Newly single mum... need some guidance please... SOA attached!

RAS

Hi

When people say you are living beyond your means they mean

Your income is £3102
and your expenditure is £3109 plus £235

Therefore you are unable to pay your debts on your income.

shop-to-drop

Have a little think about it. If you were comfortably off and living within your means why have you run up such a large amount of debt?

FBaby

I'm very surprised about what you can get in tax credits and HB, but if that's the case, then that's the answer and you should be fine.

ky822000

First of all, a big WELL DONE to you for the steps you have taken so far - I became a single parent loooong before I discovered MSE and my figures were initially much worse than yours!

I would just suggest you try again with regards to the childcare vouchers. I fully understand your relationship with your childminder as I had exactly the same with mine and would also have sacrificed the tax benefits of vouchers for that flexibility. However, I persuaded mine to take them in the end.

The process was really simple and I just made a monthly payment of the maximum amount of 'vouchers' (which was actually transferred directly into her bank account - no cheques or fiddling around or waiting for money to clear), with cash given weekly for the balance iyswim.

I would suggest getting printouts of ALL the information your employer and the provider can give you on the scheme and then emphasising the positives for both of you.

MrsLK

Thanks for the responses.

The debts are mainly from when I was on maternity leave.

I havent as yet missed any payments on any of the debts and am working hard to keep it that way, I have quite a few bits listed on ebay etc which are doing well so that will go towards Next.

Thanks again

L