A Fool and Her Money- CAFCGIRL's Debt Diary

CAFCGirl

Grrrrrrrrrrrrr I'm so angry!!!

British Gas have been harassing me regarding outstanding balance of £770. I've already paid them £400 in the last month!

They wanted to put me on a payment plan which pays the outstanding balance and my future usage. This they worked out to be £150!!!!!

Then she told me it had been outstanding for some time, they wanted to put in a meter but charge me £200 to do so!!!

So it all got a bit hectic and I asked why they couldnt take payment on a credit card, then she told me they could when previously I've been told they cant!

So unfortunately another £770 has gone onto CC1!!!! I'd just managed to BT the best part of CC1 to CC2 (4.95 for life of transfer) and then this happens!

So now have to rethink best way of paying it all off.

Theory is, £50 to CC2, and £35 to CC1. Get balance of CC2 down as quick as poss, to transfer some balance from CC1. So therefore CC1 can get transferred to lower rate quicker. I'm now looking at £2,000 of debt on two credit cards!!!!

Just when I thought I was getting better at all this!!
Not a good day at all. Payday tomorrow..............

lynzpower

Cor what a massive bill you poor thing...

those payment plans are a scam in my opinion, how can they predict accurately what you will use?

CAFCGirl

The fact that it was mine and previous flat mates bill meant nothing to them, so thats one person paying for two people's usage!

Oh well, at least the debts are in fewer places now. Now just gotta find out who cheapest supplier is for Canterbury, and switch whilst my balance to BG is zero!

CAFCGirl

And it just got worse!

Bought junk food from Tesco. Busy stuffing depressed face with large cookie!

CAFCGirl

OK,so took two days away from the computer and to be honest had a little bit of a panic over the situation.

Had to go to my work's head office on friday and I could see myself spending a lot of money unneccesarily! But all in all didnt do too badly. A lot of it I claimed back today.

However did spend £30 in Next at Bluewater whilst waiting for a connection.Had to buy birthday present on boyfriend behalf for his sister so will need to ask for that money back!Plus have had to pay for his parking, which is eating up my little coin pot, just when I find a £2 coin!!!

But I got my expenses back today so need to pay that straight off CC1, even though I didnt pay for the things on there.So that will be about £50 paid off there!

Then I need to pay some money off CC2, aiming for another £50 there.
My flatmate is giving me her share toward the bills, so I've got one household bill to pay, plus the council tax. So that gives me a little bit to play around with.

My new plan is to take out £100, and put it into a little Halifax current account that I have.And thats going to be my money for the month. It should be quite do-able.I'm hoping that my parents will be visiting soon and they always treat me to a bit of food shopping so thats always a welcome break.

I'm taking steps to sorting out a meal planner with flatmate.At least cooking with each other means that the general cost is split between the two of us.

Hope everyone else's weekend goes well.Last Bank Holiday for a while yet!!!

Emmzi

I only spend cash like mad on BHs so glad of that!!!

Good luck on the £100 a month. Should be healthier :-) Sounds like you're not out of control, just having a teeny splurge - big difference!

In_Search_Of_Me

Nasty BGas...sure you can get cheaper & better service - their poor attitude is famous! Stuff em & go elsewhere...Well done for imporvements so far. Just a wee suggestion for those days when you feel low...I started a little stocpile (ok, my own shop!) of nice bits like hairpack, bubbles, book, choc in the freezer so when I feel low the treats are there & I (so far!) manage to resist a "real" splurge while feeling a bit papmpered & more importantly dont go over budget...just a thought? We will all have naff days (& with 35,000 to go!) can plan for them without cocking up the grand plan & going further into debt. Are you keeping a diary? Well done on menu plan (i cant quite do a formal one but cook & freeze in batches) it will make a huge difference me thinks! Remember too not to be too tough on yourself...dont think a large cookie (unless you have one every day!) is going to be a huge deal! Well done on job application too! Let us know how you get on! Big hugs!

roswell

Just a thought but you will be better off in the long run paying more to the highest apr card and just min to the life of balance once the highest is paid off eg a £70 / £30 split pay the full £100 to the life of balance. this way you will pay less interest for example on 12% you will be paying 1% a month interest where on 4.9 you will be paying 0.4 %

Molanole

Just wanted to say hang in there. The fact that you're getting everthing down in black and white on here is a real start. Once things have really bedded down with your incomings and outgoings all set out you'll find the good days will start to outweigh the bad. On the bad days you can just come on here and rant to all of us!

CAFCGirl wrote:

However did spend £30 in Next at Bluewater whilst waiting for a connection.

Bluewater is SUCH a killer. My friend and I used to call it the magical place but now I really think it must be magic as somehow money from my purse disappears as soon as I set foot in the doors!

Keep it up!

CAFCGirl

roswell wrote:

Just a thought but you will be better off in the long run paying more to the highest apr card and just min to the life of balance once the highest is paid off eg a £70 / £30 split pay the full £100 to the life of balance. this way you will pay less interest for example on 12% you will be paying 1% a month interest where on 4.9 you will be paying 0.4 %

Now that I've seen it written out like that, it does seem a better idea, I wanted to try and get the balance of the 4.95% down as quick as possible so that I could transfer more of the balance of the higher apr.

Had a few hiccups this week, like the whacking great bill from British Gas, spent some money on CC1 when I went on work trip but have claimed this back now. It's sitting in my purse waiting to get paid off the CC1, but till banks open.It's like its waiting to get spent.

One more day to go till the bank opens!!!