It has to stop

phil_rich1983

Only a small point from me. If your hubby wants sky that bad buy a kobi box off ebay and cancel the sky, he can still get the channels he want then.

Spendertosaver_2

Hi worried,
Read your post on my diary so thought I eould have a little read. Can definitely understand the shift work and variable income! You sound so worried but looking to make positive changes which I'm sure will benefit you. That must be so stressful for you covering all the bills, have you looked into changing your energy provider or tarrif yet? (Sorry if this is really obvious but we change dours a while bavk and made a substantial saving each month!) Your reduced food bill is amazing, we get a few bits in lidl but may have to look into this again!
Any further news on what your husbands plans are?

Worriedaboutmoney_2

Well it's been a while since I've updated my diary. Not much has changed. Still haven't contacted stepchange - I think hubby is reluctant to do before Christmas.

In terms of his business he's desperate to keep it going and a bit of good news he's got a new contract starting spring term so it's definitely building. I think what he's doing now is going to be how it is going forward. He's working 20hrs a week processing mortgage applications which is easy money for him and they are very flexible on hours so he can work his other business around it. He coaches 1 after school club a week plus running a youth football team (this bit is voluntary) and he's now coaching at junior premier league level 3 times as week (he does get paid for this).
The way forward as I see it is that he needs to drastically reduce his outgoings in order that he can start contributing towards the household bills again and take some of the pressure off me. The way I see this happening is a DMP. Whether he does an individual one or we do a joint one I'm not sure.
If we were putting 50/50 into the joint account towards our bills then my debt would not be an issue as I could easily start making headway with it.

Still waiting on a response from HMRC about a pending tax claim - if (and I'm not holding my breath) I get a refund I will put some away as an emergency fund and the remainder will go towards reducing debt.

Desperately need to do a car boot as have loads of stuff in the garage to clear but fear I've missed the best weather to do one - my work schedule has been a nightmare so not been able to do one.

I have some eBay stuff to list and I have the opportunity to book additional shifts at work so I can get us through this.

Massively slashed my Christmas bill by agreeing not to buy for friends kids so I have very little left to buy. We've prioritised the kids so they don't miss out

Just wish we could catch a break

Worriedaboutmoney_2

EssexHebridean wrote: »

It's a quandary on the job front. I think you both need to sit down and think hard about whether his current business is viable in the long term - and if it is, how long it will take to get to the point of real viability. If he absolutely hates the industry he left, and working in that sort of role was having a negative effect on his mental health, that would potentially give a different answer to a situation in which he doesn't get wildly enthused about it, it's "just a job", but he doesn't actually find it makes him unhappy. I'm inclined to think though that several options surfacing in a short space of time like that ought to tell you something!

Taff made a good point on the "striking a balance" front - can he accept that his 5 day a week 9 to 5 may not be that inspiring, but the stuff he does at weekends does, and that's a compromise he can live with.

Yes that's it. He loves what he is doing now. He used to work in financial services and he hated the job, was always stressed and complaining and this is one reason why he doesn't want to go back to it full time. The part time job he's doing is "just a job" but he doesn't dislike it - there's no pressure as it's a job he's more than qualified to do and he likes the people he works with.

I think part of the difficulty is that he feels that he should get the chance to do his dream job as 6 years ago I completely re-trained and undertook a degree to do what he sees as my "dream job" so I think for a long time when he still worked in finance there was some deep rooted resentment that I had the opportunity to change. The difference is that I had a sponsorship to undertake my training and was not financially disadvantaged whilst I trained and after I trained it also meant I massively increased my earning potential.

So the tides have completely turned. He's gone from being the breadwinner and biggest wage earner to earning very little whilst I have taken over as main earner (although not earning anywhere near what he used to)

Time will tell I guess

Worriedaboutmoney_2

phil_rich1983 wrote: »

Only a small point from me. If your hubby wants sky that bad buy a kobi box off ebay and cancel the sky, he can still get the channels he want then.

Thank you - we did consider doing this and looked into it but there were some downsides such as glitches etc that caused boxes to freeze.

I know we may have to downgrade sky and I'm really trying to convince him but at the moment it isn't working

EssexHebridean

Worried your OH needs to slash his personal outgoings to damned near NOTHING while you're in this position. I was in a position some years back where my income dropped to essentially nothing overnight, and then gradually crept back up again, but only to a fraction of where I'd been. The first thing I did was to stop my own personal spending money. Completely. I then took the decision to go the Self-Employed route, which took a little time to build up - in the short term I took on an Avon round (there are alternatives out there more suited for chaps - Kleeneze, Betterware, although in fact there are "Avon Men" as well as women!) in order to fund myself whatever spending money I could earn from that. I didn't take away from money that was needed for household bills, though, and we only reverted back to the old methods when my business had built to a level to support that.

It's great that there are signs his business has started to build, BUT in the meantime he needs to accept that a) it's HIS drop in income that is causing a lot of your problems - harsh but, I'm afraid, true and b) That you BOTH need to work together to fix the situation - and that him burying his head in the sand and refusing to work with you on things like contacting Stepchange is not only not helpful, it's potentially leading you into further problems.

Currently, he's leaving you to cope with the stress of this, and that's not fair.

EssexHebridean

Worriedaboutmoney wrote: »

Thank you - we did consider doing this and looked into it but there were some downsides such as glitches etc that caused boxes to freeze.

I know we may have to downgrade sky and I'm really trying to convince him but at the moment it isn't working

Tell him that there is currently no money in the joint coffers to pay for it, and that it needs cancelling and that if he's that keen to keep it, he'll need to set it back up in his name only?

Worriedaboutmoney_2

Spendertosaver wrote: »

Hi worried,
Read your post on my diary so thought I eould have a little read. Can definitely understand the shift work and variable income! You sound so worried but looking to make positive changes which I'm sure will benefit you. That must be so stressful for you covering all the bills, have you looked into changing your energy provider or tarrif yet? (Sorry if this is really obvious but we change dours a while bavk and made a substantial saving each month!) Your reduced food bill is amazing, we get a few bits in lidl but may have to look into this again!
Any further news on what your husbands plans are?

Thank you I changed energy provider a few months back so think we are still tied in at the moment - I do try and shop around for the best deals and will continue to do so.

As for plans the business is growing but will take time. He went for chat re the full time job and they said they wanted to know more about how he could fit it around his business. I think they were impressed at his replies but they said they might not be taking on immediately so might be in the new year

Huskyrunner

Re Sky if it has too go it has too go, its not a necessity. Can i ask what you pay for your sky a month?

I think sky is way overpriced. We did have sky in the past but found there broadband horrendous

Worriedaboutmoney_2

EssexHebridean wrote: »

Tell him that there is currently no money in the joint coffers to pay for it, and that it needs cancelling and that if he's that keen to keep it, he'll need to set it back up in his name only?

I know I know. I'm just too soft - we have the full
Package sky Q plus phone line and broadband and it's around £100 a month 😞

To be completely honest his outgoings are minimal he doesn't go to the pub or buy clothes or gadgets. He used to buy himself Xbox games and boy rays all the time but this has all stopped now. All his outgoings are on his extremely high levels of debt (credit cards) As they were built up when he was on a good income. He used to earn over £2k a month sometimes as month as £3 or £4K a month so he's gone from that to virtually zero - it's now back up at around £1200 a month but his outgoings are around £1200 a month which leaves nothing left for anything else.

I think I have MUG on my forehead