Wednesday 23 January 2013

Flowing our way

News this morning from the chap who has been helping with the laptop issues - he has put it on eBay and had an offer on it!  Whosoever buys a laptop carcass with no hard drive and no working power, I don't know, but after expenses [for the chap rebuilding the hard drive into an external hard drive for us to use, and the eBay fees], we will get £30+ back!  

This month is being extremely tight and I was beginning to be concerned about failing in my target to save £750 a month with the extra costs I have had this month - like the £292 car insurance payment - and I sat down yesterday and worked out the remaining commitments to pay this month, against the remaining income, and it didn't look nice - we had about £40 left over to do food and petrol with if we were still to achieve the savings [do-able but challenging, as the FH's car hasn't had any petrol since before Christmas and Needs some!].  The promise of this little boost means that we have a little more wiggle room, although I don't anticipate spending all of it, don't worry!

So, we will achieve our target of £750 by the end of the month but we won't manage any more than that this month, which is a little disappointing, but I have to be thankful on two counts - one, that we have the income to make this saving possible at all, as I know a lot of people don't, and two, that it has been possible to save even that amount, and still pay the car insurance bill!

On the subject of insurance, I always pay the full amount at the time of renewal as so many companies charge you extra for the convenience of paying monthly, so we try to make sure we can pay the whole amount. to avoid credit charges.

3 comments:

sweet blondie blue eyes said...

I put the money away for car insurance, service MOT etc away each month in a separate account, then when I have a bill to pay I transfer the money into my current account. I do the same with money for holidays etc transfer the same set amount each month and then either draw it in cash or into my main account. I prefer cash then I know exactly what we are spending. Fuel is usually the most expensive thing as we tow the caravan our little Skoda Fabia does about 35 miles to the gallon when we have the van on the back against 60+ without the van.

Angela said...

I agree with you about paying the whole lot 'up front' if you can.

Trying to be positive this morning - teaching cancelled - so no pay today!

Glad that you have sold the laptop bits on ebay. Bob v pleased to have got rid of some redundant stacking chairs yesterday, so the church will benefit from that! Some people will buy anything!!

blessings xx

Morgan said...

@Silversewer - Excellent response, thank you, and I have a Standing order set up to take money from the current account to another account for just this purpose, as you suggest. But then I get tired of that sitting there, and move it to the higher paying savings account, from which I am loathe to remove it, and so I make the current account squeak even further by paying the bills from the rest of the money and keeping the money I have set aside as savings. It all works out in the end, but I seem to see saving as a one-way street most of the time, and only take the money out when we need something really big like the cars last year.

Thanks for your input - it is valuable, as usual :)