July benefit challenge -here we go

Scottish-Diva

WoW
what a challenge:beer:
Scary though survivng on benefits....much respect to people who do, especially with children

Emmzi

Ok. Now deduct..
-insurance
-gas,electric
-transport costs
- phone
- any other 'must haves' you couldn't give up (tv licence?)

Dentist,doctor,optician - detailshere

http://www.adviceguide.org.uk/index/family_parent/health/help_with_health_costs.htm

only real costs are if kids *must* have expensive contacts, glasses etc.

You might want to decide on an 'incidentals and entertainment' allowance to give everyone, and see if you can manage on what's left over?

tru

I've already taken the bills off I didn't include the debts - I'd just tell them I'm not paying anything else til one of us is working again.

I have 1 teen at school (15) and 1 who's left school (16) but hasn't started his job yet.

Bus fares are £30.40 for this month so I have £347.81.

£11.22 per day.

tru

How do you manage your money? I was thinking of taking £100 (for example) out of the bank, dividing it up into daily amounts then any that's left over each day can go into a pot for Christmas/clothes/holiday/whatever.

Emmzi

Ahhh a doddle then

Let's see how you spend it!

Emmzi

troo wrote:

How do you manage your money? I was thinking of taking £100 (for example) out of the bank, dividing it up into daily amounts then any that's left over each day can go into a pot for Christmas/clothes/holiday/whatever.

I'm not a big forward planner other than bills! My clothes come out of budget and are usually Adsa sale/ charity shop (it's not where you buy it, it's who's wearing it that makes it look good!). Obviously might be different if you need to plan for school uniforms etc.

No holidays for me unless I'm doing well enough to get camp site fees out of the pot - trying for that next weekend (have tent etc)

Presents are home made :-) or come out of budget for that month.

tru

Oooooh I'm quite excited about this I feel the need for another spreadsheet :rotfl:

*Troo toddles off to write her new spreadsheet*

tru

Hubby is rolling his eyes at me again - "Are we cutting back AGAIN? grumble grumble.................sigh"


:rotfl:

Emmzi

troo,

can you include a 'no' column, for all the times you would have had to say no to the kids doing something? I'm just interested - it's easy for me to stay home and do macrame and be quite happy with that, but I have no idea how a family would take it!

(you don't really *have* to say no, but I'd like to see if there's anything they couldn't have/do that they wanted to..)

As fdor my day one, turns out b/f has used all the sugar in his weekly 7000 cups of tea. So my evaporated milk is in the ice cream tub whipped up with some honey, and we'll see if it's edible around 9pm...

tru

I've done a 'no' column for each of the kids. Though they don't ask for much, they practically live at the skate park and that's free

Hubby bought some bread, milk and fruit earlier - he thinks it came to about £7 but he's not sure. I'll let him off because he didn't know I was going to do this so didn't keep a record.