Please help, we've hit crisis point

Hopeful1

Well done, Shezza. The first few steps are overwhelming and exhausting, but once you start to get to grips with it all, you'll be able to take it in your stride.

I haven't had any ebay alerts about free listings, but would quite like some myself!

A pad and pen sounds like a good idea. When you're tired it is harder to take everything in. I'm like you, when i'm stressing i don't sleep, which makes everything ten times worse.

Have you got any charges on any of the accounts?

I am full of admiration for you. You are showing great spirit and determination with the way you are exploring every avenue to help you and your family out of this situation.

I wish you all the very best

lynzpower

I will be buying the local evening paper tomorrow night to have a look to see if there are any Christmas jobs being advertised yet. I have not been into the city for a while, so I'm not sure if anything is out there, so fingers crossed. I am also taking photo's to put some things onto e-bay, does anyone know if there are any free listing days coming up?

Ive already sen a couple of "cheapie" bookshiops and Next advertising for Xmas staff, also Jobcentre plus is a good place to look for part time as you can search the jobs by postcode

moanymoany

Hi shezza, I've just read through the thread and it seems to me that you are on your way.

There is a lot of good advice and support to keep you feeling that you are moving forward.

Jacks advice about the snowball is spot on. By paying the most expensive first you save that precious cash. Lynzpower's advice about making sure you get points with your car fuel is a goody. Those points add up - especially with Tesco if you get a clubcard plus card which gives double points. The spending diary is a real eyeopener.

Here's my bit. I think from your income/outgoings you can probably save £150/£200 a month. What I did was to make this a target and did what I could to achieve it. It may take a few months, but I found that as I started I kept finding ways to save £5 here and £10 there and it mounted up more quickly than I would ever have believed.

Get an old ring file and put in there all your challenges - what you are doing to get to your targets, ideas and thoughts. All those envelopes that come through the door can be cut in half and trimmed to be used as paper for the file. The smaller ones can be used as scrap paper for those notes and lists. It will make you feel very virtuous!

Start some challenges. If you start the 'Make £10 a day' just reading will give you loads of ideas. Just think, even if you only succeed for one quarter of the days it means an extra £75 a month. With what you shave off the outgoings a month it could mean over £200 a month to whack into the snowball. ( and keep detailed notes of what works and what doesn't, how long it takes and the costs. All important info for building it up.)

Read weezles feeding an adult for 50p a day - not saying do it, but it is full of ideas as is her previous thread which has a link at the beginning of 50p a day. Go onto old style and start a thread asking for advice - it will roll in - meal plans, recipes and shopping lists for them are all there to save you the anxiety and work of having to do it for yourself.

Sorry about your mum, as a mum I know I can be very insensitive with my grown up children and I'm always so sorry when I realise. I also would worry and want to sort it out for you - so I can see where she's coming from. BUT - you are on the right track and the snowball will mean you see a difference really quickly.

Good Luck

ixwood

It's 5p listing day on Ebay today as it happens!! They don't seem to do free listing days any more. 5p is as good as it gets. They did a half price one the other week and my gamble to wait for a 5p one paid off.

ixwood

Where did the debts come from? Your SOA looks OK without the debts, so how did you end up in debt?

Have you identified/resolved the reasons for your past over spending?

Janey51

Well done shezza for plucking up the courage to speak to the CCCS.
It will be hard for the first few weeks until your creditors get the message that you are on a DMP but stick with it and you will soon be sleeping instead of staring at the ceiling.

shezza

ixwood wrote: »

Where did the debts come from? Your SOA looks OK without the debts, so how did you end up in debt?

Have you identified/resolved the reasons for your past over spending?

Hi, most of our problems came flooding in a couple of years ago. My OH was really ill and spent nearly 4 months in hospital, and then a further 7 months on the sick, by the time he hit 9 months off he was on no pay just SSP. When I tried to get the mortgage paid by the insurance they would not even deal with me, they would only speak to my OH as he was the one that was ill, but he was not in any position to do this. Fortunately some of the other insurance policies were happy to deal with me even though I was not named. Our main problems started when he went onto half pay. I went to my bank to ask for an increase in my overdraft to help meet all the payments that were coming out of my account, but they basically told me that they were not interested and would not increase it. So I started in the lovely cycle of I missed 1 direct debit, got charged by the bank, so the next month I missed 2 and you know the rest. We were using the cc's just to eat at first, then put petrol in the car, then money out to pay bills. We had a couple of loans already as we had not long bought our first house and we needed furniture etc and things just got out of hand very quickly. When we eventually got the money from the mortgage most of it went to pay everything we were in arrears with (utilities, council tax and family) it was a very stressful time.

Since this I have always thought that no-one cares, especially the banks, I sat and cried in the office of the woman at my branch, and I was told not our problem. Since joining here I have slowly learnt that there are people out there who do care, and I have learnt so much from you all, and after talking to cccs yesterday I know that help is definately out there I just did not know where to look. So thank you all x

Treadmill

I think one or both of you needs to get a second job if you don't already have one.

savingholmes

Hope things go well tomorrow for you. You are doing the right thing in at least getting some professional advice....

brummiebabe

Hi Shezza - well done on posting :T

I'm a nurse too - the £76 is an annual fee (they don't do it 3 yearly anymore - shame because before the NMC took over it was only around £40 for 3 years!!) so you need to account for this in any budget you do - he obviously can't work if it's not paid, so is a priority really.

As for work related phone calls - if he gets itemised billing, he can claim for all work related calls from a personal mobile (on an expenses form) I used to do this but have finally been given a work phone:T (after working on my own in the community for over 12 years!!!!:rolleyes: :rolleyes: )

Can he do any agency/bank shifts? Doing a night shift at the weekend can be a real moneyspinner - if he did it once or twice a month...it all helps!!

Best of luck....