Food Parcels

[FeelinFagin]

We received two government food parcels today. I think DH must have said okay on the phone call he got after he received his shielding letter. I have medicated hypertension but presume not needing to shield so don't know if the second box was down to the fact we're a family of 5?
The thing is, he's still going to work. Granted it's isolated with no one else around in his work area, but going to work means technically not shielding. We've also been going shopping (albeit as rarely as humanly possible) as theres 5 of us and need to eat.
I haven't seen a delivery slot at Tesco since all this began, even staying up after midnight to nab a slot.
I just feel guilty that we should probably not have the food parcels. We do have food and we still go out when we have to (DH drives, I don't)
So, should we call up asap and cancel the boxes or use the opportunity to not have to go into the public shopping? What does the MN jury say?

Keep the boxes and use them.

If you are entitled to them, then use them. It will restrict you having to go out more than you have to. Don't feel guilty.

We been keeping the boxes and using them. I don’t get two even though we are a family of 5 so not sure why you did, we only get one. I keep it incase I run out of things cos with the Tesco’s 80 item limit and a family of 5 it doesn’t go very far so the milk and bread always comes in handy

Use them, I doubt they can take the ones you already have back now theyve been delivered anyway

Keep them, use them.
Any left over food or food your accumulate too much of there's a fantastic app you can get called OLIO where local people can collect surplus food from you.
I have a regular local lady who needs to use food banks, OLIO is another little life line for her and her family. I would highly recommend it.

Who is the shielded person?
They need to log on to the hub to stop the boxes arriving.

Supermarkets should give priority to the shield group for delivery slots. So once you have secured that, stop the boxes.

Unless of course you are happy with the set up you have now. So change your hub settings now to 'do not require food support'

I called last week when I got my first box to cancel as there is no need (recurrent delivery slot with Asda) still got one this week 🤷‍♀️
Got a call from the government to check I was ok- said thank you I was fine and didn’t need anything.
Then got a call from the local council- said I was fine thank you and didn’t need anything.
The things that won’t be used will be donated to the food bank.

We are shielding but luckily thanks to Tesco we are getting weekly deliveries. When we spoke to the shielding hotline (they called us) we declined the boxes but the woman we spoke to said we might get the first one anyway. We did and contacted food bank who collected it. We then found an email address for our local authority and asked them not to send further boxes, which worked.

I’d rather not have received a box but I don’t feel bad that I did - the food and the way it was packaged was ideal for the food bank and they were pleased to receive it.

It's an issue with the way the food boxes are allocated. If you are in the extremely clinically vulnerable group and say you need help to get food shopping, you get priority access to supermarket slots and a weekly food parcel. At the moment there is no way to just get one of those options. I know a couple of people who have phoned up to ask the deliveries to stop. One was told she could cancel the food parcel and keep the priority supermarket slots, the other was told that if she cancels the box she will loose access to her delivery slots.

I'm not sure why you got 2 though!

You're entitled to the boxes because your DH got a letter, it doesn't matter if he is not technically shielding. Use them. No one will miss out

He must have said yes, i got the same phone call and turned one down. I didn't think I'd eat most of what was in it.

There's a lot of examples of people getting food parvels and being able to use food banks, who don't need them, you included OP. It will eventually put people off giving, or wonder about this use of public money.

Reading through the letter I assume DH said yes when asked if "you and someone else in your household both need a grocery pack".
I do know he didn't read the letter. It's too long and he has zero interest in reading. (He would probably get bored halfway through a Biff, Chip and Kipper book to be honest.)

I think I'll call up and cancel. It's a wonderful service but unless DH is truly shielding I feel guilty receiving even one box.

No word on supermarket delivery slots though. I'll look into this hub thing. I know he did say he did want priority delivery slots so maybe we'll get the option soon?

YappityYapYap
"You're entitled to the boxes because your DH got a letter,"

You're not, you are asked if you need the package.

I'm dying to know what was in the boxes?

If you are on the shielding list, you phone up and they'll give you a slot.

MysweetAudrina, if you Google there's articles on it. It's bread, cerial, tea bags, tinned meat like meatballs, tuna, rice, pasta, long life milk, biscuits, toilet rolls, soup, soap, shower gel, some fruit etc.

My Gran also has a box, which she doesn't really need. We've decided to keep it going until end of May, in case we have another peak.

Bread
Long life milk
Cereal
Various tins eg hot dogs , peaches, beans
Rice
Potatoes
Oranges
Biscuits

You should definitely keep the parcels.

They reduce the amount of times you'll have to put yourselves at risk by going out other than for work.

You'll be able to get a fourth week to view on the Tesco app soon if you are on the shielding list. So you'll have a week ahead priority slot recurring. This means booking a slot for a months time, then every week after that.

It just reduces your exposure.

@MysweetAudrina
2 cartons of UHT milk
A loaf of bread
A bag of apples
A bag of oranges
A bag of potatoes
A mango
Pasta
Rice
Tea bags
Coffee
Digestive biscuits
Jar or pasta sauce
Tinned- tomatoes, soup, peas, pie, rice pudding, tuna, beans.
Mini toiletries (like the ones you get in a hotel with a mini soap)
One roll of toilet paper.

The boxes aren’t exactly exciting ours contain the same things every week. Potatoes, rice, pasta, pasta sauce, carrots, apples, oranges, long life milk, bread, ready brek, tins of tomato soup, beans, rubbed fruit, tuna, corned beef, toilet roll, shower gel, we don’t eat some of the stuff so what we don’t eat we will save and give to the food bank.

Rubbed fruit? tinned fruit! *

Loving rubbed fruit!

Thanks. They do sound very practical and you would be able to make some decent dinners. No cheese or eggs though. Definitely helpful and a good service to have in place.

Hey! I've just had my first ever Iceland delivery,they've done a few subs. Anyone want a pizza? So far, I've unpacked 3 bags,got 4 pizzas so far,just another 5 bags to unpack
btw I ordered one pizza..