Forgotten Debt

Jesthar

Hee hee, now this looks MUCH better! Some comments still stand, of course:

lostnfound wrote: »

Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet
Household Information
Number of adults in household........... 2
Number of children in household......... 3
Number of cars owned.................... 1
Monthly Income Details
Monthly income after tax................ 365
Partners monthly income after tax....... 1000
Benefits................................ 702
Other income............................ 0
Total monthly income.................... 2067
Monthly Expense Details
Mortgage................................ 325
Secured loan repayments................. 0
Hire Purchase (HP) repayments........... 32
Rent.................................... 0
Management charge (leasehold property).. 0
Council tax............................. 133
Electricity............................. 90 - :eek: HORRIBLY high, does this include arrears? Can you change provders? I don't think I pay that much for electricity in a year...

Gas..................................... 45 - Also quite high, does this include arrears? Can you change provders?

Oil..................................... 0
Water rates............................. 0
Telephone (land line)................... 50 - Nastily high, you should be getting both phone and broadband at well below this price...

Mobile phone............................ 0
TV Licence.............................. 13
Satellite/Cable TV...................... 57
Internet Services....................... 19.99 - This is pretty high for normal broadband...

Groceries etc. ......................... 280
Clothing................................ 30
Petrol/diesel........................... 120
Road tax................................ 15
Car Insurance........................... 17
Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 15
Car parking............................. 0
Other travel............................ 0
Childcare/nursery....................... 0
Other child related expenses............ 0
Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 0
Pet insurance/vet bills................. 0
Buildings insurance..................... 6
Contents insurance...................... 6
Life assurance ......................... 0
Other insurance......................... 18
Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 30
Haircuts................................ 0
Entertainment........................... 0
Holiday................................. 0
Emergency fund.......................... 0
school lunches.......................... 0 - did you miss this, or are you going to drop school meals? Good for you if you are!
hubbys money............................ 60
pet food................................ 40
Total monthly expenses.................. 1401.99

Assets
Cash.................................... 0
House value (Gross)..................... 60000
Shares and bonds........................ 0
Car(s).................................. 5000
Other assets............................ 0
Total Assets............................ 65000

Secured & HP Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
Mortgage...................... 48000....(325)......0
Hire Purchase (HP) debt ...... 600......(32).......0
Total secured & HP debts...... 48600.....-.........-
Unsecured Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
cahoot.........................240.......43........0
cahoot.........................240.......39........0
lombard........................6000......265.6.....0
Total unsecured debts..........6480......347.6.....-

Monthly Budget Summary
Total monthly income.................... 2,067
Expenses (including HP & secured debts). 1,401.99
Available for debt repayments........... 665.01
Monthly UNsecured debt repayments....... 347.6
Amount left after debt repayments....... 317.41
Yay - money left over! You need to use this money to pay extra off your debts - if you really have this much left over each month, you could clear your Cahoot debts in a couple of months!

Personal Balance Sheet Summary
Total assets (things you own)........... 65,000
Total HP & Secured debt................. -48,600
Total Unsecured debt.................... -6,480
Net Assets.............................. 10,520
Created using the SOA calculator at www.makesenseofcards.com.
Reproduced on Moneysavingexpert with permission.

Well, now, doesn't that look nicer? :T

On paper, at least, you have a good amount of money left over per month - if you can't find that in reality, then the extra money is going somewhere. I think it would be a very good idea to start a spending diary (I use a spreadsheet) - write in absolutely EVERYTHING you spend and find out where all those extra pennies slip away.

It would be very useful if you could find out the APRs on all your debts, as that helps you work out which to pay extra off first. This is called 'snowballing', and there is a useful calulator you can use to work out which order to overpay on your debts in to minimise the interest you are charged once you have the APRs to hand, although as you have so few creditors this will be a very simple decision to make and probably won't need the calculator!

Snowball calculator is here: http://www.whatsthecost.com/snowball.aspx?country=uk

Hope that give you somewhere to start

~Jes

TotallyBroke

If you can just account for your surplus money you could have paid one of the smaller debts off in 1 month. Get hubby to give up his £60 and you could be 2 debts gone in 2 months.

lostnfound

Electricity was £40.00 but received a letter from scottish power about price increase backdated to 1st september was increased by them to reflect the new prices. Now i owe them money but was in credit with them before they increased it, was only notified of increase in November 2008 after 1st september increase.
Gas was £35.00 increased again by scottish power.
Telephone with Bt was £25.00 until daughter phoned every tom !!!!!! and harry`s mobile now £50.00 to cover shortfall.
Would like to leave the sky as is because i dont go out so dont spend money on entertainment except this but may take the movie package off as i dont really watch them.
Internet with Aol for gold package, very hard to get a good deal where we live as no cable an even the cheapest b/b from sky we cant get.
i would say the clothing is an estimate as i tend to buy only at sales and only when children really need it, i probably spend less than this a month.
Error with car tax and the maintenance. oops.
Other insurance is my Scottish Gas maintence for boiler and central heating.
Presents is probably alot less than that as well was trying to calculate christmas and birthdays for everyone into the cost.
Petfood is for 3 cats and 1 dog. might be able to shave more off it.
Hubbys earns the money i give him pocket money i think he deserves something, could reduce his money for a while.
Lunch money for 2 oldest kids £2.00 per day, and youngest gets £1.50 per day.
Forgot to add in the fact i smoke i pay roughly £35.00 per week on that filthy habitn which i am working on stopping so my calculations are wrong again.

Eager_Elephant

While everyone else sorts out your SOA I would like to agree with what someone else wrote about communication in writing.

I would not contact the local office because their targets wil be to collect as much in as possible and they may well be unreasonable in how much they expect you to pay back.

