A few months and several questions

RosaBernicia

Hm, a not v exciting update here.

Couldn't get to sleep, then overslept and went in late... and still ended up doing an extra hour because I got into untangling something. Clearly I am the problem at least as much as the job.

Raided Sainsbugs as didn't have much in house and it's payday tomorrow :j so will come out of that... but failed to take my list :doh: so now have ridiculous stockpile of butter and favourite instant soup. Ah well, intending to make scones with new mixer which will use up butter fast. And needed some decently healthy food as have been eating rubbish just because I didn't feel like cooking.

Also belatedly realised that I could pay my TV licence on monthly direct debit - why didn't they allow that like, years ago - so will be switching that - saves a whole £5 a year . Think that's the last of the bills so then they will all be fixed. Got quarterly statement for electric (from my actual supplier) which shows I'm about £40 in deficit, but that will be partly due to the chaos of moving and partly using fan heater to make up for broken one in living room. Will get that fixed for next winter.

Haven't been to allotment as weather has been terrible, also haven't been to recycling centre due to working late so must sort that next week/ tomorrow/ weekend. Bit annoyed as the specially purchased £40-odd lockable box is sitting in the garden doing nowt.

No reply from pole school yet so will chase them up tomorrow.


Rosa xx

vasseur

Well said.

Whilst clearing out my paperwork last weekend I found copies of lots of complaint letters that I've written in the past (B Tee, V0dafone, my local borough council, n p0wer to name just a few). I sound so pompous :rotfl:. Your letter reads really well.

Hope you get it resolved now.

ZTD

RosaBernicia wrote: »

British Goose

Your incompetence continues to amaze me.

No amount of incompetance by either npower or British Gas surprises me in the slightest. Not since npower charged a pensioner £20,000 per month for electricity for their bungalow. Now anyone would half an ounce of sense would have looked at the factory next door and said "I wonder..."

RosaBernicia wrote: »

Following the SIX complaints I had to make about incorrect billing at my previous address, and a further complaint at finding my mobile number used for marketing calls, I have now received an invitation to pay you a bill for electricity at my new address.

You do not supply this address, did not when I moved in and never will while I am resident here because I never want to deal with you again.

I now insist that you remove any suggestion that I remain a customer of yours from your databases because if I receive any further communication from you, I shall take the matter further. It is very poor practice at best to send billing reminders for an address you do not supply, and could be considered inappropriate marketing and/ or likely to cause distress to the recipient.

Rosa

Ask them to respond quickly with their false apologies and outlandish falsehoods about "ensuring it will never happen again" because you wish to take it to the energy ombudsman ASAP in the hope that they will be fined for their gross bungling.

RosaBernicia wrote: »

:mad::mad:

Yup. That's the energy companies for you.

RosaBernicia wrote: »

Couldn't get to sleep, then overslept and went in late... and still ended up doing an extra hour because I got into untangling something. Clearly I am the problem at least as much as the job.

You can't be perfect all the time. It's enough to strive for it.

RosaBernicia wrote: »

Also belatedly realised that I could pay my TV licence on monthly direct debit - why didn't they allow that like, years ago

They did. But it was some strange scheme that if you paid monthly direct debit - it cost you money. If you paid annually - it cost you money. But if you paid quarterly direct debit, it worked out a tiny bit cheaper. I think they were told to offer a DD discount and were very grudging about it.

RosaBernicia wrote: »

No reply from pole school yet so will chase them up tomorrow.

You need to get twirling once more...

RosaBernicia

Well have shuffled my spreadsheet, made my transfers and appear to have a net status of -£10,370. This is about £500 better than last month, but not all of it has come off the debts as some is in savings pots (and I seem to have miscalculated one of the cards last month so have now corrected it).

I'm aiming to pay off £100 less this month than originally, partly because I've just treated my relative to restaurant lunch at £50 for both of us :doh: - probably not necessary as she did offer, but I feel bad costing someone on a pension when I am working. If all goes to plan then next payday I should be down to four figures on the net status, and the month after that it will be a four figure debt. Seems I was about right that moving has set me back by 3-4 months debtbusting.

