The Vault with Financielle - “My partner left and I’m £37,000 in credit card debt” | The Vault Episode 106

Episode Date: March 5, 2026

“I upgraded my phone even though my old one worked perfectly”… jail or no jail? 🚨This week, we’re diving into these money dilemmas:💸 “My partner left and I’m £37,000 in credit card debt”💸 ”My job expenses pushed me £5,000 into debt”Got a money win or (totally anonymous) dilemma? Share it via the Financielle app community or email [e-mail] 💌You’re not alone in figuring this stuff out. Get honest, helpful reads at financielle.com 💖💸Check out the Money MOT in the Financielle app 🤑Connect with our Partner🫶 Protect yourself and loved ones with our friends at Lifesearch ** The above is a tracked link, which tells our partner we sent you and may in future result in a payment or benefit to our site.

Welcome to the vault with finite child. This is a safe space where we talk all things life and money and no topics for our limits. How do everybody? How are we feeling? Good. I've just had a lovely salad. Not to rub it in because I know you two are hungry. We've not brought your lunch.

Tuna, pasta, rocket, avocado, seeds, pumpkin, linseed. We have come into salad time? Yes. This is like, I know I can't like, I just don't want one. but chili flakes, salt and pepper. The trick to a good salad is seasoning it properly. And not choosing basic stuff.

So my go to, if I have like, I don't know, a sweet potato and a bit of tuna for lunch, I'll be like, oh, and we'll have a side salad. And it'll be so basic. It'll be like, remain lettuce, chopped pepper. Like, it's very 80s salad, 90s salad. That's what I mean. So I'm trying to branch out into what does a good salad taste? Like, what can I put in that's, like, exciting and tasty and is really good for me

rather than what you would see, like, I always think there's like hospital food. Yeah, like iceberg lettuce, red pepper. Half cherry tomatoes. Sweet corn is my night bar. Whereas I like cubed sweet potato with like cumin or... Yeah. I love quinoa and a salad.

Yeah, quinoa. And I keep seeing roasted chickpeas. Yeah. I think it will be good to look on... Because in the north, there's not that many. These iconic like salad places in London and L.A. Yeah. And look at what they have as these...

ingredients and then like do a session on a Sunday where you cook some of those get them ready and get them in the fridge. I always think our mum can throw together a really good salad and really good pasta just let me up my cupboard in it and I'm like I can't do it I'm so hungry we're probably not got the things let's move on I'm hungry. Stop talking about food. Sorry. We're doing hello fresh this week we're testing it. What I hate it? We hate it. I hate it. It's not you. It's not for me. No it's not. I like food shopping. Yeah. I like having control they're sending stuff and I'm like I wouldn't have sent that

all of the sauces are rubbish yeah it's a bit basic for you it's too basic for you it elevates someone else's dinner it doesn't elevate your I know I said that to Alex I said this would be good for you

because you can't cook you are a basic bitch I was like you live alone this would be good for you okay fair enough and you live with me and you need to step by step of how to do everything

I think he needs a step you're like a toddler step like I'll have a step when he needs to wash his hands Okay, time for jail or no jail. I take cash from our joint account for secret spending and say it was for petrol. A jail? What?

That is jail. Seriously. That's very bold. Say it was for petrol. I love her like. Imagine when you then actually have to get petrol and he's like, where are you going? The secret spending's funny. I have heard people doing that where, but I don't know if it's more like a trying to leave someone where they're like,

That's the way around. Oh, like taking it out to cash back. Yeah. Do you know when they're like, oh, the food shop for the kids or the clothes, uniform for the clothes for the kids was 150 pounds. It was actually 100. And then they're taking the 50 and putting it somewhere.

Oh, my God. Only advisable if you want to leave and if you are struggling. And if you, yeah, for otherwise, try not to do it. Yeah. I don't actually know when my debt will be cleared. Yeah. Jail. I'm going to know Jail if it's because,

oh, if it could be sooner. But no, it's probably jealous, isn't it? Like, that's why that's what that one is. It just means you've like not modelled it out. Yeah. So you don't know, one good thing with our app is, the debt tracker will tell you your end date because you're telling it,

either one way or the other, how much you're paying into every month. So it will give you a date. So if you don't know how much you're paying off your debt every month, you're in a lose-lose situation. I've ignored life insurance because it feels too overwhelming. Gail, because we've told you how it's not overwhelming. So you should know. It's not overwhelming.

