I passed one of them money loan shops today

27col

patman99 wrote: »

Why is it everyone bashes the unemployed?. Yes, I'm an unemployed person, not through choice though. Yes, I have an HDTV, smartphone, laptop, netbook * desktop PC, but I use my smartphone as a tool to organise my jobhunting. I can add interview details into the calender, link the address into google maps and use the voice navigation app to turn said google maps into a satnav to get me to my interviews. By trading my old telly in for a new one, I am saving £10 a month on my electricity bill.
The rest of the tech was obtained whilst in employment.

In my town, the local rag ran a frontpage article stating that there were 3,200 on the dole and 1500 jobs on the jobcentre database. What they failed to mention was that 1450 of them are either part-time or nmw. None of which are able to support me and my family. My response will be to go self-employed once my cataracts have been done.

How on earth did you manage to find your way about before satnav.
As for the interviews nonsense and Google maps, well all I can say is write it down in a diary and buy a street map. People can manage perfectly well without the "toys". Anyway, people are not bashing the likes of you, who is obviously looking for for work. But those who appear to be permanent dole scroungers. I am sure that they know who they are and equally know that they have no intention of taking any job unless the pay covers all the things that they now get as allowances. Which is not going to happen, in spite of what the Government might say. There is something seriously wrong with a benefit system that makes one better off when not working.

patman99

NMW just won't pay enough to cover my mortgage and utilities even with WTC. I did manage to get a job via an agency (starting rate was supposed to be £8.25 p/hr, but turned-out to be £6.13 p/hr, but thats another story), but due to the actions of a customer, the job only lasted 3 weeks.

patman99

Before satnav I used to get a route map from the RAC or AA, then pin it to my sunvisor, looking-up at it as I drove towards each turn-point. The phone is on a 24 month contract taken-out whilst still in work.

Apples2

geoffky

patman99 wrote: »

Why is it everyone bashes the unemployed?. Yes, I'm an unemployed person, not through choice though. Yes, I have an HDTV, smartphone, laptop, netbook * desktop PC, but I use my smartphone as a tool to organise my jobhunting. I can add interview details into the calender, link the address into google maps and use the voice navigation app to turn said google maps into a satnav to get me to my interviews. By trading my old telly in for a new one, I am saving £10 a month on my electricity bill.
The rest of the tech was obtained whilst in employment.

In my town, the local rag ran a frontpage article stating that there were 3,200 on the dole and 1500 jobs on the jobcentre database. What they failed to mention was that 1450 of them are either part-time or nmw. None of which are able to support me and my family. My response will be to go self-employed once my cataracts have been done.

good for you m8..i wish you well but you are not a professional unemployed who can quote social security law while having sex ..:)

good luck with your hopes and dreams..

MrsE_2

ILW wrote: »

"Designer" clothes are something else I don't understand. Most come out of the same chinese factories as the cheap stuff and are made from the same fabrics, but once they have a label on them will sell for many times the amount. They seem to be most prevalent amongst those who claim to be poor. (I do not include pensioners in this, many who are truly poor)

My theory behind this is (& I was raised in this kind of area so I do understand this thinking) is that if you have a nice home & garden you are proud of you spend money on them, if you live in a council flat in an inner city you don't have that (& possibly don't have much money in reality) so you buy little trinkets to "show your wealth", things that are affordable.

People who can afford a smart kitchen or a snazzy car or a new conservatory can't understand that. But if you have no hope of getting those every then your aspirations are labled clothes, Iphones & the rest:)

Chrisblue1962

Money Loan Shops - I am currently paying off a payday loan of £300 I got in December because my partner's benefit ceased after six months despite the fact she had worked for 30 years and paid thousands of pounds of tax and NI... we got it because we were absolutely desperate and were struggling to put food on table NOT for luxuries.


Sh is now back in work and we are slowly emerging from the nightmare of her being unemployed. I do not decry unemployed people out of hand...only those who exploit the benefit system (which was designed by Beverage et al to be a safety net not a long term option) and those business - payday loan shops, etc who exploit people by charging exhorbitant interest rates - A plague on all your houses.

INSTEAD, JOIN A CREDIT UNION AND PUT THE SHARKS OUT OF BUSINESS !

Sermon over....

iluvmarmite

Oh my god what a bunch of snobs!!! Yes I am a newbie but I have a right to my opinion. The money shop is not only a payday loan shop its also a pawn shop and they buy gold and jewlery, how do you know the woman hadnt just sold something? As for the iphone maybe, just maybe the daughter had been given it, if you have a phone contract and upgrade the old phone is yours to do with as you wish, someone in the family could have upgraded and given her the phone, no they are not locked once an upgrade has taken place and you can put a payg sim in it, I know as I do it every year with my contract phones and I always give my old one to members of my family.

As for being unemployed and getting designer clothers etc what about catalouges? yep its going into debt but I should think most could afford a couple of quid each week to pay for a pair of trainers. The unemployed are not the lowest of the low you know quite a lot are unemployed through no fault of their own, yes of course there are some NED'S around who prefer standing up a corner smoking dope rather than going to work, but those you will never change and I think its wrong to lump all unemployed in the same catagory and call them chavs.

barbarawright

iluvmarmite wrote: »

Oh my god what a bunch of snobs!!! Yes I am a newbie but I have a right to my opinion. The money shop is not only a payday loan shop its also a pawn shop and they buy gold and jewlery, how do you know the woman hadnt just sold something? As for the iphone maybe, just maybe the daughter had been given it, if you have a phone contract and upgrade the old phone is yours to do with as you wish, someone in the family could have upgraded and given her the phone, no they are not locked once an upgrade has taken place and you can put a payg sim in it, I know as I do it every year with my contract phones and I always give my old one to members of my family.

As for being unemployed and getting designer clothers etc what about catalouges? yep its going into debt but I should think most could afford a couple of quid each week to pay for a pair of trainers. The unemployed are not the lowest of the low you know quite a lot are unemployed through no fault of their own, yes of course there are some NED'S around who prefer standing up a corner smoking dope rather than going to work, but those you will never change and I think its wrong to lump all unemployed in the same catagory and call them chavs.

Well said! As the cuts hits, more and more people who once thought themselves immune to money problems will be entering the ranks of the unemployed and will perhaps find that getting a job, even a poorly paid one, isn't always as easy as you all seem to think,

Apples2

iluvmarmite wrote: »

but I should think most could afford a couple of quid each week to pay for a pair of trainers..

I agree with this in principle but this is a mindset a lot try to convince others to change.

All those "couple of quids" add up to quite a lot, now extrapolate that until the trainers have been paid for and it is not an insignificant amount.

This is like the Brighthouse posts we see where people pay a few quid a week for their 42" plasma TV. Hightstreet price £499, once it has been paid for with those small amounts the TV has cost £2,500.

You rightly point out that paying small amounts regularly is affordable to most. The push from MSE is one of, "start putting that couple of quid aside each month NOW"

By the time the new trainers are required, there would be enough in the pot to buy them outright which will save you massively against what you would be spending for them on a catalogue. You are then free to continue adding to your pot of emergency cash.
I don't know much about the sealed pot challenge I see in peoples signatures but I guess this is the same thing.

Catalogues and credit agreements are a scourge, the sooner you can get away from them, the quicker the stress will diminish.