End of the month so I can actually take a bit of a better look at my financial status. Most weeks nothing happens but when I get paid then I've actually got something to talk about.
I've managed to save a bit of cash this month. Last month, if I remember right, I was hitting a bit of a wall. It surprised me but when I thought about it, there was a lot of expense in the previous month which impacted it. At the end of May I was probably about £2-300 ahead.
I do my shopping once a week and I've got a fairly regular shopping list that I now buy. This was generally coming in at around £50 a week for me and my daughter. It's probably more than I would like but that is allowing for a few treats, some better quality produce and a bit more discretionary spending. I have no other real financial demands at the minute so I can ease up a little on the frugality in the supermarket.
But one thing I've noticed is that prices are going up. I don't know if reduced supply is starting to feed through into the system but there is a noticeable increase. I the bulk of my shopping in Aldi and there are a few things I've seen creeping up. Some quite dramatically. I get through a lot of nuts and I buy a pack of cashews every week. They are 85p. They have been 85p for as long as I can remember. Last week they shot up to £1.45. I noticed it on a lot of things.
It's a lot to just be price gouging. The jumps might be small on most things, 10p here, 5p there, but it's still significant. I suspect this is the reality of food shortages. At the start of the lockdown when people were panic buying, it seemed to be that they were expecting some sort of biblical famine. What was more likely, and what seems to be happening, is that there is still stuff available but just not as much as there was. The end result of that is increased prices. Makes you wonder which is more damaging, an interruption in supply when we're all living off tins and what's in the freezer or a situation where we are paying 25% more for what we'd normally buy. Either way, you can bet supermarkets, who have done extremely well out of the pandemic, are not going to miss an opportunity to take a profit. As much as Tesco and Asda and Morrisons want to shout about their charity work, they are not charities.
A positive is that my little pot of investment funds has started to recover. At one point it had lost about a quarter of its value. Considering it was only about three grand to start with (and that was hard won) that's quite a hit. When I checked yesterday, it was only down 2%. Not great (as it was about 13% up before the panic) but a hell of a lot better than 25% down.
Another savings issue that I've had is with Chip. For starters, it has not saved a penny for me in about six weeks. Nothing has changed in my spending or earning habits but it has pretty much died on its arse. It was a nice little app when I first started using it, squirreling away a couple of quid every few days until it had built a nice pot up. Now, nothing. And as it is adding in a monthly charge (in certain circumstances) it makes me question whether or not it is worth using. It has always niggled me that a. they get the benefit of holding my cash and b. they get the benefit of knowing my spending habits which can be turned into a commodity that can be sold on to third parties.
A second issue I've found with Chip is accessibility. My phone died a couple of weeks ago and I had to revert to an ancient phone I still had lying around which I could not install Chip on. But there is no other way to access your Chip account. There is no online access and you need a device with a phone number (so I couldn't install it on my tablet). That really pissed me off. Luckily I didn't need the money this month but if I did I would have been screwed. They say I can email the helpdesk but is that really the best option in this day and age? How hard is it to set up a web page to allow access? I think my love affair with Chip is at an end and I might be closing my account if it doesn't improve its performance this month.
I can't remember if I mentioned this previously, I've started using my credit card to pay more bills that will allow it. I've always preferred manually paying bills because it makes me feel like I have better awareness of what is going on. Anywhere that gives a direct debit discount I have been leaving alone. But places that don't, like my council tax, I've been using my credit card. I never thought about it until I heard someone mention it on a podcast: I get cashback on my credit card spending so why not use that for bills? Regular things like council tax I transfer the cash into my account and then pay it. It all adds to my pot. Now, as I've said before, it gets paid in Waitrose/John Lewis vouchers and those aren't places I would shop regularly. But it does mean that I get to give myself a bit of a treat now and again on something I wouldn't generally consider buying.
