Floozie does Frugal 2010

Intergalactic_Floozie

Days to payday: 6 (can't come quick enough, so annoying there's another weekend to go through also)
Money in bank :£ -44.66
Money in purse: £4.50
Grand Total: £-40.26

Money spent since last update: £1.00
£1.00 - entry to Friday's Euromillions draw with work's syndicate

Grocery budget: £280.00 / £0.00 remaining
Petrol Budget: £110.00 / £0.00 remaining
Everything else budget: £147.00 / £-40.26 remaining

OnePoll: Balance £10.30 (YAY!!! over a quarter of the way there now.
Mystery shopping: No new jobs, and the job I did last week is still showing as pending so highly likely it wont get paid in this next pay period (GRRR) although £25.84 will be paid tomorrow.
Lightspeed: did a 110 pointer today on food (again) but it was a boring one (YAWN) but am on 260 points now (only 85 points away from being able to claim £3 paypal).
Toluna: 11335 4745 added since yesterday, most of which were ones from answering the lifestyle ones for 200 points, then a bonus for answering them all.
Advantage Card Points: Still on 830. Managed to stay away today.

PS - book number 9/2009 started http://www.amazon.co.uk/Good-Times-Justin-Lee-Collins/dp/0091932912/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1265732567&sr=8-1

PPS - found an Adidas tracksuit jacket type thing in the waiting-to-go-to-the charity shop bag yesterday, might see if I can sell that on e-bay!

Intergalactic_Floozie

Days to payday: 5 (!!!!!! wish it would hurry up, am losing will to live)
Money in bank :£ -54.66
Money in purse: £9.05
Grand Total: £-45.61

Money spent since last update: £5.35
£2.40 - panini
£3.00 - chocolates / sweets from pound shop
* I couldn't help myself, really miserable at work todayand craving sugar like a mad thing.

Grocery budget: £280.00 / £0.00 remaining
Petrol Budget: £110.00 / £0.00 remaining
Everything else budget: £147.00 / £-46.61 remaining

OnePoll: Balance £10.60.
Mystery shopping: £25.84 has been sent to me today. One shop is pending for next pay day.
Lightspeed: did another 80 pointer and am 240 points now. I was also offered another 80 pointer but I was unfortunately screened out, so 5 points from pay off now.
Toluna: 13495 points - 2160 added since yesterday,
Advantage Card Points: Still on 830.

£4.50 of Tesco Club cards arrived today. That's £7 I have so far, which will hopefully go towards a magazine subscription at Xmas time.

Luncheon vouchers still haven't arrived from survey last week - normally they are really quick. Also Love 2 Shop voucher hasn't come yet and I can't remember how long they were meant to take.

Intergalactic_Floozie

Days to payday: 5 (This has been the longest week of my life)
Money in bank :£ -54.66
Money in purse: £4.06
Grand Total: £-50.60

Money spent since last update: £4.99
£2.99 - mystery shopping purchase
£1.00 - to school with DS1 for non-uniform day
£1.00 - to school with DS2 for non-uniform day

Grocery budget: £280.00 / £0.00 remaining
Petrol Budget: £110.00 / £0.00 remaining
Everything else budget: £147.00 / £-50.60 remaining

OnePoll: Balance £11.00.
Mystery shopping: No new shops available.
Lightspeed: Was offered a survey at 9am but as I have only now just been able to get on the laptop now, it's screened me out. BAH!
Toluna: 17545 points - 4050 added since yesterday, IT'S CHUFFING ADDICTIVE!!!!!!!
Advantage Card Points: Still on 830.

I e-mailed my friend to ask if she still had the money she was meant to bring down last week, and said if it was alright I would call into hers and collect it at the weekend. Anyway she didn't reply but when I got home, she's shoved an envelope with £50 through the door and a card saying she'd have to pay me the rest when she got paid at the end of February! My faith in her has been restored.

Really gutted to see that I have (almost) finished the month £85 overdrawn in my Bills account and have no idea why! I will have to go through that with a toothcomb. It can't be right seeing how I am also £50 overdrawn in the spends account, I just can't have miscalculated by that much surely!!!