Instead contact Head Office direct:

Customer Relations,Provident Personal Credit, Colonnade, Sunbridge Road, Bradford, BD1 2LQ

They are very helpful.

EE

iB1

One burning question for me is - did you Mum actually pay back the loan to Provident or not? If it slipped her mind, can you ask her to help you out, since by not paying the balance it has left you in a bit of trouble.

Jesthar

lostnfound wrote: »

Electricity was £40.00 but received a letter from scottish power about price increase backdated to 1st september was increased by them to reflect the new prices. Now i owe them money but was in credit with them before they increased it, was only notified of increase in November 2008 after 1st september increase.
Gas was £35.00 increased again by scottish power.
Ouchies. Time to try cutting down your useage and getting out of arrears, then shop around and see if you can find a better deal on the comparison sites!

Telephone with Bt was £25.00 until daughter phoned every tom !!!!!! and harry`s mobile now £50.00 to cover shortfall.
Oooh, nasty! I do hope your daughter now understands calling mobiles from the landline is taboo...

Would like to leave the sky as is because i dont go out so dont spend money on entertainment except this but may take the movie package off as i dont really watch them.
Fair enough! You're not it so bad a hole you need to do this, although if thre are parts of the package you don't use then you mat as well save that money.

Internet with Aol for gold package, very hard to get a good deal where we live as no cable an even the cheapest b/b from sky we cant get.
That IS annoying - are you sure AOL are the only ADSL option, though?

i would say the clothing is an estimate as i tend to buy only at sales and only when children really need it, i probably spend less than this a month.
Fair enough!

Error with car tax and the maintenance. oops. But a good oops, as correcting it has made you better off...

Other insurance is my Scottish Gas maintence for boiler and central heating.
Have you looked around to see what this would cost from another provider? The cover provided by the utility copanies may not be either the cheapest or the best.

Presents is probably alot less than that as well was trying to calculate christmas and birthdays for everyone into the cost.
Fair enough

Petfood is for 3 cats and 1 dog. might be able to shave more off it.
Well, if you've that many pets, £40 isn't too bad!

Hubbys earns the money i give him pocket money i think he deserves something, could reduce his money for a while.
Probably best to talk things through with him

Lunch money for 2 oldest kids £2.00 per day, and youngest gets £1.50 per day.
It would be definitely cheaper for them to take packed lunches, then. Or if you don't want to do that, as another possibility (and if you haven't already taken action on this front) have you considered docking your daughters lunch money by 50p a day until she has paid for the phone bill she ran up? Just a rather cheeky suggestion - might help teach the value of money.

Forgot to add in the fact i smoke i pay roughly £35.00 per week on that filthy habitn which i am working on stopping so my calculations are wrong again.
Good luck kicking the habit!

Well, at the moment it looks like you just need to focus on finding out where all the extra money you are theoretically have left over every month is getting to by starting a spending diary ASAP. You can then start making some serious dents in your debts!

After that,the thing which jumps out on me is trying to use less gas and electricity (I'm at the stage where I'm pathalogical about turning things off a the wall when they're not in use! :rotfl: ), as well as comparing prices for a new supplier and boiler insurance.

As to calling the Provident, have you asked you mother what happened to the payment? It would be useful to know that before you contact them, I suspect. Let us know how you get on?

~Jes

lostnfound

Thank you everyone for your input, I will write to head office regarding the debt, make cut backs and I think the idea that Jestar had of docking my daughter money good but think I will just not give her lunch money at all and make her have packed lunches along with the other 2. Also think i will start a Debt diary and keep you informed of my progress as everyone needs a fresh view every now and then to see the wood for the trees. And regards my mother no point talking to her she not speaking to me as i will not lend her any more money, do thats a brick wall i do not wish to break down for now.
Groceries willl be getting a further chop and i will be looking to take sky movies off my package and will look to see if anyone else can give me a better broadband deal.
Well ive done it time to get myself back on track an be debt free on my terms and as quickly a possible.

RAS

Hi

Well doen for this.

Given the age of your kids could you and hubby sit down with them and explain that things are a bit tight and you need to clear your debts and that means things like not leaving stuff on or using the telephone to call out.

Also with hubbie, that you may be able to sort stuff out but if either of you lost your job, it could get nasty very quickly. So you need to clear any debts that you can now and put aside at least enough to cover 3 months expenses?

lostnfound

Okay today is the start of a new day, got time before college this afternoon will write letter to Provident this morning and send to head office. Got one packet of cigs left so will try to stop smoking from tommorrow, hope I can do it, the money would be really useful, positive thinking.
Looked on internet for broadband to see who has a cheaper not much out there for us will phone sky an see what they can offer us, will also try Bt as we have there telecoms and if no joy with then try bluffing with Aol and see if we can get it down to at least £10.00 a month. Go for groceries tommorrow so will buy packed lunches for kids even though they not best pleased but needs must. Will phone electric and gas today as well and give them a meter reading, will do this every month.
Last but not least Hubby got paid a bit extra this week so will put it to one side to pay Provident when i find out what they have to say to me.
Okay ramble over, off to get the final child to school and on with a new day.
One final thing going to start a diary of where my money goes every day, will look at it and try and stop it from frittering away.

TotallyBroke

Bit of a hint with the diary. Write in it before you pay for it. By the time you have written in the notebook "Newsagents, packet of crisps, 35p" you won't want them as they will be a hassle.
When doing packed lunches buy Frubes yoghurts, They can be frozen and will thaw out slowly during the course of the day. I actually prefer them frozen like an ice pop. Also get the kids to make home made sausage rolls etc over the weekend to put in their lunch boxes. Instead of the usual sandwiches and rolls use pitta bread or wraps, or do a pasta with tuna and tomato sauce.

If you really can't give up on the smoking at the minute. Buy roll up tobacco it's so much cheaper.