I think my main news is that I was finally furloughed on Monday. This has actually worked out really well because on the same day I was finally offered the job that I was interviewed for a couple of weeks ago. Same salary, same commute and a year's worth of work in the pipeline. I am putting my notice in today. So now I can happily sit on my arse for the next month. Taking a 20% hit is going to hurt but it is only temporary and then things go back to normal.
The way I look at it, if you are first to be furloughed then you are first to be made redundant. The scheme ends in October but what I didn't realise was that if you are not on it by today (10th of June) then you are fucked. The regs say you need to have been furloughed for at least three weeks before the 30th of June. I only found this out recently which is why I've been a bit anxious to get on it sooner rather than later. After today, you're facing the boot with no safety net if you haven't been furloughed already.
Getting the job offer could not have come at a better time. The government is increasing the amount employers have to contribute and I know for certain that the people I work for are going to start the cull the moment it costs them a penny. It won't hurt them, when things pick up they know they can get anyone they need and on a lower rate because it will be a buyer's market. So I am going on my own terms.
The choice is whether or not to start the new job sooner. According to the rules I can work for someone else whilst on furlough. It would almost double my salary for a month, that's a couple of grand I could just drop straight in the bank. I don't know if this is the right decision but I don't want to. I've been so stressed of late that I'm happy to pay 20% for a month's leave. Mentally, I'm really burnt out with everything that has happened and having this time to chill and just catch up has been great even after just two days.
I think it is time that I just sit down, relax and let my mental health come first. I've got plenty to fill my time. I will not be bored. For once, I am taking a fucking reward that I actually deserve. That's at the expense of the tax-payer (which I am one of) and maybe my current employer but I do not give a flying fuck about that.
Showing posts with label furlough. Show all posts
Showing posts with label furlough. Show all posts
Tuesday, June 16, 2020
Wednesday, May 20, 2020
Weekly update: 20th May 2020
I'm trying to get back into the habit of uploading a weekly update. It's about time I got back into a routine.
So this week I got my car insurance renewal through from the RAC, my current insurer. £800. No surprise, everyone knows your current insurer knocks the arse out of the renewal every year. They know a ton of people will just accept it and let it auto-renew. And they know another ton of people will phone up and try to bargain. And miraculously they always seem to manage to cut it in half, a special deal just for you, just for today, so that you couldn't possibly turn it down. I don't know what their retention rates are but it must be high.
It pisses me off. I just want to be able to buy a service and that's it. I don't want to have to haggle, I don't want to sit through a script where someone in a call centre pretends to talk to their supervisor about discounts. I just want to know what I'm paying without having to do this tedious fucking dance. And it is everywhere now as well. It used to be car insurance and everyone just accepted that's how it was. But it's mobile phones, it's broadband, it's buying a fucking couch. I don't want to do it, it doesn't build loyalty, it makes me want to just get it over and done with.
As usual, I just do a search on Confused and go with the lowest deal. I never even bother going through the hassle of calling them that may or may not result in a few pennies saved. But the one thing I always do is I go through Topcashback. There is usually a kickback on the insurance search providers (they are all much the same) so I get a quote through that first. But I always check cashback offers for the lowest insurer as well. If they have a better deal then I'll dump the search provider and do the policy direct. If not, I go through Confused (or whoever) and get their cashback instead (usually about £40).
I had a look at my savings today. I'd been regularly pumping what I could into fairly conservative index tracker funds through an ISA with Hargreaves Lansdowne's. At the start of lockdown about 20% got wiped off the value. Now, they are only down 6%. A small loss is good news. Most financial bloggers say hold on to your shares through shitty times unless you really need to sell so that's what I've done. It was tempting to just move it into cash to minimise the loss but I'm going to plough through for the minute. I've also switched my monthly deposit from all trackers to half trackers and half bond funds for a bit more conservatism right now.
