Money, Prices and Banking
Paying, saving, borrowing and complaining about cost — plus the bank vocabulary you need when travelling or living abroad.
Money vocabulary splits into three: talking about cost, handling transactions, and dealing with a bank. All three come up fast if you are abroad.
Talking about cost
- How much does it cost? / How much is it?
- It costs £40. (not it costs about 40 pounds of money)
- That's good value. (worth what you pay)
- It's a bargain. (much cheaper than expected)
- It's a rip-off. (far too expensive — informal, quite strong)
- I can't afford it.
- We're on a tight budget.
Cheap vs inexpensive: cheap often implies poor quality as well as low price. Inexpensive and affordable do not.
Two structures worth having: I can't afford to go. (afford + to + verb) and It's worth the money. / It isn't worth it.
Paying
- Can I pay by card? / in cash / by bank transfer
- Do you take contactless?
- Could I have a receipt, please?
- Is service included?
- Let's split the bill. (divide equally)
- I'll get this. / It's on me. (I'll pay for everyone)
Verbs that get confused
- spend money on something: I spent £50 on books.
- pay for something: I paid for the meal.
- cost — the thing is the subject: The meal cost £50.
- lend = give / borrow = take: Can you lend me £10? / Can I borrow £10?
- save = keep for later / save up for = accumulate towards
- owe = have a debt: I owe you £20.
- charge = ask a price: They charged me £5 extra.
❌ I paid the meal. → ✅ I paid for the meal. ❌ I spent £50 for books. → ✅ I spent £50 on books.
Money coming in and going out
Income: salary (monthly, professional) · wages (hourly or weekly) · earn · get paid · bonus · pension · tax · gross (before tax) / net (after tax)
Outgoings: rent · bills · mortgage · deposit (paid up front, returnable) · insurance · subscription · direct debit (automatic monthly payment)
- I get paid on the 25th.
- Most of my salary goes on rent.
- The bills come to about £200 a month.
Careful with deposit: it means both money paid in advance to secure something and money you put into a bank account. Context separates them.
At the bank
account · current account · savings account · balance · statement · withdraw · deposit · transfer · overdraft · interest · loan · mortgage · exchange rate · commission
- I'd like to open an account.
- What's the exchange rate today?
- Do you charge commission?
- My card's been declined.
- I need to withdraw some cash.
The informal words
British speech is full of these, and you will hear them long before you need to say them:
a quid = a pound · a fiver / a tenner = £5 / £10 · I'm broke / skint = I have no money · it cost a fortune = it was very expensive · it's a bit steep = rather too expensive
Note quid has no plural: twenty quid, not "quids".
Problems
- I've been charged twice.
- There's a payment on my statement I don't recognise.
- I'd like to report a lost card.
- The payment didn't go through.
- I'd like to dispute this charge.
Getting these verbs wrong changes who owes whom. Lend and borrow are the pair to fix first: Can you lend me £10? and Can I borrow £10? mean the same thing, but Can you borrow me £10? means nothing at all — and I owe you versus you owe me is worth being certain about before the conversation, not during it.
Splitting a bill
A: Shall we split it?
B: I'll get this — you paid for the taxi.
A: Are you sure? It's not cheap.
B: It's fine. Just lend me a tenner for the tip, I've got no cash on me.
A: Here. You owe me, though.
Split, get this, pay for, lend, an informal amount, and owe — six of the confusable items in one short exchange.
Test yourself
The quiz below focuses on the confused verbs.