Batten down the hatches.....

Orange_Ena

Hello, I'm new! I've been lurking for a while but its time for me join in all the fun!!

In July 2012, I realised how much money I wasted. Not only frivolous things, but on household bills. Why pay more when I can get the same service for less?!

Since that point I have made quite a few changes, cut back on all the "painless" things I can and tried to keep my spending under control. I know I could do a lot better so in my attempt to do that, I thought I would start a diary to track progress, have a ramble and feel motivated to finally become debt free.

Last July, when I totalled up all my debts, it was around £5300 but then I thought it would be a good idea to add my holiday to my credit card :mad: Maybe my lightbulb had only flickered :rotfl:

As of today, my debts are as follows:

Overdraft - £1050 (mostly live in this)
JD Williams - £260.66
Nationwide credit card - £457.08
Mint credit card - £3417.88
TOTAL - £5185.62

So I'm a bit better off than I was in July 2012

I have got a plan and rightly or wrongly the order I've typed it in is it! I've £250 in an ISA and in March and April, I am aiming to save £800 and then pay off the overdraft in one fell swoop. I've tried the old spending a bit less and when I went on holiday in November, I did get it down to £450 but then since I've been back I've got distracted with clearing other debts its gone back up. I read somewhere that if I get the bank to reduce my overdraft, they would credit check me and I really could do without that (that's another story!). I don't think I've ever lived in credit. I've had a overdraft since I was at university and I've been [STRIKE]happily[/STRIKE] unhappily living in it ever since. I'm 36 this year and if my plan works, I'll be living in the black by my birthday . Of course my other debts will still be there........

The big Mint card is the last thing to tackle as most of it is on a 0% until September. When I've cleared the other smaller debts, I'm hoping to get a longer term 0% credit card and balance transfer it.

My next job is to collate all the bits of paper where I have kept track of what I've saved by cancelling direct debits, and reducing bills by shopping around. I'm pretty sure its around £150 a month but it will be nice to see it written on here. I also want to collate all my other income streams such as cashback, surveys, tesco and nectar points and my nutella jar of change.

Right, best get on. Lots to do...

patman99

Welcome to the DFD thread. I can see that you are already making small inroads into your debt. When compared to some other posters debts (thinking of MrBloater's £301k in debt thread) yours may seem quite small, but I wouldn't mind betting that it is just as big to you as his is to him.
They do say every little helps, so I would suggest checking out the 'Old style' & 'shopping' threads for hints, tips & money-off coupons.

Orange_Ena

The savings I've made are as follows:

Cancelled

• Contact lenses (never really got on with them) - £17.50 per month
• Insurance (not sure what this was) - £12.19 per month
• Virgin cable, phone and broadband - £45.60 per month
• Love Film - £5.99 per month
• Gym - £31.78 per month
• McAfee (installed free software) - £50 per year

Reduced bill

• Changed from British Gas to EDF - £74 to £45 pm (saved £29pm)
• Phone insurance - £9.99 to £4.99 (saved £5 per month)
• Changed house insurance - £29.74 per month (£356.88 a year) to £96.46 paid upfront for the year

Other money saving / better deals

• Magazine subscription - £8 every 6 months instead of £23.88 a year (saved £7.88 per year)
• Refund from Orange Care insurance (was paying for 2 insurances!) - £78 refunded
• Wrote to HMRC re: uniform and professional fees - rebate for £96.64
• Paid line rental upfront to Plusnet - would have been £12.99 per month, but equivalent of £9.49 being paid

With just the cancellations and reductions in bills, that's nearly £2000 saved. And none of it was a sacrifice. I don't miss anything. I have Freeview now and at first I missed not being able to record things. It was my intention to get a box that records but I've lived without it and survived. If there really is nothing on worth watching, I have plenty of DVD's that I've bought in the charity shop for a quid :rotfl:

Orange_Ena

Thanks for the welcome Patman. Yes you're right about how debt the big feels to me. I know it could be an awful lot worse but I need to get it under control now. I used to feel quite safe in my job and while I think I'll always have work, I may get down graded in the next few months which means a big pay cut. If I carry on spending like I have been, my debts would take years to shift :mad:
Thanks for tip about the Old Style boards, I'll go take a look.

ani_26

Welcome Orange Ena. :hello:


Debt is all relative to your income and ability to repay your debt, i think. My debts are even smaller, (only around 1- 2k, and rather frustratingly, some of them shouldn't even be debts,) but if you don't have the money or income to repay them, the overall standing, is still the same, is the way i look at it.


