Minty's incredible disappearing £700 thread...

gilly1964

mintymoneysaver wrote: »

Wahay, the Barclaycard statement has arrived! Not quite as bad as I first thought, but not far off it! The total I owe is £2973.81, and the direct debit this month will be for £66. This is going to come out right at the end of the month, so I'll have to leave enough in my account for that, but I've then set up a Standing Order for £60 to come out on the first of the month from then on, and I'll also try to throw any extra bits of money at it as they come in.

Are you intending to pay the DD and an additioanal £60 SO, as I think BC may mess your idea up!

In the past when I did PAD - they took any overpayment off the DD amount and then claimed less on DD pay

If I have understood correctly to get round this call BC and ask them to set a fixed DD amount of £120

HTH

mintymoneysaver

Hi, thanks for all your comments,and please do feel free to hijack my thread, it's nice to know I've got company!

The driving lessons are a very scary price, the only plus point being we've got £275 towards them from the shares we sold. That will be her birthday and passing her exams present so she will get 13 for that ( £22 each or £200 for the first ten) After that she's on her own, I'm afraid, she is asking for money for Christmas and Birthdays, and she paid for her provisional out of her own money. Hopefully she will have the good sense to save some of the money from this job ( 6 weeks at 15 hours per week)

Gilly, you're right about the barclaycard, but what I did was let the first dd go out on the 29th of October and then set up a standing order for the 1st Nov, so £120 has gone this month. It will only be £60 after this month as you're right, they'll only take what's left to pay as a DD, plus whatever else I can throw at it through one off payments. I don't suppose the extra will be much till after Christmas, but every little helps!

beanielou

gilly1964 wrote: »

Sorry to crash the thread - but tell me about it :mad:

DS started in July £23 per lesson and most driving schools round this way insist on 2 hours each time - so £46 per week.

We are already up to over £700, with the theory test to book, the practical test to book, before we even think about getting a car and the insurance:eek:

Blimey I was hoping DS might not quite get to that figure.
I cant afford to buy a car for him so dont have that to worry about, just guilt of not buying.

mintymoneysaver

No beanie, we can't afford the car either, whatever daughter seems to think!

Been into town today, and spent £30 but reckon I got over £160 of stuff, thanks to Boots and Debenhams! And I was good, and din't buy myself a sandwich for my lunch, I came home and made one instead! Going out tonight with theatre tickets that I won on the comping thread, and a 50% off voucher for La Tasca.

Even better the £50 Debenhams card I won arrived today too, so I'm going to save that for my Christmas outfit!

Money wise I have also found out I may be due a refund on dancing fees, one daughter has just stopped going and I've realised I must have been overpaying for her ( possibly about £1.50 a week) but I reckon it must have been happening for at least a year if not more, so I could be due a nice amount back:T

Daughter 1 has started her part time job, so I can reduce the amount of allowance we give her a month, which will save us even more money. It's funny but ever since I started this diary things seem to have improved! Of course I've still got a massive debt, and after Christmas I will be making a concerted effort to pay as much off that as possible, but family money seems much better. Still got Christmas to come yet though......although today's trip means some of the friends and relatives can be crossed off the 'to buy' list!

Family credit card £72
In 'savings' £450 ( had to pay Amazon bill for a few bits and pieces, daughter's allowance, today's spending and £40 off Tesco credit card that I'd forgotten about:o but is now clear)
so my original aim to keep £500 in there has already gone by the wayside. I'm now going for £350 as a more realistic target, with only £150 on the credit card which will give me £200 to carry over to next month! With next month's money that should easily mean we can go into 2010 with all the Christmas spending done....

mintymoneysaver

It slowly disappears however hard you try, doesn't it..... Savings is now down to £411, but I need to pay the car tax out of that. I could get away with waiting till right near the end of the month but there doesn't seem much point, when next months money has to pay for Christmas, and the MOT.

credit card is up too, £130, so if I can not put any more on that, and not spend any more then I can carry over £150 at least, which means I've managed to save £75 this month and last. I'm not sure how we'll go over Christmas, so not planning on putting that into a seperate account just yet, but am hoping after Christmas to maybe siphon off £100 a month to put in my ISA as proper savings!

Barclaycard is just carrying on, no chance of overpaying that till after Christmas although I have got some stuff to put on ebay if I can only find the lead for my camera to upload the photos. There's not much but it might be £20 or so...

Hope everyone else is doing well x

mintymoneysaver

Aaaahhhhh, where does it all go??? Now down to £198. Car tax has come out, owed daughter her pocket money, cheque for other nephew's birthday, cash in a birthday card for godson,bought all my Christmas cards and a few presents, so I can safely say I won't be carrying anything over to next month after all! Just ordered £80 of stuff off Amazon too, so need to watch what I'm doing now! I knew there wouldn't be much left, but I am absolutely determined not to owe anything after Christmas so once this credit card is paid I am planning on using all cash, or at least putting it on the card and then paying it off straight away, as I always use a credit card on the net.

