Trying to take the stress out of the debt - little steps

Lemon_Tree

hi i went to Morrisons as well yesterday and spent a small fortune! got the ragu offer but didn't see the coffee offer or if i didn't it couldn't have been the make we like which is a real shame.
Gotta hit lidl this week as we have the £5 off when you spend £30 vouchers so we're going to have a good old stock up including baking stuff as i've gotta make cakes for the christmas fair at OH's work.

Triggles

We went to Morrisons again today. Mainly to pick up some of the tinned salmon on offer for MIL, some more of the bolognaise sauce, and the shortbread on offer. Now we will stay away from there. LOL (unless they have a really good new offer!)

We've been getting correspondence from our creditors (re the DMP) asking for proof of our income, bank statements, info on our expenses and other debts. So I will be putting together a letter this weekend to send out with next months payment for all of them, with a general "incoming/outgoing" sheet, so they can see where it's all going. They are also asking for our phone number and for us to call them. THAT isn't going to happen. I will also be putting in the letters that we wish contact ONLY by letter/post in writing, no contact by phone. And I will also be requesting again that they stop any extra charges and interest. I noticed that some of them have stated they will stop interest and charges once we send a reference number from an "approved credit management company" to them. Hmmm....

Lemon_Tree

hope you're able to get them sorted. You've just reminded my my bank asked for my mobile number so i can make payments under their new security regime, keep meaning to tell they are not to use is under any other circumstances other than fraud, otherwise i'll consider it harassment. (and i don't even owe them any money)

Triggles

LemonTree - my bank has our phone number, but none of our creditors do. We changed our phone number prior to the DMP starting, and just never advised them of the updated phone number. Consequently, they're all sending us letters saying "call us"... um.... no!

Well, that's it. Christmas is officially "on" at our house. The tree is up and decorated (we always do it the weekend after Thanksgiving). The general decorations are up. My holiday stockpile is starting to look nice (of general groceries, holiday treats, and baking supplies). We have a few things still to pick up, but not too much. DH decided he wasn't going to buy any alcohol this year over the holidays. We have a few friends that we always pick up a bottle of wine for, so we'll do that, but we're not going to stock up on alcohol "in case of people dropping by" this year. We did that last year, and it just gets soooo expensive, especially as we would end up with lots of different things, and people would just have one or two drinks, so we'd end up with tons of partly used bottles to finish off. I've got to feed the cake again this weekend, as I think I have just enough brandy left to do it maybe 2-3 more times and that's it.

We had a storage unit in the states that had a bunch of our stuff in it. We were feeling quite clever as a friend of ours was happy to empty it out and ship any important stuff to us. Didn't count on US postal service discontinuing m-bags (for shipping books at a cheaper rate) and now only allowing shipping at a priority rate overseas, instead of a slower cheaper route as we used years ago. Friend shipped the stuff we asked for, then told us the amount we owed them for postage was $445!! :eek: So obviously, we need to send this amount to them to reimburse them for the postage. I was quite shocked at the amount, and wish that they would have checked with us when they realised the amount (especially as they knew the reason we wanted the storage closed was because we couldn't afford to keep paying for the storage each year!), but they just shipped it and paid for it - maxing our their credit card to do so! It's quite a hit for us, but at the same time, they were doing us a favour and things happen, don't they? So thankfully, we had put a little money aside and will be able to pay them. I certainly don't want them to be out the money when they went out of their way to help us!

OOoops...baby waking... gotta run...

beanielou

Wow,thats a lot of money.

Triggles

beanielou - yes, it is. I was absolutely horrified at first. But then, we were paying over £200 a year for the storage unit, figuring it would be a few years (at least 6-8) before we got over there to empty it out. So figuring max of 8 years, that would be £1600 in storage fees, whereas this is about £300 in shipping fees. So overall a savings of £1300, I suppose. We have to look at it that way. There were some things we decided not to ship over, and we told our friend she could keep those items and sell them and keep the money herself. She drove an 8hour trip twice to empty the storage unit out, spending all day sorting and packing and shipping. We absolutely don't want her to be out of pocket for it, as she went way out of her way to help us with this.

DS2 managed to pull the Christmas tree down on himself this morning. Nothing damaged on boy or tree, thank goodness! Although I have to say, he was rather shocked by the whole episode. He keeps looking at the tree as if expecting it to leap on him. Although he still loves looking at the tree from across the room!:rotfl:

Have at least had a productive day today so far. Washing up done, kids all taken care of (fed, dressed, and at this point of the day, both down for a nap although DS2 is playing in his room rather than sleeping), laundry washed and hung up to dry. Bread pudding with raisins baking right now, so the house smells like cinnamon. yummmmmm

I need to finish scanning MILs picture albums this evening, as I don't know when I'll get the chance to work on it later this week, and I want to return them this weekend.Along with her pressure cooker and carpet cleaner. (Does it sound like we have half of MIL's stuff here? LOL) It's all stuff she's loaned us over the last month, it just took us awhile to use. The carpet cleaner was an ongoing project, but I think we've gotten all the carpets cleaned now. And the pressure cooker was because we were toying with the idea of buying one, but wanted to see how much we'd actually use it. Which was "not often enough to buy one!" So saved some money there! And best of all, MIL is happy to loan hers to us if we occasionally would like to use one.

