Setting myself up for a fall I think.

Al24

Hi everyone.

I am a recent graduate and am employed in a graduate job, I am also taking on my MSc part time. I have what I would to consider a good level of student debt. My student overdraft account is maxed out at £2300 and HBOS have just written to me saying that in 7 days this limit will be removed. I can go into branch and talk to them about it but from what I have read on the internet they convert it into a personal loan. If I were paying £100 a month on this overall it would cost £2900 to pay back according to their loans calculator. I also have £500 outstanding on my credit card from a recent trip to New York and I initally owed my parents £1266 when I graduated, this is now down to £766 and a monthly payment of £100 goes out to them.

Here is my SOA
Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet

Household Information
Number of adults in household........... 1
Number of children in household.........
Number of cars owned....................

Monthly Income Details
Monthly income after tax................ 1300
Partners monthly income after tax....... 0
Benefits................................ 0
Other income............................ 0
Total monthly income.................... 1300

Monthly Expense Details
Mortgage................................ 0
Secured/HP loan repayments.............. 0
Rent.................................... 525
Management charge (leasehold property).. 0
Council tax............................. 93
Electricity............................. 16
Gas..................................... 24
Oil..................................... 0
Water rates............................. 25
Telephone (land line)................... 14
Mobile phone............................ 25
TV Licence.............................. 12
Satellite/Cable TV...................... 15
Internet Services....................... 23
Groceries etc. ......................... 100
Clothing................................ 0
Petrol/diesel........................... 0
Road tax................................ 0
Car Insurance........................... 0
Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 0
Car parking............................. 0
Other travel............................ 50 <-- I sometimes need to travel to and from Uni once or twice a month via train as I don't live in my Uni city and study my MSc on a distant learning/part time basis.
Childcare/nursery....................... 0
Other child related expenses............ 0
Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 0
Pet insurance/vet bills................. 0
Buildings insurance..................... 0
Contents insurance...................... 0
Life assurance ......................... 0
Other insurance......................... 0
Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 0
Haircuts................................ 20
Entertainment........................... 200 <-- furniture and additional payments are included in this, I have to do some dinners and corporate events which come out of my pocket but will improve my salary later on in my career. This can be reduced as this also includes some nights in the pub with a couple of colleagues I get on very well with.
Holiday................................. 0
Emergency fund.......................... 0
Total monthly expenses.................. 1142


Assets
Cash.................................... 0
House value (Gross)..................... 0
Shares and bonds........................ 0
Car(s).................................. 0
Other assets............................ 0
Total Assets............................ 0

No Secured nor Hire Purchase Debts

Unsecured Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
HBOS Credit Card...............500.......5.........20.9
HBOS Student Overdraft.........2300......0.........0
Parent Loan....................766.......100.......0
Total unsecured debts..........3566......105.......-


Monthly Budget Summary
Total monthly income.................... 1,300
Expenses (including HP & secured debts). 1,142
Available for debt repayments........... 158
Monthly UNsecured debt repayments....... 105
Amount left after debt repayments....... 53

Personal Balance Sheet Summary
Total assets (things you own)........... 0
Total HP & Secured debt................. -0
Total Unsecured debt.................... -3,566
Net Assets.............................. -3,566

I have been living in my flat since July and have been furnishing it gradually, otherwise more payments would have been made to date. I am concerned that I am not going to pay back the debt quickly enough and it will cost me more and more money. Every month I always just spend excactly what I am paid. Currently I have about £3 in my wallet to last me until Thursday when I am paid. Ideally what I'd like to happen is to clear all of my debt soon and have an emergency fund just in case.

I recently made an application to Virgin Money for a 0% balance transfer credit card and was refused. I checked my Expiran and it seemed to be ok, maybe it's because i haven't been earning for that long? I am scared to apply again incase I am once again refused and too many refused applications appear on my report.

Any advice or tips at the moment? Borrowing more from my parents isn't an option and I can't stop paying them the £100 a month even though this is the cheapest debt because I know that they need the money back soon. Moving back home isn't an option either as I don't know how to drive and need to be in a large City based hospital for work and they live about 50 miles away from their nearest large Hospital.

Thanks

slickric1234

evening job / satturday job in a pub perhaps

should pay off your debts quickly if you could find the extra time to make an extra £50-100 a week

bargainbetty

Hello

Talk to HSBC and ask them for the best possible rates, even pay it off at a lower rate (I know it costs a little more, but it's worth researching).

I think you may have to look at your entertainment spending - is there any way of you bringing in some extra cash in the meantime? Can you have a clear our of DVDs, CDs, books etc that could raise some ready income?

Good luck x

RAS

You must be living alone with those CT and telephone bills?

Stop buying furniture; join www.freegle.co.uk and gradually pick up what you need for free.

Think urgently about what you have that you no longer need and sell on amazon, e-bay or at a car boot sale - stuff in the loft at your folks if need be.

You HAVE to cut the entertainment right back for a few months and reduce your phone and satellite costs.

tazzy2010_2

Hi definately talk to HSBC. Does your monthly wage go into this account?

