Newbie SOA - fresh eyes with any ideas?

PerfectPeaches

Hi Debt Dodger

With regard to child care I think as your father is looking after your child I think you should be able to reduce this. At the end of the day I'm sure your parents would understand if you said you need to reduce to say even £300.00 per month. Thats an extra £200 per month you get to clear your debts - surely they want you debt free too!

With a phone contract you can always see if you can get it reduced. I am with O2 and rang them back in August to say that I'm not getting any value from the tariff (and I said I had now received a work phone) and they reduced the monthly payments by £5 - not a huge amount but it is still £5 saved per month which goes on something else.

I'm not an expert with car finance/ HP unfortunately but if you have taken it out in March its highly unlikely you could sell the car with enough money to be able to purchase a new one as you need to get to work. But it never hurts to know your HP agreement inside and out especially if sometime in the future you sell the car you would want to know about early repayment charges.

Again, I am not too knowledgeable about Sky contracts (my OH deals with this sort of thing!). You could always see if you can get the monthly amount reduced, the worst they can say is no and at least you have tried.

Hope that helps!

Peaches x

iamana1ias

DebtDodger wrote: »

Everyone is saying the child care is too high. Is it really? My friend works in a crech which is £800 per month for each child 8-6 so I thought it wasn't too bad. I'd only get £240 in vouchers anyway wouldn't I?

A 'professional' creche has very high overheads. Staff costs, employers NI, pensions, tax, rent, rates, plus they have to make a profit.

Your father has none of these expenses, and I'm afraid he's taking the p1ss by taking that much from you.

Yes, you can get £243 in vouchers from your employer, but you can only use them for registered childcare and the saving is that you don't pay tax or NI on the £243.

RAS

And there would be nothing to stopyour father registering as a childminder.

DebtDodger

RAS wrote: »

And there would be nothing to stopyour father registering as a childminder.

We did look into this but the agreement is that I can use the vouchers for my dad but he must agree to take on at least 1 other non-related child which he's not really physically able for

I can see everyone's points in terms of the child minding but I have to reiterate that they haven't asked for this amount, in fact they're very uncomfortable about it because it was originally £100 a week and when I got this job it came with a pay rise and I offered them an extra £100 per month. They asked only that if I wanted my dad to stay retired and not find another job then I would have to cover the wages. I think that's reasonable considering they've their own IVA payments to make. I do it because it makes me feel less guilty about how reliant I've been on them (my partner cheated when I was 8 months pregnant and I completely fell to bits) the only reason I'm back on track is because of their support.

I suppose really I have 3 main reasons for doing it this way: I'm not comfortable with putting Che in a creche, I would literally leave my job and sign on first! For various reasons I just can't cope with the idea. Secondly, I'm helping out my parents because I am by far the biggest earner in the family and lastly, I was hoping I could repay my debts and still help my parents because I thought I'd caught them in good time. But perhaps I haven't?

Che will go to nursery next year and my payments to my dad will reduce anyway because there'll be 3 hours a day where he doesn't have him so I see it as a short term hard ship if that makes sense

RAS

if you carry on paying dad, then everything else has to go, mobile, ents, clothing, food, sky, presents everything cut back to the bone.

Otherwise by next year your debts will be a lot higher than now.

If you have been spening silly amounts on clothes, you will have a good supply that you can wear or sell if they are not going to be worn again. What esle id knocking around that can be sold. You need to get HMRC down below £750 urgently and then make regular payments on that and the Virgin card.

What is then limit on the Ulster card?

DebtDodger

Thanks RAS, your advice has been really helpful on this.

I know what you mean and it's what I need to hear, if the payments to dad continue then I have to weigh up what is more important to me and something must go. I definately have a good supply of clothes now and am only buying what I need. Last month I needed a winter coat for work as I didn't own one and the cheap car park means a good walk across the bridge in the rain! I managed to get that on eBay for £17. It was the only purchase I decided that I "needed". My son then grew 1 size in feet and so a new pair of shoes was £30 (he has really narrow feet so I have to go to Clarke's because the health visitor said the cheaper shoes were giving him a turn as he walked out of them)

I'm not fully finsihed the first month of the new budget - different from the one above - but I managed to save £100 and if I save another £100 next month then I can use that to lower the HMRC with a small lump sum? Although it's my son's birthday I'm not buying him a present which will help me save this because everyone else will buy a small toy/clothing voucher and I've just had to buy new shoes! I hope that doesn't make me sound like a bad mum but he won't know any different (I hope!)

The Ulsterbank CC is £350 in limit. I racked that up in the last few months before starting this job because my old work had cut me down to 4 days a week. This new salary SHOULD mean that I can manage my finances but I wasn't seeing any excess and this discussion and my own previous budget ideas is definately helping me see why!

RAS

DebtDodger wrote: »

The Ulsterbank CC is £350 in limit.

Ok, so every thing you spend this month, say petrol, goes on the Ulster card. And as soon as you spend that, you pay exactly the same amount toward the Virgin debt. By the end of the month you have "transferred" £100 from a 28% debt to a 15% debt. Not a lot but it will save you over the years.

Go to www.whatsthecost.com and put in your current debts and work out how lang it will take to pay them off.

PerfectPeaches

Debt Dodger

As you say your parents feel guilty by taking the money from you but they are still obviously taking it! Yes they have their own debt problems but they are adults and your parents, it isn't your responsibility by helping them knowing your in debt yourself. God, that sounded harsh but you need to think about your debt first.

You could always reduce your childcare costs to your dad by £200 just for a few months until you've reduced some of your debt and if need be give them more say 6-9 months later.

If you don't do this, a lot of your outgoings have to go but due to most of them being in contracts this can't happen.

Your parents have obviously been very good to you by having you and your child back but I'm sure they would want you to be debt free and should understand reducing the amount of childcare. They still get rent!

Peaches x

DebtDodger

Thank you everyone for all these tips and for making my thinking much clearer. I will apply all the tips to my new budget and see how it works out this month, as well as speaking to my parents and being honest about my own situation instead of trying to be a crutch for them...

I will try to contribute what I can to the forums as a thank you for the time people have taken with me here and I also hope to find some tips on my travels here about cheapo entertainment for my son socialising as well as learning to cook to help me cut my grocery bill

PerfectPeaches

Hope it all goes well for you.

Peaches x