60k debt - anyone else with one? - Got a new job!! :D

Brassic

OneSpike

Wow Brassic, that little lot looks fantastic! We have stacks of chutney and jam, but I've not bottled any oil or home-made drinks as I can't find suitable bottles. I love your little corked ones - where do you find them? We often give hampers of goodies we've made and that are local to us, as we live in a very foody part of the world so can get local honey, beer, fantastic crisps etc. Together with wine from DH's cousin's vineyard in France they usually go down very well!

owessomuch

Hi guys,

Wow Brassic your gifts are fantastic :T well done! You should feel proud, threy're great.

Sorry to here about your bad news with the £150, that is such a nightmare any time of year but right now is even worse! :mad:

I'm also short on money for the next two weeks and starting to fret. I get paid weekly so budget that way and things are very very tight at the moment.

Any word on the redundancy?

I received my 'Thrifty Ways' book this morning, so thats my mum present sorted. I know she's going to love it. She's always reading the tips in her magazines and I tell her about the sight but she's never gotten to grips with computers so this is the next best thing.

Around this time of year we get £50 supermarket gift vouchers from our company for Christmas so as always I'm going to have to use these to buy Christmas presents. I can't wait until the year I get them and can spend them all on myself!! Gready I know!!

Brassic

Thanks guys!

OneSpike - the bottles are from the pub I work in - they're the mineral water bottles, I just asked the staff to keep them for me instead of chucking them and I've got loads now. I bought the corks from a seller on ebay, and sealed them with wax from an old candle I melted down

oweseomuch - have fun with the shopping! I'll bet your mum will be well chuffed. Hope that you last the next 2 weeks. I've just been updating my spreadsheet, and it's going to be tough. Wrt redundancy it's a case of wait and see now. I spoke to the two people above my boss, and they're dealing with it now (I told them that I had spoken with my solicitor so hopefully they're clear that I won't take this lying down) and one of them is setting up a meeting with HR to discuss redundancy package options. Keep your fingers crossed I hear this week, as Friday is my last day when I can hand in my notice and be within my legal 4 week notice period :O

I really need a good deal too because I get paid in advance here - and arrears there so will be a month without money. Also, I've found out that I have four weeks training where I will be doing 9-5 instead of shift work. This is bad in 2 ways, firstly I will have a month without shift allowance :O and secondly it's a month where I'll need full time childcare for 3 children :eek:

So atm I'm waiting with baited breath........









.....<gasp!> Almost. lol!

owessomuch

Hi guys,

Well the car did go Bang in the end! I was driving along in the pouring rain to meet my mum on my lunch break and thats when it happened. My first thought was to feel sorry for myself and stress out about how much it was going to cost to get it fixed

I called work to explain I would be late getting back to the office and called mum to say I wouldn't make lunch then something really cool happened.

Within 5 minutes one of the guys from work had come to town to tow my car back to work and mum arrived with a takeaway sandwich for me because she knew I would be hungry. It just made me realise that I am a very lucky person.

Sometimes I really do need to remind myself of that when all I seem to think about is my debt.

Yes getting the car fixed is going to be an extra bill but I have wondefull friends and family who are always there for me.

Anyway thats about everything thats happened in the past few days, How are you guys?

P.S - A friend of mine is fixing my car at 'Mates Rates' - Another bit of luck I think

Brassic

Awww, poor you! What a shame abou your car, and don't these things always happen at the worst time?

Do you budget for tax, maintenance etc? I did for a while, but just recently I seem to only just be keeping afloat day to day, so would be stuffed if it happened to me. I'm hoping that once redundancy, new job, Christmas etc gets sorted, we can get back on track with things like that.

Sounds like you really do have lovely mates and family though Hope you get the car sorted soon.