Verbatim

Intergalactic_Floozie wrote: »

Days to payday: 5 (This has been the longest week of my life)
Money in bank :£ -54.66
Money in purse: £4.06
Grand Total: £-50.60

Money spent since last update: £4.99
£2.99 - mystery shopping purchase
£1.00 - to school with DS1 for non-uniform day
£1.00 - to school with DS2 for non-uniform day

Grocery budget: £280.00 / £0.00 remaining
Petrol Budget: £110.00 / £0.00 remaining
Everything else budget: £147.00 / £-50.60 remaining

OnePoll: Balance £11.00.
Mystery shopping: No new shops available.
Lightspeed: Was offered a survey at 9am but as I have only now just been able to get on the laptop now, it's screened me out. BAH!
Toluna: 17545 points - 4050 added since yesterday, IT'S CHUFFING ADDICTIVE!!!!!!!
Advantage Card Points: Still on 830.

I e-mailed my friend to ask if she still had the money she was meant to bring down last week, and said if it was alright I would call into hers and collect it at the weekend. Anyway she didn't reply but when I got home, she's shoved an envelope with £50 through the door and a card saying she'd have to pay me the rest when she got paid at the end of February! My faith in her has been restored.

Really gutted to see that I have (almost) finished the month £85 overdrawn in my Bills account and have no idea why! I will have to go through that with a toothcomb. It can't be right seeing how I am also £50 overdrawn in the spends account, I just can't have miscalculated by that much surely!!!

is it the money your subbing your OH for re his course?
V

Intergalactic_Floozie

DUH - am a MORON - discovered why I am £85 overdrawn!!! On 4th Feb I transferred £70 from our bills account to DH's account so he could go and buy DS2's birthday present. I then went and paid DS2's birthday money that he had received (£70) into the current account to pay me back, but then I thought I had taken it from the CAR FUND so I transferred it into there. I am actually only £15.12 overdrawn. Oh well, that's a lot better than being £85 overdrawn. The £15.12 is from a late dinners cheque (£7.25), the Virgin bill being £6 more than I had accounted for and a tiny bit of interest £1+

Days to payday: 3
Money in bank :£ -64.66
Money in purse: £9.55
Grand Total: £-55.11

Money spent since last update: £4.51
£2.00 - football bets
£2.00 - breakfast butty
£0.51 - change to change jar

Grocery budget: £280.00 / £0.00 remaining
Petrol Budget: £110.00 / £0.00 remaining
Everything else budget: £147.00 / £-55.11 remaining

OnePoll: Balance £11.50
Mystery shopping: No new shops available.
Lightspeed: Was offered a survey at midday, logged on at 3:30pm and the survey was now full BAH AGAIN!!
Toluna: 19435 points - 1890 added since yesterday - nearly a quarter of the way to that £15 voucher.
Advantage Card Points: Still on 830.

Received a £3 luncheon vouchers in the post today, so when I get paid on Monday, £3 cash will go into my Gifts fund.

Got wage slip today and it's £25 more than I expected (ie on top of the overtime and mileage), which is great but sadly it will go towards car insurance. BOO HOO.

Need to do budgeting. Next month is going to be tight too, especially seeing how it is the school holidays next week, still they're good kids and they don't pester much.

Shouldn't need to spend much over the weekend although I do have a mystery shop tomorrow, so give or take a few pounds, the above should be more or less how I finish the month. It's not brilliant, but it's not too bad. At least it's less than I saved the previous month (which all actually went into my car fund account).

Intergalactic_Floozie

ARRRRGGGHHHHH am in massive bloodlust-warpath-frenzied rage at the moment. Opened post to find £5 Love to Shop voucher (hooray!) and a letter from Tesco Credit card informing me they were charging me £12 for the fourth month in a row for being over my limit. I knew that I hadn't spent a penny on my CC and I knew that indeed I was £7 under the limit so couldn't work out how I was overlimit. I phoned them and it gave my balance as £2795 (ie £45 over my limit). I asked to speak to a customer service person who then (shame of shames) PUT ME THROUGH TO THE COLLECTIONS DEPARTMENT!!!!