Chances are I won't be making my usual £165 deposit next month anyway. As far as I know I am still on track to be furloughed. And I am still super-angry about the whole thing. As far as I know, I am the only one right now. And, everyone else seems crazy busy right now as well. So everybody else has too much on but they can't find anything for me to do?
You can't help take it personally. It has soured my relationship with the company. I'm actually finding it really hard to work with other people there this week. I'd forgotten how many people are competing for the next rung on the ladder. And you see it now, so many people trying elbowing each other out the way to get recognition. Sending emails at stupid hours. Messages where senior management are copied in unnecessarily so that they get to be seen. Working well past reasonable hours all for free. The way things are you can't blame them but I guarantee that senior management are going to take advantage of the goodwill generated by this self-inhterest.
Me, I just want to get the fuck out now. I think I'd happily eat the 20% pay hit to not be working amongst them. But what worries me is that if you are first on furlough then you're probably first in the queue for redundancy when they realise that long term the company is now too big. Even with the government funds they still have employer's NI to pay so there is still a cost in me being on the books. The ax will fall eventually.
The thing is, they told me it could have been anyone. But everybody knows there are people who it won't be and I'm not on that list. On the plus side, it is pushing me into other things. I've been learning to code for the last year and I'm nearing the end of the course (I will post about it separately) so the time is coming when I will be able to start looking for work as a junior developer. And the other positive is that I saw an ad for a job the other day that could have been written for me. They're looking for my specialism which is in short supply, they are offering a similar salary and it's only a couple of miles away (I could probably cycle it). I contacted the recruiter and I've got a video interview next week.
Mentally, I've not been doing well this week at all. Monday I was pretty depressed. Tuesday, I veered between anger and depression. My phone died on Monday as well, five months outside of warranty. So now I'm back to using a ten year old phone. I don't really care, I'm not into technology. It's just the principle of it. It cost me £100 seventeen months ago and now it's going to cost me another £100 if I want to replace it.
But that's somewhere else I can save a little bit of money when I go on to furlough. I'm only paying £13 a month for a pay as you go SIM card with Vodafone. But if I'm not working and not going anywhere then I don't need much mobile data. I can swap to a lesser deal on Giff Gaff for about half of that. So I save £6 a month? Well, that's £1.50 a week I can spend on something else. A little treat for my daughter or something.
I had a lot of optimism at the start of the year. I thought this was when things were going to turn around. I guess a lot of people thought that. Right now, I'm just trying to maintain that optimism. I'm trying to be disciplined with household chores. I'm being mindful when doing tasks, take pleasure in doing it and experiencing it. I'm still working out hard and I'm probably in the best physical shape I've been in for a while.
My ideal scenario is that I get offered that job next week, I get a couple of weeks on my arse on furlough while everything is finalised and then I tell where I work to go fuck themselves finally. If it doesn't happen? Then there's going to be something else. There has to be. I just need to keep reminding myself that.
So this week I got my car insurance renewal through from the RAC, my current insurer. £800. No surprise, everyone knows your current insurer knocks the arse out of the renewal every year. They know a ton of people will just accept it and let it auto-renew. And they know another ton of people will phone up and try to bargain. And miraculously they always seem to manage to cut it in half, a special deal just for you, just for today, so that you couldn't possibly turn it down. I don't know what their retention rates are but it must be high.
It pisses me off. I just want to be able to buy a service and that's it. I don't want to have to haggle, I don't want to sit through a script where someone in a call centre pretends to talk to their supervisor about discounts. I just want to know what I'm paying without having to do this tedious fucking dance. And it is everywhere now as well. It used to be car insurance and everyone just accepted that's how it was. But it's mobile phones, it's broadband, it's buying a fucking couch. I don't want to do it, it doesn't build loyalty, it makes me want to just get it over and done with.