You're doing well so far, to reduce your outgoings. :T

patman99

The one big advantage of my redundancy was that I went from a low-paid £15k p/a job (+£500 in WTC) to benefits & then onto an agency job that started at £17900 & through the 2nd annual rise, on to £18.5k (no WTC), so I have an extra £3k p/a to play with. The hardest part has been trying not to live up to the new pay level, but to keep on pretending that I am on a lower wage.

One huge positive is that as a temp, it is extremely hard to get loans etc so apart from stoozing my cc balance onto a 0% card, I have not increased my credit stream in 3 years & have had to adopt an 'if it breaks, it will get fixed/replaced when funds are available' attitude.

We used to shop at Sainsburys, but now use Aldi as it is cheaper (even than ASDA) although I need to avoid the centre isle (where they have the tools & DIY).

Orange_Ena

ani_26 wrote: »

Welcome Orange Ena. :hello:


Debt is all relative to your income and ability to repay your debt, i think. My debts are even smaller, (only around 1- 2k, and rather frustratingly, some of them shouldn't even be debts,) but if you don't have the money or income to repay them, the overall standing, is still the same, is the way i look at it.


You're doing well so far, to reduce your outgoings. :T

Hello ani :wave:

Yes I agree. It is all relative to income. Someone could earn 100k a year and still owe 50k and be in the same position. Any debt can easily turn unmanageable if circumstances change. I'm so glad I discovered this site and can start to deal with my debts once and for all.

patman99 wrote: »

The one big advantage of my redundancy was that I went from a low-paid £15k p/a job (+£500 in WTC) to benefits & then onto an agency job that started at £17900 & through the 2nd annual rise, on to £18.5k (no WTC), so I have an extra £3k p/a to play with. The hardest part has been trying not to live up to the new pay level, but to keep on pretending that I am on a lower wage.

One huge positive is that as a temp, it is extremely hard to get loans etc so apart from stoozing my cc balance onto a 0% card, I have not increased my credit stream in 3 years & have had to adopt an 'if it breaks, it will get fixed/replaced when funds are available' attitude.

We used to shop at Sainsburys, but now use Aldi as it is cheaper (even than ASDA) although I need to avoid the centre isle (where they have the tools & DIY).

The same happened to me. I went from quite a low paid job where I was ok, I was managing into a job where I had quite a bit extra. I vowed to save, save, save but it didn't take long to cut my cloth accordingly and start spending!! Haha love Aldi and those centre aisles. Always a bargain to be had

Orange_Ena

Second snow day and second NSD. Not even bought anything online :rotfl:
I've spent the day wrapping up my sold items on eBay. After fees etc I think I've made about £45 which isn't bad considering the items that were for sale. Most of my good stuff has already been sold.

I've also checked various balances and have so far got:

• Nectar - £23.33
• Tesco - £55.50
• Valued Opinions - £10.95 (waiting until £20 to cash out)
• TopCashBack - £51.16 (waiting for one amount to become payable)
• Swagbucks - 356 (will get to the next £5 amazon voucher then give up)
• Coin jar - £28.15

I'm really quite pleased with that.

I've also joined AdPoints for extra nectar points. It'll keep me out of trouble watching all the ads :rotfl:

I'm only working tomorrow then off until the following Tuesday. As well as catching up with friends and doing some nice (cheap) things, I'd also like to get a meal plan in place and do some batch cooking. I'm not very adventurous with my cooking so if I can get a 2 week meal plan in place, I'll just rotate it for the next 2 weeks. I had a slow cooker about 2 Christmasses ago which is still in the box so that will have to be experimented with. I do believe there is a thread on slow cooking on the Old Style boards so I'll head over there to have a nose.

I'm dreading the drive to work tomorrow. Its a 50 mile round trip so I hope that snow melts sharp ish!

Orange_Ena

Well I survived the snow!