I have about £50 in the utilities pot, and this will be used to minimise any impact of switching to monthly DD for the TV licence - I don't know where I am in the buy/ use balance so may be charged more for a few months to pay for first licence in advance. If not, the remainder will come straight off debts as have discovered I don't need to pay the water bill. The car pot will be enough to pay the insurance and MOT when due, but not the service, so may need to reshuffle for that. The gifts pot looks like it should cover all planned pressies and Christmas. So am quite impressed with all that - before I would have just chucked it all off debts and been cross when it had to be spent, so am pleased I'm finally learning to plan

While sorting payday paperwork noticed that my limit on one card has been put up by £1K, so may ring them and ask if they could do me a decent balance transfer. Especially as have just had letter from Mr Branson informing me that they will be upping the APRs on one of my other cards - by about 10% - to 26.9% :eek: Funnily enough I shall be declining that and just paying the card off anyhow.

Have spoken to new pole studio and am impressed. They provide books for learning and tracking moves and help you put moves together, plus they do gradings to work towards. This is all sounding much more organised and sociable than the last class - as well as more effective for learning. She asked if I could invert which I certainly can't after 12 weeks lessons and missing about 4 of them so either they are very effective, I've been at a worse class than I thought, or I am a slow learner :rotfl: Am booked in for an assessment and beginners class on Monday so fingers crossed. There may even be free parking in the evenings so that would remove all excuses not to go to more than one class a week

It's been chucking down all day here so no chance to get to allotment


Rosa xx

RosaBernicia

I've just been very, very brave :cool:

and added up what I paid in interest this month :eek: *seeks terrified smiley*. Then I used the amount I paid towards my debts to work out how much of it went on interest and how much should go to reducing the debt.

It turns out that 17% of my total payment will be used up on interest :mad::( which is 6% of my monthly salary :eek: being used to support past choices (some of which were perfectly sensible, others not).

That's some motivation to get the interest bill down.

When I re-read the letter my offered credit limit increase doesn't kick in til June, so will ring them then and see if I can get a low life of balance transfer to take some money over from the biggest and most expensive card. The smallest CC will be gone next month, and the ODs will both disappear as soon as the money from my gran's estate comes through.
That will leave me with:

• one life of balance card at 6.8%, which can stay where it is;
• one card with about £3400 , some of which is at 18% but about £1K is low rate for a year - that is the one where I need to refuse the rate increase;
• and another card with about £3K on at 19%... that is the one that most needs moving.

Have to say though, I am very very impressed with getting honest communications from the companies about my right to refuse the increased rate and my option to refuse a credit limit increase. It makes it much easier to identify my options and do things right, so hurrah for :money: and everybody who's been campaigning for these things :beer:.


Rosa xx

kerri_gt

RosaBernicia wrote: »

Thanks Kerri GT... I must say a big sparkly, soppy :TTHANK YOU :A :T to you, and Polesalot, and of course :money:the man who started all this :money: because if I hadn't been 'talking' to anyone else who does it, I think I'd probably just have got fed up with pole, assumed all classes were like that and dropped it. Which would be a shame if it isn't necessary... so thank you for the motivation :A.

I shall be reporting back on the new class

Rosa xx

RosaBernicia wrote: »

Have spoken to new pole studio and am impressed. They provide books for learning and tracking moves and help you put moves together, plus they do gradings to work towards. This is all sounding much more organised and sociable than the last class - as well as more effective for learning. She asked if I could invert which I certainly can't after 12 weeks lessons and missing about 4 of them so either they are very effective, I've been at a worse class than I thought, or I am a slow learner :rotfl: Am booked in for an assessment and beginners class on Monday so fingers crossed. There may even be free parking in the evenings so that would remove all excuses not to go to more than one class a week


Rosa xx

Awww shucks, i just come on here, hijack your thread and waffle about something i'm passionate about from time to time

New studio sounds fab, we also do the gradings and it's great to have something to focus on and work towards - did my level 3 last year, have gradings coming up but am giving it a miss as we're also doing a photoshoot I want to concentrate on, and i'm not sure I can put 10 level 4 moves into a competant routine atm. Plus I'm happy working on some new moves at my own pace right now.

