Giving every £ a job

savingholmes

Very exciting milestone. 

Glad your holiday has been going well.

Blackcats

cash back has been paid in full by Raisin - it was £55 which I'm really happy about.  We came back from holiday to find a letter from HMRC confirming OH's tax rebate is being paid into his bank account.  I think he'd forgotten about it so when he saw the brown envelope from Inland Revenue he was very unwilling to open it but soon cheered up when he saw that £720 was coming back to him.

I need to add up holiday spends but I know I will be over budget - I'm significantly underspent on groceries so I can probably balance it out.  We usually have the cat sitter visit once a day but eldest blackcat is acting a bit strangely so we wanted her to check on him.  He's eating quite well but doesn't seem to want to go outside so a litter tray has been deployed.  So the cost of cat sitter has doubled but it was worth it for his well-being and our peace of mind.

as I had annual leave booked for the funeral Bank Holiday I've got an extra day's holiday I can take.  I think I'll take Friday as I'm sure the HR system will get in a muddle when I change my hours.  Saving Holmes reminded me that my tax will adjust too over the remainder of the tax year.

plenty of food at home so I'm hoping not to go to the shops this week.  

ladyholly

Mr LH always groans when he sees brown envelopes.

savingholmes

£720 back is fantastic 

leftatthetrafficlights

Good news on the raisin and tax fronts!! 🙌🙌 

Glad you enjoyed the holiday and don't worry about being over budget, particularly as a chunk of that is for additional cat sitting - our pets are priceless and you wouldn't have enjoyed your holiday if you'd spent it worrying about him! 

I'm also hoping to have a shop free week- I'm pretty sure that there are enough salad leaves in the garden for dh lunches and we have watermelon, oranges, pink grapefruit, grapes and apples in the fruit bowl so I'm going to encourage him to use those for brekkie this week rather than buy more berries - let's see how we get on! 😉😂

Blackcats

LadyHolly your OH sounds like mine.  Although brown envelopes are synonymous with bills aren't they?  And the ones that contained the red final demand were the worst and that was usually when I took action to write a cheque to pay the bill and keep my fingers crossed that the cheque wouldn't bounce.   

Thanks SH - yes I'm very pleased with the rebate.

@leftatthetrafficlights - thank you for your reassurance about the cat budget busters.  The older cat is a rescue who had been very cruelly treated so he has a quirky personality.  I do pander to him but he is a very gentle and loving cat who just has some strange habits.

I'm very happy to announce (accompanied by a drum roll) that the council tax is now completely paid.  I've achieved it in 6 months and am pleased with that.  I'm going to try to save £60 a month for the next 6 months which will put me one month ahead when next year's payments start.  I think £60 is achievable but I'll be adjusting to my new income levels so will perhaps need to change this amount.

we had a nice walk at a local garden today.  We had to dodge some showers but the autumn colours were beautiful.  We had a £5 voucher for the cafe and optimistically chatted about getting a slice of cake each to have with our flasks of coffee and tea.  Since when did it cost £4.60 for a slice of Victoria sponge 😱.  Needless to say we shared it.  

leftatthetrafficlights

Brilliant work on the council tax!! 🙌🥳

That cake price is ridiculous! 😳 I would want it to be gold plated for that cost! 😂

ladyholly

Well done on your council tax. I hope it was a nice Victoria sponge at that price.

Generally the only brown envelopes we get are from DWP with information about pension increases and our winter fuel allowance so I think the worry is historic. I know what you mean about writing cheques and hoping they dont bounce. That is behind us now thank godness. I can do without the stress.

Cheery_Daff

£4.60 for a single slice of cake?! 😱😱 Fantastic news on the council tax though!

savingholmes

Well done on the CT and the sharing of the cake!!