Can’t Pay Your Bills? Neither Could I
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This article might be a little bit stressful for you to read, but trust me, it’s like a bandaid. We have to rip it off. Ready? Deep breath. Let’s face this together. I am not judging you – at all. I’ve been where you are and am still getting myself out of a mess. Lots has happened to us. We can do this. We can. OK? Onward!
If you are anything like me you probably have a pile of emails in your inbox, flagged and trying to be forgotten, and a heap of red letters stuffed deeply away in a document tray or filing cabinet drawer. You know they’re there. Waiting for payment. And you have no idea how you’re going to pay them at the moment. So, probably like me, you put them on the back burner or in the too hard basket until one day, crap, the power goes off. Then you have to face it.
It’s so embarrassing when this happens. I remember it well. I had all three kids at home and the guy comes to turn the power off. I got my eldest daughter to tell them it was ok while I was in my bedroom crying, trying to work out how I was going to keep my food cold until I could afford to pay for the power bill.
When I stopped crying, I realised I would just have to call them and try to work something out.
It turns out that this is an excellent idea and great plan.
I have found by doing this with all of my utility bills, orthodontist, mowing man from 3 houses ago (long story) and my mortgage provider, that communication is the absolute key to working things through.
Now this is where it’s going to be a bit stressful but we’re going to do it.
Get ALL of your bills.
I know. It’s as scary as shit but we have to.
Think carefully about everything that is outstanding everywhere. You might have an account at the chemist, or a store card as well as usual utility bills. Let’s get them all out in the open.
Now get a piece of paper and write down the amount that is owing and the date it’s due. You can use an excel sheet if you want to as well but the power of paper and pen should not be ignored. It’s something that can sit in front of you all the time, and for me, it gave me encouragement when I could see the bills going down or I had conquered one completely off the list.
Don’t be scared.
Now – total them up.
I know, but you have to.
So go have a drink of wine or a cigarette or a quick walk around to relieve the tension and stress and we will move on together.
Firstly you can take the total and divide it by four to work out how much a week all the bills would cost. If this is affordable to manage, then contact each of your creditors and let them know that this is what you will be doing.
If it’s not affordable then we have to look at the most urgent ones first. To me power and phone are always my most urgent ones. Without either of these I could not continue to bring in my (small) income and feed the kids so these are always the ones I try to keep paid or have an arrangement in place. Anything else is negotiable.
Contact these ones first and make a payment arrangement. Try very, very, hard to stick to it or you will find yourself either re-negotiating or without service, and we don’t want that.
Mortgage providers can give you a period of grace if you are having financial difficulty so contact them and organise for payments to be suspended until you catch up with your other bills. Most of them are pretty good about this if you can show that you are in hardship.
For credit cards, if you have to, miss a month payment so you can catch up on the others. I know a lot (everyone) of personal finance bloggers tell you never to do this, but I am in the land of reality here, with 3 kids to feed and a small income, something has to give. Should I have a credit card in the first place? Have you tried to raise 3 kids on minimum wage? It’s unavoidable if you want to eat sometimes. My goal is to eventuality not have any and I have already banned them from my children who have learned very valuable lessons of what not to do financially, from me.
So if you have to, miss a payment. You can even go to 90 days but anything after that, you are kind of asking for trouble. But if you have to make them stretch out to 60 days each and then pay alternatively minimum payments at 60 days, then so be it.
Council rates (property taxes) can be negotiated. They charge HUGE cumulative interest on outstanding fees, but you can get this interest charge waived if you can show hardship, so it’s really worth a conversation with them. Alternatively, just pay a little bit each month so they can see that you are at least paying something, and this in turn reduces the compounding interest charged.
It’s the worst having to ring people and admit that you are having trouble paying your bills. It feels shameful, like you’re a failure, it’s embarrassing, you don’t want people to find out (that bitchy mother at school would have a field day). IGNORE ALL OF THIS.
You would be so surprised to find that those people driving those nice cars with everything all beautiful and organised are in as much crap as you and me. So no judgement. From yourself or others. You have to keep things on. You have to keep that roof over your head and that of your family. Suck it up and start negotiating.
You will feel wonderful relief after this process. It’s suddenly doable, manageable. You can get through these bills. I will be talking a lot about managing your day to day expenses, bills etc in other posts.
Let me know how you went! Subscribe and join the Facebook Group here. You are not alone. Trust me.
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