The Mental Debt Struggle...

Cherryfudge

Keedie said:

I need to focus on what will make me happy at work, and disregard chasing any specific salary. It always helps to have money, but feeling at peace within oneself is priceless. 

That's so true. Once you aren't so exhausted and juggling so much, the pressure to spend will decrease too

Keedie

Yes I hope so @Cherryfudge. Things are getting a bit better in terms of spending and keeping on top of the impulsive spendings scenarios. I've just been experiencing a lot of anxiety. Which makes it hard to sleep, and then the bone deep fatigue makes me likely to comfort spend. But I am trying to rationalise things before I make spendy decisions. 

However, I have done a £3,000 balance transfer from Barclaycard to MBNA as it was cheaper than doing a money transfer from Barclaycard to my bank account and then repaying Barclaycard. And the balance transfer was for 20 months (so August 2026), so it was longer too. It's all going through now, so I'll be able to see exactly where I am debt wise at the end of year. I'll concentrate on Barclaycard for additional snowball payments as there's Barclaycard Plan 2 to consider which ends in November 2025.

I've thought of this decision since I've been signed off work, as I don't want to have any additional pressure next year in terms of debt repayments. It means that if MBNA is still 1% minimum payment, I'll be able to pay £50 a month to cover more than the minimum payment and keep Barclaycard at £100 a month. That will all fit in with the £150 a month that I was paying up to November 2024. 

beanielou

Good news on the BT. 

AntoMac

20 months gives a nice bit of breathing space Keedie. With the minimum payment being only 1% that looks a good move as it adds in flexibility for you. Good move. My offers seem to only be 12 months at the moment so I’m not bothering for now

Sun_Addict

Just caught up with your diary and my goodness what a lot has been going off! So sorry to hear how shoddily your workplace has treated you. This behaviour would not be tolerated where I work. We have to be in the office 3 days a week but reasonable adjustments are in place for those with disabilities so they don't have to meet the target. Some do 1 or 2 days or are full time homeworkers. Good move to go off sick and get some money out of them while you take time out to consider your next step. They don't deserve you it's definitely time to find an employer that will appreciate you.

Your son is a real credit to you as always, he's got a good head on his young shoulders that's down to you. 

I hope something positive happens soon on the work front.

Keedie

I've been a bit all over the place in the last few days, and struggled to figure out the correct temperature for the flat, as I underestimated the chill and now my joints are all sore. I think I've finally got a balance on things, as my son is always hot and complaining about the heating being on, and I'm always cold and sore. But I do also need to be mindful of the fact that the energy cap thingy is rising again January 2025, so I need to figure out if I'm going to fix my rates or whatever. It's all a bit of a headache to be honest. I find those comparison thingies confusing, even though I checked out the MSE Energy Club. It doesn't really look like I'm saving any money or maybe I'm just not looking at it right??

I've made peace with the work situation and drafted my resignation letter. I have a meeting with my line manager and Deputy Director tomorrow and I am nervous about it. I've never quit a proper job before. Just ran off from jobs when I was a student and things didn't fit with my schedule. But as an actual fully fledged bill paying adult, I've had two jobs since I graduated university, with this being the second. I left my last job via voluntary redundancy after nearly 12 years, but there was a max exodus with loads of other people doing that, so it wasn't too bad. And the £16k redundancy payout helped massively. The job market doesn't seem to be that great at the moment. My brother in law told me that he had nearly 400 applicants for a customer service role in his company and he was blown away by how overqualified some of the applicants were. So I am incredibly anxious about everything 🤦🏾‍♀️😬🤦🏾‍♀️😬. But I know that I am making the right decision. My son told me to take a break, but don't get comfortable with not working, as it doesn't suit me and he's worried I'll get very depressed again as I like to work, I just need to do it somewhere that isn't toxic. So yeah, you're right @Sun_Addict, he does have a good head on his young shoulders 🤗. 

As for the balance transfer, everything went through, but I should have done some googling beforehand, as it looks like the minimum payment for MBNA is now 2.5% and not 1% 🥴. I was trying to figure out my repayments, and did the googling afterward and discovered that 😬. But I'll make it work, I just had to juggle a few things in my new budget, but I think ironically, that has helped me with everything. Also, @AntoMac the only reason why it was a 20 month offer is because I have not held a balance on MBNA since June 2023. So they're enticing me back. When I did have a balance with them, they only offered 12 months at a time for a money or balance transfer. But yes @beanielou, it's definitely good news to have been able to do the balance transfer. I'm very grateful that it was even an option. My next 0% interest plan on Barclaycard ends on 1 November 2025, so it takes the pressure off me for the first half of the year, and I can just concentrate on getting back on my feet.

As my debt has changed, I sat down the other day and worked out what I wanted my overall balance to be as of 31 December. I had £5,350 on Barclaycard, £3,090 on MBNA including the £90 transfer fee and £293 on the Argos Card as I recently brought a new combi microwave, a 4 place plate set, a kettle and microwave in the Black Friday sales. I had to throw the other toaster away as those stupid moths were eating the breadcrumbs 🤢, and the kettle wouldn't descale no matter how hard I tried and the microwave didn't heat the middle of things. Anways, the overall total was £8,733. I wanted it to be £8,500 by New Year's Eve, and so I made a PAD of £158, which felt really good. I paid £90 to MBNA so that balance is now £3,000, £18 to Argos Card, so that is £275 and £50 to Barclaycard so that is now £5,300, for a total of £8,575. I reduced the Barclaycard fixed payment to £75, so once that clears at the end of the month, it will be £8,500 to enter into 2025.