December starts a new month of grocery budget, as well as spending money and paying creditors for the month. I'll be sitting down with the bank statement, adding up what is coming in this month against what is going out, and then I will work out what we will have left after primary bills (rent, council tax, utilities and such)to pay the creditors. They will get a token payment again this month. I have the figures from last month and will compare them to the figures from this month. Then starting in January, they will get a higher payment than a token payment, based on each creditor's percentage of our debt (if that makes sense). So if the Virgin credit card is 10% of our debt, then they will get 10% of the monthly amount stipulated for paying off debt. That way they're all treated fairly. I plan on sending a brief "here is your payment, just to let you know things are unchanged at the moment" letter each month to them, along with a regular request for any that are still charging interest or fees to please suspend them for the time being. Again, I think keeping them in the loop is probably the best way to handle it, along with starting the repayment relatively small (to make sure we can meet it each month) and then gradually increasing it as circumstances improve.

Menu plan this week is fairly basic:
29 Sun chicken roast (done)
30 Mon chicken soup with dumplings (done)
01 Tue sausages and mash (done)
02 Wed chili
03 Thu lasagna
04 Fri cottage pie
05 Sat chicken curry
06 Sun beef roast
07 Mon turkey stirfry with noodles
08 Tue bbq pork ribs in slow cooker, rice
09 Wed cheese omelet, bacon, toast
10 Thu spag bol
11 Fri sweet/sour chicken with rice
12 Sat beans and shredded cheese on toast (lazy night lol)
13 Sun pork roast

Well, off to have a cup of tea and a biscuit before I do a little cleaning up in the living room.

Triggles

Ooooooh what a horrible night! I've had about 2 hours of disjointed sleep - DS2 kept waking up and making enough noise to wake up DS3. So between the two of them, I was up from about 1am onwards. It's going to be a caffeine day for me.

Anyway, because I am low functioning today LOL, after I washed and sterilised the bottles, DH made them up for the day. DS2 is potty training in earnest now (whether he likes it or not as I KNOW he is capable just derailed from new baby in the house), and he has already had two accidents!!! Aaaargh!! and breathe...... I know I know... it happens, and I'm not THAT horribly frustrated with it... it's the fact that when DD or DH are in charge of him (when I'm cleaning in the other room, showering, cooking, etc), they simply forget that the potty end exists and forget to take him to the toilet. Since he was wearing pullups, it was just like a nappy, so now he doesn't want to use the toilet. I think it's going to take a few days of wet training pants to get him to use the toilet again. *sigh*

Christmas tree lights are on today. No more "pulling down the tree" incidents, thankfully. DS2 is watching tv today, and I am unashamedly letting him. I need to stay destressed as I am seriously exhausted. And DS3 just woke up from his brief early morning nap... so it's back to work I go.

slm6002

Poor you i totally understand how you are feeling. Will do no harm to have a tv day every now and again just so that you keep your sanity. I hope that your day improves and that the little ones let you sleep tonight

Triggles

Our adult DD has finally gotten a flat of her own! It's rather a quick thing - she found out it was available on Wednesday, and that she could move in Monday, so she's spent the last 2 days running around trying to get everything organised and set up to move in. So I've got DGS here quite a bit right now while she is setting things up. But then we have our house and our privacy back as of Monday!! :j

We've sent our December payments out to creditors (token payments again this month) today. We included a letter stating that we would be contacting them next month with a more structured payment plan, and to please only contact us in writing by post. We've been receiving 6+ calls per day from MBNA and it's getting just ridiculous. DH talked to them twice - both times telling them to please stop calling, that we've sent them a letter and would prefer to deal with this by post, and the person just kept banging on, so DH hung up his mobile and now refuses to answer any calls from numbers he doesn't recognise. If the calls continue after they receive this letter, I will send the more formal one demanding they take our phone info out of their records and cease calling us.

We're just putting final touches on christmas prep - just a few things to pick up, and then just a matter of what we're going to have for the christmas/boxing day meals so I can prepare a grocery shop. And that's it.
Everything is up in the air right now, as DH is ill (and so am I with a nasty cold, although not nearly to the extent DH is, poor thing! You can hear him wheezing from across the room!).

I've been quite careful to keep the paperwork organised for the self-done DMP, so we know exactly what we've paid to each creditor, along with keeping a copy of the letter sent. They all have gotten the same letters to us so far, and most likely will for another few months. I'm hoping that a few will agree to stop interest and other charges, although one specifically said they couldn't do that unless we did our DMP through an "official DMP company" that THEY recognise. But I will persist and hopefullly they will roll at some point and be agreeable. I would like to think that after a few months of regular payments, even if they are reduced, they will realise we are honestly trying to pay it back, just need longer to do so, and that adding interest and fees is counterproductive.

slm6002

Great news about dd's flat - i expect you house will feel so much bigger with a few less people in, and the privacy after this long time will be great.

Sorry you and OH are feeling poorly. Hopefully you will both feel much better for the christmas festivites. We too are mainly finished with the preperation of christmas and only need the food for the days we will be eating at home.

I do hope the silly people stop calling you, and i dont blame you OH for not answering his phone. HSBC rang me the other day for a payment on my credit card as i had not realised the DD hadnt been set up. They phoned at 8.55am and we were already running late for nursery. I kept telling them i would ring them on my return but they just would not accept people have be places at a certain time. I ended up just saying bye and hanging up while the lady on the phone kept talking.