Hannah_10's debt-free-wannabe diary.

Hannah_10

Welcome to my DFW diary,

As I am keping this diary mainly so I can hold myself to account for the trouble I'm in as I try to get out of it, so that I have a place to record things and to prove to my sister I haven't forgotten I owe her!
I am hoping that as the total debt left remaining decreases both in pounds and pence and as a percentage of the original then I will be able to maintain the momentum required to be debt-free and I hope one day soon I'll be leaving this diary behind to start a shiny new one on the savings board.
Feel free to read it and leave a comment if you like, but please be aware it might be a bit boring because it's basically my notebook.

xx Hannah_10






Monday 7th June, these were my debts:

Under control...
Rent arrears £779.28
Gas arrears £599.03
Electric arrears £158.85
My Sister £450*

Not under control
Council tax arrears £161.29
Empire £131.00
Barclays Bank £2268
Moorcroft £539.65
Water arrears £463.58

Adds up to about £5550.68 of debt in total as debt to sister are not exact.

Hannah_10

• Monday 7th June paid Empire £131 now clear!!! (Or actually in credit if the item they are refunding does get refunded as promised)
• Monday 14th June paid Council Tax £161.29 now clear!!!
• Monday 14th June paid sister £100.
• Monday 14th June paid £99 towards rent arrears.

• Also moved rent to not under control as served with "Notice of Seeking Possession" dated 9th June but only just read.

New totals:

Under control...
Gas arrears £599.03
Electric arrears £158.85
My Sister [STRIKE]£450*[/STRIKE] Now £350*

Not under control
Rent arrears [STRIKE]£779.28[/STRIKE] Now £680.28
[STRIKE]Council tax arrears £161.29[/STRIKE] Clear!
[STRIKE]Empire £131.00[/STRIKE] Clear!
Barclays Bank £2268
Moorcroft/Orange £539.65
Water arrears £463.58

New debt total £5059.39 (91.15% of original)

Hannah_10

Also, not a payment but a start, following some advice from a MSE member, I discovered the opening hours for my local CAB and intend to speak to them this week with regard to trying to get help with my water rates.

Better add rent arrears to the list of things to speak to them about- just got served notice.

Happytogetdebtfree

H hannah good luck welcome also.... have you posted up a statement of affairs ?? can you not break the rent down and overpay by so much a mionth ? xx it would help if you popped an soa up x

Hannah_10

I was planning to over-pay on the rent, but that was only a verbal agreement and that came before I got served notice. I now don't know where I stand with this. I will talk to the woman who manages this estate tomorrow. I have just paid £100 off the rent arrears though, on a payment card, so I hope that at least shows willing.

I'm not brave enough to post a SOA. I've been lurking a while and I think some of the suggested reductions in outgoings look really harsh, so I'm affraid I shall chicken out of posting it. I am going to do one for my own sake when I get to it, but might just post what I've got left to pay with rather than the whole thing here.

Hannah_10

Moorcroft
Yesterday I sent Moorcroft a prove it letter, as the bill to Orange was £400, not the whopping £540 Moorcroft are saying so I would like them to prove I owe a debt of that size. It was sent by 1st class signed for. Today I got letter from Moorcroft saying "Monthly Installment Offer" of £40.00 per month. Tellingly it doesn't say if they mean calendar month or 4 week month, I bet they mean 4 week month specifically because people will think it means calendar month and then they can charge them again! They're sneaky toads, I'm not trusting them as far as I can throw them. They also say they want to send me a payment book, they don't mention they charge fees on that too, again sneaky. Although they can't have seen my letter before sending thier letter, they have definately seen it now anyway as I've just been on the Royal Mail track and trace and it says it was signed for early this morning.

Printed Name: R LEWIS Signature Time: 6:45:00GMT 17/06/10

Thier offer letter was much gentler than thier threats to "get a judgement" [against me in court]. Last time I looked the judge did the judging not the DCA! How do they know they even WILL get a judgement? Sneaky sneaky sneaky is what they are. I am still resolving not to take anything at face value and not to scare on the basis that fear is the only real power they have over me and if I don't scare then they have no power at all!