It doesn't mean that you're going to die tomorrow. No. It's just one of those adulting things that. Tiny bit of faff. What I liked about when we read, we did ours because I wanted to introduce Chris Killen's cover. And if you go to find outchelle.com forward slash protection, you can, the banner that we've got, you can go, obviously we've got a partner in life search. I just rang them. Yeah, I rang Chelsea.

There's another amazing ladies and this is a Gemma as well. And basically you get women. and you get a free review and what you can do is you can just verbal diarrhea and go this is like this is what I'm thinking this is what I want to protect this is what I'm worried about I don't want it to be too expensive but I don't want to

I think I got to a point where like we didn't have Chris Killner's cover but then we're like we're paying out like over a hundred pound a month for dance yeah like not for me Netflix and Amazon Prime and this that and the other and you're like proportionately I was like no no no no we are not doing our age 22 life insurance policy that I got on about the house not happening. And so it is overwhelming just because why are we meant to be experts in it.

So when you sit and you download on someone and I, you know, not being sexist, but especially female who could like understand the different combinations. We then got a policy that we were so happy with. I feel so comfortable with. But before that, I was uneasy. So not, not jail, but really you are jail if you keep thinking this way. Like I get a free review. Just ring them. Yeah. Just that one on life admin things that sits over your head. And like you said, now it's done. I actually didn't realize how much it was bothering me.

I feel a bit more like... A piece. We talked about paragliding. Oh, God. We're talking about zip lining and paragliding and stuff. And now I can do it all. You're like that guy on a long came polly. Yeah.

Or he's trying to do all the stuff. The dangerous thing is getting hurt. Does he get hurt and injured and stuff? Yeah. And he's like having meetings playing squash and he's like, okay. I'm invincible. Bring on the invincible danger.

I do feel like the weights lifted a lot. And she was really budget conscious as well, which I quite like. She was like, do you think this sits in your budget? Because she knows you're coming from financial health. One thing I would say is she knows the huns are coming. Like she's prepared. She's ready for you. And one good thing, she's very complimentary of you all.

She is. You've got your budgets in order. So anyone else, she probably spends three times to slog on the phone because they don't know how much they currently pay. They don't know how much they can afford. Like when you sit with her, she's like, you've got a. it all. She's like, wait a minute. She said everyone just puts me on hold while they go and get the financial app because they're on the mobile. They're like, wait a minute. She didn't tell it. Don't worry. She's not told us who you are. What you got, what you spent. But we had a conversation

but we had a conversation about the, you know, the financial like girls and guys. And she said, you are on it way more than you're the customer. You like, know your budgets. You know what you spend. And it is that point about we had a conversation. And that's just someone in the community who was asking me, how do I know how much cover to get for this? And Chelsea helped me have a think about it, which was, if this happened, what amount of money would give you comfort? And then let's price that and let's price like 25 grand more. Let's price 50 grand more. Because at what point do you go, I don't need that extra bit. But if I'd have, if I'd have skrimped and saved and not and gone down and it was an extra 10 pound, that's a coffee.

Yeah. Yeah. Big coffee. Coffee in London. So it's that help where it's not that much more to nudge up more But then there's a point of no return which is like I don't feel like that specific thing would help that much more So yeah just don't no excuse don't be embarrassed Go on speak to the gals I upgraded my phone even though my old one worked perfectly In jail Do you pay your phone now Lucy?

Yeah Lucy there came a point of Lucy's mobile phone journey where her dad was still paying for her phone contract and what was the catalyst that we were so we kept Lucy

on the download for years like you know hiding her off stuff like covering her face on stuff we didn't want her dad to think about the mobile phone contract that was paying out for what was the catalyst? I don't know I think it's

because I was going on holidays last year loads he was like hang on a minute you can pay for this I was like dad I thought this was keeping us connected

at what point did we get kicked off Why do we pay hours? I don't know. That have happened. Mom and Dad, you should probably still pay hours. So I remember what's really interesting, right? So recently I bought, oh, this comes to Hirox, sorry. I bought a Hirox ticket for one of my best friends, Vicky, her mom, me and her mom are going to do one together.

