Need help please...

Tazinijif

I am having serious trouble with finances at the moment as my partner has just graduated uni and is having trouble getting a job.

Incoming PCM
My salary - £948.51
Partners salary - £0
Benefits - £0

Total - £948.51

Monthly Outgoings:

Mortgage/Rent - £475
Council Tax - £90.85
Gas - £unknown
Electric - £61.43
Virgin Media - £25
Phone - 32.43
Food - £80
Credit card debt - £41.00
Managed loan - £40.86
Overdraft loan - £40
Bus pass (to get to work) - £60
Specialist Job website fees: £15


Total: £961.57

You can see why we are in trouble! We have already applied for all the regular benefits and been told we can get nothing. All the loans etc have been shaved down to their minimum as we have pleaded with companies to let us pay less for a few months and everything that we are not contracted to has been cut out.

I am a sensitive soul so please be friendly... I posted asking for help on another board and was basically told I should have forseen that this would happen and have rented a cheaper flat, not got a contract mobile, not got into any debt etc etc so that when this happened I would be fine. I already now I am an idiot for getting a student overdraft and credit card, please don't rub it in!!

I am not very 'up' on what to do with the debts, I think they are what is causing the most trouble (the £60 electric bill includes a £40 pcm backlog from when we first moved in and the loandlord hadn't properly sorted out the paperwork) so if anyone has any advice on how we can go about reducing them I would be hugely grateful.

lesalanos

there doesn't look to be much to cut out there so the only other option is to increase your income or your parner to take any job for now.

Have a look on the up your income board for some ideas

Tazinijif

Yeah he is looking for absolutely anything at the moment, but as is the trend in the current climate he is not hearing back from anything. Thanks for trying to help anyway, seems I am a bit of a lost cause :0(

dark^knight

Hi,

Which sector is your partner looking to work in?

There are a few strategies that help in finding a job:
1, Make sure the CV is appropriate for the role and is targeted properly.
2, Networking - Lookout for networking events, jobs fairs in your area and build network of contacts. Also, join Linked-In online and network with companies and individuals who may be able to help.
3, Mentoring - Find out if the university has a mentoring scheme which would help in gaining networking skills and building confidence.

Good luck.

DarkConvict

Getting a temp jobshouldn't be too bad, as comign upto summer the supermarkets loose alot of students that go home so start rehiring, if more is dire you have to take these types of jobs to cover your living costs. Whilst you keep on applying for your career roles. Only once accepted for your career job do you then leave behind the supermarket/retail/bar/sales 'temp' job.

You may wish to fill out this SOA to seperate out your income into a better budget - http://www.makesenseofcards.com/soacalc.html

NorthernLas

You are not a lost cause, so stop thinking that, you just need a solution which isn't as obvious as it first seems, as your budget is tight...

You have made a great start by working your outgoings, now some thought is required as to how you can jointly up your income

I know your OH is looking for work, but do you need to pay fees for a specialist job site? could they try monster.co.uk or totaljobs?

Does the uni careers service have any free help available?

Is there part time work evenings / early morning ... cleaning, bar work, etc., that would be OK as a stop gap while looking for a career start?

pixiechick_2

I know you said you've been told that you're not eligible for benefits but is your OH not eligible for Jobseekers?

Good luck

TUS

Tazinijif wrote: »

I am having serious trouble with finances at the moment as my partner has just graduated uni and is having trouble getting a job.

Incoming PCM
My salary - £948.51
Partners salary - £0
Benefits - £0 < your partner should be entitled to Jobseekers

Total - £948.51

Monthly Outgoings:

Mortgage/Rent - £475
Council Tax - £90.85
Gas - £unknown < why is this unknown? best estimate here
Electric - £61.43
Virgin Media - £25 < get rid of this, you can't afford it. Freeview.
Phone - 32.43 < for 2 phones? Can the tariff be reduced?
Food - £80
Credit card debt - £41.00
Managed loan - £40.86
Overdraft loan - £40
Bus pass (to get to work) - £60
Specialist Job website fees: £15 < is this really needed? There are lots of free ways to job search.


Total: £961.57
* What about water?

You can see why we are in trouble! We have already applied for all the regular benefits and been told we can get nothing. All the loans etc have been shaved down to their minimum as we have pleaded with companies to let us pay less for a few months and everything that we are not contracted to has been cut out.

I am a sensitive soul so please be friendly... I posted asking for help on another board and was basically told I should have forseen that this would happen and have rented a cheaper flat, not got a contract mobile, not got into any debt etc etc so that when this happened I would be fine. I already now I am an idiot for getting a student overdraft and credit card, please don't rub it in!!

I am not very 'up' on what to do with the debts, I think they are what is causing the most trouble (the £60 electric bill includes a £40 pcm backlog from when we first moved in and the loandlord hadn't properly sorted out the paperwork) so if anyone has any advice on how we can go about reducing them I would be hugely grateful.