Empire.
Well this is unpleasant. Empire appear to have filed either two or four defaults against me and charged me an additional £24 in fees (on a bill under £100 that's a scandalous percentage). I'm not too sure what I'm going to do with them as of yet. I will get back to you on this one Dear Diary. I think the first thing would be to re-read the letters and see if I can work out if it is four or if it is two!

Rent.
I spoke to someone in the estate manegers office yesterday, the estate manager is on her hols. I have left an offer of £10 a fortnight, to begin as soon as the benefits agency sort out my claim and I know what day I get regularly repaid (it stopped then rapidly restarted). From experience I wont offer to pay it that day, I will move the day back by 3 (eg. get paid on Tuesday, pay the rent arrears on Friday) to allow a little leeway for any days I'm too ill to leave the house. Also because paying 90% of payments early and all on time looks a lot better than paying 90% on time and 10% late!

Bills.
Got my first shipment of dinner from Approved Foods in the hallway waiting to be unpacked. Saved a fortune, but is it any good? Only one way to find out! With 24 packets of couscous for 99p (4p each) instead of 79p each how bad has it got to be before I have not had a bargain? If it's edible then it's a bargain, we shall see!

Halifax (my current bank).
I've read about getting bank charges refunded on this site and decided next time I am in the town where my branch is (should be soon) I am going to see them and ask for a refund of the £15 they had on 31st March on the grounds of hardship. As that was during the period where I had no benefit coming in (which they can see as it goes into that account) and they can see I get DLA, therefore am ill or disabled, I am thinking the harship case should be fairly simple so I wont bother with template letters I'll just ask.

Gym.
The gym debt from when I joined the gym but then was laid off and couldn't afford the fees I had previously agrred to doesn't appear on my credit files. I wonder why? It can't be statute barred because I have made payments within the last 6 years, within the last 3 I believe. They have got my new addresses in the past without me actually telling them to as well, so I always thought they were getting that from the CRA's? Tiz a mystery. I shall not be surprised if another £300 bill hits the mat soon.
The good news with that one is though that one might be unenforcible, so if anything does hit the mat I'm not paying it I'll be over on Niddys thread checking it twice.
Also the other bit of good news is, I had PPI on that (alhough on a technicality it didn't pay up) so reclaiming that is another way to go.

Paypal
Reclaimed £28.37 from Paypal for transactions I didn't fully recognise from March and April. Was very very easy and it's all money towards being debt free- yay!

Hannah_10

22nd June: £10 to sister. Now stands at...

Under control...
Gas arrears £599.03
Electric arrears £158.85
My Sister £450* Now £340*

Not under control
Rent arrears £779.28 Now £680.28
Council tax arrears £161.29 Clear!
Empire £131.00 Clear!
Barclays Bank £2268
Moorcroft/Orange £539.65
Water arrears £463.58

My benefits are now being paid, but they're a lot of money down on what they're meant to be, someone's made a mistake at Income Support and left my severe disablement premium off. I really must get hold of them this morning about that, on the upside it ought to mean lovelly backpay, I must be dsicplined and pay it off the debts if I do. Not heard back from Moorcroft yet. Also need to actually get on and get myself a CAB appointment as not done this yet. Must call to estate manager about paying £5 a week (or £10 a fortnight) to the rent arrears this morning too.