How old do you really go and tell everyone? She's 65. She's going to be 66. In fact, she might have 66 by the time this comes out, birthday imminent. So unbelievable. So we're going to do doubles together, pro doubles as well. That's just how amazing she is. And her daughter, Vicky, got me into how Rox has done it for years.

But she's training for Iron Man because she's a superhero. And so I needed, so I bought a ticket for Julie. So I needed her phone number. And then Vicky would be her emergency contact. So I needed her phone number. And I went and looked and them two and me and mum's numbers are so similar because we absolutely, and I'm not checked this with her, all must have gone to the iPhone.

That wasn't the thing. Apple wasn't the thing. It was so old. No. The O2 store at Middlebrook in Bolton because we've both got a very similar, not just the first five. I think the first five or six digits are so similar. Because me and my mom have one number different because we went to the till at the same time. I'll get a number and you get a number.

And I'm not told them this, but we all must have literally at the same time gone and I got a phone contract with our moms. We've got literally so similar numbers. So now I can't picture at what point she. she or we. Trish, did you pull the plug and cut us off like a nepo baby? Or did we go? Ringing Laura, Mom cut me off!

One thing that she did used to pay for that I don't miss is our haircuts. And she used to pay for our nails. Sorry, that's good. How boogie is that? As a teen. And then at what, but I want to know who made the first move, like at what point. Did we

go, Mom, we got it? I got this. Oh, that's like, I got it. I get it. She pushes it like the card back and she's like, I got this. It's like a two pound cookie or something. Did he pay for your brothers? Yeah, well, he stopped paying for my brothers at like 21.

You got a good few years out. And then like mine just kept. She just avoided the conversation. Sorry. You're cutting out, dad. I think I do remember sending like one thing to him once. And I was like, yeah, I'll pay it. And then I just stopped.

I was like, yeah, I've said the Derek. at Debubbed her. And she blocked his number and I've read for him again. That's hilarious. See at Christmas. Do let us know if we've got any fellow nepoes in the...

Yeah, I want to know what are your parents still paying for? Right, there's finally come a time where we can talk about this. I've been looking for a natural segue. Our friend was paying. We did a... Life had been night over WhatsApp.

Of Dobdrim. Oh, I was going to give a name. Sues. We're talking to you. She knows exactly what we're talking about. And we're like, I don't know how it started, but we were like, we're getting our life shit together, blah, blah, blah. Let's do a bit of a life admin, but I know girls do it together face to face,

but as millennials like to do it over WhatsApp, obviously. And she was like, oh my God, I have three, maybe four breakdown policies under my name. Almost all with, I think, either the RAC. The same provider. It was RAC, same provider or the A. And then she was like, and worse still, my mum and dad, who are in their 70s, pay for one of mine. She had four causes

Because one was like Through a bank And one was her And we don't know What the extra one is Maybe her husband got one As well And put her on it

And then her mum and dad are So imagine Having to speak to the RSA And going Hello I need one Dickheads Why didn't they volunteer

They're here Cashing in This This Before men arrive Sorry as men Sorry how sex Do I

Do four Ducks Come to your rescue If you pay Four time Which one do you Ring when you Breakdown

Yeah It's the same As I am I'm not going to give a name. Suzanne, someone. Oh, I can see you've got four policies with us. Which one would you like it on? I'm sorry.

I want four people to come. I want one to bring me a coffee. Yeah. One to sort my car out. One to make me feel better about breaking down. It's the fact that my mom and dad in the 70s were paying for one of them. And I'm like, she's a very successful CFO. Like, it's not like struggling to make ends meet.