I explained what had happened and he told me that X-Box Live membership had come out for £39.99 on 25th January! GRRRRRR. I had no idea it was a continuous card authority. I also had no idea that they didn't let you know when your membership was up, they just took it. The annoying thing is that DS1 has the money for his membership, so even though he's paid me back, I'm £12 out of pocket for it. So he ended up demanding a payment to bring me back under the limit, so instead of paying the expected £55. I've had to pay £105 so that's a tenner extra (if you include the money DS1 re-imbursed me). I feel like crying!!!!

It was one of these collections agents who obviously loves their job because he was being really patronising to me (which immediately gets my back up) saying I shouldn't spend on the account if I know it's going to take me over my limit, and I shouldn't spend on the card until I know this payment has gone through. I was like HELLO, I HAVEN'T SPENT ON THIS BLOODY CARD IN ABOUT TWO MONTHS!!! I did smugly get my own back in my own way by refusing to update their records with my home, mobile and work phone numbers though (even though they've probably got them)

I then rang X Box Live to get them to remove the credit card from the account only for him to say he couldn't because it had a 12 month membership associated with it (!!!!!!) but he could cancel the 12 month membership immediately, get the accounts department to issue me with a refund of £39.99, and I could then ring with a new debit card and set up a new 12 month membership! God, so frustrating. Anyway I did notice that the credit card expires in October this year, so he said they wouldn't be able to take it out on this card next January because it will have expired, so I wont have this problem next year. He did helpfully tell me you can buy pre-paid cards from Games shops so I think we'll do that next year.

Anyway, it's made me realise just how perilous my position is hovering so close to the limit of my CC so I've been thinking of how to get around it. After I have paid my Car Insurance off I'll be left with about £600 in my Car Fund account, which I was keeping back for MOT & Service & Tax due in August. So, do I just put it on the CC and then when those items are due, pay for them on my CC? What do you think?

PS - My wage on Monday is now showing as being available, and in my available balance!!!

Also will need to address my personal spending. I started a spreadsheet last night for the January wage spends and so far £75 of the spends was my personal spending, of this £6 was the work's teafund (tea, coffee, bread, spreads & Biscuits), £44 was the shoes/bracelets/charms/scarf, £17 was extra food when I was at work and £6 was on betting. So next month I am going to try and limit myself to £30 pocket money and my target is to see how many days I can go without buying any extra food at work.

mooomin

Intergalactic_Floozie wrote: »

Anyway, it's made me realise just how perilous my position is hovering so close to the limit of my CC so I've been thinking of how to get around it. After I have paid my Car Insurance off I'll be left with about £600 in my Car Fund account, which I was keeping back for MOT & Service & Tax due in August. So, do I just put it on the CC and then when those items are due, pay for them on my CC? What do you think?

I wouldn't do this if you're close to the limit on the card as it means you will be charge interest for purchasing on the card. I only use mine now if I know I can pay it off right away (Thus earning lots of glorious Tesco points, hurrah!)

It might be a good idea to punt £100 onto the card out of your car fund. You will still have £500 free for repairs etc, but have the comfort of knowing that if anything else like the Xbox membership comes out you won't get b*ggered by the credit card folk.

Intergalactic_Floozie

I wish I'd have never bloody spent a single penny on this card once my mum and dad paid it off for me. I'm so annoyed with myself for doing it. Yeah, I think I will do that FF, pay £100 on the CC to give me a bit of breathing space. I think I need to start PAD-ing again, it worked when I was paying off my HSBC credit card although I did have a lot more money spare in those days, and I wasn;t trying to save up for Xmas either.

mooomin

How much do you owe on the card? Do you have another card with space on it to BT over? Is it high interest?

All these questions!

Intergalactic_Floozie

I owe £2795 (less £105 + interest) at the moment. I think it;s 16.9% with a 2% minimum payment.

I have gazillions of other, empty, credit cards but none of them write to me to tell me they've got special offers on balance transfers.