SOA and Diary of a Former Debt Denier

PercyPig

Well I for one don't think we should give goodeys a hard time over the Sky. She has said its her only form of entertainment so I think we should leave it at that and be supportive. If you use the logic that you are in debt therefore you can't afford any luxuries, then where do you draw the line? Some peope would say Broadband is a luxury but no one has told her to get rid of her PC. The OP is in debt - we should be supportive not berate her over £20 spent on entertainment.

Just my opinion, don't want to offend anyone.

Good luck goodeys, you sound really positive. As others have said, the grocery bill could be much lower but you know that already.

Cheers,

Percy

DebtFree2015_3

Not to touch on a sore point with Sky but you could save money but moving your Telephone to Sky. We have an inclusive TV/Broadband/Telphone Package with them and we pay £32 per month for all of it (incluses free evening & Weekend) You could get it for as low as £27 but we work from home so need a semi decent broadband!!

Would really suggest you look into that so you could keep your entertainment package and save £23 per month to go towards getting debt free.

Good luck xx

goodeys

Supreme wrote: »

It really is ridiculous that people think Sky is a necessity. Wake up, you are in massive debt, and will be for years and years, so you can't afford it. How do people not understand these basic things?

Freeview and Freesat both have E4 anyway. Sky1 is not something you require to survive. If it is, then you have some serious issues.

Yes you are right I do have issues, I have been suffering from severe anxiety and post natal depression which required inpatient treatment at a psychiatric mother and baby unit so forgive if I want to have something simple like sky. One little pleasure in life I will not feel guilty for. I will be in debt for years and years whether i have sky or not! Thanks for your input but I will be keeping Sky so there isn't really any need to keep going over it. I am saving money everywhere else that I can so I will not feel guilty about it.

goodeys

Thank you to everyone that has stuck up for me. Not sure why Supreme is taking it upon themselves to tell me what to do rather than advise (which they had, repeatedly). I really do appreciate all of your support. I have done my token payment letters and am now off to the library to print them. My printer is out of ink and I am saving money by going to the Library to use theirs rather than buy more. Its a new me already!!! :A

Thanks guys, you really are fab xxx

webitha

im another one in favour of menu planning, i spend around £250 for 5 people inc toiletries, 2x packed lunches, fresh fruit and veg every day, so you will get there come over to the old style, and check it out also stop the CTF, i have and plowed it into my debts, and believe me that £20 will make a difference

goodeys

Well good morning folks.

I am feeling super positive and in control today, despite the fact that my DS woke me at 04:30 and I was unable to get back to sleep afterwards. My head was just swimming with what I could do, what I needed to do and how to do it so I finally got up at 5.20 and everything that I wanted to do I couldn't do as all of the paperwork was in the wardrobe in my room where husband was asleep or in the filing cabinet in my son's room. So I settled down and read too many posts on this site. My good intentions are now vanishing as I am still in my dressing gown and can't seem to tear myself away from this site. Sure I have OCD when it comes to sites with useful chat rooms.

Anyway so I thought that I would put a quick update on here and then get cracking or at least dressed.

Yesterday was a success. I wrote four token payment letters. Went to the library and printed them and wrote out 5 personal budget sheets (as no printer!) and addressed the envelopes. I should've achieved more but my bloody mother was here for the day.

Today I need to get to the doctors to see if I can get NRT on presciption. Post the letters off. Pay all of our 'change pot' into the bank and then pay the council tax (15 days overdue ooops) with it. Check my question that I posted on here to see what advice i can get about my disputed BT debt and then hopefully write a letter off to them. Finish my meal planner for the week. Get to Sainsbury's and keep the spend as low as possible. Call vodafone (not looking forward to that one). Do all of the housework. Sort through my sons drawers to find stuff that he has grown out of to eBay. Write a letter to Child Tax Credit to see if I can get my initial payment backdated more than 3 months due to exceptional circumstances.

Busy day ahead me thinks but I will get it achieved. I have finally realised that half of the problems that I have are because I lack motivation and put everything off to tomorrow, but, of course tomorrow never comes and it never gets done. My new thought is that it needs to be dealt with, it will be unpleasant but waiting til tomorrow will not achieve anything or help in anyway.

Basically......I am pulling my lazy SOB finger out and I am taking control.

Thank you so much to everyone that has posted on here with their support and encouragement, it really has spurred me on and I am so thankful to this site and to all of you. :j

shellshell

Hi there,
Can i first say, well done for starting to sort the problem, better late than never!
This is fixable!
The majority of people on here has been through it or are going through it and they will all have some great ideas and advice that you can then utilise to start getting things back on track.
Can i also suggest a few things?
Your shopping bill. (as others have also quite rightly pointed out) is quite extreme. I can feed 5 (2 adults, 3 and 4 yr old plus baby milk and nappies for 3 month old inc girls pack lunches for school and nursery) on £50 a week. It is nt that hard, the trick is to make things go as far as they can i.e i make spaghetti bolognese and lasagne at the same time using one large pack of mince.
Also, a challenge im doing at the mo, is to try and down grade at least 3 things a week to see if anyone tastes the difference and to test the quality i.e cheaper washing liquid etc and if they pass the test then that becomes my usual brand. i tried value tea bags last week. didnt pass the test but now i know so wont buy them again.
hmmm... straying from the point lol
as for the sky thing, do what you feel is right. If it comes down to you desperately needing to magic an extra £20 a month then im sure you'd do the right thing.
I know things are bad at the mo, but you can change it.
good luck with everything, i will keep checking back to see how your doing.