Fantastic. So if there's a lesson here, it's like double check. There's like, we've got a money MOT actually. Go to the app, look for money MOTie. Yeah. And go through the flow. because I was also, so there's another feature in the app called Life Admin

where you can track your policies and they remind you when you're coming up for renewal because the option time is between four and six weeks before policies coming for renewal to like we get insurance and stuff. And I was double paying for landlord insurance. I can't remember why, but they were basically three months apart. So they weren't even at a similar part, but it was only when I went,

the life I've made up again, I went, I feel like I've just renewed that. I have. Yes, I have. And I was only tracking one on financial and my husband Carl was like, funny that. It's like we could have built an app with a reminder system where if you put your policies in, you would have been reminded. And I was like, I know it's a really good tool. I didn't know I had it so I couldn't put it in the policy track. In my mini defence, when I'd done my money MOT and my admin, I have a separate account for the rental. So my rental income and my rental expenses are kept in one place so that it's easier for the tax return time. But so then at tax return time, I don't know why me or the accountant didn't catch it then, but I was double paying. Oh my God. Do your life admin, ladies. Okay, time for our first dilemma. If you're stuck in consumer debt, listen to this.

One financial user said budgeting the financial way helped her clear over two and a half thousand pounds worth of debt and finally feeling control of her money. If you're ready to do the same, download the financial app and join our community today. My partner left and I'm in £37,000 of credit card debt. Just before Christmas last year, my partner dumped me after eight years of being together. I now have to buy a house by myself with no money to use because of the debt I'm in. Currently, I have 37K worth of debt in credit cards. I have tried to ask the bank to freeze the interest and they refused. I have no idea what to do.

I could either sell the house and use the equity to pay off some debt, but it won't pay enough to clear it. or I could sell my jewelry to pay off at least some of the debt so I can qualify for a mortgage by myself. Consolidation is not an option, as they have said, it would affect my credit score. Credit score. Is there any good options you can think of?

I would be doing both. What do you think you should do? Selling the home to release some equity to pay off the debt. You're pulling it down straight away. More manageable monthly payments. I would be selling the jewelry because you give it. it if you want to, I think it would help. But like to give an either or like, should I do this or should do this. If you're hell bent, 37,000 pounds is not an insignificant amount of debt. Like,

I would be wanting to get rid of that, especially being a solo person trying to pay it off. It's difficult anyway, just to live, never mind paying off debt. I would want to be getting rid of that debt. Yeah. Because it's on you. It's on nobody else. Like you say, you're on your own now. And I also wouldn't be worried about getting another mortgage right now. I would want to be flexible. Like, how much can you afford? I don't know how much you'd be able to borrow, especially because the equity you're using won't be going to then a house deposit, it'll be going to paying off the debt. So I don't think practically you could afford a house right now.

I didn't hear you say that you would have enough in there to go towards your next house deposit. And you're worried about your credit score, but why you bothered about your credit score? Like my priority, if this was me, would be getting rid of the debt and probably a short-term rental somewhere while I just focus on getting that debt down. I wouldn't be entering into an agreement

because basically a mortgage is taking on more debt. And if you're already in a significant amount of debt, I wouldn't be looking to get into another agreement of 20, 30 years. Yeah. It's hard because I feel like once you've got on the property ladder, especially in Britain, it's tough. And you, like, are reluctant to step off the train. But maths is maths.

And so you've not got a God-given right to one. And sometimes, you know, it's hard because rent sometimes is more expensive than mortgage. and it can be really frustrating. So, like, I give you permission to not sell the house if you model both, and it's going to tell you whether you can or not. So option A is you sell the house, sell whatever you can. Like we start again, you do proper financial money playbook.

You save a mini-emergency fund. You start paying off your debts, snowball it, smallest the logages. You get super intentional. And when you've got that, you build up a bigger emergency fund and you build up a house deposit. And that might be a four-year budget. process. It might not be a two-year process. That might be a long time. But what you then get is you're buying a home in a stable situation where you are debt-free and you've got cash so you can,

you know, then the mortgage that you can afford is better because you've got money. Because you're not going outgoings of paying off your mortgage and paying off your mortgage. Paying off a small-age. Now, the other side to that is lots of people move home and buying new homes whilst with consumer debt. Like we don't advise it, but people do do it. And they'll be on this journey and they, well, they might not be on the journey, might not be paying off debt, but they might be happy to keep it and just keep it around. And they do move home. And if that is so, so important to you,

show us the figures and model it and really work out fine. If I don't and I need to, because she needs to buy a new home, right? Yeah. Because she buy him. Yeah, it sounds like. Sounds like she can't stay. Yeah. Sounds like she'll be selling the home.

