Out of Interest, Are There Any Ladies Here Whose Husbands Control the Purse Strings?

Tiffany_Aching

I do all the finances in our house - I would prefer it to be joint, but my husband isn't interested. I get quite upset with him that he doesn't help or show interest and his reply is always that he trusts me and that he isn't interested but will take over doing the finances himself if I insist. That's not want I want, I want to share the responsibility - but that's not going to happen.

Money is tight as there is a lot of debt that we have jointly run up over the years - I have had my light bulb moment and realise that as our income drops over the next couple of years we will not be able to make minimum payments. We need to get out of debt fast. He acknowledges this and goes along with all my suggestions to save money but is just so disinterested it makes me want to yell - I feel like it is so unfair that I have to make all the decisions and have all the stress (and on a tight month there is a lot of stress!).

Wow, it felt good to get all that off of my chest!

My SIL was married for 40 odd years to her husband. She used to have no say in the household finances and was given 'housekeeping' for food and clothes, everything else was dealt with by him - she was very happy with things being this way.

He owned a business that was not doing too well and the threat of bankruptcy was constantly hanging over them, she worried about it so much that she got quite depressed. Just over 2 years ago he died suddenly. He had lied to her the whole marriage - the business had been very healthy and he had money (a lot of it) hidden away in so many accounts. All that time she had been so worried and yet she had no idea that they (he) were, in reality, so well off.

She had constantly defended him against others saying that he held 'old fashioned views' about marriage and money and that she felt looked after by him. She had quite a shock when she found out about the money and is now so upset.

onlyroz

My husband has no interest in financial matters - he could access the joint account if he wanted but never does. I'm the one who monitors the bills, makes sure the money is in the right place at the right time of the month, and does the checks to make sure we're getting the best deals for utilities etc.

When we met he'd do some infuriating things - e.g. he bought a £300 suit on a credit card and then only made the minimum payments on it for years. That suit probably ended up costing over £1000, and he could have paid it off at any time. He did the same with a bicycle. I asked him why he would do things like that and he'd just shrug his shoulders - as long as he was able to make the minimum payments he just wasn't interested. Needless to say, we he doesn't do things like that any more.

InsideInsurance

PenguinJim wrote: »

"Confused"? One of the first debt-free lessons* I was taught was to get rid of the direct debits and pay every bill manually, to assert greater control over my finances.

So one of your first debt free lessons was to lose the discounts that utility providers give for paying by DD? :think:

You certainly need to keep on top of your bills, and DD arguably can be bad if your finances are such that you arent going to be able to afford all your bills, but if your bills are such a small amount of your income as you say then it seems rather odd to increase your bills by not paying by DD in an attempt to reduce you debt. I've always found reducing my bill helped me maintain being debt free.

Worry_Wart

I run my house as if I'm single with a lodger. My boyfriend pays £300/month "rent" into my savings account, and I pay all bills/mortgage/house repairs etc. It's my house, so my responsibility. If I die, he doesn't get it, and if we split up, he doesn't get it either. He spends the rest of his wages on records, gadgets, and whatever else he fancies, and I spend/save/OP mortgage the rest of mine. He seems to have no interest in saving or looking to the future, so to avoid frustration, we will always keep our finances separate.

bargainbetty

My exOH and I used to have a joint account for household bills and our own personal accounts. Since both of us worked, it was easier for each of us to transfer funds into the household pot and pay bills from there. Our own money was our own money, and we didn't have to justify any spends to each other. We were both fairly sensible with money though, so we never had to argue about it or bail the other out before month end.

I wouldn't mind sharing financial information with a partner, but no one will have control over my finances. What's his is his, what's mine is mine. We share what we need to and the rest is personal.

I also won't co-sign a loan, transfer ownership of my flat or be a loan guarantor. I've worked hard to get to where I am, and I couldn't hand over the reigns to my financial security to someone. Just couldn't. No matter now much I love someone, there is an intrinsic part of me that needs to take care of itself and pay its own damn bills.

PenguinJim

InsideInsurance wrote: »

So one of your first debt free lessons was to lose the discounts that utility providers give for paying by DD? :think:

No. None of my providers offer a discount for paying bills by direct debit. But I'd appreciate it if you'd assume the answer is "yes" and then write an overly-long explanation about how paying less is better than paying more.

Ah, thank you.

Strange how we were discussing all direct debits before, but it's suddenly only utility bills.

Edit: here's a handy guide to avoiding common Direct Debit utility bill pitfalls in the UK. It does undermine the assumption that DDs are always cheaper AND passive, as there are a few plates to spin, but I don't know any MSEs who would make that assumption anyway. At the end of the day, you need to be aware of the unit cost you're paying overall, and do what's best to make that as low as possible. (In my case, it would not be cheaper to use DDs)

And, of course, don't be conned into thinking lower direct debit payments automatically mean you'll be saving money (but who would assume this? Wink!).

Marisco

I get a discount for paying by DD, having "duel fuel" and doing everything online It's far easier paying by DD anyway, and requires no effort whatsoever on my part, that'll do me!!

PenguinJim

Are your cheaper DDs actually saving you money per unit, though?

Are you underpaying based on the promise of lower DDs and heading for a significant catch-up bill?

You can check today, but it will require some effort on your part, and therefore bring them into the realm of the active.

lostinrates

PenguinJim wrote: »

Are your cheaper DDs actually saving you money per unit, though?

Are you underpaying based on the promise of lower DDs and heading for a significant catch-up bill?

You can check today, but it will require some effort on your part, and therefore bring them into the realm of the active.

Speaking for our household we have gauged dd estimate three monthly. ( after one mess up) its not active like a monthly payment but we've had a lot of changes to our electric set up ( gone three phase, have new electric using heating system put in, ) so makes sense to monitor more closely. My guess is we'll be following more closely once heating goes on this year for first full winter, but then relax)

But to do this sort of bill watching monthly is not best use of every couples time. Other bills which have to be active take priority of our 'office time'. In our set up we only get weekends together, my DH is here Friday nights to v. Early mon am, and works some of that time. Plus we have to look at other office stuff that demands active time then.

For us to put things that can be dd forgotten is good use of time / money because it leaves us the rest of that time for the other things we try to fit in.

What makes sense to do will depend on each situation and set up I think. If DH were home week nights and worked normal work patterns we'd probably be a lot more organised, as my natural inclination is to be tight. .

Gloomendoom

I'm not sure who does the finances in our household. Somebody must as there are no burly gentlemen banging on the door.

Thinking about it, I think our approach is similar to above. Everything is DD'd so rarely needs any attention at all.