I am about to start a Non-funded PhD in microbiology and I am a home student living with my parents in the midlands. I am having to pay my own tuition fees. Once I have started my PhD how easy is it to get funding from charities or any organisations?

Generally funding for PhDs in the sciences is obtained by academics and covers both the lab fees, tuition fees and student maintenance. We are not aware of anybody working in laboratory science who has received scholarships in the way you suggest.

Your best hope is if your supervisor can apply for a studentship for your project, but the funding for this wouldn't be available for at least twelve more months. Your supervisor may also be in a position of apply for money from a research charity to support your research should your project be appropriate. Unless your supervisor has genuine reason to believe he will be able to get funding for you in this manner, you should not have been led to believe that there was a real possibility of obtaining funding for a microbiology PhD on your own.

It may be worth contacting your Local Education Authority to see if they know of any educational trusts are available to you (these are sometimes bestowed for people from a particular school, village or ethnic background). It's also worth checking with your new university for similar opportunities. Both of these are long shots.

Just out of interest, what sort of average cost (not including living costs etc) is involved in self funding a PhD?