A Ditherer's Diary (again)

WinterWarrior

Good plan with the food. We have two back up turkey crowns in the freezer..two! And that’s only in case the fresh pre ordered one doesn’t materialise. MrWW has turkey panic from about September onwards as he loves his Christmas dinner 🤣

Naomim

We're usually at the in-laws so this really is my back up. I had to do a fair bit of rearranging to get it in the freezer! 

Naomim

jokono said:

Travel costs are crazy. I'm thinking of changing my job but at the moment I work mostly from home so travelis negligible, I'd need a chunky pay rise to offset commuting if I were to work in an office. 

This is what I did. I left my job of 17 years and went to work full time in Central London for a hefty pay-rise! The main reason was to pay off our debts.  Unfortunately I hadn't had my LBM properly so when my wages increased, so did my spending and lack of budgeting! 🤦‍♀️ 

To be honest, Covid and wfh really helped as I could afford to pay off more on the credit cards but other bills like food did increase due to us all being home and having a teenage human dustbin in the house!  Everything is just increasing at the moment.

Today I have tilly tidied £5.48 onto my Barclaycard.  My Tesco 0% deal expires in January and I'm still not being offered anything by Barclaycard which I was hoping they would by now.  I think MBNA is offering me some deals so I will check there.  Halifax also have an offer but I'm trying to avoid them as their minimum payment percentage is 2.5%.  Actually, on checking my spreadsheet Barclaycard minimum % payable is 2.25% so probably best not hanging out for a deal from them anyway. 

I did very well on the Black Friday deals and only bought one thing. A  Bosch food processor for 16yo for Christmas that had £33 off. Got it from John Lewis as they have very good customer service and aftersales.

I'm hoping to go and do some Christmas shopping on Saturday. I'll have to remember to take a pad and pen to note down what I've bought and how much so I can sweep it from my Christmas pot. At least I don't have that to worry about.  I'm also taking heed of @EssexHebridean post on the DFW board. https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5939652/beware-the-december-pay-trap#latest  (not sure I have posted the link correctly). If you are paid early in December, please check this out. I did it first time last year and it definitely made a huge difference!

I hope everyone is safe and well and not too cold!

Naomim

moving_forward

Today I have tilly tidied £5.48 onto my Barclaycard.  My Tesco 0% deal expires in January and I'm still not being offered anything by Barclaycard which I was hoping they would by now.  I think MBNA is offering me some deals so I will check there.  Halifax also have an offer but I'm trying to avoid them as their minimum payment percentage is 2.5%.  Actually, on checking my spreadsheet Barclaycard minimum % payable is 2.25% so probably best not hanging out for a deal from them anyway. 

MBNA also have a minimum payment of 2.5% so do HSBC.  Santander offers 31 months at 0% and minimum payment is lower.

P.S. **waves hello ::smile:**

Naomim

Hi @moving_forward 👋 

My current MBNA payments are at 1% I wonder why there's a difference 🤔  I'll have a look at Santander but don't think I'm eligible as still owe too much. 😬

CRANKY40

I feel your pain with the food bills for the teenage dustbin!

moving_forward

Strange mine is 2.5%. I'm in the process of shifting mine to Santander as we did with hubbies. Debts are still reducing and we seem to have found a budget that works at last.
Only spanner in the works was YNAB attempting to increase my protected premium by 50% so like many others I ditched them and am in the process of finding the best way to replace. Currently I'm finding a mix of spreadsheets and pen and paper is doing ok.
At least I'd already worked out the amounts to budget for each category so we had a good place to start.

Naomim

I checked the MSE eligibility calculator and zero chance with Santander it seems 🙄.

I do have a 24 month offer from MBNA so I'll probably do that.

I'm up and down with ynab. Still using my spreadsheet though.

moving_forward

Sorry to hear about Santander but at least debt is reducing 🥳
Any zero offer is better than the position you thought your were in last time worrying you wouldn't get one. Keep at it. As my planner stickers say "the greatest view comes after the hardest climb" x

Naomim

True, as long as I'm offered a 0% deal somewhere, I'll take it! I've a few deals ending in the summer so I have to plan the shuffle.