any advice please

us,thecat&thedebt

me and partner have a load of debts between us and we are struggling to geta grip on any of it i know there is some really nice people out there so im hoping if i post my entire siuation on here someone will have idea ect that will help

nothing ventured nothing gained!

so here goes

joint income (from end of this month as we are currently unemployed but have jobs starting) after tax and ni £1500 per month

outgoings

rent 575
c/tax 80
elec/gas 20
water 18
contents ins 9
car ins 30
shopping 100
phone+bb 29
mobile 15
pet ins 6
dvd rental 8

debts
t-mobile 600
vodaphone 390
tesco ins 140
argos card 667
llyods loan 7000
llyods o/d 900
hsbc o/d 1500
dfs 1269
mum 2000
brother 800

they money i owe to pay to my mum has to be paid by regular instalements hopefully 200 per month she wont budge on it but at least theres no interest i owe them this money for debts they paid off for me in 2004 so i dont blame them for being persistant as they know ive run up debts again!!

my brother in law can wait till last as he doesnt need money right now and is another no intrest one..

sofa repayments start in march for 3 years and are also intrest free!!!

am currently awaiting for ppi on loan to be removed so should reduce balance by about a grand...

last thing i will say is i wont give up the 8 per month for dvd rental as it is our subsitution for the sky which i cancelled and going out we get it through tesco pay once a month and on av get 4 dvds month from it

and no im not getting rid of my cat!!!!!!!!!!!!

Janey51

Hi. This is a really helpful site and you will get lots of advice.
Is it possible for you to list the payments you make each month on your debts? I know you have said you pay your Mum £200 a month but what about the other payments?
It looks as if you have some spare cash. Is the £1500 your salary when you start work? If so, you are looking at another month or so before you actually have money available I think.
What is the £140 to Tesco Insurance?
Do you really feed 2 adults and a cat on £100 per month? My 3 cats would leave of their own accord if I tried to feed us all on the equivalent!! The standard figures quoted by National Debtline are up to £75 per week for housekeeping for a couple.
Do speak to your banks. We are in terrible debt at the moment but our bank has been great...up to now...lol...given us a payment break and suspended charges.
If you do decide to go to a Debt Help Agency (one of the free ones such as CCCS) you will be expected to treat all your creditors the same....and that includes your Mum and brother I'm afraid.

ms_london

outgoings

rent 575
c/tax 80
elec/gas 20
water 18
contents ins 9
car ins 30
shopping 100
phone+bb 29
mobile 15
pet ins 6
dvd rental 8

mum 2000 200



TOTAL: £1090

debts



t-mobile 600
vodaphone 390
tesco ins 140
argos card 667
llyods loan 7000
llyods o/d 900
hsbc o/d 1500

• DFS repayments start in March. What is the monthly repayment?
• You owe your brother 800 but say there is no immediate rush.

• With your “regular” outgoings standing at £1090, this leaves you with £410 to split amongst your creditors.

• What are your minimum repayments at the moment? Have you agreed repayments with them? (i.e. the arrears on phone bill)

• As another person asked, what is the Tesco Insurance for? Is this an arrear also? I would suggest that you try and clear this first. It might not have the highest APR, but it would motivate you to clear your debts & will mean you will have one less creditor.

• Are the mobile phone people charging you interest/charges on the money you owe? If not, there is no rush to pay them off and I would concentrate on those that ARE charging you interest/charges, i.e. the overdrafts, and obviously the loan – but this would be the last one you should worry about and just make the minimum repayments at the moment.

• Have you called all of your creditors? When will your first pay day be? Have you already agreed repayments? Call them today and explain that you are both starting jobs on X and your first pay day will be X.

• You don’t appear to have included petrol in your budget. Also, are these estimates for gas/elec or what you currently pay as they seem a bit low?

• Are you looking to throw all of the remaining £410 at your debt? Or will you need “pocket money” each? If so, how much will this be?

us,thecat&thedebt

Hi

the jobs we start are going to be paid weekly which is good for us..

i have this morning rang the pub across the road and they have some vacancies have worked there before so i know will be ok so that is going to give me roughly 40 per week for two 4 hour shifts..

as for shopping i shop around and buy alot of food from netto iceland ect and when i shop in tesco i buy stuff thats on offer and stock up also i get 10% discount as my brother works there

gas and electric are on estimate but last month electric was only £6 we are being so tight about have lights on ect hehe

the tesco insurance was owed from a previous motor policy and is now with debt collecters moorcraft whom i pay for my argos card i told them i was umemployed and cant make an immediate payment of 40 straightaway and they said without they cant set up arrangement!!!

have spoken to creditors and this agreements i have at present...

tmobile is with a company called fredicksons my min payment is £15 per month no intrest

vodaphone is with wescot argh!!! we arrange to pay them £20 per month no intrest

argos card is with moorcraft and is the best thing that ever could have happened although i got a default at least i have got rid of 29.9% apr plus deffered intrest from 6 months free i pay them £20 per month
no intrest there

lloyds
i was really scared to ring them but they were quite nice after a fashion!!!
i have a payment plan with them of £100 per month from that 100 they pay 70 of the loan 10 of the joint account and 20 of my partners sole account they also then add 8 in intrest to the joint account and 8 in intrest to the sole account so from my 30 only14 is taken from the balance i think this is terrible but apparantly normal
after 6 months i will have wot they call a refinance were if i made all the payments on time ect they will put all the o/d ect into one loan with a better intrest rate... the apr on the current loan is 16.9% which ive haeard is not great but not too bad as we had no credit history ect..
im thinking this is the best one to tackle as the intrest rates are so high!!!
am expecting a tax rebate of 300 very soon should i throw it all into one debt or split it

as for the hsbc the od limit is on 300 im kicking myself for letting it get like this but i havent rang them yet nor have they me which i think is wierd????

i was thinking of selling some bits on ebay and getting the buyers to pay by cheque that way i could pay cheque straight in to bank to clear od

there is no petrol ect as we share my partners dads car as he works nights and only lives down the road.. we put 30 towards his insurance as it rose by this much when he added my partner to the policy but he pays for petrol and rfl ect


dfs repayments are 39 but am having ppi taken off so will only be 35 these are intrest free..

to be honest im looking into throwing every penny into getting out of debt but am a complusive spender and useless with money i make plans ect and cant stick to them
i think what i might do is use the 40 per week from the pub to spend ect and the rest just for bills and debts...
im thinking of getting a basic bank account all i need is for it to accept dd for the insurance policies i pay everything else by giro as i always seem to get stung with failed dd payments accept bacs and have a withdraw facilitie any ideas remeber i have crap credit rating!!!
also can you get theses type of accounts in joint names...