Been listing items on eBay but mostly the earnings are disappointing, wrong time of year maybe? Been doing surveys but these are dull and colourless, in truth I hate them and I can't see them paying for the broadband as I'd hoped. Had a few perks by using the MSE shopbot and then using the cashback sites to claw a little of that back too so I now have a £160 Kenwood FP920 processor for £101.59... Which is great (under 2/3 of what the Empire book sells it for) but it's still money, even if it is justifiable. I have ordered a couple of t-shirts and some shoes but I am going to send one of the pairs of shoes back and one of the t-shirts too because they're not as fab as they looked. In the past I would have just kept them but I'm trying not to be so profligate with money. I do still need things of course, shopping will have to happen but that said it has to happen more economically. In that vein I have discovered Approved Foods, my first order came on the 19th and I've been eating my way through it. I'm not sure I actually did save a fortune y'know, I seem to have bought a lot of snacky things because they were deadly cheap and I thought I'd make them last but am now living off them like they were staples (eg. moo milk type biccies, hula hoops). The Emma Noel soap I bought there was OK to smell it dry, but as you use it it stinks like fishy old women- have given it to boyfriend. I may not bother too much with Approved Foods again, they currently have a competition to win a drum of olive oil- I couldn't use that much within the date if I rolled in it and I'm not so greedy as to want it anyhow, this company may not be for me. Lidl is another one that's not always cheaper either, strawberries were £1 a box in Asda the other week and £1.99 there on the same day. Being savvy clearly has no one-shop-fits-all answers!

On a money-free note, I've also got involved with the feeding a family of four healthily on under £100 a month project being oragnised by Weezl from MSE. I've been doing a bit of researching about nutrition, it's good to have revived an old interest. That it makes me think more about my eating and spending is a bonus. Have had a few freebies, a Cow & Gate toy cow and a sachet of vaseline moisturiser spring to mind, it's all good. Got a GiffGaff sim too, must get round to looking into that more today too. The vaseline sample made me think, I had a bit of Lush dream cream lying about and a bit of nivea too. I shall make every effort to actually use these right up and my other toiletries too.

Went to the beach yesterday, ahhh it's been a long time since I could do that. I stood in the water and it was glorious. Couldn't swim, but thats because my cozzie I won on eBay for a snip has not come yet, I wish the seller would get her finger out, there's a pool class on tomorrow I'm just about able enough to go to if I could dress for it. Wish I still had a pool concession, might ask the GP to renew it, he probably will, he's very reasonable. Which is a point, need to see him anyway about the pain, it's getting worse but I was mostly trying to ignore it. I am starting to have to accept that "if I can walk it doesn't count" is probably not a strategy in my best interests. Boyfriend was bereaved yesterday, a young man who was like a son to him took his own life. I can't help but be reminded that life is too precious to be sat about fretting really, what's more I need to make a definate effort not to mention pain or "I used to be able to...", it doesn't matter what I used to be able to do and I need to make better use of what I still can do.

Looks like today will be a busy day. I bet it wouldn't have been if I didn't have a DFW diary to update. Town will be busy, it's cloudy today. I might take the boyo (dog) in with me, he draws a crowd of fans wherever he goes and was home alone yesterday so he will like the change I think. It's good to be able to make someone happy. He's a someone to me.

Hannah_10

Using this like a notebook...

CAB appointment: Friday 2nd July, 10am. Bring all relvant paperwork.
Cashout from the £20 money back bet on MSE newsletter due to show on account between 29th June and 2nd July- check then.
Left estate manager coming round in 20 minutes (ye Gods)- will pick up where I left off later, need to clean up!!!

Hannah_10

Right well the estate manager accepted £10 a fortnight. But then I didn't pay it.

That's because I finally got the chance of a car which was incredibly cheap and which I could afford, so it was a case of grab it fast or go without. I know a car is optional, but since I can't now walk the 500 yards home from town (but I'm not diasabled enough to qualify for a motability car) then it seems less optional, the taxi fares are killing me.

Which brings me on to Aviva, turns out I owe them £102 *sigh*. My fault for not sorting out paperwork.

And despite a lot of calls the gas arrears aren;t yet coming off the card, so I need to call AGAIN!

So now the situation looks like this...

