Managing budget

Nickynoo1

Hi,

I was wondering how you all actually manage your budget as I don't seem to do very well at all.

I don't mean for bills etc but for food/petrol/everyday spends etc.

Do you take all the cash out at the beginning of the month and put into separate jars, or have lots of current accounts, log everything on a spreadsheet, or as I seem to do, wish for the best?

Would really be interested on simple ways of keeping track. Also do you borrow from one budget to supplement another?

Anyadvice?
Nickynoo1

susimuggle

Even though I'm struggling with my credit cards, I'm currently doing the following: (I get paid monthly).

I pay most my bills at the beginning of the month, then deduct any money I know will come out of the account during the rest of the month. I then divide the remaining money by 4 (weeks). So, for example,if the remaining money is £200, I then decide to withdraw £50 on a certain day (usually Monday), one week later withdraw another £50, so that the money should last to the day before pay day. Don't get the whole cash at the beginning of the month, you'll just spend it.....

I find that if you actually have cash in your hand and know that this money has to last you until a certain day, it sometimes makes it easier to hang on to it. If you mainly use your Switch card, you don't really see the money going out. This would probably work best if you can also leave your Switch/Bank card at home.

Hope this helps a wee bit. Looking forward to reading other tips.

Little_Pickle

yup... it's taken out and split into jars...
well, actually it's split into money bags (you know the plastic ones?)
yeah, well, those... and the receipts are put back into the bag with the change... so at the end of the week, you know how much you have spent and what on!!!

In regards to borrowing... it's a no no for us unless it's ABSOLUTELY needed.
but what ever we have left at the end of the week gets rolled into next week or saved (depending on how much of a 'saving' mood we are)!

Good luck!

LP
xox

Poosmate

I have 2 current accounts. One for me and one for bills. My salary gets paid into "my" account and on payday a lump sum is transferred into "bills" account. This covers all of the DD's/SO's.

What's left in "my" account is what I have to live on till next payday. At the moment I, like you, wing it and hope for the best! lol I wish I had the self control and discipline to do as Susimuggle and Lickle Pickle do! Must try harder!

I've had some really scary, week before payday moments but never take money out of my "bills" account unless the credit after all the bills have been paid is over £20. I like to keep a little bit extra in there in case someone decides they want to increase my payments (like Virgin Media are putting my package up by £2 next month). There's no point keeping much more that £20 surplus in there as the interest is abysmal! (about 3p per month lol!)

If I absolutely need to I will transfer money from my savings account.

Hope that helps

Poo

jak

I leave our bills money in my bank account for DD's. Then I split the rest into agreed budgettted areas. We have 9!!!!! We have 9 little drawers we use for each category and a little book lives in each. Every time we spend from a category we write it in the book and put the recipt in there.

We also have a big money book which is a spending diary. We write all purchases in there. At the end of the month we add up what we have spent in each category and tick off our purchases in the little books. This takes about an hour.

This may seem unduly complicated but it does seem to be working. It gives us a clear idea of what we are spending and we can adjust our budget accordingly if necessary. For example, this month we spend £20 of hair stuff for dh- would usually have cost £60 for the amount we got so we need to build in a miscelanious 'pot' from next month to cover buying in bulk purchases etc.

Hope that helps.

J
X

Horace

I keep my money in my bank account because of all the DDs. My car gets filled up with petrol once a month because I try not use it too often and when I do, I drive extremely carefully and economically.

With regards to shopping - I make a list of what I need and go to various shops to get it - I do a big Tesco shop now about once a month. If I run out of stuff then I just write it on my list (I have magnetic lists that I stick on the fridge), when the list has several items on it I go out again to get them.

I occasionally buy a newspaper but other than that I don't spend much. Any loose change gets put into empty coffee jars. So far I have a £10 a day challenge jar, a jar of 10s, 5s and 20ps, a jar of 2ps and another one for 1ps. Then I have the main jar that I sling all my £2 coins into.

When I get say £20 in coins, I take these to the bank and have them turned into notes which I then spend on the shopping rather than using the cashpoint to draw money out. Guess, you could say that I am recycling my money.

shopaholic2008

Some good tips on here i love Jaks method probably cause i love writing things down and sorting things out :rolleyes:

Im not too good at budgeting so hope to learn a few more tips. Next month im going to put my spending money into another account and draw it out week by week. Anything left over will go in my money pig towards the littlewoods account which is my main debt to get down at the moment.

If you decide to open another current account make sure you go through a cashback site as theres some money to be earned there:D

postingalwaysposting

I have a spending acount, just like Poosmate. I transfer anything after bills/savings into that account and thats mine. I then weekly, on a monday take out £10 for my personal spends through till friday. The remainder then can be used as/when on whatever. Seems to work for me. I also have a word document running along side this that logs what I spend and when/how

Horace

Well First Direct will give you £100 if you open an account with them and another £100 if you leave.

tealady

Hi I have my bills paid monthly by direct debit or standing order. Each month I add up whats due out then divide the rest by 5.
Each week ON THE SAME DAY I take out 1/5 of the bit thats left, thats my spends for the wek. Of course most months are 4 week months so thats extras for savings and emergencies.
What isn't spent at the end of th week goes back into my savings (well it did - been a bit lax lately)

ltm07

Nickynoo1 wrote: »

Hi,

I was wondering how you all actually manage your budget as I don't seem to do very well at all.

I don't mean for bills etc but for food/petrol/everyday spends etc.

Do you take all the cash out at the beginning of the month and put into separate jars, or have lots of current accounts, log everything on a spreadsheet, or as I seem to do, wish for the best?

Would really be interested on simple ways of keeping track. Also do you borrow from one budget to supplement another?

Anyadvice?
Nickynoo1

Hi Nicky,we have just changed the way we budget for food & petrol funnily enough! I get paid weekly & OH gets paid monthly. We did budget £90 a week for food,DD's bus fares to school & odds & sods & £15 a week for petrol in 2 separate online accounts. We usually just about manage to stay within our budget but there's weeks when we need washing powder & other big purchases,which does takeus over budget now & again. Once over budget we find it hard to keep track so we have now started to budget monthly so we can watch every single penny that we are spending. It also means that we won't hve to go shopping so often & can buy more things in bulk & put more petrol in the tank at cheaper petrol stations instead of just £15 which usually only just lasts the week & we find ourselves nearly running on empty before my payday!