Brassic

I need a bit of a moan, so gonna just let off some steam here I'm afraid

Redundancy is basically a non starter, so raised issue with HR saying I wanted to raise a formal grievance. HR were suprised as they thought all was going well with communications between myself and boss. Turns out US bosses had conveniently forgotten to mention the whole bit about me being concerned about being told me being a mother effected the way I do my job etc. :eek: HR very shocked and have let the US know that this is SERIOUS. I have re-raised my concerns in writing and if I don't get satisfactory response then I'll raise the grievance formally. A good friend of mine has offered to front any legal costs, but I'm hoping it's covered it doesn't go that far and if so it'd be covered on my home insurance as there is no way I'd take him up on his offer.

Another blow has been dealt by Tax folks getting in touch saying they're going to take us to court for an overpayment in 2003!!!:mad: First I'd heard of it so I'm fuming. Have filled in a dispute form to give us more time (phone bloke said it doesn't matter what we put on the dispute form they'll still reclaim the money). We haven't claimed since then so now need to fill in a claim form so if/when it gets decided we owe it then it can be taken out of current payments as we can't afford a sou atm.

Problem is to fill in the form for tax credits now I need my details from last year and I can't make head nor tail of them. It reckons my taxable pay was 25.5k, yet I only got paid 15.5k in my bank account including mat benefits, how can that be right? Only 4.5k taken in tax so where is the other 5.5k?

January and feb are goign to be hell. Pay problems as follows.
1. I get paid in advance currently - new job pays in arrears. This means one month without pay.
2. First month is training which means regular hours instead of shifts which means no shift enhancement and thus less pay.
3. First month full time instead of shifts means I'm going to need to pay twice as much childcare.

:eek: :eek: :eek:

I have no idea how we will survive. My mum is coming up to stay for a week to look after kids to cut down on childcare costs, but I've got no idea how we will pay for the simple things like food.

Only silver lining is that Barclays seems to be paying up quicker these days so I may get that money in January/Feb. BUT - most will pay off barclays overdrafts, so will only actually be an extra 500 to use - and it's not guaranteed. Fingers crossed though.

Sorry for the depressed post. Am feeling very stressed and down atm so haven't been on for a while. I'm sure no one has read this far, but it's been quite cathartic writing it all down!

Cheers,
Brassic.

owessomuch

Hi Bassic,

You poor dear! It seems you are having a bad time of it lately hun. I can't believe that you have to pay back the tax credits. This also happened to a friend of mine. From what I remember they were not very helpful to her either.
I really hope that they sort out your redundancy, very convienient of them to forget! At least now they know you are not going without a fight and this should give them the kick up the A** they need. Good for you hun!

Money is always tight but at this time of year it's harder than normal. I sending you good vibes for both the redundancy and bank charges

My car is finally fixed and luckily my friend did it for £30 which was really nice of him, so that was one less thing to worry about.

I'm still not completly ready for Christmas, I was supposed to go to the shops today but I just could'nt face all of those people and the queues so I'm having day in today and may possibly try tomorrow.

I've had a very busy week helping five of my friends with claiming back their bank charges, so hoping they will all get them back like I did.

Work is very quiet at the moment so my days are dragging so much, we always have this slum before the Christmas break. I am looking forward to a week off at Christmas but it normally ends up in spending money :eek:

Had a bit of annoying news this week, I appplied to for a credit card to get a 0% balance transfer and was declined, so doing everything backwards I then decide to look up my credit report and rating, which states 'Excellent' so guess I'll have to give it some time and reduce my debts some more before I attempt that again.

Also having a nightmare with my Paypal account. They have to be the most unhelpful people I have ever dealt with :mad: I have emailed them around 4 times now and rather than reading the email and looking into my case they just send a standard reply back :mad: :mad: :mad:

Anyway I'm off now after my little rant (we make a right pair today!) I really hope things get better for you Brassic and hope you have a better week next week. Keep your chin up!

Speak to you soon

Owessomuch x

gettingitsorted

Brassic wrote:

I need a bit of a moan, so gonna just let off some steam here I'm afraid

Redundancy is basically a non starter, so raised issue with HR saying I wanted to raise a formal grievance. HR were suprised as they thought all was going well with communications between myself and boss. Turns out US bosses had conveniently forgotten to mention the whole bit about me being concerned about being told me being a mother effected the way I do my job etc. :eek: HR very shocked and have let the US know that this is SERIOUS. I have re-raised my concerns in writing and if I don't get satisfactory response then I'll raise the grievance formally. A good friend of mine has offered to front any legal costs, but I'm hoping it's covered it doesn't go that far and if so it'd be covered on my home insurance as there is no way I'd take him up on his offer.

