My accountability Diary for £42k!!!!

KellyAS

So I checked my balances earlier and because I did a BT to pay off some of the Barclaycard 1 they are not taking my payment this month. That leaves me £118 spare so I have just paid it towards the MBNA card. That means only £50.44 to go to get the overall total to under £38k! MBNA DD payment is over £70 and due out on 31st July so I might make my target this month after all! 

KellyAS

Not doing too bad this week. Met my Mum and sister in town yesterday, Mum paid for us all to go on the bus tour then down the pier then got the boys some lunch. Just had to pay for parking and the council are offering 1 hour free when you pay for 1 hour so I got 4 hours parking for £2.40 (should have been £5!) plus £3.85 on lunch. I'm very lucky and grateful to have such a generous Mum. Of course I did offer her my share but she won't take it so I think I'll add it to her 'pot' instead.

Had a few orders yesterday following a bit of free marketing I did so about £100 earnt by me so far this week, hopefully more orders to come by Friday too.

One of our cars has been running sluggish (Mr K says it's due to the short once a week journeys we did during lockdown). He took it to some friends to be checked (handy being an ex mechanic!) and we have a diagnosis which hopefully means just £20 plus a day for him to clean the relevant part and it should be OK. Worst case scenario is replacement part costs £205 so that will be covered by the money I put to one side for him last week! Fingers crossed we won't need to use it.

Eldest needs school shoes ready for September and I am tempted to get them from Clarkes. They are guaranteeing fit until the end of Feb 2021 and replacing for free if they outgrow them. I know they are more expensive (a lot more!) but they also seem to last him longer than the cheapo ones from the supermarket. And bonus is he really likes a pair they have so he will want to put them on (instead of arguing with me over it every morning!) Will have to do some research.

Went shopping yesterday and although I stuck to my list I definitely spent more than I wanted to. I did a full inventory of the kitchen stock and replaced everything that was getting low/finished but they also had a lot of offers on things that I usually buy so I thought while I've got the money in the account I should get them as that will save me more in the long run. I did manage to avoid the biscuits though. Yay me! Haven't had time to make the muffins or cookies yet, maybe tomorrow.

Have completed the furniture ombudsman form so that is sent. Fingers crossed we get some good news from that. Checked the CCJ status online but it's now saying no judgement has been made which is incorrect so I need to find my letters and recheck.

Not happy with Santander. Got my statement through today and they are charging me standard interest on the balance transfer! Have sent a message to them to find out why (tried to call but the automated thing said to do it online) Barclaycard is now offering me 0% so I can transfer it back if I have to but I need to find out what's going on first and demand a refund if they are not going to honour the letter. Unfortunately I no longer have the letter. Note to self, keep everything in future until you're sure!

Mortgage payment went out today so at least we're back on track with that.

KellyAS

End of the month and I made my target! Yay!
Not without some hiccups but we have got to £37981.06!

Heard back from Santander. They say that the BT should have been made before 15th July and I did it on 19th July therefore they are sorry but I missed the offer! I maintain that my letter said end of July but I've had enough of the bank so I have transferred it back to BC (0% til Feb 22 and I double double checked that offer!!) and I am going to close the credit card and transfer the 4 accounts I have with them elsewhere. They have been increasingly useless over the years so now it's time to go. Have heard good things about Metro Bank (and you can take dogs in which is always good!) so will look at them for a business & personal account. Also will check what banks pay you to transfer too. Free money is good.

So that's the Santander card gone, albeit with a higher balance now due to transfer fees and interest. So today I have the DD payment of £75.30 to MBNA plus an extra £7.30 to get the balance down to a nice round number, and £2.88 to BC to round that balance down.

Made my banana bread last night, it is yummy!

SuperHung

I am subscribed to your journey and wanted to say a quick thanks. Your thread has been inspirational and I am quite impressed by your positivity in clearing your debts.

KellyAS

Well it's been a while since I last posted, it's been quite a year!

So hubby got furloughed again! But it's ok as thanks to the online markets this Christmas I needed him to do my deliveries as I have had my best year in business so far. In just 2 weeks in November I turned over £6k and had to close my books to new orders as I couldn't take on any more!! Some of that I had to use to restock and keep me going for next year but that's usually my turnover in a whole year so I am extremely happy with it and hoping that I now have a good footing and have gained many new customers to continue increasing profits for next year. I won't lie, I was very stressed trying to get everything out on time and had 2 weeks of bed at any time from 12-2am, then up at 6.30/7am with 12 hour work days plus looking after the family (unable to get help in due to covid) but it was all worth it! Good job I love what I do! I learned lots of lessons about pricing properly for postage! And all feedback so far has been 5* reviews on my website and social media pages. Fingers crossed it continues.

Heard back from the furniture ombudsman and apparently they agree with B&Q that there is no fault with the floor and I have lost all fight in me to deal with it so we will be saving up (again!) to get it replaced properly. It really needs to be done asap as it's so hard to keep it clean with the way it is. Oh well, it is what it is.

