Putting My Life Into Order

Dizzyduck

Hi Catandy,
I'm a frequent lurker and I think you are doing really well.
Just a suggestion for the photos - can you e-mail them to yourself & transfer them that way? or download the e-bay app and list them using that?
Hope this helps and all the best for future debt bustin' xx

catandy

thats something i hadnt thought of and even something this confirmed technophobe can do!

gonna be busy listing stuff this weekend then,

thanks again!

catandy

I've just set up online payment for the business ready for the influx of sales we're going to make when the 2 new contracts go live :rotfl:- also worked out we make more commission if they pay by the new method as transaction fees are much less then CC payments so I want lots of direct bank transfers going thru so we maek lots of money!!:beer:

seriously though I just want to get started with these new contracts, I need to feel that something is happening in the right direction, even that its going to cost us more money to begin with but I just want some action at last!!!

catandy

things are not going well at all...

I was put on hold on the one contract I had left yesterday as they work out if they have budget enough to pay for my services moving forward ie I may have lost my only remaining 'regular' contract. This is a major problem basically it means I'm not earning at all and may have to be looking at signing on:( - before i do that im going to apply for every employed job i can in my area of experience, ok ive not actually formally worked for anyone for over 8 years but I can still remember how its done and the security of a pay cheque would be a godsend at the moment.

payments are still going out at the higher rates for some companies - why does everything take such a long time to work itself out? I cancelled my payment protection early last month on one of my CC and got the letter confirming it had been stopped but they still took it anyway this month - another 40 quid wasted:mad:

the good thing that has happened over the last 2 days is the business expenses to move forward with these new contracts has been confirmed and its a quarter what i was expecting so I'll take that!:j timescale is also a lot quicker than i expected so who knows this may yet just work out, by the skin of our teeth but even so it may still just work out ok - or we will run out of money before it can go properly live and have to shut down and have wasted 2 years and serious amounts of £££ :mad::( - oh well time will tell i suppose. Im not stressing any more about it - ive made myself ill over the last 2 days with the worry of it and you know what, what will be will be now.

catandy

I've spent some of this morning trying to do balance transfers off my big CC with the scary interest rates onto one of my 2 % rate interest cards and got No's from each of them - so back to the drawing board there then

ive picked up a contract for a company i used to work for from next week so although its bitty and all over the place ive replaced my income (or thereabouts) so no need to sign on or find a job just yet...

tax rebate is going to be submitted tonght / tomorrow latest and ex and flat mate has done his - hes due a tax rebate as well so that will help a bit again. ive got to get my head down and do some of the part time job i do but i cant seem to settle at anything im just going over and over figures and trying to make them balance and coming up short all the time.

rent is due to go out on monday and at the moment i dont have enough to cover it which is a major problem - i get paid on monday and the co pay me into my other account - so im 200 quid short and no time to to a transfer between one account and the other. ive got nothing else to liquidate now at short notice - so i cant see any other option but to do a payday loan which really is the start of the slippery slope towards the end.

ive also been keeping a spending diary to the penny this month and the figures are just totally shocking. spent over 900 this month and that doesnt include rent/ council tax - half of it went on bills - CC and bank charges and spend for the business. all of the bills went thru at the higher rates this month despite being cut down so ive been absolutely hammered with charges, i know it will get better from next month and ease off slightly but at the moment I just cant see that far ahead.

Ex and business partner is also thinking of borrowing from his parents to pay for some of the company expenses, that said i will be paying it back as all the spend outright for the company is being picked up by me. i cant borrow from friends or family - dont have any friends as im always bxxxxy working and ive only just made peace with my family after a 10 year hiatus, dont think it would work very well just asking to borrow money on top of that.

im getting totally resigned to the fact that this is all going wrong and im going to end up going bankrupt or on a DMP for the rest of my life at this rate. I just cannot seem to pick myself up and see a way forward at the moment. i think i just left it too late to have my LBM and that once i did it all went wrong with my self employed income. just pushed it a bit too far and going to lose it all because of it.

im sorry if this is all doom and gloom but i cant see anyway forward - DS1 and DS2 have done all they can to help and I cant let them know that it still may be for nothing, ex and business partner is away for the weekend and spending £350 on birthdays for his D1 and GD1 so there will be no extra cash from him that I can borrow add into the kitty.

