Cheery's path to fulfilment - finishing the DIY, looking after myself, appreciating the garden 🌻

rtandon27

Cheery_Daff said:

What's the purpose of tracking PAYE etc separately in YNAB? Genuinely asking - I can't imagine what purpose it would serve except making you annoyed! (Which might be what you're going for, of course, but I suspect there's another reason too 😂)

There was a point when I was self-employed as well as employed and being taxed incorrectly, so I like to have the numbers handy for when/if I return to that state.  I also like to know exactly how much I pay in taxes, perhaps it is a hang-over from across the pond where taxes are paid/refunded once a year based on self-assessment rather than taken off at source.  An added benifit is being able to quip exactly how much I pay each month to uphold the 'free' NHS service, when the entitled staff try to lord over the small amount of power they wield! (4.5% of my gross btw - that more than I pay in council tax each month!)

Cheery_Daff said:

Morning chums! 

We were up bright and early enough to get a free coffee from the Octoppds this morning 😁

Left the house at 7am to walk almost 2 miles to the nearest bus stop - fortunately it's a nice mild,still morning, and we saw a deer on the way, as well as some lovely art in the bus shelter 😊

Now availing ourselves of our free coffee as we are 1.5 hours early for our appointment (it was that or 1.5 hours late - got to love a rural bus service 😂)

Oh Cheery I feel for you, hope those cars of yours are back in service soon!  Those long walks to the nearest bus stop are exactly why I purchased in the middle of a small town.  I could not fathom getting myself to work on my own when we lived on the farm! (I don't drive this side of the pond - L is R and R is L iyswim).  Very glad you have free coffee to fill the time!  It's almost the season when I start taking one in a flask to keep warm on the commute, but there is nothing like a free posh one at the end of the commute to keep the spirits afloat!

Cheery_Daff

Urgh, what a day!

Started well enough,  nice breakfast, made it to appointment, picked up his car - which is actually a transit sized van 🙄 rather than the small 2 seater advertised. We initially refused all extras but had a chance of heart about the insurance excess, so rang up later and fortunately they let us add it on.  So £80, plus £139 to reduce the insurance excess from £4000 total to £250. What a bloody scam 😡 declined their breakdown cover as its covers us in any vehicle (and yes,  I did just check it covers vans, and there aren't exclusions for hired ones). Flipping hope we don't have to call them for a third time this week though!!

Mr C does NOT like the van 😬 we had one for years so he's used to driving one this size, but it's unfamiliar and it's been years since he drove one. 

Plan was to get our own car back this afternoon but sadly the supplier didn't ship the part on time and they didn't get it til after 3 this afternoon, so we can't have it til the morning. 

So tonight's trip will have to be made in the van, and we will have to decide whether Mr C has to drive me to the garage (in a different city to tonight's), or if I dispatch myself first thing on the bus/train (my preference).

Yawn. Will be glad when all this is over!! Not hiring a blithering vehicle again!

beanielou

Great amount of free £££'s.

Cheery_Daff

Thanks Beanie, I agree! 😊

Hmm, tried posting earlier but it disappeared, might have copied it elsewhere, will check.
In the meantime, here's the pots total after the chaos of this week.... I suspect there may have been a couple of quid in cash in charity shops, will check for evidence later, this just from banks...

Food & household: £200.89 left of £350
My spends: £86.80/£150
Mr C spends: £134.60/£150 🧐
Joint treats: £62.45/£200
Diesel & parking: £138.53/£300

Hmm. Food budget is looking good (we haven't done a single big shop this month, not sure what that says about either our eating habits or our store cupboard 😂)

Joint treats is looking worst 😬 But we've had a few supermarket sandwiches on busy days (not too many), and bought some coffees for pals after the funeral.

Pleased with both of our treats budgets (Mr C's supplemented by jacket money of course but there's not been much of that). We've both just been a LOT less frittery this month. Good job really, give the amount we just spend on car-related nonsense 😬

Not many more plans this month. A couple of trips to work for me this week and next, plus yet another leaving do (although I only spent £3.30 at the last one). We'll use some treats budget tomorrow, and some next weekend. And we've still got to collect the other car, although that doesn't come out if any of these pots.

Cheery_Daff

Will start having a think about how to carry on the budget for next month. I've enjoyed the cash book, but it's a bit of a faff flicking between pages for different pots, and it currently doesn't capture the emergency fund 😬 There's also currently no way of reconciling the bank accounts to see the overall total for putting into pots - if I carry on with this I'll have to think about it. 

The alternative is a spreadsheet, I did set one up for the pots. Might be easier to keep track of overall balances in there.

If I decide to do this rather than YNAB I might have to have some consolidation of accounts, and I'm not sure how to treat the credit card, which we pay off in full each month. At the minute in the cash book I have eg a page for food, and note down what we spend in one big list, noting in a column which account it comes fro. Good for tracking the budget, but not the account overall...

Anyway, a problem for tomorrow I think!

Sleep well MSE chums 😊

Tescodealqueen

I have to say although I resisted for a long while the £7.00 approx pm YnAB is worth the hourly rate of time spent sorting out all the other methods I tried so do take your time, health and everything else into consideration when you decide. That’s my tuppenceworth into any debate

rtandon27

@Cheery_Daff - I"m in agreement with @Tescodealqueen ! - I would spend a lot more time on finances if it was by hand rather than using YNAB and the cost spent per hour is tuppence and well below my hourly rate !

joedenise

Another one thinks the YNAB subscription is worth the money.  I've tried spreadsheets and paper methods but YNAB beats them hands down, especially the time involved doing anything manually.  I don't even thing about hourly rate as a retired person!

badmemory

I have a master annual spreadsheet which tells me where I need to be at the end of each month so I get to the end of the year without a minus.  Then a monthly one which is a little more specific which makes sure that I am not going to go overdrawn at some point.  I found once I retired & was no longer paid on the last day of the month life got a bit more complicated.  With most of my income being paid every 28 days it tends to make things a little more interesting.

joedenise

badmemory said:

I have a master annual spreadsheet which tells me where I need to be at the end of each month so I get to the end of the year without a minus.  Then a monthly one which is a little more specific which makes sure that I am not going to go overdrawn at some point.  I found once I retired & was no longer paid on the last day of the month life got a bit more complicated.  With most of my income being paid every 28 days it tends to make things a little more interesting.

With both of us being retired and getting our state pension weekly on different days and I also have a work pension which is paid on the 30th of the month so we have between 9 and 11 paydays a month!  That is complicated but YNAB makes things much easier than trying to do things manually.