Also did my good deed for the day helping a neighbour get her posh car off the drive. She reveresed on to the grass while I gently pushed her car side ways so she could drive off................all while some bloke walking by just stood and watched. Cheers love, but why don't you pitch in next time?:rotfl:

Anyway.....

Spent £18.73 in Tesco on a few essentials, and one or two treats. Well it is payday tomorrow.
I plan on transferring £400 to my ISA (which already has £250 in there) to await the next £400 to go in in April and then pay it all back into my current account which hey presto, will clear that pesky overdraft. Must remember to actually reduce my overdraft limit to £0 so that I'm not tempted to treat myself for being a good girl because I've cleared my overdraft

I think the money I make from eBay and my loose change jar will be paid into my account to go toward CC1. That one will then almost be cleared in May. Barring any emergencies, I really don't think I'll need to use my CC1 at all so that would be good.

Off to pick up some tips from Superscrimpers :money:

Orange_Ena

I'd like to say it was a no spend day. But I can't. :rotfl:

I was meant to meet a friend from work today. At least I thought it was today. She wasn't outside Costa when I arrived, slightly late. A few texts, a call and a facebook message later she rings and says, no, its next Tuesday! :eek: I'm such a plum. I did mean today but when she confirmed by text at the weekend she typed Tuesday "2 Spri". I didn't know what the "2 Spri" was so I just ignored it and said, yeah, see you Tuesday, as in today. Turns out she meant 2nd April. Haha guess you had to be there but it was funny.

Fortunately for me she was free so we had lunch and a couple of drinks over a good catch up and a moan about work. I paid as it was my turn. £16.10 but worth it as it was nice. Then mooched in Next and spent £6 on a rustic heart shaped wire bowl. We're hoping to start doing a few craft fairs in the summer so this was to display our wares in

Pay day today so I'll do the money transfers tomorrow as I've just relaxed tonight. After reading a few other diaries I'm going to start rounding down the pennies every day. It will soon add up and I can keep a close eye on my account.

Plan for tomorrow - have a nice facial. I was having them every month but in an effort to pay debts off, I'm just having them as and when I think my skin needs it. I know I'm in debt and I should pay it off asap, but I can justify a facial because I don't drink or smoke or buy gadgets or designer clothes. God knows why I am in debt then?! Must be all those nice cruises :embarasse

Orange_Ena

with a stiff neck. I think I had too many pillows.

On Wednesday:

• I had facial - my skin feels so much better.
• Transferred £400 to my ISA as planned.
• No other spends

Thursday I popped round to see my friend and her 2 lovely kids. I was offered cheese and crackers on arrival, but no drink. :rotfl: She does it all the time. Sometimes she texts me after to say she forgot to offer lol. I would ask if I was thirsty but its almost a game now to see if she offers in the time I'm there It was nearly a NSD apart from £1.10 for an ebay parcel.

Talking of which, I had a message of a customer to say some sandals I sent were falling apart. There was a flower apparently coming off both of them. I suspect not but I've got bigger worries so I just credited her the whole amount back. I'm not sure if she was going to be a pain but I think I was more than generous and gave her no hassle so part of me hopes that if she is lying, she'll feel really bad and karma will get her! Is that terrible of me?!

Anyway, I'm sure she can glue them back on and wear them if we ever get any good weather. :cool:

I received my CC1 bill yesterday and thankfully bothered to check it. I ordered something online but when I went to authorise the payment thingy, there was an error. I back tracked to find that an item had become out of stock from when I put it in the basket to checkout. It went through ok after I removed that item and the stuff was delivered earlier in the week. But somehow I've been charged for the 1st order which didn't go through. I emailed the company but will have to wait for an answer. I checked with my CC too and if the company don't get back to me, they can help. Seeing as its Easter holiday, I'll give the company a chance to sort it first which will be quicker than getting CC involved. And to add insult to injury, it hasn't tracked in TCB!! :mad::rotfl: I've filled in something on TCB so hopefully they'll sort it.

And that brings me today:

• A NSD.
• Transferred £30.96 from TCB to current account which will then go to ISA
• Any extra money I make will go into my ISA this month to get my OD down asap
• Will pay in change jar next week, should be around £35.

Have a great Easter :easter: