money – Fitness Finance Life

Things aren’t going to plan

life January 15, 2020January 15, 2020 by admin

My anxiety has been a cloud all around me these past few weeks. I’m able to get out of the house but if it’s something I don’t want to do, like going to work, I want to hide from the world.
I need to know exactly what is going on & what is going to happen. If it’s something new to me, I want to freak out and I don’t know what to do.

I’ve cancelled a ‘few’ shifts with one job this year and now I’m only able to book 24hrs ahead. I went into Brighton last Saturday ready to throw myself into a shift on a ward I’d never worked at before but before I’d even gotten off the bus I had decided not to go. Strangely I wasn’t freaking out about doing the shift or the fact that I had just blown it off. I decided to cancel my next 2 shifts due to a cold/flu basically spending all my time in bed over the weekend.
It was on Monday when I was enquiring about shifts for this Friday that I got an email with an attached letter, dated 6th January, stating that I had had all my shifts cancelled and I was only to book 24hrs before! If I had actually gone in for that Saturday shift I would have been turned away anyway.

Since then I have booked a shift for tonight and waiting on confirmation of a shift for tomorrow night. I have also been approved and started at the agency I recently joined. I have a shift Saturday night and then earlies all next week. The pay isn’t as good as the hospital for nights & weekends but it is for days and it’s more local. I am going to give this a try if I don’t like the care home I just won’t go back.

I am still waiting on a date to go for my induction at the private hospital. They asked for my availability in Feb, so I gave them that and also said I’m free the rest of January. Haven’t heard back just yet.

To top things off, I have gone into my OD which I can’t afford to get out of. My food order was meant to be paid on PayPal credit (yes I know bad me) but in fact, it came out of my bank account and I have no money other than like £12 cash for the rest of the month. Thankfully My jobs are weekly paid so I’ll have money next Friday & I get my student loan start of Feb.

2020 is THE year

I’m making 2020 the year of change, the year that I have to sort my self out both in health & in wealth.

Wealth

I have plans to start paying down my debt, slowly at first but throwing what I can at it when I can. I have set up a separate YNAB budget just for debts as well as it’s own bank account.

I am also setting targets for things I want to achieve throughout the year.

Lewis (bonfire night) £100 / £10 pcm
Christmas £200 / £10 pcm – to be added to as & when
Offers £300 / £15 pcm – to be added to as & when
Savings £no target / £10 pcm – to be added to as & when
Daytona flights £1010
Daytona hotel £2000
NASCAR tickets £1500

The Daytona holiday isn’t til Feb 2021 so have time to save up.

Health

As of 5th January, I am 166.4 lbs

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My measurements are:

As you can see I have a ways to go. I have plans to join a crossfit box in February, it’s £75 a month but cheaper than other boxes and it for 3 classes a week rather than the usual 2.

What are other peoples plans for 2020?

Student finance update

life March 22, 2017August 16, 2017 by admin

student finance england logo - Student finance update

So the letter I received from student finance wasn’t anything to worry about after all. I managed to log on on Monday and found that my application had been completed and I have been given the full amount of £9690!!! That is more than I thought it would be and will mean I can do one-two less bank shifts a month!

The issue is that they can’t confirm my course as Southampton. I am going to wait till I hear from Portsmouth before I do anything. I will then either change my chosen uni with student finance or ask Southampton to confirmed the course with them.

I am starting to think that a Feb start date maybe a good thing. I could potentially pay off all debt in my name apart from my loan. If that is the case I will be able to through extra money on it and try and finish is during my training. That will be hard going as I also want to be able to save a little also.

Aiming for a retirement fund

finance September 13, 2016 by admin

At present I save nothing for my retirement other than my NHS pension. I have been looking at ways to improve me income in retirement. An income of £2000 a month would be £24000 a year!!!

I am going to start investing in shares and funds through my S&S ISA, pay into a Lifetime ISA (when they become available next year) and I have been thinking of improving my NHS pension. There are different ways of doing this:

Additional Pension
Early Retirement Reduction Buy Out (ERRBO)
Money Purchase Benefits
Stakeholder Pensions
Bigger Lump Sum Purchase
Half Cost Added Years

I am thinking of going down the Money Purchase AVC route and taking out an additional pension through Prudental. I would be able to take 25% as a lump sum, the rest needs to be used to buy an extra pension. I shall send off for more information and take it from there. I have yet to see if I will stay within the NHS for the rest of my career but at this point it is most likely.

With just £50 a month I would get a lump sum of £9790 and an annual income of £1520. Not a great amount but with my main NHS pensions I’d be looking at around £10k annual income 🙂

I am also playing around with the Additional Pension calculator to see if that route is best.

Tag: money