This is about whether you use the equity to pay off debt or whether we move, roll it into a new home. And if we roll it into a new home, do the real honest maths with a mortgage advisor and flow through and go, okay, what deposit do I need? What house can I afford? What mortgage can I be given appropriately? Because there's some crazy like loan multiples at the moment of salary. I saw that in the press that some are going to six. So what can you reasonably afford? And then when you've got these debt repayments, that's going to limit your affordability. So sit down with the mortgage advisor and look at what you're up. are and just think about what life's like with both, it may well be possible to buy another home and carry this debt. There may be other things that you can do about the debt as well, but really project forward about what life's going to be like on both because life's not linear and it doesn't mean this is your only chance of ever owning a home. And you know, you may be able to reduce what you buy and compromise on what you buy, but for just getting on the, on the,

back on the ladder, stay or staying on the ladder and staying there. but don't do it blindly. Like some people just go, obviously they need to buy a house. Yeah, they just jump from one to the other. And it is such a British thing. And I would hate for her to think

that she's taking a step back in life because she's not going to immediately go into another mortgage. But I feel like she will feel much more freedom and stability doing it this way rather than how am I going to make my, how am I going to save for a deposit first of all? How am I going to make the mortgage payments every single month?

Sometimes there's a happy medium as well where you, especially there's no minute earlier, payment charges on the mortgage, you come out of the mortgage, you sell the house and you park the funds. And in this interim period, you go ham on that debt. You don't use your savings to clear the debt necessarily. And it's because you just take in a year. You're taking some time. Like people think renting is wasted money. It now almost isn't, always isn't, especially it buys you time and peace of mind and patience. And also sometimes you walk into a really, really high mortgage rate. And in the first once, two years, all you've done is pay interest anyway. And you've not

knocked hardly anything. And then you've paid stamp duty and there's lots of other things as well. So renting isn't always a bad idea. And, you know, I don't want to predicate, you know, your future on this. But you then may, in two to three years, meet someone and you might buy home together. And almost always the house that you buy is not the house that they move into. So for like, for a period, it's not the worst. But don't, do not do this. Do not sell this house and buy your own immediately without doing the maths. Yeah. Because I think you need to know that if you're going to go forward with it. And a mortgage advisor, most of them, especially a good and trusted one, will do that modelling with you and we'll, you know, I know it's a fee for them, but they're not going to, well,

they're going to say you're not going to get accepted or they're going to say that stress test is a bit tight. You will be much better off if you have low debt or no debt and you come into this with like being able to borrow without putting extra pressure on yourself. Yeah. We talked a few pods ago like about, it's just your next chapter, like make it a positive chapter. Be like the girlie that's going to rent in like give it sex in the city by. It's like, romanticise it a little bit. Yeah.

Like, I would hate for you to jump into a new home because that's what we do in the UK. You're meant to own property. Like, not for you right now. That might not be the thing. And that's okay.

I hate that we put this pressure on people. But also, like, people agreed it. And this isn't our, um, darling a writer, but people want everything. So I want,

like, if they're going to a separation like that, I want a house, but I'm not prepared to sell my car on finance. Why not? If the house is that important to you, sell the car, get a banger, reduce your debt, reduce your payments, go be more attractive to a mortgage lender. They don't want to compromise, like they think they want, they think they would, but they're

not willing to. So it's obvious to then what's more important. If you really, really, really need and want that house, what else are you prepared to do to get it? And so I say that to anyone, this isn't the case in this reader, the listeners, dearish readers. Dearest, gracious reader. Yeah, it is that like what, it's so important to you, how hard are you willing to go,

how quickly you're willing to pay off that debt, how quickly you're willing to make life changes to enable that house owner dream because I'm all for that. But you don't get to do both. You don't get to like buy the new home and then sit around with the debt. Yeah. It's going to bite you and all we want is the best for you until you feel as strong and as financial as possible, especially going into this solo home running life, not just, just home ownership life, home rental life when you're a solo renter is really hard as well.

Like there's no easy way. Yeah. Interesting one. And you're someone at the moment, you're renting. I love renting. And you're impatience and you embraced it and you could buy. Yeah. Both of you could buy together. You've chosen not to. