I Need Help.....please!!!!

DAISYCAT_3

Hi this is my very first post and I'm sat here worried sick.
Somehow, we have managed to make a right pigs' ear of our finances and we are in debt.
Although we are keeping up payments, I don't know what I'm going to do when the 0% interest runs out on the credit cards.
We made the mistake of applying for various CC hoping to get enough credit to go onto another 0% interest but they never offered enough and we cut them up not realising that with each one we applied for, our credit rating got weaker so now no one wants to give us any credit at all.
My incomings are per month and are as follows.
Husbands' wages-£1120
WFTC-£180
Family allowance-£116
DLA- £162
Adoption allowance-£584
Our outgoings per month are as follows.
Mortgage-£620
Travelling expenses for work-£140
Phone bill-£25 approx
Gas & Electric-£54
Loan-£164
Loan-£126
Home insurance-£46
Council tax-£101

And on top we have a Virgin CC with £4500 outstanding and Llyods TSB CC with about £2300.
We also have an overdraft of £1500 which is ever so slightly below the limit each month.
Can anyone advise us please?
Are we beyond help???:eek:

looneyleo

Hi! Well Done for posting and welcome to MSE. Are you beyond help??? absolutely not! I'm no expert I'm afriad...the big boys will be along soon to help...They will probably need a more detailed list of outgoins than you have given but believe me everything will be OK. Just try to relax and wait for the good advice to come...good luck...

cattie1

hello:hello:
Looneyleo is right A more detailed list of outgoings would be more helpful.
could you change your house insurance to a cheaper provider?(and go through quidco to get cashback)
how much do you spend on food, t.v. liscence/mobiles? e.t.c

Baggiebird1nil

Welcome to MSE. Don't worry you are not alone and there are some real experts on here who will be along to offer practical advise. The worst bit is over now!

MikeyB_2

Leo is right that with your debts as they stand you are still very much within the reach of help, although there's no real point at which there's no way out with good advice :-)

Some thoughts:

DAISYCAT wrote:

My incomings are per month and are as follows.
Husbands' wages-£1120
WFTC-£180 (Are you claiming as much as you could be?)
Family allowance-£116 (Are you claiming as much as you could be?)
DLA- £162 (Are you claiming as much as you could be?)
Adoption allowance-£584 (Are you claiming as much as you could be?)

Our outgoings per month are as follows.
Mortgage-£620 (Is this locked in? Could you shave anything off this by remortgaging elsewhere?)
Travelling expenses for work-£140 (Car? Train? Bus? Do you have a car or two that you could get by without? What about car expenses e.g. upkeep, servicing?)
Phone bill-£25 approx (Who with? Can you move to a cheaper package?)
Gas & Electric-£54 (Have you read Martin's article about finding the cheapest supplier?)
Loan-£164 (How long left? What APR?)
Loan-£126 (Again how long left and at what APR?)
Home insurance-£46 (Can this be more cheaply found elsewhere as it sounds on the more expensive side)
Council tax-£101 (You're probably stuck with this as there are two+ adults in the house, but it would do no harm to ask the Council)

(You probably need to think about how much you spend on water, food, presents for Christmas et al as well when figuring out the balance of incomings and outgoings)

And on top we have a Virgin CC with £4500 outstanding and Llyods TSB CC with about £2300.
We also have an overdraft of £1500 which is ever so slightly below the limit each month.
(What's the minimum monthly payment in % for these two cards and what is their APR?)

Can anyone advise us please?
Are we beyond help???:eek:

HTH

cattie1

DAISYCAT wrote:

Hi this is my very first post and I'm sat here worried sick.
Somehow, we have managed to make a right pigs' ear of our finances and we are in debt.
Although we are keeping up payments, I don't know what I'm going to do when the 0% interest runs out on the credit cards.
We made the mistake of applying for various CC hoping to get enough credit to go onto another 0% interest but they never offered enough and we cut them up not realising that with each one we applied for, our credit rating got weaker so now no one wants to give us any credit at all.
My incomings are per month and are as follows.
Husbands' wages-£1120
WFTC-£180
Family allowance-£116
DLA- £162
Adoption allowance-£584
Our outgoings per month are as follows.
Mortgage-£620
Travelling expenses for work-£140 is this just your husbands travel? could this be cut down?)
Phone bill-£25 approx
Gas & Electric-£54
Loan-£164
Loan-£126
Home insurance-£46
Council tax-£101

And on top we have a Virgin CC with £4500 outstanding and Llyods TSB CC with about £2300.could you balance transfer to a 0%?)
We also have an overdraft of £1500 which is ever so slightly below the limit each month.
Can anyone advise us please?
Are we beyond help???:eek:

we still need to know food/tv liscence etc please

cattie1

mikey b wftc= working familt tax credits:D

MikeyB_2

cattie1 wrote:

mikey b wftc= working familt tax credits:D

Yup I went and found Acronym Finder after making the post and so now know and went back to edit my post to try and convince everyone that I knew :-)

Also found out that DLA is most likely Disability Living Allowance. I this what the OP refers to?

In general I would suggest that the OP check that they are getting the all (and the full amount of) the allowances they are entitled to..

MikeyB_2

"with each one we applied for, our credit rating got weaker so now no one wants to give us any credit at all."

Yup sadly this is what happens with a number of applications (successful or otherwise) within a shortish period e.g. six months to a year. It should be noted though that this effect will diminish in the same way it arose (i.e. with time) and so if you can cut back and play smart in the short time you might be able to ride it out for a while (at > 0%) until your "credit score" (urgh yucky term) improves.. and then you can go on to get a new 0% deal

Do you have any open cards with no balance on?

DAISYCAT_3

Sorry I'll try to be a bit more clearer.
WFTC= working families tax credit
Travelling expenses- i have a car from Motability so apart from putting petrol in it, I have no other worried on this point.
My husband has to get the bus to work which is £20 a week and I need to travel each day to take my son to school( he goes to a special school for children with learning difficulties and I am not entitled to free bus transport, walking not an option) I try to get by on £15 a week petrol money.
We have already switched all out utility bills to the cheapest, we did this about 3 months ago.We are saving around £200 a year by doing this.
Our phone bill is with TalkTalk and we pay £21.99 per month including Broadband and usually have about an extra £2-3 extra call charges for calling mobile numbers.
At the moment both CC are 0% Virgin until Deceber and LLoyds TSB just recently moved with 6 months 0%.
We recently switched Mortgage lenders and are saving ourselves about £60 per month.
We try to stick to £150 a week for food, travel/petrol 2 kids dinner money( tried the sandwich route-found it dearer!!) also try to put away a bit each week for Christmas/ birthdays.
We hardly drink, occasional bottle of supermarket wine and don't smoke but we do like to go out the occasional meal/cinema trip.
Yes, I did forget the TV license, which I beleive is about £9 a month.
I just don't know what else we can do.
i can't think of anythiong else to add.
Just really worried about the Virgin one when the interest starts !!

DAISYCAT_3

MikeyB wrote:

Do you have any open cards with no balance on?

yes we have 3