Chapter 2 - Pulverising the Post Office - one debt at a time

Housework*Fairy

Cash-in-hand situation:!
Money in purse £0.76
Money set aside for fire repair: £73.74
Money in change box (A) £33.68
Money in change box (B) £29.92
Money in bank: £260.02
Grand total: £398.12
Days left til payday: 24

Reduction since yesterday £41.08

£28.00 – school dinners
£5.50 – PAD
£3.68 – Cigarettes for DH (I went to shop)
£3.14 – unaccounted for, probably DH as he disappeared to the shop in the evening so I think he possibly had some change left in his pockets and bought cigs and pop.

Hooray, life can get back to normal now! No school holidays, no bank holidays, no more broken weeks – I know it sounds rubbish but I need a routine, and the kids need to be back at school . It seems such a long time since the last normal day of 21st December, mind you that's 17 days away so I suppose it is.

Football didn't go well yesterday, both kids teams lost :-( However heard some bad news about one of the football mums who has been diagnosed with terminal cancer at the age of 50 so that has put my problems into perspective. Can't imagine my son having to deal with the news that his mum is likely to die soon (and sincerely hope I don't have to).

I can PAD £5.50 to the holding account today (HOORAY). I paid DS2's dinner money this morning which should have been £31 but I'd paid for two days before Christmas when he was off sick, so I deducted the £3 already paid. Also after-school football on a Monday has been stopped until further notice so the £2.50 I would have been paying for this has gone to the account.

I decided to buy a slanket after all on the recommendations of Moomin via facebook. If it keeps her warm in Scot Land then it should be good enough for me in Yorkshire. I had started to buy it from a website on Friday and got as far as ordering it, then discovered it was just under £23 including delivery so never completed the order. However the company then sent me an e-mail offering me 10% off if I went ahead with the order (the slanket was already in the sale at £17.99 so this took the price down to £16.29. I also went through Quidco for 12% off (if it tracks, which it hasn't yet) so that should be £14.34 for the item, and delivery was £4.95. Long and short of it is £20.24 coming out of the bank at some point this week.

Whilst sat in DH's car yesterday I discovered his road tax runs out at the end of January so that'll be £120 (MERGH) so need to try to save half this month, and pay half out of the wage at the end of January. His car insurance is also due in March so I'll start paying that monthly again as it usually goes on a credit card.

I suddenly remembered whilst reading another diary that I had been paying into a pension scheme in my old job which obviously I left in November. I think I only paid in for 4-5 months (£80-£100) so I've e-mailed my old manager asking if she can get me the number for the pensions advisor so I can see how to go about getting my contributions back. I was also – before that for 5 months – paying into a SIPS scheme and that got put on hold when the company went up for sale. The company did say they would write to let us know what would happen by December but we've had nothing back yet. I've only got £140 in shares but hopefully I'll get back what I paid for them – whenever that may be.

Right then, hi ho, hi ho, it's off to work I go...hope y'all have a great day.

elantan

***********************

Fuel workings out

Gas
266 days
702 units

Daily average = 2.639 units per day

Roughly £1.20 per unit

[/QUOTE]


Wow That is great gas consumption, how do you get it so low ?

elantan

Just read the rest of your thread ... Apparently your consumption is high? Yikes ... It way way way less than mine, I do the same as eager elephant and take my meter readings weekly I currently use 11.81 units of gas per day and 11.5 units if electricity per day .... So if yours is high what's mine ?

Housework*Fairy

It's not normally low! I haven't converted the units to kilowatt hours, that is just the units, and in 24 hours after reducing the timed settings, it showed that I'd used 2. That daily average up there on my 2nd post was from April to January so mostly the summer months. I also only have central heating and a gas hob, that is all the gas that I use, so if the central heating is on low then it is going to be low usage.

EDIT: When I had it on timed previously, I had it on for about 8.5 hours a day (reduced to 5) and at weekends /school hols, it was set on 'on' constantly, and I've also turned it down 5 degrees.

elantan

Believe it or not I have to convert it to kwh as well I take my unit number and multiply by 11.2 for my kwh ( I understand this figure can change for others )

I imagine our consumption is just very high, we have an old boiler system

Do you find your house is warm enough ?

Housework*Fairy

elantan wrote: »

Believe it or not I have to convert it to kwh as well I take my unit number and multiply by 11.2 for my kwh ( I understand this figure can change for others )

I imagine our consumption is just very high, we have an old boiler system

Do you find your house is warm enough ?