Payments - from my annuals fund I have managed to pay outright for insurance, MOT and tax for all 3 vehicles this year which has made me very happy! and it's saved me £35.43 to the DVLA each month so that's going towards the debts.
On the downside our food bill seems to be through the roof with everyone at home so need to get on top of that.
I also managed to pay for all birthday and Christmas presents with my gifts savings pot so no additional debt there.

Debts
I have just paid £1k to my Mum towards our £13k debt with her
Cleared one of the 0% balances with MBNA
Moved a few expiring 0% deals to other cards with new 0% offers
January will be our last payment towards the sofa so £63.52 a month saved there to go towards other debt

Debt currently stands at £35879.17 which is 14% repaid

Goals
By the end of next year I would like to pay my Mum back £2k and have our overall debt at 30% repaid which means paying around £6.5k towards it (£541.75 a month which I think is achievable as long as we don't take any more salary hits like this year, currently paying around £465 a month, will up Mum's payments by £67 plus the £35.43 DVLA saving takes me to £567 ish)
I have checked my savings pots and added 10% to all prices from this year to make sure I have enough and I don't think I need to up the savings payments just yet.
I want to have at least £12k turnover in my business next year, I know that's probably not a lot to some people but to me it is and would make me very happy. I have some plans to increase productivity that will need some investment initially but will save me so much time in the long run so more time to make means more stock to sell! 

KellyAS

So business is going well, I have been managing to hit my income targets so far. I had to delay reopening by 2 weeks due to home schooling but now the husband is furloughed (again!) it's a bit easier even if it is me still having to do all the logging on and off and supervising school work still!.

This month the husband had the lowest pay he's had in a long time because of the furlough. Luckily I had built us a little buffer but it's still a tight one this month. Hopefully next month will be better as he was called in to cover sickness during that wage period so fingers crossed it's nearly 100% pay.

Good news is the sofa debt is now clear so that's another £65.52 towards the debts.

Outstanding balance is currently £35021.74 which is 17% repaid, 3% in less than 2 months is right on target for 30% paid by the end of the year. Looking at that figure makes me want to find £21.75 to pay to bring it under £35k! But I have one more payment of £51.02 coming out on Monday to the second Barclaycard which will make it less than £35k! Yay!

I am desperate to have a clear out of all the boys old clothes but finding the time is difficult at the moment. Talking of boys the littlest has just woken up so I gotta go

remote_control

We've spent lots of Dec and Jan having a big clear out, didn't think we had anything left to ebay but we've had a few sales which has been lovely and a bit more space.
How are the boys at bedtime? Could you do their clothes while they spend 15 mins putting their pjs on?! (or is that just my children?!). 
Glad to hear all the debts are going down

Parkyp

hi, I’ve just subscribed to your diary. OMG what an achievement you have made since your diary started and add  Covid year in to try to scupper your plans. Great that your business has done so well. 

I think parents have been pushed to their limits with home schooling I take my hat off to you all. Such a confusing year for you wee one not really getting the proper routine of school. 

I love rounding up like you, I do it with my spending on my debit card and any bills I pay I always make sure it’s a nice round number strangely satisfying for me 😂😂. Good luck, keep it going.

KellyAS

Thank you for your comments remote_control and Parkyp  
Unfortunately my boys need 121 help with all of bedtime, one is only 20 months and apparently the 5 year old loses all use of his hands when it comes to doing something like getting changed  !!!

So happy schooling will resume in 2 weeks! Hopefully I will finally get some of my to-do list done! School uniform still fits so nothing to spend there.

This month is a little tight, I have about £7 left to get us through the week but all bills are paid and cupboards are full so it shouldn't be a problem with only 2 days til payday. The dog van doesn't have any fuel in but it just means he'll have to be walked round here (which I always do but hubby seems to need to drive somewhere everytime) 

Now the business is doing well I have more stock to hold which means that I need to get the spare room organised so I'm not climbing over stuff to get boxes, print bits etc! Browsing the local selling sites for bits that will do the job but also need to order some stuff from Ikea for the kitchen (birthday present from my Mum). Was planning to use their planner then see what I can get for cheap locally.

KellyAS

Forgot to add last time that Sky put our bill up from £18 to £34 a month!! Just got off the phone to them and have got it back down to £20 a month (following annual price increase in April so back to what we were paying). Saves me the hassle of having to call BT to move to them as it would be the same monthly cost anyway.

Also took up a mobile deal with them as my phone is so ancient and cracked beyond repair (one of the kids dropped something heavy and sharp on it!) and I need one to take decent photos for my business as well as having a good amount of memory. So SIM cost is still £5 a month for me but now I have to pay £30 a month for a phone too. It's the phone I wanted and the best deal I could l find so I don't feel too bad about the extra spending.

That's 2 things I can tick off my to-do list.

Home schooling is hard today. He does not want to do the work 

Pay day tomorrow!