As usual, I just do a search on Confused and go with the lowest deal. I never even bother going through the hassle of calling them that may or may not result in a few pennies saved. But the one thing I always do is I go through Topcashback. There is usually a kickback on the insurance search providers (they are all much the same) so I get a quote through that first. But I always check cashback offers for the lowest insurer as well. If they have a better deal then I'll dump the search provider and do the policy direct. If not, I go through Confused (or whoever) and get their cashback instead (usually about £40).
I had a look at my savings today. I'd been regularly pumping what I could into fairly conservative index tracker funds through an ISA with Hargreaves Lansdowne's. At the start of lockdown about 20% got wiped off the value. Now, they are only down 6%. A small loss is good news. Most financial bloggers say hold on to your shares through shitty times unless you really need to sell so that's what I've done. It was tempting to just move it into cash to minimise the loss but I'm going to plough through for the minute. I've also switched my monthly deposit from all trackers to half trackers and half bond funds for a bit more conservatism right now.
Chances are I won't be making my usual £165 deposit next month anyway. As far as I know I am still on track to be furloughed. And I am still super-angry about the whole thing. As far as I know, I am the only one right now. And, everyone else seems crazy busy right now as well. So everybody else has too much on but they can't find anything for me to do?
You can't help take it personally. It has soured my relationship with the company. I'm actually finding it really hard to work with other people there this week. I'd forgotten how many people are competing for the next rung on the ladder. And you see it now, so many people trying elbowing each other out the way to get recognition. Sending emails at stupid hours. Messages where senior management are copied in unnecessarily so that they get to be seen. Working well past reasonable hours all for free. The way things are you can't blame them but I guarantee that senior management are going to take advantage of the goodwill generated by this self-inhterest.
Me, I just want to get the fuck out now. I think I'd happily eat the 20% pay hit to not be working amongst them. But what worries me is that if you are first on furlough then you're probably first in the queue for redundancy when they realise that long term the company is now too big. Even with the government funds they still have employer's NI to pay so there is still a cost in me being on the books. The ax will fall eventually.
The thing is, they told me it could have been anyone. But everybody knows there are people who it won't be and I'm not on that list. On the plus side, it is pushing me into other things. I've been learning to code for the last year and I'm nearing the end of the course (I will post about it separately) so the time is coming when I will be able to start looking for work as a junior developer. And the other positive is that I saw an ad for a job the other day that could have been written for me. They're looking for my specialism which is in short supply, they are offering a similar salary and it's only a couple of miles away (I could probably cycle it). I contacted the recruiter and I've got a video interview next week.
Mentally, I've not been doing well this week at all. Monday I was pretty depressed. Tuesday, I veered between anger and depression. My phone died on Monday as well, five months outside of warranty. So now I'm back to using a ten year old phone. I don't really care, I'm not into technology. It's just the principle of it. It cost me £100 seventeen months ago and now it's going to cost me another £100 if I want to replace it.
But that's somewhere else I can save a little bit of money when I go on to furlough. I'm only paying £13 a month for a pay as you go SIM card with Vodafone. But if I'm not working and not going anywhere then I don't need much mobile data. I can swap to a lesser deal on Giff Gaff for about half of that. So I save £6 a month? Well, that's £1.50 a week I can spend on something else. A little treat for my daughter or something.
I had a lot of optimism at the start of the year. I thought this was when things were going to turn around. I guess a lot of people thought that. Right now, I'm just trying to maintain that optimism. I'm trying to be disciplined with household chores. I'm being mindful when doing tasks, take pleasure in doing it and experiencing it. I'm still working out hard and I'm probably in the best physical shape I've been in for a while.
My ideal scenario is that I get offered that job next week, I get a couple of weeks on my arse on furlough while everything is finalised and then I tell where I work to go fuck themselves finally. If it doesn't happen? Then there's going to be something else. There has to be. I just need to keep reminding myself that.
Saturday, May 16, 2020
On Furlough
I got the phonecall yesterday that I had been expecting for a while. I was told that as of next Friday I would be on furlough. I had work for this week but after that, game over.
