There goes the first payment!

Trix07

Well done on working on clearing your debt. i particularly like how committed you are to generating more income and would like some tips on this. How do you go about joing prolific? 

South_coast

Good luck with the application, definitely sounds like an advantage to already have a foot in the door

Bennettxoxo

Thanks themadvix. There is something oddly satisfying about writing everything down and sending off into the forum. And it's a great motivator having so many supportive people all going through the same sort of thing. Really glad I came across this forum
One of the debt collector companies got back to me and said they have passed the case to the client services team (whoever they are) so hopefully that one is sorted. The other company there has been radio silence apart from an automated email to say they'd received my email. As long as they know it's not my debt, I am happy. It is just really infuriating. Buying a house is frustrating enough without inheriting extra stresses. 

Trix07, not actually my debt but has become the source of my stress hopefully it will all be sorted now and they will chase the previous owner and make them pay their debts! 
There are lots of ideas and discussions about earning extra money on the 'boost your income' page. That's where I found out about Prolific Academic. You should be able to just go on their website and click sign up to participate. Takes a little while to complete your profile but once it's done, you just kind of wait around to match criteria for studies and they pop up. Some days I will get a few studies, some days I will get nothing. The studies do fill up really quickly though so you have to be on the ball.

Thanks south_coast. It's just a waiting game for adverts to come out at the moment. My team are lovely. I've been moved around in my service to different hubs/teams about 4 times since I started 7 years ago but I have always been very fortunate to have supportive teams and managers. We have quite a few restructures in our service to "save money"
Every team I've been  has really pushed for me to start new qualifications and to work my way up from an apprentice to the administrator post I'm in now. There isn't really any further career progression in my service now for admin so they're helping me move in a new direction (but obviously without abandoning them ) They want me to get a new job, but without leaving any of them. The joke in the office is that when I decide to leave everyone else will leave too because they won't survive without me

Bennettxoxo

Morning all,

Did everyone have a nice valentines weekend?
How did we all fare against storm Dennis? 
We had no casualties at the house, thank god. The trees outside our house are still standing, the neighbours trees too and our roof and fence panels are still going strong. One of the big trees down the road from our house was not quite so lucky. Looks like it was rotten at the bottom. One big gust of wind and down it came. Just about missed peoples cars, blocked the road but no harm done. Council were out within the hour and the road was cleared. 

Feeling a lot better this week. OH felt a little unwell over the weekend but seems to have recovered too.

Still no sign of the job advert will have to keep checking to see if it appears.

Positive money bits:
- Cashed out £11.19 on Prolific this morning because I'd forgotten to over the weekend. 
- Tilly tidy for my account last week was £1.61.
- Cashed out on OnePulse the other day but forgot to move the money from my PayPal (£3.76) so I've done that today.
- Split the money above into the savings and overpayment so £8.28 into each.
- Scanned any receipts I could find lying around from the last week onto Shoppix, Receipt Hog, ZipZero and Quidco's Clicksnap.
- Paid £8.25 from my ZipZero account towards my British Gas bill and changed my direct debit amount from £10.00 a month to £20.00 (wasn't sure how to do it to start with but finally figured it out). We still owe another £27.31 on the British Gas account but will keep going with ZipZero and then use that to pay off some more. Within the next few months, the direct debit (and us finally moving in and not heating the house with a electric guzzling fan heater when we're working) should sort itself out.
- Small house spend this weekend but it was an absolute bargain so is definitely a positive spend and no one will tell me otherwise! Purchased some tiles to go in the bedroom fireplaces. We have some original tiles in one fireplace but the other one had nothing in so we needed something for that one. Went to B&Q and found some little pale blue/grey tiles in the clearance section that were perfect
Full box of 44 tiles reduced from £32 to £18 and then reduced again to £9. Got to the till and they were actually £7! Perfect tiles for an even more perfect price Another plus because a few of the original tiles have got cracks in them which may not be hidden by the fireplaces we brought. If we can't make them work, we can remove them and just put the new ones we brought in that fireplace too.

Negative money bits:
They're not really negative bits to be honest, they just made me a bit sad. Sad money bits.
- Bills, bills and more bills. Buying your first home is such a learning curve in terms of money. I've paid board to my parents since the day I started work and OH has paid rent so paying to live somewhere isn't a shock to us but now we own our own house, you don't realise how much things cost until that bill appears on your doorstep which hurts a lot more because we're paying them but not actually living there yet! Today I have paid our first water bill, £25.76 (not as bad as I thought) and our council tax bill, £462.83 Now we've paid that, we should be able to set up direct debits for the new financial year when that letter comes through. 

