You lot rock!

melou

Hello,

May I introduce myself as a lurker for a the last few months with two credit card debts of just over £2100 in total. Although I must confess - I have not managed to get my lightbulb completely switched on it is flickering at a rate of knots these days!

I have been on here since another board I belong to ran a "favourite websites" thread and MSE came up again and again and again.

But it is the people of the DFW board who have turned my life around. I am your classic "If you pretend its not happening then you don't have to deal with it" debtor paying minimum balance payments and spending the rest frivolously (despite having a good salary). But - no more. I have seen the light.... In the last few months I have:

- Sorted out my personal and our household budget using Martin's wonder budget planner
- Switched utility suppliers
- Slashed our food budget to pieces
- Snowballed my credit cards (which are now much more realistic)
- Started shopping at Charity Shops (what a revelation)
- Started using Ebay (little scary but I'm trying!)
- Sold books, cds, videos and dvds on Amazon (no luck on Green Metropolis)
- Bought a Charity Shop money box (a very cheap, rather attractive pottery owl) to save our pennies in rather than spending them on rubbish (anyone entering the house with change in their pockets is immediately alleviated of their coinage to pay the "Wol Tax" to the Owl - I loved Winnie the Pooh as a child, oh dear.)
- Applied for a new bank account with a bank which hopefully might treat me like a human being (despite me being with my current bank since I was born - they are evil spawn of satan)

But it is todays good news which has prompted me to write to you all. One of the biggest lessons I have learnt on DFW is that you shouldn't allow the large corporations to get away with treating you badly just because they are large corporations.

Against by better advice (and while I wasn't around) OH signed us up to NTL (boo! hissssss!) phone and broadband (whose customer service team actually surpass my bank's for stupidity and general evilness). Since we signed up at the end of March they have failed and failed again to provide the parts necessary to get us securely on line. OH has blithely gone on paying them until I put my foot down and wrote a letter for him to sign instructing them that they were in breach of contract and if they did not resolve it we would a) stop paying them and b) make a claim against them for monies spent so far, non-provision of service and time spent trying to resolve the problem.

We didn't hear within the time frame I had given them so I was in the process of getting all the paper work together to start the claim when OH e-mailed today to let me know they have called, will be delivering all necessary parts they forgot to supply previously, will be refunding the money we have spent so far and giving us 3 months half price in compensation.

May I be permitted to give a little Woo Hoo?!

I could not and would not have had the courage to do any of this without reading and re reading all the fantastic advice from the people on here. I will never be a regular poster as I don't think I have enough advice or knowledge to offer those whose situations are much worse than my own but I wanted to let you know that there are people out here, lurkers, like me whose lives you are changing.

Thank you all so so much,

Melou

PS - So sorry for the long thread....

Dead_Eye_Jones

woo hoo \o/

MrsTinks

Post even if you don't have advice hun sometimes just a kind word means the world to someone

Glad you took on NTL (boo hiss) and even gladder that you are tackling your debts and generally embrased the DFW life style and way of thinking

whatamess_2

Hi I havent got a lot of advice to give where debts are concerned either but love lurking around and joining in on the odd thread. Have even started a couple myself!
Its not all about money saving, offering a friendly word of encouragement and support to each other is whats needed sometimes.
You can be sure of a laugh around here as well.:rotfl:
Messy

tawnyowls

melou wrote:

I don't think I have enough advice or knowledge to offer those whose situations are much worse than my own but I wanted to let you know that there are people out here, lurkers, like me whose lives you are changing.

You're kidding, aren't you? Who better to give advice than someone who's been through the same problems? I'm actually in quite a fortunate position, in that I've never really been in debt (ran up one on my first credit card 20-odd years ago and swore I'd never pay a bank so much money again; cheap and well-learned lesson in the end!) - nevertheless, I've learned so much from this board and others about money-saving in general, and (being a naturally nosey and bossy person):D have no reservations at all about giving advice!

lynzpower

You rock yourself Melou!! Look at what your achieving!!!!
:T

Jaymz

Well done, you will be debt free in no time