xx

smem

Re the shopping - l do mine on line once a week if its not on that weeks shop we do without. No other shopping takes place for the whole week. By doing it online l only buy what l need and impulse shopping stops. l know there is a delivery charge but in the long run l feel l save on petrol to and from the shops and on those little extra we don't need but are nice to have.

mumps

goodeys wrote: »

Many thanks all for your suggestions. I have now compiled a 'TO DO' list so that I can get my !!! moving and also a 'Goals' List

• Call sky and lower package to the bare minimum that includes Sky1 and E4

Any other suggestion welcome (apart from cancelling Sky!) :rotfl:

My family were so against getting rid of Sky. We now have freeview, it includes Sky3, E4, More 4, Film4, Dave, Virgin and lots more. Everyone now agrees I was right to get rid, its not worth it. Honestly there is lots of watch on freeview and online. Good luck.

Just a thought, I cancelled Sky with agreement from the family that it was for six months to give us a head start getting straight which made it seem OK. Also keep tryig with Vodafone if you get someone nice they can really help. I know because I had to phone them two or three times before a really nice guy changed me to a more suitable plan.

goodeys

Well I haven't posted on this diary for a while so I thought that I had better give a little update. The main reason for not posting on this diary is because it has all hit the fan since sending the £1 token payment letters. It has done far more harm than good and I wish that I hadn't bothered.

HFC/Restons were offered the token payment and they rejected it straight away and then the next day I received court papers. They don't give a damn about my situation and they want a CCJ. I have posted on here about what to do and although it seems that they have not followed the correct procedures and I would have an argument in court I just don;t think that I can handle it. I feel that that I may come off course If I were to 'waste' the courts time. So i will be sending the forms back today offering them £20 per month in the hope that they accept this and cease legal action. I will keep you posted on this one.

Natwest were again offered the £1 and they rejected it and demanded that I call them within 7 days, so I know that I shouldn't speak to them on the phone but I did and there reason is that they want more than £1 but from my finacial statement I haven't got a spare £1 (their words not mine). So I have just written them another letter offering them £10 per month. I have also calculated my bank charges from them and it amounts to over £900 so this is also going off to them today along with a CCA request, I am hoping that the CCA request will slow things down on the legal side as they have just issued a default notice so I think that they are about to march down the legal warpath.

Littlewoods/NDR - Again were offered a £1 token payment and they have not responded to the letters at all despite the fact that I sent a letter to NDR and seperate letter to Littlewoods. Today I have done the CCA request in the hope that this will slow things down with them

ICON Collections (Private Hospital CT Scan) Have written to them today offering £5 per month.

Whilst doing all of this I have also done CCA request letters for my husbands debts, he if paying about £80 per month on debts that total over £20000. But I know that so much of it is charges that I hoping that they do not have the credit agreements so that we can at least get the charges wiped so that we are just paying back what we owe. CL Finance x 2 one for HSBC Current AC and another for the credit card. I have also done one for Cabot for him for a capital one credit card and from what I have read about CapOne it seems that they never seem to send the correct papers.

So to summarise I think that by the summer I will have about 4 or more CCJs to my name. I got myself into a state when the first court papers came through but now I am just thinking who cares if I have a CCJ. My credit rating is shot to pieces anway so having a CCJ is not really going to make it anyworse. But I will keep you posted. I'm not sure whether it is the current financial situation in the world that is prompting the companies to get moving quickly with legal proceedings or just my luck.

I have done some good things though too. I have managed to cut my shopping bill down by over £100 last month and I have also applied and received the government healthy start food stamps which can be used on fruit, veg, milk and infant formula. Its on £6 per week but every little helps.

I have stopped paying Vodafone theor £45 per month, I called and wrote to them so many times and they will just not help at all. I know that it is more debt in the making but I have more important things to pay than a phone bill. I have now got a PAYG monthly sim which is £10 per month f0r 100 minutes and 500 texts plus I used Quidco which bagged me £15.

I am going to try and have a good week this week which is why I have been up since 5am today getting all of these letters done so that I can try and relax a bit enjoy the week.

It is my 28th Birthday on Wednesday, it is my sons first birthday on Thursday and it is Valentines at the weekend. Plus my brother has been living in Spain since last August and he is coming back on Wednesday for a visit and will be staying with us. My Dad and his wife are taking us all out on Saturday to Drusillas Zoo as it is our birthdays so that too is something to look forward to. My son is acting like little devil boy at the moment though so I may have to swap him for a monkey.....

Sorry for droning on and on, its because I haven't posted for ages but I will post on here from now on when something changes rather than storing it all up for a mind blowingly boring read!

xxx:rotfl: