£7000 to zero

jonnyb1978

Ok where do i start?

Tried one of these before but lasted about two minutes. Just an ordinary person wanting to become debt free as paying for credit cards is like throwing money down the sink.
The idea is to pay £100 on average off every month for the first 12 months. Some months will be less some more. Seems within my reach but something always pops up. The boiler packed in and has been off and on since June. Eventually been fixed but with sons and partners birthday as well as little holiday the fee has gone on credit card. Although not as bad as i thought. The £100 is a minumum and im hoping for more.

Ive written down an aim in a paper diary to keep track on my statements and what my targets are. My first main goal is to have paid off £400 when my Decembers statments come in.
Reading alot on here a few ways of saving is changing CC's to interest free. Dont think i have a good enough rating now after stupidly paying late quite a few times. My own fault due to lack of organisation, so applying for new cards is a no no.
A SOA is ok but dont think it suits me. The only things i pay for is mortgage, car, petrol, house insurance and phone bills. My partner pays for other bills etc. The rest of my money is on credit cards and every day living essetials like the odd pint of milk or bread, taking kids out, work lunch etc etc.

£280 mortgage
£20 Home Insurance
£200 Car
£30 BT
£25 Mobile
£15 Union fees

So a total of £563 outgoings

Target for my cards for August was £7286
(Thats a total of 4 cards. Visa = £2498, BOS = £1531, EGG = £1493 and Cap 1 = £1750)
All with a total minumum payment off £210 added to outgoings of £563 leaves me with £360 a month to spend on petrol (£100), living and any extra for cards. My main priority is getting rid of the capital 1 card first. This is the one i will be paying more off each month. At the minute im confidant i can get it down to some extent but when interest rate go up im paying more for mortage and also any money for emergancies, birthday etc.

Anyways Augusts update.
Target owed = £7286
Actual statment amount = £7070
OK so far as im £210 under my target but as said earlier the boiler packed in and that has had to go on the card but wont show until next month. Taking into account boiler of £150 im still under my target by about £50.

Hope all that makes sense

On to next month with Septembers target being £7127.
A very tough month. Dads birthday on the 3rd, sister in laws 40th on the 4th and best mates wedding on the 5th...oh and mine at the end...ouch, this months going to cost abit so if i can hit that target i will be chuffed!!

I just started putting all my lose change in a money bag. This will go onto cards when payment is due on top of normal payment.
Visa, BOS and cap1 have already been paid with Egg as a direct debit so no charges to be appied this month....yippee! I will also have some more to pay on cap 1 in two weeks.

I also need to apply for statements with my Visa and claim my charged back. I need a kick up the bum to do this.
Will keep anyone updates but its also for my own motivation etc etc

jonnyb1978

Quick update:

Matched betting starting up again slooowwwwllllly.
Done this a few years ago so know its a good way of making a few quid.. Not as lucrative as before as you need quite a few hundred to start off so im starting slow. Already in the middle of first one so come tomorrow night there should be an £18 profit.

Im also saving my spare change to add to my card payments at end of month. Got £8 so far from the beginning of the week.

So far so good.

jonnyb1978

Had another bill for the gas boiler yesterday. Supposed to be a fixed fee and it still has not been fixed. Spent ages on the phone explaining its the same fault as before and i shouldnt and wont be paying for it. They the tell me it has flagged up as an ongoing callout so i should not have to pay but will pass it over to account and they will be in touch..Why do you never get a straight answer of people.
Another example is BT. I pay £29.00 a month for broadband, calls etc etc. Latest bill comes in slightly over what it should but i owe £65.00. Now this is for calls already made and advanced line rental, service charges and broadband up to 31st October. So come the end of October i will be £25.00 in credit with them. Yet because the calls where £10.00 more than last quarter they are upping the DD by £20.00 a month. Thats £49.00 a month. My biggest bill has only been £95, the rest has seen me pay, hence being in credit. BT tell me to ring back 14 days after this months DD has been paid and they will sort it. What relevance this time scale is i dont know.....

Anyways £10.00 of loose change paid on card. Also £20 made from matched betting, which £13 is going on my cards. The rest into my saving account connect to current. To try and build up an emergancy fund or for Christmas. Already paid £90.00 of my Capital One card so a total of £113 so far this month.

Had to fork out for a few presents and after everything now im left with £115 until pay day which is the 18th September. Out of this im going to have to give my best mate a wedding gift. (They want money for honeymoon), so im thinking £40/£50 as he's my best mate and known him 20 years, also to pay for drinks etc so im guessing this £115 is going to be eaten up.

I also put £100 every 4 weeks away into a credit union. (In with the above figures), im withdrawing each time to pay off cards. The plan was to put all this on cards but due to wedding if i can put half on cards and survive on the £50 i will be happy as its still £163 paid off on my Capital One card this month. Anything else i can russle together will also help and i should be under my target figure.

jonnyb1978

Anybody reading?

Well sorted the gas boiler bill out. Had to ring them back and explain again that the fault was ongoing. Anyways, decent lady scrubbed the invoice of the system and booked another engineer as it was still playing up. Engineer came out Friday and touch wood its still working. Give it another week to see if its actually been fixed properly or not.

Things are a bit slow with the extra payments onto my capital one card. Ive paid £113 but have £100 i have withdrawn from my credit union account (taking forever) so a further £50 will go onto this and use the other £50 to live on after my funds being eaten up by the wedding on Saturday.

I also booked a hotel for my in laws for their 40th wedding anniversary as a present. That was on the last day before my statement was due so is unfortunetly going to show on Septembers statement before i have had time to pay it off. My partner has given me the cash and have now paid it off but it wont reflect on statement until October. The same goes for above with the extra £50.

SmlSave

I'm reading!

Do you have a seperate saving pot for presents? This way, when they come up there's some backup cash for them!

jonnyb1978

Not at the moment no. Ive got a little saving account connected to my current account. Its got £24 at the moment so the odd bit of extra cash i can find im going to put in there and try and build it up for an emergancy fund for presents or any other unexpected items. All in all this month has been quite good considering the outlay of nearly £200 on birthdays and my mates wedding.
If i can reach that target of £7127 i will be chuffed.

Lemon_Tree

i'm reading as well, why don't you have a look at the payment a day thread (sorry don't know how to add a link), even if you just sent £1 extra a day it's 31 each month and i'll bet that you won't even miss it.

pania

Leeeeeemmmmmmmoooooooooonnnntweeeeee!!!!!!! :wave:

Hi Jonny think I recognise you from last time, how goes it?

jonnyb1978

Hi guys, thanks.
Payment a day?? This is one thread i havnt read......yet!!
Im doing something similar (i think) in where im saving up any loosee change, or money i would have spent but decided not to, for example a choccy bar froom the shop but thought its extra money on the cards. Once im reaching £10, im puttting this on my cards. Not long now before i reach my tenner!!

Guess this is something similar.

Pay day next Friday and only about £30.00 to see me until then. Need petrol also but got nothing to buy and all bills are sorted. Looks like a week of no spend.

pania

a week of no spend will do you the power of good. I'm off on holiday for a week so aiming for as low spend as poss! I'm going with 100euros and plan on coming home with change!!! the payment a day thread is pretty much as you are doing. It regularly appears on the front page so keep an eye out. I need to get back on the debt busting band wagon so will be seeing you around here regularly.
Good luck!

Lemon_Tree

paniaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa where the heck have you been?????