Under control...
Gas arrears £599.03
Electric arrears £158.85
My Sister [STRIKE]£450*[/STRIKE] Now £340*

Not under control
Rent arrears [STRIKE]£779.28[/STRIKE] Now £680.28
[STRIKE]Council tax arrears £161.29[/STRIKE] Clear!
[STRIKE]Empire £131.00[/STRIKE] Clear!
Barclays Bank £2268
Moorcroft/Orange £539.65
Water arrears £463.58
Aviva £102

Hannah_10

The CAB said...
I'm eligable for debt advice from *specialised charity* and so someone will visit me.
The landlord can't throw me out, so as long as I do something about the late arrears payments asap then I will be Ok.
She's never heard of the help I can apparently get from the water board but will look into it.
And if I use the CAB's debt service then I have to pay back all the debt, even the debt that's nearly statute barred. :eek:

Hannah_10

Yes Insurance
I need to add another £338.23 to the total debt because I couldn't afford to insure the car in one go so I had to go pay-monthly. I've spoken to Yes Insurance though and I can pay the remainder off at any time and escape the additional £3.08p each month which is just credit charges. So it's in my interests to pay this one ASAP as most of my other debt does not accrue any charges.

Moorcroft/Orange
Well today I got the letter back from Moorcroft, I have made another thread about it for some further advice. Filing it here so I can keep everything together HERE it is. It follows on from one I started on 14th June 2010 HERE. Also worth noting is that I didn't write it down before but when I spoke to Orange on the 14th they did confirm that the true amount of the debt was £399.65

The Rent Arrears.
I made an agreement with the estate manager to start paying the remainder of my rent arrears gradually beginning Friday 2nd July (as my income support came in on Tuesday 29th June and I wanted a few days grace after that in case I couldn't go out for any reason- it happens). Well that day came and went, I did not pay the £10 per fortnight as agreed because I bought the car and it wiped me out financially. Well tomorrow I get income support again, so I am planning to pay £30 off the rent arrears. This consists of £10 missed payment from Fri 2nd July, £10 payment for this fortnight (Fri 16th July) and £10 to put me in advance of the agreement as a safety net in case anything like this happens again. According to the CAB if I pay £20 this week then then any court I get taken to in future ought to be fine about it, so going that £10 over this once to build that security in should look even better and will cushion the impact on the repayment sheet if I ever miss another.

Gas arrears.
Are STILL not being taken from the bloody meter. That'll be another call to E.On I have to make I suspect, they drive me mad, I've been trying to set this up since this time last year!

Generally
I have an appointment with a debt advisor from a *specific charity* in the city on Tues 27th July at 2pm. I was referred from the CAB. I must make a mental note to remember all of the paperwork. I don't really understand why I've been referred as the main point of going to the CAB was to try to get access to South West Waters charitable trust thing and get that water bill hopefully at least partly crossed out. The other big pressing reason was the rent arrears, but I had the advice I needed there and then about the rent arrears. Over all I'm not too sure why I'm bothering the charity- unless they do payouts, but even then I'd find that a bit cringy as they've helped me in the past and I feel I've asked enough of them.

So right now the new totals look like this...


Cleared...
[STRIKE]Council tax arrears £161.29[/STRIKE] Cleared
[STRIKE]Empire £131.00[/STRIKE] Cleared

Under control...
Electric arrears [STRIKE]£158.85[/STRIKE] Now £137.30
My Sister [STRIKE]£450*[/STRIKE] Now £340*
Yes Insurance (car) [STRIKE]£338.23 [/STRIKE]Now £276.75
Gas arrears £599.03

Not under control...
Rent arrears [STRIKE]£779.28[/STRIKE] Now £680.28
Barclays Bank £2268
Moorcroft/Orange £539.65
Water arrears £463.58
Aviva £102

Obviously the grand aim is to move each of the debts up a level, from Not Under Control to Under Control to Cleared and to shrink the overall total I am in debt by as soon as possible.

This makes a total original debt of £5990.91, of which I now have paid £584.32 (9.75%) and have £5406.59 (90.25%) remaining.