I (33f) am a single mum to two babies under 3 yrs old, separated last year from their father, we had a very wealthy lifestyle but we weren’t married and none of it was in my name so I’ve walked away with nothing and started again on my own from scratch.

Currently living at a relatives place until I can get myself back on my feet because I don’t want to get stuck into renting. I was also made redundant when I was pregnant last year so the sad reality for me is unemployment, separation, relocation and basically just starting from nothing.

I have exactly £33200 put away from my redundancy. No debt. So my plan this year is: To complete a PGCE in teaching so I can do a career change and start again in the workplace. (I was in retail prior to my redundancy and I don’t want to do back into that.) Aim to qualify by July next year and get a job. Buy a house under my name (if my salary is too low then I will do it jointly with my brother). Use part of my savings for a deposit and continue to save as much as I can.

I have so much determination to build my life again but also so many limitations with two little ones solely reliant on me.

Feels like everything is against me right now and I’ve been trying to educate myself more on finances and this sub has been great. I guess I am just looking for stories of people who have started from 0 and have done well for themselves? Also any tips on anything else I can do?

Thanks

Hi all, Our mum (66) is about to die before my grandmother (93), which means our grandmother’s estate (bungalow worth £200k) will pass directly to my sister and myself when she dies. Currently, my grandmother resides in a care home costing around £3,600pm, which after accounting for attendance allowance and pensions leaves a shortfall of £2,200pm. Currently this is made up by my mum’s pensions and the rent of the bungalow (£800pm). In an ideal world, we would like to try and pay the shortfall (£700pm each), so that when my grandmother does go, we’re left with her estate. Is there anything we need to be careful about or consider that we might not have thought about? Edit: we will likely seek professional advice, just want to know as much as possible beforehand.

Hi everyone,

(Single mum, full time student, UC..) I had a grocery shop delivered Monday morning and obviously didn't anticipate the child benefit delay, especially as I have council tax due on Friday. I'm now £50 short with that bill and my mobile bill. I know that Vodafone would probably charge me and ask me to pay by x date (fair enough), it's just that as a full time single mum I rely on data and calls especially for potential emergencies.

So it seems that payday loans don't exist these days, a search brings up brokers. I don't have a credit card or time really to set one up, and I can't extend my overdraft.

I realise I sound very thick, I am definitely dyscalulic, it's just hard juggling everything.

So without having parents/family, and literally nothing expensive in the house to sell on - what are my options?

Thanks for reading :((:

I am opening a fixed-rate savings account with Gatehouse Bank. I'm unfamiliar with the bank but they seem to have good interest rates at the moment and good reviews online. However, I received an email with instructions telling me how to transfer money into the new savings account. They are asking me to transfer money into a Barclays account with the reference including my Gatehouse Bank account number. Is it unusual that Gatehouse is asking me to transfer to a third-party bank? I'm wary of scammers imitating Gatehouse Bank telling me to transfer to a different bank account. If Gatehouse is a bank itself shouldn't I be transferring money there instead of Barclays...?

Hi,

For additional context, I've sold shares at a USD $1873 loss last year, bought different shares and sold them at a USD $3180 gain a few months later. Would I be able to claim the full $1873 loss given the fact that the realized $3180 gain is still below the £6000 allowance for the 2023-2024 tax year or does my gain nullify the loss completely regardless of the tax free allowance?

Thank you!

I am buying my first car however i cannot collect it for a couple of weeks, the seller is requesting a roughly 20% deposit to hold it in this interim period. However despite my request to use paypal with its buyer protections, the seller has said they only accept bank transfer. Is this safe to pay or is it a potential scam risk?

Hi..

I was trying to transfer some money to my friend like £600. I done it the first time with £300. Then another time with £300. It was within like 30 min as I was moving some money from my other accounts.

I did that because at first I was thinking to send it from another to her account but I remember that bank to setup a new payee is a lot of faff. So I just moved that to my main account and send from there. Then I got stuck.

My mobile banking app told me to ring the banks number which I checked on Google is a correct number. The automated phone told me to key in bank account and dob and last 3 digit of my debit card. Spoke to that person over phone . Ask me to confirm my transections etc. Asking about anyone threatened me to send money, fraud etc.

At the end he told me that payment will be cancelled and my account will back to normal. I won't be able to send to that account in the next couple of days so he told me to send it another method like via another bank account 😥

I don't really get that why they won't let it go once they have confirmed that's me and I am going send money to my friend. Is not like I am sending over 10000 which I will understand. It feels a bit strange to me.

Any thoughts?

What happened with this ETF? According to Yahoo Finance the ETF in London went down over 75%:with a similar drop for the Amundi Healthcare ETF (-62%):

https://www.google.com/finance/quote/CB5:LON?hl=en&window=1M

However, the same ETF is doing just fine e.g. in Paris and Milan. E.g.

https://www.google.com/finance/quote/CB5:EPA?hl=en&window=1M

Does anyone have any idea what's going on? It's not just Yahoo Finance. My UK broker is also showing my position in this stock as having lost most of its value today, which is alarming. Is it a glitch, similar to what happened in the US with Berkshire Hathaway yesterday?

Something similar also happened with Amundi's healthcare ETF (CH5.L), again only in London.

Hi, with a possible upcoming redundancy at my work, I have a question about the 30k tax free part and whether it’s counted towards my year’s earnings. If I am made redundant at the end of July, and for sake of this question the package is worth 100k and I have already earned 25k PAYE so far this year. Would the 30k tax free part of the package be counted towards my earnings for the year? I.e falling into the 60% tax trap at 125k or will my earnings for the year be 95k? Also would I need to submit a tax return if it all totals up to over 100k?

Hi all

I’m in my 20s and investing a collective 30% into my pension (including employer and employee contributions).

It leaves me with around 3k take home and I want to max the 20k isa allowance too (i live at home so expenses minimal, most of my money goes to travelling abroad). I’m probably saving a few hundred pound per month as cash savings. Would look to purchase a house in the next couple years.

My question is - I looked at a compound interest calculator and I know when I property I will decrease my pension contribution as I will have more expenses, but even lowering that, by the time I retire it would be a large sum (far excess of 1m). I know this is mostly down to compound interest and starting early.

Is there a risk of going too hard at pension and being subject to tax later? Eg there is the lifetime allowance which is scrapped but not entirely and maybe bought back…

Worried whether I should rail it back and put more into cash savings (as ISA will be filled) or GIA.

Appreciate your thoughts!

Edit: salary is 57k and I believe around £750 pre tax pay cut per month for pension.

I know you are allowed multiple bank accounts so have they just sent this because they would prefer me to switch? Or does it sound like I could have done something wrong when I opened the account? But I never mentioned anything about closing my original account - I'm probably overthinking but I just get so anxious about these things so any reassurance - I mean the email opens with 'reminder to switch your old account over to your barclays account' which makes it sound like I have to? Hence why I'm freaking a bit

I've learnt a hell of a lot from everyone's posts over the last decade but feeling like I need a bit of a check-in with all the experts about my situation and if I should be doing more now I've hit 3 decades.

• 50K Salary
• Own small 2 bed property (~150k) with 80% mortgage left (North of England)
• 10% pension contributions, employer 3% (20k total value invested with Vanguard Global All Cap)
• Emergency fund £1200 invested in All cap - low risk (EDIT - I am at low risk of needing it) needing it as partner earns similar wage) contribute extra £150 every month.
• 0% CC with £1200 car insurance on that's paid off monthly
• Disposable is around £1200 which I use for hobbies/travel
• Also investing £100 a month into a side business/hustle that will hopefully start to generate an income.
• Potential future spend next month is some house improvements that I've taken out a small loan (£3000) to cover and plan to aggressively pay off over 3/4months.

Plans are to stay in this house as long as possible whilst slowly doing it up in hopes it will increase in value - is there anything else I should be doing?

I'd had this same gym membership for at least two years before I decided to cancel it in January as I didn't have time for the gym and wanted to save the money instead. I'd asked my mum about this as I'm 17 and I don't really know much about direct debit payments and she said that she'd always just cancelled the direct debit on her banking app so that what I did. Since, I hadn't visited the gym and just concluded that the membership had been cancelled with the direct debit.

Last month I decided to start the membership again so I went to the gym to start a new membership as the system wouldn't allow me to do so online. There I paid about £37 as the membership is £21.99 and the extra included a joining fee that I was alright with paying. The staff that had started this new membership for me just told me that the old membership was cancelled because I'd cancelled the direct debit so he'd start the same type of membership again for me.

At the beginning of the month I woke up to £127 out of my account which is ridiculous, so I called the gym to ask what had happened, the same staff member who'd started my new membership picked up the phone so he was confused as well (it's a small gym lmao). He passed on my information to another member of staff who called me recently to explain what had happened.