Any suggestions gratefully received or just a hefty kick up the a** to get me going again - either would probably do at the moment!

catandy

so i sat down yesterday on the fone and contacted all the companies that I owe money to and did some shuffling around (again...)

• I can take a payment holiday on my bank loan infact I can take 2 months out of every 12 as a 'breating space'. I'm going to do next month (cutting spend by £180) and January as December is always a slow month for me workwise.
• All DD will be on the reduced rates from next month so things will start to improve further from that.
• I've done a short term payday loan from Wonga (:eek: boo hiss I know) to make sure rent goes thru on Monday - I really could not cope with getting evicted on top of everything else at the moment so its a necessary evil and it wil be repaid by the end of the month, earlier if i get paid early.
• Ex and business partner has offered to pump 2K into the business to 'tide things over'. I will have to repay it but I can do it over 6 months if needs be and this is only going to be used as a last resort.
• The business will be live and making money from end of next week/ early the week after - ok for that money to materialise takes another 2 weeks but at least its some cash flow starting. We also have the option of contacting the business bank account and doing an overdraft or short term loan there (unlikely but worth a try if they can see transactions going thru the account).
• I have decided to take on staff to sell this software - ok it wasnt a resounding success the first time I did it years ago but I know my industry and I know what I did wrong. More to the point its not going to cost anything so what do I have to lose apart from some time and effort?:)
• part time job from home I need to get my head down with so I hit payout this month - that was going to payoff my smallest credit card by xmas so I need to at least try instead of just doing it half-arxed like i have and giving up.
• ebay is a project from next week.
• i pressed the button on the submit for my self employed figures so thats money coming back to me may just take some weeks to come thru.
• keep on going with the surveys/ swagbucks/ quidco/ menu planning etc - it all does add up and its cutting my spend which means that my cc interest charges will start coming down.
• thinking of which i need to update my Sig with my new figures - seeing the amounts go down (please ) will give me some more motivation as well.

ok busy day planned so gonna get on with it

catandy

I've got an extra £70 that came to light - refund on a policy that has taken over a month to come through. I've menu planned for the week and food shop for the week should come to no more than £30 then just top up bread and milk in the week as needs be.

Got paid by main job and loan has gone thru this month as have the big bills - almost back to where I started with regards to bank balance but it will sort itself out when im paid (allbeit very late :mad:) from the second contract I'm owed on. and of course ive got to pay back Mr Wong* at the end of the month - earlier if I actually get paid before then...

I need to check that the refund has been put back onto my CC today so that will bring one of the balances down by another £200 and need to work out what I can pay extra on them and sort out my running totals so I can actually see how much progress I'm making or otherwise. refund has not been made so im on the phone at 9am giving them earache :mad:

I've decided to do the 100% thing and cut the debt down into chunks then mark it off on a graph as I pay it, so I can actually see some physical evidence of progress - that and I've got a nice pretty graph with lots of colored boxes on it :rotfl:(small things uh?). I also looked yesterday at the logic of paying off the smallest cc early with regards to my snowball calculator and it doesnt make sense at all to be honest. so I'm only going to make extra payments to that if I make the extra money from Ebay or sales of the software or whatever.

I also contacted my mobile provider over the weekend to give them notice on mine and S1 fone to be told that although my contract is up for renewal they had automatically renewed it as I have been ' a longstanding customer'. To now cancel that contract which I didnt ask or agree them to renew would cost me over £100. :eek: I'm going into battle with the correct dept today to get out of the contract - I needed to give them 30 days notice in writing and the first contract still has over 50 days on it so I will win this one, just a hassle all the time and I'm getting sick of arguing with people.

and thats my progress thus far - rubbish isnt it - just not getting anywhere at all. only other thing I can do today is hassle my main contract for more work from next month and get an answer for December ie will I be earning at all. At least that way I can plan ahead a bit.

catandy

Ok things are moving forwards allbeit at a snails pace - I'm back working for my main contract and have enough work lined up for the rest of the month to make a decent payout next payday. Still waiting on payment from the co that has paid late but doing really well with NSD and LSD and budget planning so all good there. OD fees for next month are £40 odd lighter than I expected them to be so that will help towards the bills coming down. part time job from home is going really slowly i just cant find the motivation to log in and do it - i will make payout but at a lower rate than I wanted to but thats life.

