help need advice on trying to clear depts and provide

silkysmooth69

total invcome per month 1250
725 hubbys wages
130 child benifit
360 child tax working tax

rent 375(including arrears)
c tax 140
water 57.00
tv liceince 25
gas 65
electric 65
phone broadband 30.00
csa 55.00
200 dept loans ect
20 xmas club
total 1032
leaves 218 to feed and clothes cleaning products bathing products and packed lunches plus i have 2 cats nappys ect and stuff like that plus if we need extra gas electric or if anouther bill comes up or summit like that


sometimes i need to not pay bills to provide for my family
any adbvice guys
please dont judge me

firesidemaid

hi there

just a few thoughts....

your water rates seem high - is that including any arrears? a meter would be cheaper if you are on rates.

gas and elec are high - are you on pre-payment? make sure everything is turned off when you don't need it.

do you not qualify for HB or CTB either?

can hubby get overtime or keep applying for jobs with higher rates or more overtime available?

anything to ebay?

spend some time on the old-style board to reduce your food bills. use less meat or use cheaper cuts. eg. enough 'cut' beef to make stew for 4 is double the price of that you need to 'cut' yourself! add cheap veg and dumplings or serve with mash.

use lentils, cheap/seasonal veg etc to bulk meals out. buy cheap at end of day and put in freezer. batch cook and freeze extra. use soya/vege mince to replace 'meat' mince.

pitta pizzas made with value pittas - use tom paste, cheap cheese and leftovers for toppings etc

do you use quidco, daily clicks, sign up to all kids/baby clubs, any sites etc that send you coupons - use them for money off shopping in asda and tescos (you don't have to buy the product as long as they sell it).

Tustastic

Hi Silky, well done for posting.
Maths isn't my strong point but I think your monthly income is £1215 rather than £1250, which gives you an even tighter budget.
You've already had good advice from Firesidemaid. The Oldstyle Board has helped save many a DFW from total disaster. My thoughts;
Why save £20 in an Xmas club when you could be feeding your family with it right now, or paying a bit extra towards the debts and not missing payments?
Stuff like clothes, haircuts, debt amounts and interest rates etc is missing from your list, you might want to do a more detailed SOA using http://www.makesenseofcards.com/soacalc.html
Look at www.whatsthecost.com to see how making changes could help you pay your debt off quicker.
HTH and keep posting.

silkysmooth69

your water rates seem high - is that including any arrears? a meter would be cheaper if you are on rates.

gas and elec are high - are you on pre-payment? make sure everything is turned off when you don't need it.

Why save £20 in an Xmas club when you could be feeding your family with it right now, or paying a bit extra towards the debts and not missing payments?

can hubby get overtime or keep applying for jobs with higher rates or more overtime available?

anything to ebay?
Why save £20 in an Xmas club when you could be feeding your family with it right now, or paying a bit extra towards the debts and not missing payments?

gas and lekky have recently gone up so it varies from 50-65 a month depends really that was rough figure
water yes thats a debt arrears
do you not qualify for HB or CTB either? whats this???????please
xmas club i pay 20 a MONTH so i can afford to do chrismas otherwise i would not be able to do it at xmas
overtime the problem there is the more you earn the less ttax credits you get

ebay been trying to sell stuff to buy stuff we need buy ebay not booming at the moment plus there is always the case of money for the postage

bonnie_2

Your tax credit looks too low.

silkysmooth69

ive been on entiled to looks the same to what i am suppose to get

Tustastic

Hi Silky, how are you doing? :hello:
I hope you weren't offended by my question about the Xmas savings. There's a thread on this board about 'saving' for Xmas 2008 by doing paid surveys, daily clicks, mystery shopping and eBay, instead of taking money out of the budget now.
Keep posting to tell us how you're getting on.
PS I think HB stands for Housing Benefit but I know no more.

chevalier

Could you get a job that would negate the loss of working tax credits? Is child care an issue, because you can get an extra bit to help cover this.

There are lots of site around that you can get money from. I've listed some of them at the end of the email. Ref ebay and postage. This is included in the price the seller pays, so you should always have the money for the postage?

best of luck sorting it all out
chev

Here are some websites, on which you can earn a bit of money or points to put towards vouchers. Sorry if it is a bit long!

www.lightspeedpanel.com - this is a survey site, where you get points that turn into vouchers (you choose). May not help with the cash flow, but the vouchers could be saved towards birthday/xmas or given as presents.

www.ciao.co.uk - survey site that gives money. A bit fits and starts i.e. no surveys for a couple of weeks, then three or four the same day.

www.yougov.com - again paid surveys. However takes a while to get to the minimum payout level

www.mytns.com - again this is a survey site, but it pays you in points that convert into Nectar points at Sainsbury’s.

www.pigsback.co.uk - this is a points site, i.e. they give you points for buying things via their site. BUT you also get points for signing up for news letters (some of which are even interesting!), and also for clicking on adverts with pink borders. I have spent NOTHING with them but got £40 vouchers through (been registered since January). There is also a thread in the freebies section, of https://www.moneysavingexpert.com that gives you all the daily answers to the competitions so you can have a better chance of winning on them. I won £20 of points recently on the daily quizzes so a nice boost to the Christmas fund.

www.mutualpoints.com - another points for clicks site. You can also buy things via their site and get points too. For a long time, I just clicked the links in the emails they send you, and that gets you 5 points. At 3000 points you get £20 I think. You can do searches via their site and that gets you points too.

www.quidco.com - this is a cash back site, so very good, for checking if any potential new insurers (i.e. if you have checked your contents insurance say and found a new provider), are offering cash back. E.g. Lloyds was offering £120 cash back on new policies at one point (the offers do change). You can also get small amounts of cash again for doing searches via their site. You can earn 52p a day by doing this. Every little helps.

www.greasypalm.co.uk - another cash back site, where you can do searches and get small amounts of money. But it all adds up. I think you can get about 50p a day on there for nothing. Minimum payout is £20 I think, but you can sign up to survey sites via there, and get extra money that way for nothing.

www.topcashback.co.uk - another site where you can do daily clicks to get money for nowt.

www.britishrewards.co.uk - same as topcashback, daily clicks to do searches for pennies a time.