Best of luck with the assessment, I remember learning to invert, seems so long ago now, but every now and again our teacher will make us invert on our 'wrong' side and we're all back to beginner level again :rotfl:

Know what you mean about the weather, our lawn is going to have sheep wandering onto it soon if it gets much longer but just can't get it dry enough to cut. Rain rain go away....

RosaBernicia

Have done for ages, but have been telling myself it wasn't really doable. I would love a dog too, but that really isn't fair when I'm out at work all week, whereas a cat is a real possibility.

Going to email landlord tomorrow - as thinking emails timed on Sunday afternoon look a bit more responsible than at midnight - all my contract says is that if I have a pet I have to have the place cleaned when I leave, and he's been rather laid back so far so am hoping he'll agree. If not, it will be on my list of requirements for next place.

But... this means insurance, boosters, worrying about it getting run over (unlikely in a very quiet cul de sac)... booking catsitters when away (four within walking distance, three of those within 200m)... am sure it will be fine but am wondering how anybody copes with worrying about all this and the rest for children :eek: :rotfl:


Rosa xx

RosaBernicia

kerri_gt wrote: »

Awww shucks, i just come on here, hijack your thread and waffle about something i'm passionate about from time to time

New studio sounds fab, we also do the gradings and it's great to have something to focus on and work towards - did my level 3 last year, have gradings coming up but am giving it a miss as we're also doing a photoshoot I want to concentrate on, and i'm not sure I can put 10 level 4 moves into a competant routine atm. Plus I'm happy working on some new moves at my own pace right now.

Best of luck with the assessment, I remember learning to invert, seems so long ago now, but every now and again our teacher will make us invert on our 'wrong' side and we're all back to beginner level again :rotfl:

I think it would really help me to have a structure and something to work towards, even though I have insisted I'm not taking this seriously and it's just for fun :rotfl: - I have found it hard to remember all the moves we've covered in current class as there's no list, and we don't always cover the same previous ones so am not convinced the ones I had sort of done are sinking in. Anyway looking forward to trying new place, we'll see how they are.

kerri_gt wrote: »

Know what you mean about the weather, our lawn is going to have sheep wandering onto it soon if it gets much longer but just can't get it dry enough to cut. Rain rain go away....

Maybe you could just get a sheep... timeshare it round the neighbours as a mowing service


Rosa xx

RosaBernicia

Sold another book :j a whole £8.25.

Debating whether this should go in the clothes/ fun stuff fund or just come off smallest debt - so far smallest debt is winning.


Rosa xx

RosaBernicia

Have spent another couple of hours playing with spreadsheet to look at realistic progress - that's the kind of realistic that remembers I will have to pay for the car service in August and there won't be enough built up in the account. I've got as far as Dec12 and it looks like the debts would be at £7K at that point which is about 60% paid off in just over a year despite the house move. The interest bill would be down by that point as I will have closed some small accounts by June and two of the outstanding cards would be on low life of balance. I also haven't taken into account the interest reductions as the balance goes down simply because I have no idea how I'd calculate it.

It's a reasonable solution as making myself miserable in the meantime would be unnecessary, but I'm not happy at finding I'd essentially still have another year to go :mad:

The animal shelter I emailed yesterday wouldn't let me have a cat as there's no catflap here and I can't see the landlord letting me fit one in the picture windows :rotfl: so that idea will also have to wait. Annoyed but not desperately so as things will change over the next few months anyway and it is possible I'll be moving. Will just add 'must have catflap' to list of house requirements.

On the bright side I have now discovered N0ddle :j and I love it - dead easy to see my all my credit report info and I can see what offers would accept me straightaway instead of having to worry about it and apply. Methinks the other services may find their report business collapsing . My credit rating is a green 2/5 which is rather disappointing since I haven't had so much as a late payment in years. However it seems my electoral roll registration at the new address hasn't gone on yet, so hopefully that will be sorted soon - I might ring and nag about it. Am intending to check it every month now when I do the payday transfers and spreadsheet shuffle.

Right, now I must chuck some washing in and do some reading... it is still chucking down outside so have declared today an unashamed PJ Sunday

Rosa xx