Small Steps Out Of Massive Debt!

EssexHebridean

Is there any sort of referral bonus for ipsos GC? If so then can you DM me your link and I'll give them a go. 

GeorgianaCavendish

There are no referral bonuses unfortunately, but I would definitely recommend giving them a go - I tend to get a £10 reward every 4-6 weeks and it isn't too onerous  

EssexHebridean

All ok in your world GC? 

GeorgianaCavendish

Thank you for checking @EssexHebridean - all ok here   Work has been really busy and stressful over the last couple of weeks so I've been keeping my head down a bit, glad it's the weekend and I can relax a bit!  Hope all is ok with you too?  

GeorgianaCavendish

As I come to the end of current packs, I've trying out some "downgrades" of things like cosmetics, toiletries and vitamins to see where we can make some additional savings. And to be honest, where I've been mindlessly overpaying for a fancy brand name. 

This can be a bit hit and miss; my skin didn't react well to the hydration masks I've tried, so looks like I'm sticking to my original brand but I'm really impressed with the L'Oreal Dream Lengths shampoo and conditioner - and I got it on special offer in Savers (£2 for 400ml bottle)   

I've also been looking for ways to make the expensive brands cheaper. The best I've found so far is FeelUnique, they have a scheme where you get 10% off 2 brands of your choosing. I think you can update the brands once every 6 months. They are always on cashback sites and have free delivery for over £20; and seem to keep giving me £5 vouchers when I buy something, so I've done quite well out of them recently! I always do a price comparison across the big online shops before I buy, often one of the them has a sale or discount running. 

I've been running the sums on travel to the office (I will be doing a combination of office and home from April) and it is going to be in the region of £450 a month once I tack on the tube travel in London and cost of getting to the station here. That is more than double what I used to pay when I lived in London (and was travelling twice as much!), but I knew a return to the office was coming and I think the quality of life improvement of living in the countryside and only commuting a couple of days a week is worth it    And at least I've got two pay days between now and then to build up a buffer of expenses 

astrocytic_kitten

Ouch on the travel costs! Commuter rail is so expensive, though as you say the benefits of being in the countryside and not going in every day will be worth it.

I used to use feelunique for expensive skincare (though never thought to check cashback 🤦‍♀️), they seemed to have the best mix of the brands I use as well as everything else. I paid £10 for free delivery for a year at one point too so I could order stuff as and when I needed it instead of making up the order to £20 with treats I didn’t necessarily need 😂 Haven’t used them lately because I’ve switched to a different sunscreen they don’t carry, and I’m trying out superdrug own brand skincare which is surprisingly good for a lot of things and SO cheap!

GeorgianaCavendish

The travel costs are a bit of a killer, it's actually not much cheaper on the new Flexi ticket than it would be for an annual ticket (£400 p/m vs £460 p/m - and I would have the option to use the travel card for trips at the weekend or in case of meetings etc when I need to go into the office more frequently) but I'm going to be off for nearly 2 weeks in June and 3 weeks in August so it doesn't seem worth paying for those times. I'll see how it goes with the flexi ticket for a few months and then work out if it is still the cheapest way of travelling. 

The £10 annual delivery sounds good, but I wonder if I would go the other way and order too much because I wanted to make sure I was getting value for the delivery cost. The things we tell ourselves!    

EssexHebridean

The cost of travel into London from the outskirts is horrendous - and then they wonder why people still want to use cars?! The exorbitant cost of the rail fare for MrEH was why we ended up with the the second car in the first place - it worked out SO much more cost effective, and still does in fact. Helps as well for us that we can car-share as far as a couple of miles from where I work, and then he gets the tube using Oyster PAYG as it works out heaper than a travelpass would.  If we both used public transport in it'd cost us a flipping fortune! 

enthusiasticsaver

Ouch to the travel costs. Is it worth just prebooking super advance tickets for the days you have to go into London? What about getting a railcard? I have just picked up a senior railcard as over 60 now which saves a third but I guess there are others for those younger. 

GeorgianaCavendish

EssexHebridean said:

The cost of travel into London from the outskirts is horrendous - and then they wonder why people still want to use cars?! The exorbitant cost of the rail fare for MrEH was why we ended up with the the second car in the first place - it worked out SO much more cost effective, and still does in fact. Helps as well for us that we can car-share as far as a couple of miles from where I work, and then he gets the tube using Oyster PAYG as it works out heaper than a travelpass would.  If we both used public transport in it'd cost us a flipping fortune! 

I know, it's so expensive and it doesn't make much difference that I only need to travel 2/5ths of the work week. On the other hand, MrC will continue working 100% remotely so at least it is only one of us that needs to cover train travel!

 enthusiasticsaver said:

Ouch to the travel costs. Is it worth just prebooking super advance tickets for the days you have to go into London? What about getting a railcard? I have just picked up a senior railcard as over 60 now which saves a third but I guess there are others for those younger. 

The cheapest I can get it is £400 p/m with the Flexi ticket, any other railcards would only be effective if I was purchasing season tickets. Pre-booking super advance tickets might be the way to go, as long as I can make sure my schedule is rock solid. I'm conscious that any changes to my work schedule could end up costing me more money for buying alternative train tickets, but perhaps it is worth trialling this for the first month and seeing if I can bring the total travel costs in under £400.

If I book super advance tickets and stick to those times, I can get the travel costs down to £275 a month which would be much better but I will need to be very strict about timings.