Resourcefulness: The budgeter's friend

PennysIntoPounds

Doesn't sound scanty to me.
As I have unfortunately been saying to several people lately as the world and his dog seem to have caught covid, remember that viruses wipe your body out for longer than the feeling ill period and be extra kind to yourself!

Suffolk_lass

Blackcats said:

Well quelle surprise after I'd graduated from buying things from 'the book' (the catalogue) I fully embraced the concept of the store card.  The credit limit was relatively low but a cycle of spend a lot, pay a bit, spend as much as available stayed with me for years.  Then I progressed (oh the irony) to high credit limit credit cards.  My m b n/a card had a £15,000 credit limit and was used to entirely fund a 3 week trip to Oz including using it to withdraw cash whilst there.  Now I'm the type of grown up woman who sets a grocery budget and mostly sticks to it. 😇

Going back to CC & Store cards for a moment - Mr Sl had one of those and so did I. Back when he was made redundant he maxed out his £15k and I, my £12k limit on cash advances at 0% interest with zero fee to set up for 12 months. We moved the cash to an interest bearing account and earned good money for meagre times, paying the minimum each month, and repaying £27,000 in full before any interest was added. A single moment of needs-must clarity that made the lightbulb flicker in a way it never really had, before that!

foxgloves

@PennysIntoPounds - Yes, that can be very true of viruses. I think all the resting I continued to do in the 2nd week helped me recover. I felt too poorly to do much the first week, but as I started to feel better, I made sure to sit & read every afternoon so as to stop & rest. 

@Suffolk_lass - Thinking to do that was indeed a decent lightbulb flicker. That wouldn't have occurred to me. Even once I'd got a credit card (which was after the storecard), I was determined I'd only use it for loyalty vouchers & pay it off every month. Oh hahahahaha! Had over £800 of interesting boutique-y clothes on it in the blink of an eye. To be fair though, once the Big Major Massive lightbulb DID finally ping on, it stayed on & has been burning bright ever since, thank goodness.

Suffolk_lass

How we come to it, matters less than the fact that each of us has got here. And in my case, staying loyal to this site, and keeping up with various others over the years, has kept the faith, not to mention an absence of the dimmer switch! I am more of an advocate now than I ever was!

foxgloves

Hello Diary Readers,
Pleasant day - combination of useful stuff & leisure. Budget-helping bits as follows:
*Mr F's day off so we treated ourselves to a modest breakfast at our favourite big garden centre - Personal Spends cash so budget-neutral. Took Saturday's crossword & managed to get a few answers in.....probably the caffeine!
*Managed to buy the items I'd been hoping to find - some plant pot holders for conservatory plants. Have been making do with oddments for years, never have enough over the colder months when my geranium friends are brought indoors but recent attempts to find something plain, non-plastic & at a price I'm prepared to pay have been unfruitful. Search over! Found the exact ones I was hoping for & bought 7 (House & Garden Savings Pot).
*Also spotted smallish items from the Presents list so bought those. One is something I usually have to buy online which adds £5 onto the price for delivery so a saving made there plus stuff crossed off.
*Mixed up a sourdough ready for baking tomorrow.
*Changed bed linen - washing machine rtg if we suddenly get a free electricity hour this week, not that I am expecting one.
*Discussed weekend plans & decided that apart from a fairly functional little trippette into town on Saturday morning, we will stay in & move our planned outing to Monday which Mr F has booked off for our anniversary. 
*Did the numberwork on latest bill from the Cephalopods. We spent £23-57 less on energy this month than we did in the same billing period last year & paid more than we were charged, which has taken the credit on our account to £576. That's nearly £200 more credit than we had at the same time last year, which has confirmed that our monthly payments did need to be reduced. As their request to INCREASE our dd by 60% a few months ago (which I contested & refused) has always seemed totally random & not based on any figures pertaining to either our energy use or account, I decided to have a look at our actual costs per month compared to the projected estimated amount on their AI balance forecasting tool. It's clear to me that this is where that request for a higher dd came from. Apart from the estimate for July & August, where the projected figures were very close to what we actually paid, the other months have been over-estimated. The biggest differences were April (estimate £135-60, actual cost £69-16) & May (estimate £101-08, actual cost £66-81). There was also a disparity this month, when we used £86-81's worth of energy against an estimated figure of £124-33. I think this is more understandable in that my usage figures for October 2024 shows that we did use more gas, so obviously it was colder & the central heating was coming on more throughout the day. I can find no logic to the high AI estimates for April & May. We turn off the CH at the end of March - if any evenings early in April are particularly chilly, we might have the living room stove lit for an hour or two on an evening, but this is infrequent. As for May, we would never use any heating. I assume that the online forecaster tool combines info from our household energy use over the past few years plus insider knowledge as to energy cap rises, etc, so I don't know what caused such high estimates for months in which have the CH switched off. Ah well, I suppose it just shows that it's worth keeping an eye on things, especially if there appears to be no logical reason for monthly dd to be increased. Latest request of course has been for it to decrease quite significantly so as my Dad was fond of saying, these things "all come out in the wash".
That was very boring, I'm sure, for anyone not identifying as a bit of an energy bill nerd! 
*Another on-plan meal tonight which feels like a 'free' one - the leftover Indian butternut & chickpea curry I batch cooked last week with a portion of Mr F's lovely home made jacket wedges.
*Did a few surveys. I'd love to reach my old £40 cash-out target from PA this month. Am just over £36 atm, so it's possible.
*Took a bowlful of veggie scraps down to the wormery as they have scoffed everything again. There's defo going to be a decent tray of compost in there ready for use so will try to remember to remove that at the weekend.
Defo time for some reading now. I'm reading 'Down Cemetery Road' by Mick Herron, which I am finding very intriguing. Have added the next one in the series to my library wishlist.
Hope everyone's had a decent day - if not, I hope you manage a calm evening. 
F x

PennysIntoPounds

On top of your deductions never underestimate utility companies thinking that your money should be earning them rather than you interest

Glad to hear Mr F has booked your anniversary off 😊

Eta maybe 'deductions' should be 'what you've deduced', that was poor phrasing from me in a conversation about bill increases!

rtandon27

Atm our utility company has one month of last year's average upfront plus 2.29 - you can bet that that I'll be getting the 2.29 back ASAP 😉 😀 - the rep I spoke to last time for my 40 pound refund tried to give me a BS line about my account so I calmly told her I'm happy to take my business elsewhere if she didn't do as I asked.

foxgloves

Yes, I am aware they are making interest on our credit balance instead of us, but compared to an earlier period when I would request refunds, I find I do like that extra cushion sitting there for Winter so we can be more generous with our heating use if we get a cold snap. Neither of us are chilly mortals but I can't stand cold hands & feet!
F

Suffolk_lass

Our cushion is currently £997.70. Our usage averages under £40 in summer (it will be double that this month as I have two oil filled radiators, under my desk and in the bathroom, that are deployed before the heating is turned on).

Imminently, the (electric) aga will be turned on and our consumption goes back up to £400+ a month. So November to April, I may need to top up in April. 

You can imagine what that does to their algorithm! Just saying...

foxgloves

@Suffolk_lass - I should think that just about explodes their algorithm! Just shows there's no 'one size fits all' approach to these things.