SOA - Help/advice required

pgudge

Hi all,

as everyone does, can I first give a huge thank you for the help and advise you people are giving. You are changing lives, for the better.

I am at the stage where I have higher outgoings than incoming and need advise, on what I believe is bad money management and laziness.

* Removed Figures *

Total debut around £*. The student (although costing more with interest) is not really affecting me as its always been taken from me before I get my wage). I have thought of getting an loan @ 6.7% over 3 years which will bring the monthly payment down over the 3 items above, but that is because I am also extending the Tesco loan, as there is only 2 years left. The thought of being debt free in 3 years is appealing, but this will only get me about an extra £40/month.

Is there any other options, or any advise to help me.

Other things like Sky, Mobile and bills are already as low as I can get them to be honest.

Thank you again for your help and advice.

DFW1701

GeorgeUK

Hi - welcome to the board.

First order of business is to put up a detailed SOA of all your income and expenditure. Then we should be able to see where any savings could be made.
http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/announcement.php?f=7&a=90

Probably best to do that in the morning (afternoon) though

For the loans - are you allowed to overpay on them? And filling in the missing APR details would be good if you can get the data.

George

In_Search_Of_Me

Hi welcome! Its really hard to help without yur SOA or an idea of whats what! You dont have to post it but you do need to find out as much about your loand etc as you can - ie are loans front loaded, can you overpay & by how much, how much can you pay if you can etc. It would be a good idea to check your credit rating too so if you have hight APR's you may be able to get a 0% or long life of balance deal & save on the dreaded interest. Th emain thing is to sit down & look at why you have the debt & think of strategies for changing the behaviour, get to know the site & start saving money!! YOu could also do extra work, surveys etc to bost your income & check insurance etc to see if you have the cheapest. EVen things like contact lenses can be got for discount prices - its just about becoming more savvy!! Welcome to DFW!

pgudge

Thanks guys.

A full SOA would probably not help too much as I have already knocked back a lot of things, I canceled all my magazine subscriptions, and I changed phone contract to better free sms and xnetwork minutes saving me about £10 a month on my last contract!, and so on.

The only things I have not changed is the electric, I am currently on a Token meter (this was in from the previous owner, and I have not changed to a normal meter) I heard that tokens does cost more than normal DD but not sure how much. Having to goto the shops all the time to get tokens is a real eye opener on the amount of electric I use. Like falling asleep on the sofa and leaving the house lights on, I do notice i'm buying electric more than remembering to turn stuff off. Plus at winter I tend to save a little more as I turn off the big pond pump and install a smaller one, saving me about £10/month on electric.

My regular/static outgoings are
* Removed figures *

Then there is Petrol, food, dinner, the odd lottery ticket and Fee/Charges from HSBC. I claimed back my charges about 4 months back, and got about £10 less that what I had worked out they owed me. But now I am getting charged the £25 fee again and also a £16 Arrangement fee too!

My wage covers this to the penny, so some months if I have to put extra petrol in, or I spend a little more in the super market I sometimes go over, some times there is about £6 available so I escape charges.

In Search Of Me, regarding why? Most of my debts are old, I have had them for a long time and they are a mixture of student support, new house, wedding money, etc etc. I haven't really bought anything big for over a few years now, its just been a journey of paying things off and not saving anything.

HTH's

p.s. its scary publishing your life!

Gemmzie

Don't worry about it being scary, most of us have done it

Regarding Sky, can you not have their internet? It's free or £5 a month, would save a bit.

pgudge

Gemmzie wrote: »

Don't worry about it being scary, most of us have done it

Regarding Sky, can you not have their internet? It's free or £5 a month, would save a bit.

I am already saving a bit with my current provider via referrals, and I download far too much for Sky's FUP. I am saving about £4 off my fee a month, and that should go up to £5 next month.

Thanks

Gemmzie

I have their £5 a month one and download a lot, only get chocked a little but it saves quite a bit so it's worth it

riddlesticks

pgudge wrote: »

My regular/static outgoings are
BT Line Rental £12
Internet £18.13 Virgin do a phone and Broadband deal for £19.95
Sky £55 (I do watch and record lots of TV and don't really want to lose any channels) Thats fair enough but could you cut it out for the time being. When your finances are a bit better then you could think about going back to this package. Do Sky offer a freeview service. I have been with Virgin for years and have now reduced to their freeview service. I have kept the same box and although I have all the freeview channels they still give me a few extra channels. I can also still use their catch up and demand service so maybe you could keep all these things if Sky offer freeview.
Car Insurance £71 (the last quote was slightly cheaper, so I maybe changing this very soon.) Try compare, uswitch and moneysupermarket.

Then there is Petrol, food, dinner, the odd lottery ticket and Fee/Charges from HSBC. I claimed back my charges about 4 months back, and got about £10 less that what I had worked out they owed me. But now I am getting charged the £25 fee again and also a £16 Arrangement fee too! What for? Have you got an O/D? If so and you are going over it then you could think of also transferring the debt on this to a 0% CC and hopefully this will stop you getting these charges.!

Just a few points made above. You could try transferring some of the debt to a 0%CC. If you are going to do this then you need to stick to your guns and not use the CCs for anything else. Also make sure you budget and stick to it. I know you have said you cant cut back anywhere but do you shop at the cheaper shops and do you get your petrol from the cheapest place?

Lastly just wanted to say well done you for posting and good luck with clearing your debts.

xxx