Join in if you are self-employed and work from home

Mudbath

Hiya
Lovely to see lots of people on this thread - welcome to everyone new who's joined. I've got my children off poorly today but luckily I always have Monday's off so I won't have to cancel clients.

Cheeky monkey - I'm going to start playing the glad game too. Today I'm glad i'm self employed because i'm at home and don't have to take the day off because my children are ill - I can work this evening and whilst they're watching a dvd.

My plans for today....i'm going to print out my client front sheets, continuation sheets etc...so i've got lots in the file and i'm not frantically printing things out at the last minute. I'm also going to phone a couple more clients that I had before my three months off to see if they'd like to book in. I don't like making those calls but everyone is expecting me to ring them after my op so it's not cold calling - can you tell this is the part of the business I have problems with ... selling myself - I really need to get better as it is quite crucial!

Hope you're all having a good and productive day xx

bluecowonthebus

Hi there

Can I join? I'm a freelance sub-editor and single mother to one child. I run my own small magazine and I too have a day job three days a week, working in an office doing admin. I like to call it the world's most boring job - some days all I do is file invoices and don't talk to anyone. But with the current economy, I am grateful to have it because it pays the rent. I also do the odd bit of waitressing for a catering company and sell things on Ebay. However, I am flat broke and on a DMP with CCCS to pay £33k of credit card debt.

I do find it hard to work from home even though I mostly enjoy doing what I do. The amount of work I get through at home seems minuscule compared to what I used to do in a busy office so I'm trying to overcome that by being more organised and generally strict with myself.

Quentin

cheekymonkey20 wrote: »

Just designing some flyers to put round

Uw reps are well known for abusing these forums by using them for misleading advertising, and not declaring their interest.

AND your company does NOT guarantee to "always" beat either BG or npower prices! (So why lie about it here - this site is for moneysavers, not gullibles!)

Horace

I think its truly amazing at you can find out - my free advert in the Chamberlink magazine (our local chamber of commerce mag) has borne fruit again. This time another photographer but one who is really local to me - about 5 mins walk in fact contacted me this afternoon and I am going to meet him and his wife on Wednesday when we can discuss business. In fact when he told me that he used to work at the Uni, then I feel sure that I know him because I certainly recognise his name and he worked in a dept that I worked in (although the dept was huge).

Hollyberry

Thanks for the info on the Chamber, Horace, that's very interesting. Once I know for definite where we are buying our B&B house, I will certainly be looking to make contact with the relevant Chamber.

I am still being pleasantly surprised by how much you can find out with a few gentle enquiries. We found a potential grant from a chat with the lady at the local tourist bureau - sadly the house there turned out to need an eye-watering amount of work (and that was only on the bits we and the builder could get to...who knows what lurked in the cellars, attic and coach house :eek: ) so that one is off the list, although the location is still viable.

Today I have been: sorting out books to keep/go to Amazon/go to charity shops and recycling, looking at Business Link for free training, signing up for some seminars, looking for some short term work to fill the gap between redundancy and the brave new world of B&B. I am fancying being an OU tutor (summer school/returning to learning); I have been an OU student before, and I like the approach. Longer term, it might also be good to balance out those hours of toilet scrubbing I am going to be doing! Time now to do my property trawl to see if there is anything interesting new to the books.

Mudbath - I like the "turn it to your advantage" way of thinking. If I hadn't been ill and then at risk of redundancy, I would never have thought of doing something I might actually enjoy, but would probably have stayed on the treadmill. Better late than never, I guess.

Mudbath

Well, i've finally printed out plenty of client forms for my file...i've been very lapse in doing this for years (only actually printing them off minutes before clients have arrived sometimes). I've also started to consolidate lots of separate forms into one longer form that I can just fill in the relevant bits. Then, if a client has a different treatment I'll just fill in an extra bit of the form rather than wasting several more sheets. Thanks to this thread i'm already more organised!

My job tomorrow is;
- finish designing my consolidated form
- write up April 2008 to July 2008 accounts.

My aim is to get my accounts ready for submission by the end of April but i'll probably hang on to them for a few months so I don't have to pay the accountant just yet!!

skintjenny

just about to go off for my night shift and thought i would pop in and see how you are all doing. what i really want to do is stay home and work on my business but never mind, soon i will have endless hours for doing just that.
is anyone else involved in the arts? im hoping to make most of my money selling artwork, going on residencies and organising exhibitions and events. although to be honest i think ill take any job i can get- a portfolio career indeed!

Horace

I need to find a decent accountant - although my books are basic I hate doing them and feel sure that an accountant will be able to save me some money in the long run.

I am going to be out tomorrow morning - said I would help the local conservatives with a petition that they are running outside a massive college, the government have withdrawn funding as it was going to be built on the site of the old rover works (about 2 mins walk from my place). I am thinking that if I am seen to help them out then I may just be invited to participate in assisting the person who will be our parliamentary candidate. Who knows where that might lead me.

I need to sort out some business cards and take them to the local marquee company as they are having an open weekend but have said I cannot have a stand but they are willing to dispense my business cards. I did point out to them that I have become a member of their day spa so there was really no argument about my business cards. I shall nip to the stationers too to see if they have a plastic stand that I can put a notice in - may just do a sooperdooper offer - book a full wedding planning service and get on the day co-ordination free.(of course it won't really be free, people will just think that its free:D ).

Can't decide whether or not to chase up someone who promised to provide a service for me on 12 March but haven't nor have they phoned me back:mad: Their phone is permanently engaged and as a last resort have had to get onto my credit card company and ask them to investigate - they have frozen the amount that was due to go out (I currently use my personal card and will pay myself back from my business). This service was supposed to provide me with customers:mad:

Need to crack on with my remaining two assignments too - so will try and tackle them tomorrow afternoon. Please give me a kick up the pants if I don't do them.

downshifter

Well it's another day in selfemploymentland! I had a lovely walk after work yesterday with the dog but the wind was so strong, we could hardly stand up in it. We were both pretty tired but I must've burnt off so many calories which is good. However I made flapjacks and ate most of them which is bad!

I had a really bad night, probably because of the wind, one of those nights where you can't stay asleep for long, kept waking up. But today I have to write a formal job description and person spec for a post I'm going to advertise, will be digging about on net for examples. Have also got to get on with a piece of work I've been putting off and putting off but the time has come. Not a good thing to do when I'm feeling so exhausted.

It's the shop payday today and have seen that they've underpaid me by about £100 which I was really depending on, and I won't get it back till next month. God, small businesses and their accounting!!! Of course the good bit is that I will be up next month, but till then I'd be far better off on benefits.

Time for another coffee, a shower and lets get the show on the road!

Jan

ps, Hollyberry, which area are you looking in? Perhaps we could help look out for maybe something suitable.

skintjenny

oh no thats awful about your pay being down- i hate it when youre relying on something and it doesnt come through.
i have so many things to get done this week that i just keep putting off... why am i reading mse boards when i should be working on my business?!
someone kick me