I've designed a debt free tracker, and each icon will be worth £85 (1% of the debt). As I'll be paying £150 a month towards my debts, that will be £1,800 or 21.18% in 2025 with no additional payments. I'm going to see if I can pick up some surveys, side hustles, cash back and stuff to aim for clearing £2,312 overall in 2025, which will be 27.2% of my debt. That's an extra £512 that I have 12 months to find, so I think it is definitely feasible towards the latter part of the year especially. That's my own personal target. The money owed by my sister is like a further 12.8%. So I should end 2025 with 40% of the debt gone. In an ideal world it would be 50%, but considering that I am soon to be unemployed, 40% based on my sister doing her thing seems more of a rational target. 

The £150 in fixed direct debits for the debt is for MBNA and Barclaycard only, so I need to squirrel away some money to pay the £275 to Argos Card by 14 June 2025. My brother gave me the last part of what he owes me today, so that pot now has £84.51/£275 which is 30.73% saved so far. Once the Argos Card is cleared, I will then focus on Barclaycard. I've got a transfer from Monzo to Chase tomorrow for £25 to go into the debt pot, as I had set aside £100 for debt repayments, but as the fixed payment to Barclaycard will be £75, I will move it to the pot for the Argos Card. That means as of tomorrow, I will have £109.51 in there, which is 39.82% of what I need. I should have paid only £25 to Barclaycard instead of £50 and left the direct debit at £100 for one more month, and sent £38 instead of £18 to Argos Card, for a remaining total of £250 instead of £275. But I didn't figure that out until after I'd moved everything around 😂, so this is my workaround. 

This debt plan feels a lot better as I will still be able to work on clearing it, but in a way that is kinder to myself. And doing savings challenges will make it fun whilst I am clearing the debt target. I've also got a good plan for the sinking funds, to make it easier to manage, and I am focussing on less things to have more flexibility.

I've given up on an emergency fund and actively saving for one, when there is the Help to Save account that I can utilise if there is a genuine emergency. But as I would lose some of the bonus for doing so, I'm less likely to frit it away. Whereas I've always been dipping into my emergency fund for non-emergencies. So I will have a light version of an emergency fund, that will be more of a buffer to use if something crops up, like a budget miscalculation or unexpected expense that is not an actual emergency. The target for that is £500, and I have £108.74 saved so far, and will add £25 a month to this pot and the money from my Chase round-ups will go in there too when it matures in June 2025. Currently the round-ups is £147.58 and I reckon it'll be around £200 with another 6.5 months of spending.

Anyways, this long monologue is in place of a Sunday Summary, as everything has changed. When I figure out exactly what I am doing goals wise, I'll be able to restart them as I do find them useful to hold myself accountable.

Makingabobor2

Sounds as though you have found some good solutions.Hope all goes to plan. Surveys would be a good option for some extra cash. Will give you something to occupy yourself whilst not working as well. 

LadyWithAPlan

Hope all goes to plan and it sounds like you had enough time to figure out the right next steps for you are re the awful office situation has been.
Onward and upwards!

KajiKita

Decision made then. I hope it will make you feel lighter once you have handed your notice in. I assume you will stay on sick for your notice period, apart from handing your laptop in etc?  

Looking forward, and perhaps don’t worry too much about what I write below just yet, but might be useful when you are ready 😊

I always see a job search as being partly a question of luck - are the vacancies available when you are? 

Also, I wouldn’t worry about BiL’s experience - you have a very different skills set to that of a customer service person which is often seen as an entry level role - not that it necessarily is, but that’s why so many people will apply for it. 

I will have been out of work 10 weeks tomorrow when I start my new job. 4 of those were me having a rest! It would be worth you looking at job seekers allowance - it lasts six months and you don’t get paid it for the first 7 days anyway. 

Get your CV updated now, if you can - often so much easier when still in the headspace of the current role. Get it uploaded to CV L1brary and update it every week (you can just change the date in the file title) as that keeps you at the top when recruiters are looking for candidates. 

Work your LI profile and contacts. Decide what your USP is (for me it is that I am a catalyst for ‘unsticking’ previously unsolvable problems and getting previously siloed teams working well together - so not a technical thing I am selling - an intangible that is hard to recruit for). You will have one too 😊 Use that to craft an LI post when you use the LI green circle and open up your profile to recruiters. 

This one might sound a bit woolly and eccentric. 😉 Try using a vision board for what you want next as per what debtfreewannabe321 has shared. I did one for my new job, and so far it looks like I am getting everything I asked for …. 😊🤞

Sending huge hugs and best wishes for a happier and more settled future. 

KK

Cherryfudge

Will be thinking of you and your meeting - you've got this! I've been in a job that changed around me and went, in my case, from being perfect to making me ill. It wasn't my fault and it isn't yours - they clearly haven't demonstrated an understanding of reasonable adjustments so you are quite in order to give them notice. After all, it's a two-way relationship and they say people don't leave jobs, they leave managers. You have shown yourself more than capable and worked at a higher level than you were supposed to, but they've let you down. So move on into your new freedom with your head held high. You'll sort the money and your health will have time to stabilise.

And @KajiKita, all the best for your new post!