I knew it was coming. I'd done fuck all this week and started every day pestering my manager for something to do. I'd be given a simple task and 7.5 hours to do it. I knew when there was no-one chasing it that this was just something so that both me and my manager could pretend I was busy.
It reminded me of the old Bill Hicks gag:
"Hicks! Can't you just pretend to be working?"
"You're paid more than me. Can't you pretend I'm working?"
So it was no surprise. I'd expected it about a month ago so the impact isn't going to be huge. I'd already thought it through in financial terms. It translates to losing £500 a month. I pay £165 into a savings plan which I can cancel and I'm probably spending about a quarter of my monthly budget so that's the £500 taken care of.
There are discretionary things I can cancel as well. I've got Amazon Prime because the free delivery was useful in lockdown but it's £7.99 that can go. I've got £6 for membership of a local nature reserve where I like going birdwatching. I hate to do it but that can go as well as it's shut for the duration anyway. I'm going to hit up my car insurer and see if I can get anything reduced there. Weather is getting milder so I can cut back on heating.
There are lots of things I can do to make this work financially. I can't get worked up about it. I fucking despise this government but surprisingly the Job Retention Scheme is an absolute godsend. And they've extended it to October. So worst case, I've got the summer with my feet up. My line manager says that all the work that was put on hold is coming back on stream in another month or so, we're an NHS supplier so in theory should weather this OK. And if everyone is still in this shit in October then we're all fucked.
The problem is the mental impact. I tried writing this post last night and I just couldn't do it. It hit me hard and I'm still pretty angry about it. I'm really good at my job and I'm really reliable. People ask for me to be assigned to their projects. There's a lot of people there that you honestly cannot say that about. So it is a real slap in the face that I get furloughed and they don't.
And it is ironic because I fucking hate my job. I have no end of things I could fill my time with and just having the break would do my mental health a power of good. But it's just that little, shitty niggle that says "you aren't as good as these people".
I know that's bullshit and that I am just inventing a narrative based on shit that has happened in the past. I have zero evidence that that is the case. I know that the likely explanation is that I am more skilled so more expensive. At the minute, they just need the office equivalent of a labourer. They don't need skilled. So if they get me off the books then it pays for nearly two "labourers". But I just can't shut that voice off that keeps asking "so why aren't they doing it to others? Why is it just you?". And the answer to that is "they hate you, you must be shit at it".
It's my brain fucking with me. I know it intellectually but I just don't feel it on a gut level.
I'm a big fan of Jocko Willink's outlook. I know what he would say. "Good". On furlough? Good, more time to train, more time to learn, more time with my daughter. Losing 20% of your salary? Good, you've still got 80%. You aren't on the dole. There is a big part of me looking forward to what is basically extended paid leave. I keep thinking maybe this is the push I need to start a business. There are a couple of things I could be doing to make a little extra money that I'd have the time to pursue. It'd just be getting some advertising and hoping that the demand was there.
Someone else I am a fan of is Ram Dass, a late American spiritual teacher. Ram Dass had this idea of "becoming nobody". He said that we build up an identity based on all these external things. Our careers, our hobbies, the clothes we wear, the stuff we own. But all of that can be taken away. So who are you underneath it all? Being "somebody" means having all these pointless trappings. Becoming "nobody" is who you really are without all that shit. I know that I hate work so why do I let it define me? This is an opportunity to let go.
We'll see. I'm bouncing along the edge of a depression. It's not how I saw this year playing out. I'm getting older but I don't feel like I'm getting further along the track. The things I'd hoped for like getting out of debt, getting on my feet, starting a new relationship, having more of a life outside of just work and childcare, it feels like they have gone. I wanted to finally put divorce and nearly going bankrupt in the past. What is worse is that it feels like the opportunity is gone. That door has closed and there's nothing on the horizon to get optimistic about. Even wars have an end, this seems to just be the normal state of human life from now on.
