Possible debt advice

Gavin78

thegreenone wrote: »

Is your wife a teacher? If she is, could she look at tutoring? I know someone earning £40 per hour and it's usually done evenings and weekends.


If she was admin. perhaps it is time for a change. I used to work in the office of a secondary school, running the Medical Room. I picked up every sickness going. If she looks outside education and explains that to a potential employer, they may look more favourably, particularly if they have children themselves.


Good luck, I will have my fingers crossed for you.

My wife is a teaching assistant holding a foundation degree. She has had around 10 interviews this month and hasn't had any luck, She has worked in schools for 16 years and has struggled against the likes of ex teachers, NQT's and those with more experience. She has worked in a high school and primary.

She has considered going back to Uni for 1 year to top up her FD to a BA Hons which she says should help her more for getting a job and is looking to do some weekend/ evening work unless she gets in a school after september when they start with interviews again.

Unfortunatly we had to pull our daughter out of nursery as can't afford the fees and while my job has been flexable with childcare I can't ask for anymore as work for the NHS and we are short staffed as it is.

We had her name down for a year before she got a place so this has thrown a spanner in the works if wife suddenly gets a job and we don't have childcare and we don't have any family really that could help out.

Luck might shine in January as daughter can attend 3 year old nursery for 15 hours.

Gavin78

BullShark wrote: »

McDonalds are recruiting 5000 staff, good luck!!

They don't do flexible hours for my wife around my shifts she's spoken to their HR department after the 2 local ones to me said they can be flexable but can't do set shifts and can't always give the same shift pattern as need to have staff to cover 24 hours so could be rotated in a variety of different shifts at different hours to cover 35 hours.

So she could be calle in to do 10-3 then back in later 8-11 then in the next day 12-5 and then maybe 11-4am and so forth as long as the shifts make up 35 hours in the week.

The local manager said the jobs wasn't reallly suited for a family unless they could be flexible

FBaby

I really feel for you Gavin and I think you are a very understanding person. Personally, the way your wife has behaved with her job resulting in not only being dismissed but tarnishing her chance to get another job would have left me livid considering your financial situation and where it is leaving you now. Hopefully she's learnt her lesson and someone will be prepared to give her another chance.

Just a question, you say you earn £18K working within the NHS. That means you are on a very low band and I'm surprised that you would be travelling for 2 hours a day for such a job, or it means that you are only working part-time. Are they no other job opportunities at a higher band, full-time hours within one hour of where you live?

Gavin78

FBaby- I think my wife knows I'm not happy with the situation I did say as soon as she started struggling with uni to let work know but I think it was embarrassment with failing more than anything. What's done is done at the end of the day I still love my wife faults and all.

As for the debts it's my fault I kept getting one cc after another thinking if I could shift money around it would ease things but I found that I had no wage left nearly once I paid all the min payments and found I was using the cc more and more for everyday living. I don't even know at what point I lost control

I wasn't even telling the wife till after I got the cards and loans till after I did it thinking I could keep on top of it all but we'll here we are now and reality has sunk in and starting to do something about it.

As for work I'm a band 2 health care assistant working 2 miles from where I live not 2 hours I'm on my top band pay 18k moving to band 3 will put me upto just over 19k but once tax and stuff comes off I'm only about £20 a month better off.

Wife has considered doing uni full time now for a year instead and has support if needed from a local school around the corner from where we live which would be a better option at to top up her foundation degree to a ba hons and she would have time now with not working to complete this...if a job comes up during this course she will leave she said

bettyboo71

Gavin, regardless of what happens with your wife re jobs/studying, you really need to get this sorted properly NOW. You said you have an appointment with stepchange - they know what they are talking about so best to tell them about all debts/cc/loans etc. If you keep something from them, it may affect any arrangements you make when it does come to light. I have been in your situation and it took me a long time to get out of it, but once the arrangements were made, interest stopped being added, totals were coming down, and I wasn't trying to juggle or hide things from anyone .

For the sake of yourself, your wife, and your kids, you really need to sort this out properly before t gets any worse.

FBaby

As for work I'm a band 2 health care assistant working 2 miles from where I live not 2 hours I'm on my top band pay 18k moving to band 3 will put me upto just over 19k but once tax and stuff comes off I'm only about £20 a month better off

Sorry I got the miles/hours confused! Moving to a B3 job would mean not being much better off the first year but the year after you would go up the next scale and be better off. Are there any B3 job you could apply for?

Gavin78

FBaby being on the top scale of band 3 only works out around £20/£35 a month better off as a couple of staff are on top pay for that scale

Point 8 £17,978 ( top end band 2) which is me

Point 12 £19,655 (top end of band 3)

It takes around 18 months to do the training for it and then you have to wait for B3 jobs to become vacant you don't move upto band 3 pay until 2 months after so you are looking at around 3 years before starting to move upto band 3 pay scales as they won't move you upto the next increment until the year after.

So for example I started in the July 2007 so my pay goes up every year from then on so if I passed my band 3 after July 2007 which would be the case I wouldn't get the next increment up till July 2019. Which I would then move to £18,152

2 staff have just started the training for it as have been waiting a long while so I wouldn't be able to start till next year which would then mean a 2020 pay inc (sometimes its crap working for the NHS when it comes to money)

On another note while I wont lose my job they have put the whole Leeds renal units out to tender so atm I don't think they are considering any further training.

Gavin78

Just to cont this post I have canceled my DD's with some companies as Sept will be when I default on them.

As I went to cancel my DD it pops up saying that companies can setup another DD if I don't inform them I have stopped the DD? can they do this?

I will be contacting them all next week to explain my financial situation and inform them I am in contact with a debt charity.

I am also in the process of moving banks as one of my CC is with my bank so going to start getting my wage paid into another bank and move DD's over to that bank

Fergie76

I am no expert by any means, but reading through other threads on here the advice seems to be, to make token efforts of £1 towards your debts, rather than nothing at all.

fatbelly

Gavin78 wrote: »

Thanks for getting in touch...So if I am going to default I have to do it on everything in order to setup a DMP?

That means possibly 30k of debt then. I could simply not mention my Natwest CC so at least that saves my bank account?

I'm worried that adding my debt even higher will result in Baliffs getting involved in the future and I am trying to stop that happening best I can I thought that if I could at least have a DMP on some of the debts it would help the burden?

You may as well do a DMP on ALL your debts. Think you've worked that out. Bailiffs can only be instructed on a defaulted court order so lots of stages before that could happen, and it probably never will.

Gavin78 wrote: »

Just to cont this post I have canceled my DD's with some companies as Sept will be when I default on them.

As I went to cancel my DD it pops up saying that companies can setup another DD if I don't inform them I have stopped the DD? can they do this?

I will be contacting them all next week to explain my financial situation and inform them I am in contact with a debt charity.

I am also in the process of moving banks as one of my CC is with my bank so going to start getting my wage paid into another bank and move DD's over to that bank

Close the old bank account as soon as you can but keep an eye open for creditors trying to set u a new d/d though they shouldn't do this.

No need for token offers now - just tell them what you are doing and ask for 30 days breathing space (Lending Code)