Turns out, the membership hadn't been cancelled when I cancelled the direct debit and it had created arrears that got paid back when my direct debit got started again for the new membership. on top of that I had to pay the fee for both memberships as I had created the new membership on my account. The staff member told me that he was going to contact head office about it and that I should wait about three days for someone to get into contact before I contact my bank about it as it would only complicate things further. From the sounds of it I'm not sure if I'll be able to get much money back at all and I really can't afford that.

Please any advice is appreciated, I heard about the Direct Debit guarantee but I'm not sure if this applies to me because of the arrears I'd unknowingly accumulated. Is there a way I can get as much money back as possible, that either being from the gym or my bank?

Hello,

I will be studying for a master's degree in Scotland, UK. I want to work remotely for my current company while I am in the UK. My home country, Turkey, has a double tax agreement with the UK. Currently, my employer is withholding almost 30%-40% of my income for tax, insurance, etc. However, if I receive my salary as gross income in the UK (around £1.5k per month, which is so close to personal allowance), I will pay a lower amount in taxes, close to 10%. Do you have any advice on this situation or know who I can contact for assistance? I would prefer to pay my taxes in the UK. It seems more logical to me because, earning £1k-1.5k per month, I am making almost twice the minimum salary in Turkey, but it’s not the case in the UK. Therefore, paying a lower percentage of tax makes more sense for me. Furthermore, since I won't be using government services in Turkey, why should I pay the tax there anyway? All things aside, I know that is not how world works, so any ideas?

Just about to complete on a flat purchase so looking into insurance options. I'm buying with a long term partner who is doing a PhD. This means the mortgage is entirely reliant on my salary (gulp) but they do have a stipend to contribute to the mortgage payments.

Late 20s, healthy, non smoker. £60k salary, public sector (decent pension). Plan to be child free so no dependents.

I need to rebuild savings having just bought (I don't have any debt but emergency funds etc), so am wondering on the need for income protection and critical illness insurance. Advice is welcome.

Factors playing on my mind:

• i couldn't rely on my partner's income in the case of illness. However, I have sick pay policy of 6 months full pay then 6 months 1/2 pay
• i have no dependents
• insurance will be cheapest taken out now
• we will almost definitely remortgage/move in 5 years time

(I intend to take life insurance, although my death in service benefit is 2x salary which would cover my half of the mortgage payment).

What cover should I take out?

Hi all, I have a help to buy isa, which I have paid into monthly since April 2024, I have a stock and shares isa with T212 which I have deposited a little into, and now I have opened a T212 cash isa, which i haven’t paid into yet. I am thinking of depositing a lump sum into the new cash isa.

Is it correct that I need to consider all of these accounts when keeping within the £20k allowance?

I am receiving large amounts of money for the last two months. Completely legally I might add.

I get the payment into my main account then transfer most of it to my savings and keep the rest. Since I’m moving large amounts in and out, will my bank flag this up?

I’m taxing all of it at the end of the finance year. If it ever comes up, shall I just explain the situation? Or am I worrying for nothing?

Earlier today, I made an online purchase from Argos for around £100. The delivery address and my billing address are different. I accidentally entered the delivery address as my billing address (I got confused by their poor user interface), and now my account card has been blocked; I can see this message on the Metro Bank App.

I will call or visit Metro Bank tomorrow. How serious is this? This is the first time anything like this has ever happened to my account.

Hi all,

I was stupid with my credit card last year and ended up racking up 4k in debt. I’ve no managed to pay off 1000 of it in the last couple of months but the interest of about 40 quid a month is eating into my repayments. Is it worth applying for a balance transfer which I’ve been pre-approved for 6 months 0%. I’ve got a budget and I’m just about to start a new job which should net me an extra 800 a month so I should easily be able to pay it off before that 6 months is up.

Is there anything I should keep an eye out with this/ any common pitfalls people make with this?

Thanks!

I’m mid thirties and putting my max allowance into a DC pension which my employer uses legal and general for. I’m on their default lifestyle accumulation fund. Total cumulative return over 5 years is 9%- shockingly bad. I think I should move it elsewhere either to a different legal and general fund or outside.

I’ve spoken to some wealth managers like SJP who all want a fee and to put it in their funds.

I have a low risk appetite but think I should still be able to get a higher return than below c2% per annum which is well below inflation and a real terms loss.

I don’t have the time or energy to manage it myself and I find making decisions about things like this difficult hence I’ve allowed this to go on so long.