I knew it was coming. I'd done fuck all this week and started every day pestering my manager for something to do. I'd be given a simple task and 7.5 hours to do it. I knew when there was no-one chasing it that this was just something so that both me and my manager could pretend I was busy.
It reminded me of the old Bill Hicks gag:
"Hicks! Can't you just pretend to be working?"
"You're paid more than me. Can't you pretend I'm working?"
So it was no surprise. I'd expected it about a month ago so the impact isn't going to be huge. I'd already thought it through in financial terms. It translates to losing £500 a month. I pay £165 into a savings plan which I can cancel and I'm probably spending about a quarter of my monthly budget so that's the £500 taken care of.
There are discretionary things I can cancel as well. I've got Amazon Prime because the free delivery was useful in lockdown but it's £7.99 that can go. I've got £6 for membership of a local nature reserve where I like going birdwatching. I hate to do it but that can go as well as it's shut for the duration anyway. I'm going to hit up my car insurer and see if I can get anything reduced there. Weather is getting milder so I can cut back on heating.
There are lots of things I can do to make this work financially. I can't get worked up about it. I fucking despise this government but surprisingly the Job Retention Scheme is an absolute godsend. And they've extended it to October. So worst case, I've got the summer with my feet up. My line manager says that all the work that was put on hold is coming back on stream in another month or so, we're an NHS supplier so in theory should weather this OK. And if everyone is still in this shit in October then we're all fucked.
The problem is the mental impact. I tried writing this post last night and I just couldn't do it. It hit me hard and I'm still pretty angry about it. I'm really good at my job and I'm really reliable. People ask for me to be assigned to their projects. There's a lot of people there that you honestly cannot say that about. So it is a real slap in the face that I get furloughed and they don't.
And it is ironic because I fucking hate my job. I have no end of things I could fill my time with and just having the break would do my mental health a power of good. But it's just that little, shitty niggle that says "you aren't as good as these people".
I know that's bullshit and that I am just inventing a narrative based on shit that has happened in the past. I have zero evidence that that is the case. I know that the likely explanation is that I am more skilled so more expensive. At the minute, they just need the office equivalent of a labourer. They don't need skilled. So if they get me off the books then it pays for nearly two "labourers". But I just can't shut that voice off that keeps asking "so why aren't they doing it to others? Why is it just you?". And the answer to that is "they hate you, you must be shit at it".
It's my brain fucking with me. I know it intellectually but I just don't feel it on a gut level.
I'm a big fan of Jocko Willink's outlook. I know what he would say. "Good". On furlough? Good, more time to train, more time to learn, more time with my daughter. Losing 20% of your salary? Good, you've still got 80%. You aren't on the dole. There is a big part of me looking forward to what is basically extended paid leave. I keep thinking maybe this is the push I need to start a business. There are a couple of things I could be doing to make a little extra money that I'd have the time to pursue. It'd just be getting some advertising and hoping that the demand was there.
Someone else I am a fan of is Ram Dass, a late American spiritual teacher. Ram Dass had this idea of "becoming nobody". He said that we build up an identity based on all these external things. Our careers, our hobbies, the clothes we wear, the stuff we own. But all of that can be taken away. So who are you underneath it all? Being "somebody" means having all these pointless trappings. Becoming "nobody" is who you really are without all that shit. I know that I hate work so why do I let it define me? This is an opportunity to let go.
We'll see. I'm bouncing along the edge of a depression. It's not how I saw this year playing out. I'm getting older but I don't feel like I'm getting further along the track. The things I'd hoped for like getting out of debt, getting on my feet, starting a new relationship, having more of a life outside of just work and childcare, it feels like they have gone. I wanted to finally put divorce and nearly going bankrupt in the past. What is worse is that it feels like the opportunity is gone. That door has closed and there's nothing on the horizon to get optimistic about. Even wars have an end, this seems to just be the normal state of human life from now on.
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