April Pin Money Challenge

Big_Nige

I've just put £210 in my pms account, it comprised of my payrise, overtime & interest. Was used to not having it so did't miss it,squirelled it away for a rainy day. New total in account (drum roll please) £435.62

nicki_2

Decided to add the money I have on storecards (Asda Christmas Saving card, divs on Co-op card) to my virtual savings as I will be spending that money at some point.

Had to dip into my PIN money today to pay for some babylotion. I spent yesterday working in the garden clearing out the flowerbeds of diseased/pest infested plants and I've got my first batch of sunburn this year. As I bent over to pull out some stubbon roots etc my top must have hutched up above my pants and I've ended up with a 2 inch band of sunburn level with where my waistbands sit at the top of my hips :mad: My shoulders have also caught the sun but aren't causing me problems compared to my back, infact after the baby lotion application they look their normal colour again instead of purple like they were last night. Any bending (even at the knees), stretching and in some positions sitting hurts. I've found that since I seem to have an allergy to most bodylotions on the market and aftersun makes me sneeze (?????) or has too strong a scent that babylotion is the cheapest & most effective aftersun for me. I'm currently having to sit here in my PJ's (had to get changed when I got back from the school run) and liberarly applying babylotion to my back every 30 minutes or so just to stop the pinching feeling I get

Anyway :
Virtual Savings:£9.71 (£2.69 Asda, £1.52 Co-op, £4 OH owes me)
PIN : £1.04

tinytot_2

I have to ask, how or what do you spend virtual savings on

crana999

Virtual savings can sometimes be "spent" in the sense that the money saved in one area is used, for example, to buy something that is needed and which couldn't be bought otherwise without going into debt. Say you find £10 on the street, and immediately spend it on groceries which otherwise you would put on your credit card - you don't physically have the £10 so it's not "savings" like in the bank, but it's "virtual savings" because you saved £10 (and more, in interest charges) over what you would have paid otherwise.

In other cases, the saving would never have existed as a real entity - for example, if I bought a cake priced at £5 for £0.50, I have "virtual savings" of £4.50 - but I wouldn't have spent the £5 on the cake if it was full price. So here, I haven't made £4.50 of savings over what I would normally have spent on groceries, so the £4.50 can't be used to reduce my debt etc... but I could still consider it a "virtual saving" from the point of giving me encouragement and motivation to lower my spending...if that makes sense?

Curry_Queen

Big_Nige wrote:

I've just put £210 in my pms account, it comprised of my payrise, overtime & interest. Was used to not having it so did't miss it,squirelled it away for a rainy day. New total in account (drum roll please) £435.62

Well done!!! :T


I'm currently in a bit of a muddle with my own PMS and grocery budget as I used April's PMS to pay for a few impromptu grocery deliveries last week ... to take advantage of Tesco vouchers going out of date before I needed them and Icelands online shopping ending ... not to mention the crazy Aussie wine deals atm ... so I'm all at odds with my accounts and shouldn't really need to do any shopping for May (apart from milk, fresh fruit/veggies which DS will have to get locally for me) so need to do some re-calculations

I've also just got my first ever credit card, which is going to change the way I do things from now on, and will take a bit of getting used to! Don't worry, I have no intentions of getting into debt and will be paying off the balance at the end of every month, but it means I can earn more interest on my own money sitting in the bank

ET03

tinytot wrote:

I have to ask, how or what do you spend virtual savings on

i was wondering about that too

crana999

Um, well, if you read my post it might have given you an idea..

Curry_Queen

ET03 wrote:

i was wondering about that too

Crana has already done a pretty good job of explaining it but just to add another example ....


Say for instance I needed a dress to go to a special event and I allocated £50 to spend on it, but then I found something in my wardrobe that I could alter and adapt to make a new outfit, I'd have made a virtual saving of £50. So although I hadn't actually spent any money I would now have £50 extra that had been allocated for a specific use to spend elsewhere

squeaky

Curry_Queen wrote:

Crana has already done a pretty good job of explaining it but just to add another example ....


Say for instance I needed a dress to go to a special event and I allocated £50 to spend on it, but then I found something in my wardrobe that I could alter and adapt to make a new outfit, I'd have made a virtual saving of £50. So although I hadn't actually spent any money I would now have £50 extra that had been allocated for a specific use to spend elsewhere

So would my Co-op divvy count as real money (which it is sort of) or virtual money ('cos I never see it and never touch it) or savings ('cos it does earn interest)...

Signed: Confused of Sunny Suffolk

crana999

It earns interest? I never knew that, wow.

I guess it depends what you DO with the divvy.

If you use it to pay for your shopping and put the money you would have spent in your savings account = real savings

If you use it to pay for an extra thing in your grocery shopping one week, or you spend the money you would have spent on groceries on something else = virtual savings. "Real Virtual" if it replaced money that was previously allocated. "Pseudo Virtual" if it's something you wouldn't have bought otherwise

that's how i think about it anyway.