A few comments above. They should help you break even - you really need to get under the threshold to spend less that you earn to avoid running up more debts.

The only longer term solution is an increase in income, whether thats you or your partner (probably your partner - he/she needs to take ANYTHING they can get - forget about graduate jobs, get some temping work). Hard work is the only way out. Good luck :-)

dancingfairy

With the credit cards / unsecured loan/overdraft etc will need to write to them with your budget and show that at the moment you can only afford token payments. If that's 5 a month each (you need to inlcude water, clothes, food is too low to be sustainable etc) then that's all they can get - obviously if you can pay them more then pay them more but at the moment it just doesn't add up.
Make sure you get a new bank account away from the bank you have the overdraft with/credit cards with as they can and will take money in your current account to pay their credit cards/loans etc and not leave you any money for the mortgage/food etc.
You need to make sure you pay the prioritiy bills though - ie the mortgage and any other secured debts.
I hope this helps. Basically they can't have what you haven't got and in the meantime you need to work on trying to get some more money in (but you know that bit).
With regards to JSA your partner may not be eligble for contribution based as they may not have paid enough NI contributions but you should be able to get the income assessed version? (I'm not sure what the hosuehold income has to be to qualify for this though).
You may qualify for council tax benefit? Check with you council and the jobcentre - I think the jobcentre is the hub of the benefits and once you've got the JSA sorted then you can get other benefits ie the council tax benefit if eligible.
Good luck with it all.
df

Tazinijif

dark^knight: He is ultimately looking to work in the sound engineering field but at present he is applying for any job he has any hope of getting, from retail to sales to cleaning to washing pots in restaurants. Each job he applies for he goes through his CV and edits it to conform better to their ideal candidate (with the exception of a standard CV he hads out around town each week). Newtorking events are a good idea, thank you for that I will certainly look into that! His university have stopped helping out graduates in pretty much any way this year as their finances are so shot. He has been to their careers department and is getting his CV and job applications reviewed though, if that is what you meant by mentoring?

DarkConvict: He is currently applying to temp jobs as well as part time and full time work, our ideal is in fact part time or temporarty work so he can still freelance/volunteer in his ideal field, at some point this week he is going to go into all of the recruitment agencies and see if he can be put onto their books for part-time and temporary work. :0)

Northern Las: The specialist job site fees are for his 'career' job, most of teh websites that recruit for workers in his field require a signup fee, if he doesn't find a job in the next couple of weeks they are already on the list to be cut! I believe he is already signed up to monster and totaljobs, they are good sites! Again, he is applying for everything, morning, evening, weekend, even night shifts, every job that he CAN apply for he is. He is getting help from the uni careers srevice as mentionned above too :0)

pixiechick: No he is not, they have told him that I earn too much for us to claim any benefits whatsoever. Unfortunately they take into account your income alone, without making any allowances for your outgoings. It is the debt repayments that are killing us!

TUS: As above, he is not eligible for JSA because I earn too much, Gas is unknown as like our electricity the landlord didn't get it properly sorted when he renovated teh basement into a flat, and we have not yet received a bill for the gas, despite having moved in a year ago! We are calling the gas company on a weekly basis now that the landlord has got his act together but we are getting nothing out of them. The same is true of our water bill, although we are sorted with that now and just waiting for the bill to come in. We consider our virgin media as a necessary expense at the moment as it is the only company we can get internet through. Our landlord put in the connection for a virgin line and refuses to either add a BT line himself or to allow us to do it, which sucks, but we don't really have much choice in the matter! On the plus side, our contract with them is up next month and we are hoping to negotiate a better deal with them on renewing it. The phone bill, believe it or not, has already been reduced. My phone alone used to be £30 a month, we have negotiated cheaper contracts with the phone company and spoken to a friend who works with the company who has graciously helped us out by giving us 2 of his 'friends and family' discounts. As soon as the contracts come to an end we will be reviewing our situation and if necessary returning to pay as you go. Again as mentioned above the job website bills are for specialist websites that hire in his 'career' field, if nothing is forthcoming on the job front in the next couple of weeks (i.e before the next bill for them comes out) they will be cancelled.

dancingfairy: This is one of the things that has been suggested to me by a few people/websites and something I am definitely going to be doing. One of my bank/credit agencies has already shaved my payment down by 80% just on the basis of a phone call, hopefully the others will also let me pay a little less until the situation improves :0) The bank I use for direct debits and wages etc is already separate from credit cards, loans etc, I learned that banks will empty adjoining accounts to pay off debt the hard way a few years back! again as above, we have been refused JSA, LHA, HB, WTC, CTB, the whole kit and caboodle based on my income.

Thanks so much for all the help and kind words, they mean more than you can know!

jules888

If Virgin media is for your phone line and broadband have you given them a ring to get bill down,i did and only pay £20 now.