The reason why I am asking is because I had a 2000 student/graduate overdraft with Natwest a couple of years ago. As I paid my salary into this account they were able to give me an interest free loan for the 2000 (pay 83/month over 2 years) and put my balance back to zero.

I am very sure HSBC do a similar thing, mainly as I also had a student/graduate overdraft with them too (should not have had 2 student accounts I realise!) up to 1500. When I phoned HSBC about this, as they were due to start charging me interest, they said they could offer me a similar offer to my 'friend' at Natwest but only if my full monthly wage went into this account.

So you never know, mention what Natwest do and they may be able to offer you an interest free/ very low rate loan.

Hope that helps

CLAPTON

you're spending more than half your income on accommodation (rent, ct, water, utilities).. would it be possible to share a flat until you have paid off your debts

and/or parttime job to improve the income.

stop spending on things for the flat

Verbatim

You should be able to get sat/ cable TV, internet and phone as a bundle for a lot less than you're paying. We have Virgin for around £35 a month. If not cancel sat tv or if you're tied in cut back to the minimum.

If your salary is paid in to HBOS and they don't agree to reduce the o/d gradually or any other deal be aware that they may take all your salary to reduce the o/d and leave you with nothing. If this is likely to happen you need to think about opening another bank account with an unrelated bank (check which banks are connected) and arrange to repay with HBOS. They could treat this as a default though I suppose which would appear on your credit file.
Is your flat big enough to have a spare room you could let?

RAS

by the way, no sign of course fees on that list???

And when does the tenancy end, is their a break point at any time soon?

Al24

Hi everyone,

Thanks for your input. I had thought about getting a saturday/evening job however my MSc does take up a fair amount of time and I really don't want to compromise on that. In addition I am required to go into Uni once sometimes twice a month for saturday lectures so this could make it harder to fit around a second job. If things get to the point whereby I am spending more than my income I will look at this again.

My employer, the NHS, are sponsoring my MSc completely so there are no course fees for me to meet - only the associated fees of visiting Uni, stationary at my own time etc. The MSc costs £810 per semester I am expected to complete in 6 semesters so it is not cheap!

Entertainment does need to come right down, I do have quite a good excuse with the MSc to not go out so often.

My mobile phone is with Orange and the contract which is £25/month - unlimited data,texts and 600 xnetwork minutes expires in Jan 2011, and is eliable for revalidation in Oct. The phone/broadband and TV is a package with BT which expires at approximately the same time - I got very excited about earning and the potential to have posh telly when I first moved in and now regret signing for the deal. I will see if I can renegotiate the price as unfortunately my apartment building is not wired for Virgin otherwise I would have gone with them, so whatever I do once the BT contract expires I have to pay line rental to someone.

My contract for the apartment is until May 31st so will have a look at the potential of moving to a cheaper rental/shared accommodation.

I think the main thing to do at the moment is to look at what other banks offer their graduates/postgrad students and see what HBOS can manage. I shall take in proof of my student status and of permanent contracted employment and see how they view my situation. Like I said in my OP I am in debt but I think it's relatively manageable I just don't want to spend any more than I have to on interest payments etc to clear it.

As per the agenda for change NHS pay scheme I had a payrise of £500/annum on Feb 3rd they just haven't paid me the difference yet, I have chased them and they have promised to honour it in the April pay packet with back pay to Feb 3rd. All NHS employees get a pay rise of 2.25% in April as well, which is another £480 approx/annum. Therefore my current salary of 20710 will go to about £21798 from April 1st.

I opened a reward current account with Alliance and Leicester (Santandar) which I will arrange my salary to be paid into, a ddebit could then pay the overdraft off as per the negotiation with HBOS.

I will also have a good trawl of things I can sell in the flat on eBay/Amazon.

bouncydog1

Hi - on the dinners and corporate events can these be part sponsored by your employer - if you have to attend them, then surely your employer should at least be paying some if not all of the cost.

In my own profession if we attend events in connection with our employment then they are paid for by employers - for out of hours ones my colleagues and I certainly would not be meeting the cost from our own pockets - the career enhancing part is attending in our own time! Not sure how the NHS works though.

Perhaps you need to ask the question?

firesidemaid

check on the phones board, but if companies change their terms + conditions you are sometimes therefore 'allowed' to break your contracts as they haven't kept to their side of the bargain. i'm not sure whether this might apply to BT as they are changing their option 1 plan free evening calls times to start at 7pm instead of 6pm - this might be enough.

re. the mobile i am with vodafone, got a 12-month deal for £20/month 600 mins, unlimited texts (plus £120 quidco cashback;)). i then saw that they were advertising the same deal to new customers for £15 a month (after i had been with them 4 months). i rang and and asked why i was being penalised for NOT being a new customer, and they reduced my bill to £15 immedately. ring and say you cannot afford, others are doing cheaper, better deals etc).

what about a couple of evenings a week in a supermarket (free/cheap food) or delivering takeaways etc?