Scrimping, Saving and Planning

At the beginning of this month I made myself a promise that I would be more conscious of saving rather than spending. With me not being able to work and having to survive mostly on Elizabeth’s benefits we have to watch the pennies more than ever. One of the ways to save was to put all my change into a money box at the end of the day no mater what change it was. I started this on 1st January and on Wednesday I needed some money to go to Slimming World. I opened the tin and was amazed when I found over £50 inside. This helped me pay for a 12 week countdown at Slimming World. Now I don’t have to worry about my Slimming World money until April and it meant I got to join for free and get two free weeks. I would never have been able to afford to just pay out £50 if I hadn’t done this.

The other thing I am doing to save money is to keep a spreadsheet of all our incomings and outgoings and then whatever is left at the end of the month will be transferred from my account to help pay off the overdraft which got bigger when we were in hospital.

I am also using our weekly tax credits and carers allowance to cover our weekly expenses, this helps me have a budget for the week so we x amount for food and x amount for diesel. Obviously having a set amount for food means planning ahead and with my new discovery of fruit2you.org (a manchester/stockport fruit and veg delivery agency) I know that I will be getting fresh fruit and veg delivered to my door for a set price so all I need to buy is the essential items.

I have been using Ocado for my shopping usually as there delivery charges are good, I didnt have a car to shop around and they do regular deliveries really easily. I know I would save money going to cheaper shops but I fear that I would sacrifice quality and end up buying more than I need. My computer is my protection form binge buying and it would also help protect my diet too as I will only buy the things I am allowed. Should I shop around instead?

The rest of the weekly budget is spent on travel for Hubby to get to work and diesel for the new car although it may take me a few weeks to get that right. Luckily I don’t have to worry about parking costs now as I have Elizabeth’s Blue badge so that should save us a bit.

I still want to start thinking more about not just paying the overdraft of but putting some money away too, I am transferring the girls Child Benefit into their accounts so as and when we need things for them then the money is there so hopefully that won’t impact our weekly budget too much but I would still like to try and save even more pennies. What saving tips do you have? Is there anything cheap that you would recommend that doesnt lose the quaity?