This is always the worst week of the month. It's the countdown to pay-day and it's when I start to get worried about whether or not I'll have enough in my current account to cover all my commitments. I've been especially worried this month after a. the shit show of last month and b. my outgoings have gone up with buying a car. I don't have any padding, I blew all my cash savings last month trying to cover all my post-Christmas direct debits so if it goes tits up this month then I am in the shit because I have no bail out.
I'm usually fairly organised about stuff like this. I made a table that works backwards from pay-day. It's a countdown that shows me what my balance needs to be in order to make it to the end of the month safely. But it still doesn't stop me worrying about it. All it takes is a couple of bad experiences to imprint that fear into you.
When my partner and I split up in 2014 I hit a similar rockbottom. It was maybe worse because I had all the expense of setting up a new home on my own with about three weeks notice to prepare for it. I reckoned at the time I was maybe around four weeks away from declaring bankruptcy. Even now, six years down the road and with being in a totally different place financially, I am still terrified of opening my bank account homepage. When I am entering my password and waiting for the page to load my anxiety is through the fucking roof.
Weirdly, I get paid on the 4th of each month. I don't know why. But according to my table, I've got about £300 in cash in my current account and about £200 in direct debits until the 4th. In theory, I'm going to make it with 100 quid to spare.
There are a couple of apps that I've started using that have really helped. One is Chip. I think I might have mentioned it in a previous post. You register your bank account on it, it says it uses AI to analyse your spending and works out how much money you can set aside. Every now and again you get a message saying that it's moved ten or fifteen quid into its holding account. So far this month it has put away £83.50. It's my money, I've not magiced it out of anywhere but it is nice to know that I've got a little pot sitting there. It's my first month with it so I've been keen to see how it actually pans out, whether it would blow my budget or not, but it seems to be working OK.
The other is Money Dashboard. You register your bank account and credit cards and it shows you an instant snapshot of what each account balance is. It's not fantastic, it's a bit slow to update, but it's useful to have. My main current account is a bit shit, it's a long log in process and the site isn't optimised for phone or tablet (and there is no app). I'd avoid checking my account regularly because of that (and partly because of my anxiety as mentioned above), Money Dashboard makes it less hassle. Open the app, refresh the display and there it is.
I know there is a lot of fuckery with apps like these. They are free. Why is that? The obvious answer is that your data and spending habits are a commodity. I can only assume that my spending behaviour is being sold on for some sort of analysis. In all honesty, I'm a skinflint twat so I doubt my data has much to offer. But it is important to bear in mind.
The other financial news was finally getting a new credit card. For years I never bothered applying because I would always get turned down or hit with a massive interest rate. So I just gave up and managed without. That's probably worked in my favour, I've not had any searches, no hits on my credit record. Out of interest I did a soft eligibility check and Virgin offered a Mastercard with 24 months zero percent on balance transfers and a £7000 credit limit. It shocked me as I thought my rating was in the bog.
I've got an Amex card with £1500 on it. I've been paying 50 quid a month and it barely makes a dent. At 0% interest then I'd clear it in a couple of years by just paying an extra tenner a month. Seems like a bargain so I transferred the £1500 to the new card. I'm doing fuck all else with it, I don't even carry it with me. The card stays in my finances box where it belongs. A credit card with plenty of space on it is a poison. It's like a cheap whore sitting in the corner of your living room all day, every day. I'm really ambivalent about having it, on the one hand it means I get to clear one of my existing cards but on the other it's a temptation I just don't need. Too easy to say "I'll stick it on the good credit card and sort it out later". "Later" never comes.
I'm still doing good on not spending a load on food shopping. I've done my own lunches for work every day except today. I was lazy, I wanted an extra ten minutes in bed.
Matched betting is still ticking over. The profits are hardly rolling in. A couple of quid here, a couple of quid there. Still unimpressed. I think the excitement of tracking down the right deal is more enjoyable than the tiny amounts of money being made.
This week's spending is £25.07 under budget so that is me up to £114.69. I don't know if I will sustain that this week. I'm going to see my parents this weekend with my daughter and that's a 400 mile round trip on top of everything else. I hardly see them because of the distance and they hardly see my daughter so I can't complain about it.
I've got another job interview next week. Supposedly pays decently but it's a bit of a trek and looks like harder work. One of my big gripes about where I am is that I don't feel valued. To my mind, if I have to work harder for more money in another job then that isn't them valuing me more, that's just me working harder. Kind of defeats the purpose of swapping jobs so I think I've written it off in my mind already.
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