Tax credits not gone in..HELP!

[Deleted User]

I mean this nicely.., but you rely on tax credit payments for food, have an overdraft that's costing you money and gettting married, which is going to cost more money. As weddings can be quite expensive.., and there's nothing spare even without this change., it might not be the most sensible thing until you are in better circumstances.

If you are expecting tax credits to go down now, I really would strongly suggest looking at your spending and reducing it to the bone. Go on the Debt board and ask for help. Not even having enough for breakfast the day the money would have come in suggests money and food management could do with some looking at.

andrewmp

deannatrois wrote: »

I mean this nicely.., but you rely on tax credit payments for food, have an overdraft that's costing you money and gettting married, which is going to cost more money. As weddings can be quite expensive.., and there's nothing spare even without this change., it might not be the most sensible thing until you are in better circumstances.

If you are expecting tax credits to go down now, I really would strongly suggest looking at your spending and reducing it to the bone. Go on the Debt board and ask for help. Not even having enough for breakfast the day the money would have come in suggests money and food management could do with some looking at.

With that sort of income there should be no reason someone is relying on a tax credit payment to provide breakfast for their kids, especially seeing as though they received an extra payment at one point.

FBaby

Certainly one lesson, don't ever allow to find yourself without any food in your cupboards and/or £10 in your wallet. Surely you can afford to make sure you always have to bread/cheese/cereals and milk/pasta and tomato sauce and soups?

Whatever the reason for the non-payment, you should never found yourself in such a situation and the anxiety that goes with it, so as soon as your OH is paid, take £20 out and put it in some secret place to be used for emergency (and systematically replaced when used).

andrewmp

Spend 75p on a box of UHT milk and a 25p box of cheap cornflakes and store in the cupboard and your child will never go without breakfast.

densol_2

I have to agree with the others. " gadget insurance " is way down the list before a babys breakfast. You really need to go over to the debt management board and get tips on how to save even a small amount for emergencies for situations like this. Hope you work something out.

tubie22

Do you all not think i feel bad enough not having much to give my son? You all must enjoy kicking people when they are down.

I have cereals/soups/pasta etc etc but not enough to last a month. OH gets paid 19th of each month and is paying off debts. We did not expect this to happen otherwise of course we would have put money aside. We had no warning that this was going to happen. Do you all seriously think if I knew I wasn't getting any money that I would still not have put a sum of money aside to last us until the tax credits got sorted out?
Also, our wedding is costing less than 2k altogether and the majority of it is already paid so that is a non issue.

I thought these forums were supposed to be to help and guide people, not criticise them and remind them what rubbish people/parents they are.

andrewmp

tubie22 wrote: »

Do you all not think i feel bad enough not having much to give my son? You all must enjoy kicking people when they are down.

I have cereals/soups/pasta etc etc but not enough to last a month. OH gets paid 19th of each month and is paying off debts. We did not expect this to happen otherwise of course we would have put money aside. We had no warning that this was going to happen. Do you all seriously think if I knew I wasn't getting any money that I would still not have put a sum of money aside to last us until the tax credits got sorted out?
Also, our wedding is costing less than 2k altogether and the majority of it is already paid so that is a non issue.

I thought these forums were supposed to be to help and guide people, not criticise them and remind them what rubbish people/parents they are.

So your child did get breakfast in the end?

The point of a rainy day fund is that it's there before the rain comes. People are trying to help I think. You have over £1500 per month coming in and claim you don't have enough money to feed your child when your benefits are delayed by a few hours. It's about priorities, It's time to act now, then if this happens again you'll be ok.

tubie22

andrewmp wrote: »

So your child did get breakfast in the end?

The point of a rainy day fund is that it's there before the rain comes. People are trying to help I think. You have over £1500 per month coming in and claim you don't have enough money to feed your child when your benefits are delayed by a few hours. It's about priorities, It's time to act now, then if this happens again you'll be ok.

Yes he did get breakfast. My OH earns 1145 a month after tax. our rent is 500. His debts come to 300. His monthly train fare is 93. then he pays bills which come to around 100 a month. Unfortunately this month he had to pay our electricity bill too which was 120. That leaves about 30, which he used to buy a friend a birthday gift and go for a few drinks with him. This was all obviously before we knew our tax credits wouldnt be going in.
WE know now to make sure to save money, however small, each month. Our benefits are also delayed by 2 weeks, not a few hours. 2 weeks as a SAHM is a long time. I understand people are trying to help but there surely is a nicer way to say things.

Surely we should have received a letter that we had been overpaid and that this would happen? then we could have prepared. But we recieved nothing at all.

Pollycat

tubie22 wrote: »

Yes he did get breakfast. My OH earns 1145 a month after tax. our rent is 500. His debts come to 300. His monthly train fare is 93. then he pays bills which come to around 100 a month. Unfortunately this month he had to pay our electricity bill too which was 120. That leaves about 30, which he used to buy a friend a birthday gift and go for a few drinks with him. This was all obviously before we knew our tax credits wouldnt be going in.
WE know now to make sure to save money, however small, each month. Our benefits are also delayed by 2 weeks, not a few hours. 2 weeks as a SAHM is a long time. I understand people are trying to help but there surely is a nicer way to say things.

Surely we should have received a letter that we had been overpaid and that this would happen? then we could have prepared. But we recieved nothing at all.

I don't think people have been nasty, although as you're in a pretty stressful situation I can see how you might take it like that.

But the reality is that if there is any chance that your income is going to go down in the future you need to take steps to deal with it now.
This may be a one-off glitch but you don't want to be feeling like this every day.

Looking at your income versus spends, where is your budget for food?

Like deannatrois & densol, I think you would do well to pop over to the Debtfree Wannabe board to see if and where you could cut some of your expenses.

andrewmp

tubie22 wrote: »

Yes he did get breakfast. My OH earns 1145 a month after tax. our rent is 500. His debts come to 300. His monthly train fare is 93. then he pays bills which come to around 100 a month. Unfortunately this month he had to pay our electricity bill too which was 120. That leaves about 30, which he used to buy a friend a birthday gift and go for a few drinks with him. This was all obviously before we knew our tax credits wouldnt be going in.
WE know now to make sure to save money, however small, each month. Our benefits are also delayed by 2 weeks, not a few hours. 2 weeks as a SAHM is a long time. I understand people are trying to help but there surely is a nicer way to say things.

Surely we should have received a letter that we had been overpaid and that this would happen? then we could have prepared. But we recieved nothing at all.

Sorry, I misunderstood, I thought your benefits were only supposed to be paid today? Maybe others have made the same assumption from your first post.

Good luck either way, as I said before, they'll sort it out, going forward, from the earnings you've mentioned, you'll be getting far more than £90 per month.

A couple of tips:

If he's only getting £1145 per month after tax on £15,500 then you haven't transferred your tax allowance over to him. Do this, you'll instantly be £20 per month better off.

Apply for housing benefit, you'll probably qualify now due to his reduced wages.

Keep a rainy day fund, it rains.