Another blow has been dealt by Tax folks getting in touch saying they're going to take us to court for an overpayment in 2003!!!:mad: First I'd heard of it so I'm fuming. Have filled in a dispute form to give us more time (phone bloke said it doesn't matter what we put on the dispute form they'll still reclaim the money). We haven't claimed since then so now need to fill in a claim form so if/when it gets decided we owe it then it can be taken out of current payments as we can't afford a sou atm.

Problem is to fill in the form for tax credits now I need my details from last year and I can't make head nor tail of them. It reckons my taxable pay was 25.5k, yet I only got paid 15.5k in my bank account including mat benefits, how can that be right? Only 4.5k taken in tax so where is the other 5.5k?

January and feb are goign to be hell. Pay problems as follows.
1. I get paid in advance currently - new job pays in arrears. This means one month without pay.
2. First month is training which means regular hours instead of shifts which means no shift enhancement and thus less pay.
3. First month full time instead of shifts means I'm going to need to pay twice as much childcare.

:eek: :eek: :eek:

I have no idea how we will survive. My mum is coming up to stay for a week to look after kids to cut down on childcare costs, but I've got no idea how we will pay for the simple things like food.

Only silver lining is that Barclays seems to be paying up quicker these days so I may get that money in January/Feb. BUT - most will pay off barclays overdrafts, so will only actually be an extra 500 to use - and it's not guaranteed. Fingers crossed though.

Sorry for the depressed post. Am feeling very stressed and down atm so haven't been on for a while. I'm sure no one has read this far, but it's been quite cathartic writing it all down!

Cheers,
Brassic.

Hi Brassic im sorry your being put through the mill at the mo ,i dont know if this will help in anway with the tax credits but it may be worth a shot.on the job seeking and benifit board the is a thread on tax credit overpayment which includes a link to some very useful information which alot of people dont know about about how much they take off you apparently its not made common knowledge by HMRC .

Brassic

Poor you owesomuch, sounds like you've been having a tough time too. I think partly the card depends on the company, so you might just have picked one with very strict conditions Good news about the car though!

Talking of cars - I've managed to sell mine :j :j :j

This honestly couldn't have come at a better time. I've managed to speak with nursery & childminders and they're happy to let the girls have a week off without me paying since they'll have them there 3 weeks full time instead of part time. Phew. So my mum is coming up to look after them which'll be a shock to them all no doubt! :rotfl:

Soooo, am now looking out for a very cheap runabout. I've seen a couple of nice puntos/kas etc, but trouble is (as [STRIKE]annoying [/STRIKE]practical hubby pointed out, they have to fit 3 kids and seats in the back at least every now and again. Anyone got a small car that does this?

Need to only spend 2k, cos we need the other 1k to pay childminder/nursery/bills etc. :eek:

Went to Tescos yesterday and spent about 55 quid, but got the rest of this weeks shopping, AND LOADS of cheap pasta, beans, lentils, tomatos, tuna etc to last us through next month too :think: I even bought some of those 8p noodles someone was on about ages ago. I think the kids are going to have a bit of shock next month, but it's better than starving. So next month is pretty much paid for wrt shopping, will just need fresh fruit and veggies.

gettingitsorted - thanks for the advice re tax credits, will pootle off to have a look now.

Oh also got some bargains this weekend. A rocking horse on freecycle for youngest daughter for Chrimbo from freecycle, and a lovely new (to us anyway) lcd monitor for the elder 2 girls pooter as the old one we had wouldn't fit in their room. A good friend of mine gave it to us as a Christmas present - and fixed their pooter whilst he was at it - what a lovely friend :kisses3: Good news all round as I won't have a pooter come january as work will take both of mine back when I leave

Right, that's all from me (thank goodness!)
Bfn.