It's never warm enough for me! But DH and the kids say it's warm enough. Although DH came home from work at 2pm today and said it did feel chilly, and oldest son said today he thought the house felt cold when he got in from school. He just got under the duvet which is now a permanant fixture on the sofa. I'm going to keep it like this as long as I can now, I've set myself a little mini-challenge to see if I can reduce my fuel consumption enough to dent the amount outstanding. Hopefully if I can get rid of that £420 deficit I can get my direct debit reduced and not have to pay it off over a year.

StressedSteph

Hi Housework Fairy,

Just wanted to say hi and that we have two large blankets on our sofa, so that if we are ever chilly the kiddies can wrap up.

Much better than cranking up the heating xxx

elantan

wish i could get my husband to adopt some of these ideas, he just turns the heating up and always complains its cold ... grrr

Housework*Fairy

Grocery/Petrol Fund: Was £500 – is £323.08 ( just went and bought some 'laydee' items and enough for two night's worth of evening meals totalling £7.55).

Cash-in-hand situation:!
Money in purse £0.76
Money set aside for fire repair: £73.74
Money in change box (A) £31.18
Money in change box (B) £32.48
Money in bank: £230.28
Grand total: £368.44
Days left til payday: 23!

Reduction since yesterday £29.68

£20.24 was deducted today for my slanket
£ 4.00 – PAD (£40.64 towards the PO now)
£ 2.00 – DS1 bus fare
£ 3.44 – cigs for DH (I think, this figure is actually unaccounted for)

The PAD has been possible as neither kid is going to athletics training tonight as me and the eldest are off to watch the big game tonight, and DS2 wont go to training on his own.

DH had his ECG yesterday and the Health-Care Assistant wouldn't tell him the results (DH said “is it okay?” and the HCA replied “I'm sorry, I can't discuss your ECG with you, you will have to see the GP”). I asked the HCA where I work if she would tell a patient if their ECG were normal, and she said she would do....oh dear, not looking like he's going to be given good news. He did see on the print-out that it said 102bpm so it does look like it's abnormal. He sees the GP on Wednesday morning so not too long to wait and find out. Stress and smoking can cause the heart rate to be quick and he does smoke. Hopefully though he'll attempt to give up smoking rather than give up his job! But lets see what the doctor says eh? The last time I looked, I wasn't the owner of a medical degree.

Previous employer sent me the contact details for the pension chappy, I rang and left a message but it was early evening so hopefully he'll get back to me today and left me know if I can claim my contributions back. I'll have to pay tax on it, but it might be worth £75(ish) back after tax.

Still no cheque from Doctor lady though (harrumph).

Read the electricity meter yesterday and had used 46 units in three days which is working out at an average of 15.3 per day which is near enough spot on what it averaged to be on my last bill. I haven't used the tumble dryer since The Fuel Bill of Nightmares made an appearance and am hanging washing on the airer in my bedroom so I'm going to try and keep up to my washing every day

Housework*Fairy

Cash-in-hand situation:!
Money in purse £0.76
Money set aside for fire repair: £73.74
Money in change box (A) £30.18
Money in change box (B) £27.52
Money in bank: £218.42
Grand total: £350.62
Days left til payday: 22!

Reduction since yesterday £17.82

Where did the money go?
£11.09 - debit interest
£0.77 - kindle e-book
£1.00 - DS1 bus fare
£4.96 - DH must have taken this.

(I know it's a random amount, but he must take a round amount in a morning and then throw pennies back in later on)

Not much to report on debtbusting. DH has his doctors appointment this morning so hopefully we'll get some positive news that he won't suddenly have a heart attack or have to leave his job to reduce stress.

The pensions guy from my old work got back to me yesterday. He told me unfortunately, in the scheme I was in, they don't give you back your pension contributions. As I am not opting into the NHS scheme yet (til my debts are paid off) I'm not currently in a scheme so I'll have to leave it there. If and when I start another pension scheme I "may" be able to transfer it over if the NHS scheme is one of those that accepts transfers from other pension schemes. Typical - story of my life that.

My beloved football team did the unthinkable last night and beat the third premiership team in a row in the semi-finals of a famous cup. We have the second leg to go through now in two weeks time. Of course if they get to Wembley (which is a distinct possibility) we'll all be having a family day trip down to the big smoke to watch it so I'll have to try and find a way to fund that before resorting to the credit cards / overdraft.