They’re not giving you any leeway either. I don’t know how much it will go up but I can imagine it will be a lot.

Another Bradford chip shop announced that is having to close because it is not cost effective to stay open.

And it's not just energy prices that are causing concern but stock including the fresh fish has more than doubled, according to another local shop.

Undercliffe Fisheries

Mrs Aujla, Owner of Undercliffe Fisheries said: “Fish is rising, you’re looking at £19.50 a box to £42 now. That on top of the rising energy prices doesn’t help, especially when you’re a small business and you’re trying to keep everything afloat.”

Mrs Aujla added that the recent concerns of rising energy prices, plus the fact that many people are still working from home and ‘not coming out to buy their lunch’ are causing tremendous issues for small businesses.

“People aren’t coming out to buy their lunch but you’ve still got to have the gas and electric and everything on to get things cooking. And you can’t employ staff because you can’t meet the overheads. It’s a massive concern.”

Mrs Kumar, owner of Triumph Fisheries on Tong Street added: “It’s affecting us really badly. Prices are up and everything is costing almost double, but business is very down. It's hard to pay all the bills, just because of costs going up up up.

"I am trying to switch off some lights to save energy, but that’s not helping. It’s a solution to close but closing isn’t a solution because I need to pay rent, and I can’t do that if I’m sitting at home.”

A survey conducted by The Office For National Statistics found that 60 percent of Businesses in the food and beverage sector reported being affected by the rise in energy prices, compared with 38 percent across all sectors.