Putting My Life Into Order

catriona79

Good luck Catandy... You are such a strong woman! I'm in awe of you

catandy

ok operation this week is concentrating on my day job - ive got a project starting this week again so I need to get some solid leads put in so I have ongoing work. So this week I'm concentrating on that and may even start looking for other work so I can double up on projects for a bit so a bit of extra money coming in.

letters get sent out to my creditors today - all going recorded so no nasty surprises due there. should have 150 left at the end of the month to put in my emergency fund which is paltry but at least its better than I have right now. I'm working to a grocery budget of £75 per week from this week onwards which is a lot better than the 50 odd I was originally allowed by Stepchange, means we can actually eat a cooked meal each day for all of us! Still going to be careful planning and batch cooking but at least we can afford a bit of variety.

catandy

and a totaly mess up courtesy of DS1 - a £50 fine that was £25 but he didnt tell me so its gone up. No idea where I'm going to find the money to pay that and cant exactly ask son to find it - hes got 2 months of exams on and off so he's not going out alreay..

I just totally give up with this

Moneymash

Oh no a fine! :mad:

Are you able to appeal it, to either get it reduced or to give you some time to come up with the money?

catandy

no my son did it and was caught just didnt have the common sense or courage to tell me hoping it would go away so instead it has doubled in cost...

i think i merit him with being more grown up than he is actually - and both him and DS2 are totally sick of living like this so I dont know maybe its a form of rebellion against never having anything/ being able to do what they want. or is that me just making excuses for him and justifying his mistakes - I dont know anymore...

catandy

ok plan of action today is as follows:-

• fone about sons fine when the office opens. ask them to send the original request for payment thru as son didnt get it and neither did I - I'm willing to pay this off at the lower rate so am going to try it and see I mean I've got nothing to lose really. just foned them and arranged to pay over 2 payments so just about managing that - son not happy as his wings have been clipped for 3 weeks to pay me back but c'est la vie!
• my TC and CB payments are both being made into my new account, wages follow on 15th of next month so thats in hand. I've changed 3 out of 4 of the payment providers for the business to the new account so far, still got to sort out my personal Paypal account and the business Paypal account.
• Will be foning the company I freelance for today to see if they do have any work for me. If not or if they do and not for a bit I need to find something else to back myself up, probably makes sense to have 2 projects on the go at once anyway so I have always got something to fall back on.
• got to do a food shop at some stage today/ tomorrow - so list in hand and cash only it is to A+++ I shall go
• just got an £80 refund sorted out on fees for an account. problem is the payment is being made into the account I just closed down with the OD on it so its going to be swallowed up by that, oh well at least it means the amounts I owe will eventually start moving south...
• just signed up another contract for the business :T

catandy

well today has been a busy one

first thing I sent off all letters to creditors with revised offers so just waiting for them to contact me and ask for more/ accept/ throw their dummy out of the pram ... or a bit of all 3. Now its just make the payments as promised and I've set up DD for all of them so thats in place.

Major juggling gone on this morning bank account wise so I can make it through to payday ok. money set aside for feeding the leccie meter, got enough food in for all but Saturday and Sundays dinner which are going to be kitchen jambalaya aka a mixture of whatever I can find

company I freelance for has left me high and dry again without work for a week so it really is high time that I started to look around for something a lot more stable. I'm beginning to think the long-term project they put me on (which turned out to be anything but) was a bit of a mickey take, the contract has come to an end completely now so how could it have been longterm - and if they lost the contract then regardless if I was hitting target or not it was never going to be an ongoing job was it?

spoken to my landlord to set up rent payment again - mind you at this rate im going to be signing on and in receipt of HB again at this rate. tomorrow is operation find a job

catandy

So I've got a freelance project sorted from Tue of next week for the rest of the month so panic over there for now - I've applied for a couple of employed jobs, one of which is walking distance from where I live so I chase those up next week as well.

Not heard anything from creditors yet regarding my revised offers - had notification that my statements are available to read online but thats it so far. Sure they will all hit at once next week like an avalanche but again thats ok cos I can see where I'm starting from.

and apart from that life just goes on the same - waiting for pay day as ever, DS1 and DS2 both had their wings clipped for all but essential spends, food in cupboards/ freezers, leccie in meter, business clicking over ok - did 940$ of sales so far this week so we've made 200$ or about £130.

nothing exciting planned for bank holiday so just more of the same

catandy

I've just gone thru the payment providers for the company working out cash flow for this month and we are starting to get our holdback from some of the payment processors coming thru - I make it an extra £335 odd back extra this month which will help big style with managing running costs - basically we need to make £65 in new sales this month to be in profit (already done this so now in the realms of building a running float again). Company running costs are being paid on a pre-paid CC which saves on Paypal fees and their horrible exchange rates - Ive made that an extra saving of £13 every month on top of everything else. All of development work paid in full on 15th of this month so no more ongoing expense there either.

I've menu planned this week to within an inch of my life and have got our spend down to £42, DMP figures give me £130 PW so will have money there I can siphon off into a separate account from bill account to start emergency fund pot. dont think I can be that ruthless for the rest of the month (and dont want to be really) but if I can do an extra £50/ £60 saving each week till the end of the month that makes it £240 in a pot of money untouched which is a bit of a buffer.

DS1, I have found a way to do his festival ticket and pay it over 3 months so thats covered (really didnt want to let him down for his birthday as I had already promised...). Neither of my kids ask for much at all so I do try and treat them for birthday/ xmas and so on - it will be tapering off now anyway, they are both adults and out in the big wide world from the end of summer term this year.

So at least I can see some headway and that things are starting to happen and figures will start falling as my new payments to all creditors take effect.

catandy

just got notification that company has had a refund of £415 that we weren't expecting so thats a bit of a shot in the arm it also means that the running expenses for next month are covered in its entirety so we have 8 weeks of building pure profit for the business which should be more than enough to get us back on an even keel.

just had the first response to my revised offers for DMP from Wonga of all of them, who have frozen interest/ fees for 31 days with a view to receiving their first payment - providing I keep to the terms of the offer I have made to them they will keep all interest / fees frozen- result! just want the others to do the same now

good day all told :T