I don't plan on spending loads at Christmas, it just seems to happen that way! We probably spend about £20 on each adult in the family, £10-£15 on children and friends, and up to £150 on our two children and it soon all adds up! I've probably got £200 still needing to be spent on presents, plus about £120 on each of the daughters so it is doable, but I'll need to be careful!

There's £198 left in there, but about that owing on the cards, so they'll pretty much cancel each other out. About £800 will go in to the account next month as I did a bit of overtime last month, and at a conservative estimate, £400 needing to go out. The MOT also is next month, but I'm hoping nothing needs doing on that. If I didn't owe anything on a card on Christmas Day ( apart from Barclaycard obviously!) that would be a fabulous Christmas present, and 2011 can start to be a saving year....

mintymoneysaver

Wow, it's been a while since I posted. Where does that time go? Money has gone okay. Still in credit on all accounts although the idea that I wouldn't owe any money on my credit card by now was a bit optimistic. I actually owe about £250, plus some money to Amazon but I do get paid on Wednesday rather than after Christmas, so that will mean that I won't actually owe any money on Christmas Day!! ( Well apart from Barclaycard, obviously!) That'll be the first Christmas Day for a while that I haven't had to pay off at the end of January. There won't be £700 left for next month, but at least there'll be something. In my defence I have had to buy new brake pads, but other than that it has all gone on Christmas. The money just adds up, doesn't it, although I am by no means an extravagant Christmas buyer. Just waiting for 2 more presents to turn up and then it's all done.
So my plan for 2011;
Keep paying off minimum of £70 to Barclaycard a month out my own money, plus any extra I can throw at it.
Put £50 a month into savings for my holiday so that that won't come as a shock in the summer ( I know it's happening every year, but I still never save up for it!)
At the end of each month transfer anything that's left over from the £700 into my ISA so that it becomes proper savings rather than just sitting there and getting spent. None of this needs to go on debt repayment now, the skiing trip is paid, and daughter1 has enough money from her job to keep her going for a while now even though her temp contract has finished, so I'm hoping they phone her in January with an offer of a permenant job. I will have the car insurance to pay at the end of Jan but I shouldn't have many more expenses in Jan so hopefully I can start the year off well. I'd like to still have £200 in the Halifax at the end of Jan to go towards the insurance, and then put money from Jan's pay towards it.

Hoping everyone has a wonderful Christmas, and here's to 2011!:T

mintymoneysaver

So it's post Christmas and I've paid all the bills! I currently owe NOTHING on the family credit card, owe nothing to Amazon and have £400 in the 'savings' account!!! :j Honestly can't remember the last time when I went into the new year without having to pay the rest of the credit card off in January so it feels GOOD! I know it wouldn't have happened without getting the shares from dh's work so we have been fortunate, but it's managed to get us back on the straight and narrow and I'm determined for us to stay that way.
I need to pay my garage £80 as annoyingly I managed to break my windscreen wiper by knocking it on while it was frozen and he fixed it which I could have done without, but it's do able. I would love to have less than £100 plus the car insurance to pay at the end of January, with £200 from this month to go towards it. Depending on when they take the money I could get away with the car insurance not getting paid till the end of Feb, but I want to try and pay it as early as possible.
So my aim then is to carry over £400 at the end of Jan, even after the insurance. Let's see if we can manage it!
Barclaycard wise, I've actually paid off a bit more than I hoped as I seem to have set up the direct debit so a DD and a standing order came out in the same month so £140 was paid off the last statement! I can't afford to do that every month so I'll have to put the DD back a bit, but I'm going to up it to £100, I'm sure I can find an extra £30 a month from somewhere. It was 0% for 16 months, so I'm going to struggle to pay it off in that time, but I'm going to set myself a challenge to have paid it all off by the end of 2012, and keep a running total at each statement here. Here's to 2011 and wishing you all a great and successful New Year.

BARCLAYCARD:mad: at start £2973.81/£2847

mintymoneysaver

Happy New Year!:beer:
Paid the garage, so have £321 in the 'savings' and owe £43, as bought flowers etc on Christmas Eve. There's also a bit more to go on there, as went to town with daughter 2 yesterday and bought her a few bits. So probably actually owe about £100. I need to get an ariel fitted in our bedroom though for our new telly ( Christmas pressie off my mum!) and I think that's about £50 so just off to have a root round and see what I can ebay to try and balance that out!

This diary is supposed to be about finding out where the money goes, and it really helps to see what's happening to it, but it's also about getting rid of as much of that Barclaycard as possible. Should imagine the statement will be here soon, so can update that. Have added a bit more to my holiday fund too!


Holiday fund £100:T
BARCLAYCARD:mad: at start £2973.81/£2847

beanielou

Happy new yar to you too