Eventually I will get used to all these bills and when they come out and how much they will be. I meant to set up a incoming and outgoings spreadsheet but at the moment, that is way down my to-do list.

Overpayment pot currently stands at £78.65

themadvix

Have you got a water meter installed? They really help with the cost! When we bought our house (but hadn’t  moved in) it was a real shock to get a bill of £400+ for water for the year.... we switched to dd, which was £40/month but it dropped down to £17 once we’d had the meter installed.

killerpeaty

Sorry to hear that you haven't been well. But it's very exciting that you are getting so much support from your colleagues. Also, I would say that it's very relevant, it'll help you pay all the bills!

I feel you on the paying for utilities when you're not living there. My water is about £40 a month, it's just me! I'm not living there! I I'm sure it'll be worth it so I've got my fingers crossed for both of us.

South_coast

I got emailed this year's water bill today - it must be the week for it! Mine is going up to £28.17 a month and I live alone in a 1-bed flat and spend a few days a week at my BF's - and that's the discounted rate because I can't have a water meter 😢! And don't get me started on the single-occupancy council tax discount only being 25%....!

Bennettxoxo

Yes themadvix, we have a water meter installed. Wasn't our choice and to be honest, we didn't know we had one. The paperwork from the previous owner said their wasn't one. Signed up to Severn Trent and it said we need you water meter reading. We had to go hunting for it 🙄 To start with we were hoping to get rid of it but since it was fitted by the owner before the one we brought off and she has now passed away we couldn't get it removed even if we wanted to. Seems to be the better option for us now anyway since there is only the two of us so might work out better for us. A lot of our water usage at the moment is cleaning tools, cleaning drains out and making tea. Once renovations are done, hopefully it will level out and be a little less.

My team are super supportive killerpeaty and the idea of a extra £££ a year is very appealing to me too. We had a false alarm on the job front last night. My friend text me and showed me the adverts but they're been put out to internal redeployment staff only meaning I can't apply as I'm not in the redeployment category. Not sure if it's a mistake or it'll go to them first and then externally or what. Either way, I've emailed the higher ups and HR to ask if they're coming out externally so I can apply. Jury is out on that one as no one is replying to me 🙄 
Paying the bills are so frustrating while we're not living there. It just feels like dead money. Our electric is about £40 a month at the moment because of the heaters we're using and all the tools but at least I can pay that by DD. At the moment, gas is £0 because a prepayment meter was sneakily put in a month before we exchanged because the previous owner hadn't paid up. British Gas have refused to remove the prepayment meter too. They can check if I meet their "criteria" in another 60 days for it to be removed. I know there is a standing charge for it but not having any radiators currently has made me reluctant to top it up. I will obviously have to eventually top it up and pay the standing charges but for now, they can wait.

There must be something in the water South_coast 😉 I cringed to myself as I wrote that. Won't be cracking anymore jokes 😂 It's rubbish you can't have a water meter but even so, £28 seems a lot for one person. Why is the charge so high? I'm already hating paying council tax. I think I feel it worse because I actually work for the council so they pay me my wage and then I pay it straight back to them in council tax. I thought we would have a bit of a reprieve from paying as our property is currently empty but apparently they no longer have a discount for empty properties so full price it is 🤷‍♂️

twinklie

You really have your head screwed on at 26 to be in the position you are in. I'm 38 and only bought my first house Nov'18, so I'm pretty jealous. Although, I'd been traveling and still hadn't sorted my career out at 26. I'm not grumbling really, I know I'm still in a fab position. I'm planing on being MF by 56 at the latest, but I'd really like to be MF by 50. 

themadvix

South_coast, you might be able to get an assessed usage bill? I don't know much about it - seen them mentioned on here. I think it's where there's no ability to fit a meter, but I'm guessing they take into account how many you are and how much you're there? I don't know if it's offered everywhere though.

Bennett, that sounds like a high water bill for renovations. Have you checked that you haven't got a leak anywhere (just make sure everything's turned off before you leave and read the meter as you go and then when you get back). We did plenty of renovations/decorating before we moved it and our bill wasn't as high as that (but I can't remember where you said you are - I know there are regional variations in cost).

That's rubbish about the prepayment meter - I don't blame you for not topping it up.