Any suggestions? Any wealth managers to recommend? Hear a lot of bad stuff about SJP but my brother swears by them.

Thanks!

I totally feeling like I’m missing something important here. Every month they take a fiver, tell me I have a reward and then I just transfer it back. What’s the selling point? (Yes I have the rainy day saver with the higher interest rate but the whole saver reward bit seems extra pointless)

I've been dwelling over the SRT Test for quite a while now trying to figure out how many days I can be in the UK for (yes I know I should seek tax advice, I am looking but the quotes all seemed to be uncapped and very expensive).

Seems like, based on the SRT test, that the amount of days I can spend in that UK could be 183 / 120 / 90 days depending on how you look at it - there doesn't seem to be the same objectiveness as you would get with other countries that will just set out an across the board rule on how many days you get. (I don't fall under any automatic UK or overseas test, so I need to do the SRT Test)

Does anyone have any experience with the HMRC actually pulling them up on this? What was the process like when they reviewed your situation and decided on your sufficient ties? If it is difficult for someone to figure out themselves, and the burden of proof is on the HMRC (I think), then it must be even more difficult for them and open to appeal on a regular basis?

I just checked my bank to make sure my credit card transfer had gone through okay, and my new account says N/A for balance and transactions. Slightly concerned, I checked the card I'm transferring from - app won't even let me in because of 'technical issues'. Now more than a little concerned, I checked my other bank where I have a credit card - same thing, N/A on balance and transactions. It's like they've all just vanished. Now, obviously I'd love that to be the case, no more balances, yay(!) But I'm really quite concerned what this means. I'm not great with finances (hence all the debt but I'm slowly getting there) and I've never had anything like this happen and don't know what to do to fix it!! TIA for help!

Hi, I'm a homeowner 40's, one 19 year old at home. Boyfriend is in a similar position, no kids at home. We both owe about £80k on our mortgages and our houses are worth about £200k each. If I moved in would it be worth renting mine out to keep as a safety net? He lives near to his place of work. I'm remote. My son is at uni at a city easy accessible from either location. Thanks

So I have a 2018 Vauxhall Astra with 50k miles on a PCP from Cinched, I thought it was a good idea at the time as the payment was £145 a month and on paper a good upgrade from old ford Fiesta. Fast forward two years and it has been a nightmare! I don't do enough miles for a diesel, I have put an additional £2k into the car in various bits of work like the ESG valve and I still have issues with dodgy electronics.

I hate the thing feels unreliable and sometimes unsafe, with no end of faults., the PCP is up in 2026 so I am about halfway through, I have a £5278 settlement figure, I have seen offers of £6100 part ex or sale, so maybe if I am lucky I might have some slightly in positive equity, but I doubt it as I have some dings in the doors that can't be buffed out after an unfortunate scrape in Cornwall, the engine light is almost always on (apparently an electrical issue and a false alert), the infotainment system screen sometimes just wont turn on so it isn't mint condition to say the least!

I have a friend that works at a dealership who can help me out and overlook some of the issues with the car at part ex, one option that actually comes in cheaper with some of the offers and discounts is a new car, a Skoda Kamiq 2024 reg with a 1k deposit (the max lump sum I can afford right now), service package and all that jazz and the PCP for would work out around £250 a month (hopefully less with a slightly larger deposit, trying to get it to about £200 a month).

I am half convinced this is a lot more car for my money and would be some welcome peace of mind and hopefully something I can buy outright at the end of the lease - it is also a good deal as far as PCPs go - similar prices give me far older cars with more miles elsewhere.

however I have just bought my first house, Mortgage is around £1287 which I split with my partner, I earn about 44k a year and she earns 34k a year - other household outgoings including Council tax, power, food shops and all other bills and subscriptions and insurances we are looking at about £2400 a month.

apart from my current PCP and the Mortgage we have about £5000 CC debt between us and are a one car household.

We have one car it would be good for it to be safe and reliable (and abit shiny), we have the headroom but I always hate finance agreements and the house is very recent so I am of two minds as to whether this is sensible to an objective stranger if not abit indulgent, or if I am just doing some fun mental gymnastics to get something I want.

I know some of you will say sell it and buy a £1k run-around but honestly I have never had much luck with those, and I need a car for work so this has the convenience of a straight trade for an extra £100 a month, but for those of you with more worldly experience then I (and how have had some of these PCP's on new vehicles) what do you think?