Sort out finances after wife lost her job.

lindens

There are lots of videos on You Tube that show you how to list things on ebay and how to avoid the pitfalls.

maman

durzoblint wrote: »

Barclaycard have now put a hold on payments from her card for 2 months, they've stopped the card from being used and told us that if the minimum payment isn't made in 2 months she will default and it'll adversely affect her future credit.

Looking through the bills, a lot of it is last minute grocery shopping,, fuel for her car, salon bills and yes some clothes and shoe shopping.

I already mentioned previously that we don't do a big grocery shop monthly but just dash into the shops and pick up what we feel we need for the month, this might have to change.

She has a job interview next week and i have also spoken to her about reducing her job / grade expectations.

I truly wish her well with this. I do understand that the feeling of personal rejection in redundancies and the application process can be very hard.

BUT (I'm sure you knew that was coming;))

I'm sure you think you're being kind by trying to shield your wife from the financial realities/not putting unnecessary pressure but it has to be done. It is necessary. Whether she gets a job next week or not , your family finances have taken a battering and your wife needs to be part of sorting it out. You've had your own 'light bulb moment' but I'm not sure she has. The last thing that needs to happen is for her to get a job and just bury this episode as if it never happened and go back to the careless spending that's got you here.

You have a great opportunity to overhaul the family finances, pay off debts and save. I'd start with spending diaries. Write everything down, every penny you spend. Then look at it daily/weekly/monthly to see how much of these were genuine needs not wants and cut the wants out. E.g. You need food but you don't need to just pop out to the nearest shop and pay through the nose. That's just because you want to make it easy for yourself.

durzoblint

SadieO wrote: »

These things should be included in your SOA. It's meaningless for you to put £100 for petrol for instance, if you (as a household) are actually spending way more than that. Your SOA should be what is actually being spent.

I wasn't previously aware of what these costs were, but i will be updating the SOA to reflect this. Now that her card has been disabled, i will get better visibility on what her outgoings really are.

My wife isn't totally onboard with this, and it has been a struggle getting her to accept this. She was upset when Barclaycard said her card will get cancelled even she she resumes payments.

My only way of addressing this in the short term is by not enabling her.

enthusiasticsaver

I agree that the two of you together need to come up with a plan to tackle this. For relatively high earners (assuming your wife earnt a reasonable wage) you have a lot of debt but I am not sure if this has built up since she lost her job or whether you were overspending even before that. There is a lot of fat to trim from that soa as others have said. I won't go through that again.

It is actually good that Barclaycard have stopped her card as she cannot continue to spend on it when she has no income and just runs out of money. You both need to budget better and stick to it. Don't just give her the money to pay her commitments. She needs to show you what those are or she needs to get a job (any job).

durzoblint

enthusiasticsaver wrote: »

I agree that the two of you together need to come up with a plan to tackle this. For relatively high earners (assuming your wife earnt a reasonable wage) you have a lot of debt but I am not sure if this has built up since she lost her job or whether you were overspending even before that. There is a lot of fat to trim from that soa as others have said. I won't go through that again.

It is actually good that Barclaycard have stopped her card as she cannot continue to spend on it when she has no income and just runs out of money. You both need to budget better and stick to it. Don't just give her the money to pay her commitments. She needs to show you what those are or she needs to get a job (any job).

My loan existed before she stopped working and was accrued from shared overspending, the moment we realised she was going to have to resign I asked her to consolidate all her debt into a single loan so we could focus on those and then asked her to stop using her credit card.

Things that couldn't be changed such as her mobile contract, car payments and iphone loan i agreed i'll continue to pay.

Unfortunately, I had already committed to some expenses towards the end of the year such as christmas holiday trip and they couldn't be cancelled so my credit card bills started to pile up.

So i guess we both were overspending.

Pollycat

durzoblint wrote: »

My loan existed before she stopped working and was accrued from shared overspending, the moment we realised she was going to have to resign I asked her to consolidate all her debt into a single loan so we could focus on those and then asked her to stop using her credit card.

Things that couldn't be changed such as her mobile contract, car payments and iphone loan i agreed i'll continue to pay.

Unfortunately, I had already committed to some expenses towards the end of the year such as christmas holiday trip and they couldn't be cancelled so my credit card bills started to pile up.

So i guess we both were overspending.

Read up about loan consolidation on the main website.
It may not have been the best option.

As for asking your wife to stop spending on her credit card - it sounds like she didn't take notice of your request.
Time to stop making excuses for her.

Mnd

Sorry if im being a bit dense here. In your SOA you have overdraft payment of £500. Shouldn't this be in the unsecured list,, because it doesnt say how much your overdraft is anywhere

durzoblint

Mnd wrote: »

Sorry if im being a bit dense here. In your SOA you have overdraft payment of £500. Shouldn't this be in the unsecured list,, because it doesnt say how much your overdraft is anywhere

I have updated the SoA with the Overdraft under Unsecured loans

I will be freeing up some funds shortly which I plan to use to cover the overdraft and part of the balance of my credit card. I will also put aside some funds to cover her Barclaycard payments for 3 months in case she doesn't get a job before the hold on the payments elapses.

Mnd

Right, so you have £500 as your overdraft and with a £500 monthly payment. So that would clear that releasing uo £500..that should help

HampshireH

It's a shame she isnt on board and some of your posts truly reflect this.

* despite being unemployed she continued to spend her credit card on the assumption you will pay it.

* she continues to socialise to a certain degree and have you pay for salon trips (completely unnecesary) on the assumption you will pay for it

You say she resigned from her job. This may make claiming benefits harder as unless it means their eligibility criteria for special circumstances she has chosen to be unemployed (obviously we dont know the circumstances and this may not apply)

Rather than going down the route of telling her she can't do stuff etc because she isnt working

Perhaps change tact. Go through it all. Show her expenses compared to yours and stress the emotional toll this is taking and how much stress you are being put under to sort this out whilst she seems indifferent to changing her spending behaviours