im chasing the refund from AA which still hasnt hit my account - they paid it to my old card which means its stuck in no mans land so that will take some time to track down and get sorted completely. thats a job for later this pm.

no extra payments on anything till i know if im going to get paid this month for the work ive already done so balances i cant bring down for the time being... feels like im in limbo.

business with ex is the only thing that seems to be moving forward - 3 sales in 3 days and one of the big contracts that came in ready to go live by next week. we make between 5 and 15% commission on all sales that they make so ive got my fingers (and everything else crossed its all at the higher rate). ive also got the availability of an overdraft for the business should i need to use it to cover some of the payments so nice to know i can call on that if needs be.

plan for the rest of today - get my head down at work so i can invoice for a full days worth of work. send off some letters that need to be posted and do some of the part time job this evening. even if i dont feel like doing it at the moment i really dont have much choice ive got to keep bringing these balances down.

catandy

ok productive day yesterday moneywise in the end, so moving in the right direction...

• got paid from second contract :j(ok it was late but at least they paid I was beginning to think I wasnt going to get it)
• cleared short term loan from Wong* saving me £72 of interest I had accounted for from next months money.
• overdraft fees for next month are 38 quid short of what I had expected them to be - more money I can use to bring balances down.
• Sorted out refund from the AA - lost my temper in the end as kept getting passed back and forth between the companies but it seemed to do the trick just a shame you have to do it with them to get something done.:)
• Sold some books (reference books and fiction) and made £30 from that - got to get them parcelled up and sent off to get the cheque thru.
• Sold our old christmas tree which was just gathering dust in the storage cupboard - £10 added again.
• got my motivation back for the part time job so going to hit that hard over the next 2 weeks to make it worth my while getting a payout
• doing a shop using the pennies from the tin and the 'change machine' so should have a food shop this week that costs me 0 :T
• worked out business bank account yesterday (which is ridiculously secure) in credit so all ok there and decided to transfer next business paypal payment onto my personal PP account so I can access the money. Makes very little sense it sitting in a bank account doing nothing when it could be used to bring down a balance and reduce the interest I'm paying. (what has happened to me? I cant believe I'm starting to think this way naturally - what a turn around!)

Thats the good stuff thats going on. Bad stuff is all down to ex and business partner...

* he got a bill thru today for his NI contributions which he hasnt paid for over 12 months so has been hit with higher rates for some of what he owes. he either wants me to pay it and will pay me back or the company to pay it for him.... - the offer of the 2k loan to the company has also been rescinded cos he needs the money....
* daughter foned up to say she cant afford to pay for granddaughers birthday present which she's put on a catalogue and is getting letters demanding payment, she made the first and nothing since.. Can I or the company pay it and she will 'owe' it to us...
* ex told a customer to f* off and take his business elsewhere yesterday because he got bored of answering the same questions to him. the client is spanish and has limited english and our spanish is nil so he succesfully got rid of a customer and business :mad: I cant do this part of the work during the day as it means I would have to stop my day job which is paying the bills... so lost customers seem like they are going to be part of the process unless we can sort something out or I can find a way of splitting myself in 2!

I feel like im making a mistake getting this business live cos it means that I'm tied to having anything to do with ex for years to come allbeit in a business way. that said I'm loathe to give up the years of effort put into it and all the money ive pumped into it to see no return expecially as its so close to starting to work. It's also an investment potentially for my kids, S1 and S2 have been made company directors as have ex's 3 kids so long term plan is they take up some of the burden in time to come. and of course they want it to work but dont want to do anything to make that happen....

Oh well I'm sure it will work itself out in the end, these things generally do.

short_bird

Reduced and cancelled payments: did the companies say they would be
a) cancelled by a specific date
b) if you had cancelled in enough time to stop the direct debit coming out of your bank?

I don't know if this is still the case but direct debits can take a while to amend or cancel and the company should have informed you of that. if it is still the case, of course.

I was a bit concerned at you putting money into the credit card payments before knowing you had the rent/council tax payment as roof over heads needs to be priority.
Any more surprises due from the ex and daughter:eek: