Schellinho debt diary

schellinho

Hey, looking around, my debts dont seem anywhere as serious as most but I thought that it is about time I started to clear them all up.
I'll give my state of affairs first then a little bit about the situation.

Monthly Income: (done over 4 week period)
Wages - £527 (bit about this below)

Monthly outgoing:
Sky+ & BB - £53.50
Car Insurance - £62.82
Petrol - £50 (approx)
Phone - £15
Housekeeping - £100
TOTAL - £281.32


Debts:
Mum - £2400
Overdraft - £830.52 APR 1.4%
Student Loan - £12514.08 APR 2.4%

I think that sums up all the outgoings and incomings.
So onto the story.
I'm 26 and have pretty much spent all my time since school doing things that are fun. I have a degree (three years of drinking, leading to pretty much all my debt) and also spent two years coaching football in the states.
I currently coach here as well and its all I've done as a job. This is where one of the problems comes in. I'm currently only doing 17 hours a week (half through choice and half through lack of work available). However, there is no guarentee that I will get paid right each month, with some months being as high as £350 underpaid (got paid yesterday and i recon it to be at least £150 out but have to wait for my payslip to come through). Also, as my work is considered casual, sometimes the hours will be much lower (like at christmas) and sometimes they will be much higher (like during summer). During summer i will normally bring in around £900 a month after tax.
Because the pay is so random and often wrong, my mum is sometimes kind and lets the housekeeping go for the month (she has said its ok this month seeing as only £380 went into my account for the whole month)
Another problem is tax, as I worked in the states for two years (got home last june), I have been on 22.5% tax. This I know to be way too high for my wages and have visited the tax office. Got an appointment for first week in june to sort that out and hopefully get a rebate.
I've also finally had enough with the situation at work (like no pay rise in 7 years not even for inflation) and am looking for a new career, most likely starting with a GTP as a PE teacher.
I also have lots of things that i can put on ebay (lots of games workshop stuff that i find gets me more than I paid for the items most of the time) but often can't be bothered (stupid i know but thats the way it is sometimes for me with ebay).
I have started to cycle to any sessions that allow it (some don't coz i need to carry big bag of balls and cones) to help cut back on petrol.
I currently dont work on a thursday so will be spending most of tomorrow looking at careers and hopefully putting some items on ebay once i've taken the car in for the dreaded mot (hopefully not a lot wrong with the car, fingers crossed).
Also have a holiday next month so need to save a bit of spending money and car tax due the month after that.
The order I would like to do things is overdraft (as it is my main bank account) then mum, then the student loan.
Hopefully it is all there, not too sure what i'm ment to do now with the post.
Keep well all

Little_Miss_Winner

Morning Schellinho :hello:

Welcome to DFW board, the first things to look at would be your outgoings, you car insurance seems very high to me? Also Sky & BB, could you not switch these to cheaper options to save you a little each month?

With regards to your wages, would it not be possible in your field to find full-time work? Don't know what area you live in but most of the LEA 's have their own websites with job vacancies on. Or what about the Council websites for jobs at the Recreation Centres, admittedly i don't know much about how these jobs pay etc, but may be worth a look?

I also have lots of things that i can put on ebay (lots of games workshop stuff that i find gets me more than I paid for the items most of the time) but often can't be bothered (stupid i know but thats the way it is sometimes for me with ebay).

I know what you mean, this can be very tedious, but what about setting yourself a goal to put 5 things on ebay every day. Just 5, no more, no less that will be 35 items a week for sale.

Also see you have been on the comping boards, well done on your wins so far, keep going it really will pay off!

Hugs for now, and keep posting.

lynzpower

I currently coach here as well and its all I've done as a job. This is where one of the problems comes in. I'm currently only doing 17 hours a week (half through choice and half through lack of work available). However, there is no guarentee that I will get paid right each month, with some months being as high as £350 underpaid (got paid yesterday and i recon it to be at least £150 out but have to wait for my payslip to come through). Also, as my work is considered casual, sometimes the hours will be much lower (like at christmas) and sometimes they will be much higher (like during summer). During summer i will normally bring in around £900 a month after tax.

HI there, this bothers me a lot :mad:

I suggest heading over to the employment board.

What wages do you have outstanding at this time?

Its simply not acceptable they dont pay you approprioately, and ITS NOT LEGAL.

When you go to the taxman, have you worked out how much you should get in rebate?

Also Im looking at your OD charge, and I suspect that this APR is monthly, not annually . If this is the case, consider moving your bvank account to one with a free overdraft.

schellinho

Hey, i'll try to answer all questions. The car insurance is quite high. This is because i bought my car in october and its the first one i've ever owned. Always been on my mums insurance before that. I know that the companies now do the no claims bonuses when you have been a named driver but coz i had been in the states for two years and not insured in England, I was told that I did not qualify for this. The only thing the company said they could do is at the end of the year i will have two years no claim rather than just one.

With the overdraft, just checked my account and it seems that i'm paying around £8 a month so I guess thatrate is monthly. As for switching to a free overdraft, do I open the new account then take the money out to fill the other overdraft and then work at paying off the second one?

Just got of phone with my immediate boss, he's trying to help get me a payrise, and he's been letting me know all the different reasons the bigger bosses are refusing to do it, and one of the reasons is just plain stupid.

Back onto topic now.
As for full time work in my field. As a coach it would be nice but don't want to work for my current company full time as you can gather from my experience with them so far. The hours are also very unsociable, lots of evenings and weekends. Was going to leave it about another 18 months before getting a full time job, have other things that i am working towards that could hopefully mean I wouldn't need one, but the situation has now got to the stage where it will just drive me crazy.

As for he wages that are outstanding, I'm gonna be going through my wage slips once I finish writing this and i'll get back to you on that.

The tax rebate, I don't really know how to work out what I should get back.

Thanks everyone

schellinho

little update for the day so far.
Not managed to get any ebay done yet, will put at least 3 items on tonight when i get back from training.
Spent most of the day writing out information for my cv, trying to make it proper good one, never really had to write one before. Lot harder than I thought.

schellinho

Finally got my payslip, am missing £182.50 for last month. Went through previous months as well and in three months I'm owed £269.50. Will be ringing in morning to get that back.
I've put some books on greenmetropolis, hopefuly get some sells.

schellinho

Hey, liitle update and some questions.
Put more books on greenmetropolis and have an item on ebay, its not doing too good at the moment, ends in a couple of hours.
Had to email my boss with a break down of my hours to get it back so have just done that, hopefully be getting that soon.
Got a meeting with the tax man in ten days. Looking to get a rebate. What do i need to take for it and how do i work out what my rebate should be?

schellinho

Little update, just got back from tax office, should have a check in 8 weeks time for last years tax. If i get it all back then overdraft will be wiped out (risen to just over £1300 now). Back pay should be coming next friday.
Got a couple items on ebay that are doing ok, few quid each and sold a couple of books on green metropolis.
just going through this month very very carefully, spending less money than usual.

lynzpower

well done, it seems you are doing pretty well

Do you have a total of what money is owed to you by your employer.

I suggest that you write a LBA ( letter before action ) google it.

this bascially is the precursor to suing them.

it will give your employer 14 days to cough up, otherwise you will take them to court. if its under 5k which i bet it is, then you do this via the small claims court (MONEYCLAIMONLINE.GOV.UK)

IT will cost you about 30 quid, to lodge it, and from the dates you have been denied the money you will get 8% interest per day standard court rate.

I suggest that this is the only way you will really put the wind up them, if they dont pay after court direction, then the court will instruct bailiffs in! they wont want that!

Yes, about your overdraft. if you open a new bank account with a 0% interest overdraft, take the OD money out pay off the other one. then you can start chipping away at the 0% OD once other debts are cleared.

Lynz