Getting OH to sort out our Credit Cards

EmmaLou_3

November statement for Egg Card is all I could get hold of - OH promised he would get recent online statement, but is yet to do so. The amount probably isn't a lot less than shown, as the minimum monthly payment was only £57 on our recent bank statement.

EmmaLou_3

tyllwyd wrote:

This just worried me a little bit because in the past my husband's work used to pay for his travel expenses to and from home and the office where he was working as a contractor but they made a mistake and hadn't declared it as a taxable benefit. When the Inland Revenue found out, the company had to pay a huge tax bill, and although we didn't have to pay any back tax, we did have to pay tax on the benefit from then on. So if OH's train travel is between his normal place of work and home, make sure everything is OK with the tax.

I didn't realise that _pale_ - I will have to check with him!

EmmaLou_3

:j Just got NTL to reduce bills to £21.50 (not including phone calls)

Housing Benefit has been reduced :sad: . Apparently they overpaid us last year. Now only getting £163.20 per month

EmmaLou_3

Here are the current totals:

Income = £1616
Outgoings = £1785
which means overspending by £169 each month (doesn't count for all the squandering of cash, so this figure realistically is probably more! Need to do spending diary!)

Ok so plan is to reduce costs somewhere or make more money!

OH is just waiting for a payrise to come through - word is its going to be significant, but still don't know how much.

Parents say a bond they set up for me is paying out soon - around £500.

Daughter is entitled to free child care 3 mornings a week after easter, so I could go and work these days (although it would mean benefit would be reduced even more so seems pointless working).

Is there any way I can reduce credit card payments each month?

EmmaLou_3

Yippee! OH got a £2400 a year payrise! Not sure how that will affect our Housing benefit, but will probably cancel each other out.

Yet again OH has forgotten to swap credit cards over in time and we are going to have to pay the high interest this month! He has had plenty of reminders! I have told him it might be time to think about getting a loan to cover these - at least he won't have to remember to swap over!

lynzpower

Incidentally, somewhere on this site think its on the credit card info bits, there is a free function courtesy of martin that texts you a month before your o% deal runs out. Maybe you should get it texted to you instead of OH? Or to both? Why would a loan make it any easier to pay back? loans are seldom cheaper than 0%!!! it just needs to be organised so he has no choice but to get it paid.

Cutting back aint easy, I know that much, but your food can come down ( it can, see mine below) and sorry to have to sound harsh first thing in the morning, but bagains like your handbag, are only bargains if you NEEDED them, not wanted.

All the best
Lynz
x

ms_london

Hi Emmalou - how are you getting on?

You say that you look after your sisters children while she is at work. Does she give you any £££ for this? I can appreciate that childcare is expensive but she shouldnt take advantage & anything will help your situation...

What about selling on ebay for some short term cash?

You do need to strike a happy medium as budgeting too tightly is no fun & sometimes you will just think "S*d it" and have the urge to spend money for the sake of it (same with dieting I suppose...). I think you are doing well to manage on one salary (just, anyway!!), but you dont know what is around the corner. You could win the lottery or your OH could lose his job - not meaning to scare you, but you really dont know!!

Has OH taken any advice on board? If he thinks the whole budgeting is his idea he might be more likely to do something about it, so perhaps try and kid him into thinking it was all his idea (not sure how though....)

Best of luck.

xx

all_hours

following on from what ms_london said about childminding. You could look into registering as a childminder, then your sister might be able to get some tax credit to help cover the costs then she could pay you for it

Theres a limit to how many kids you can look after at one time depending on the ages. and your home would be checked by ofsted for health and safety. Their website has information about this https://www.ofsted.gov.uk

You might also be eligible for a start up grant to cover buying supplies or making changes to meet health and safety regulations

Once your income is high enough so you don't get HB the next time your OH gets a pay rise you'll really notice the difference

EmmaLou_3

OH has had plenty of reminders to swap - he just never gets round to sorting it! I only wish he would let me sort them out!

Sister now works weekends so I don't have to look after her brood. Can't say I'd want to do childcare full time anyway!

Now the weather is better and my daughter is at pre-school 4 mornings a week, I can hopefully get back into doing gardening. I need to look into setting up my own business.

I guess slowly we will get there.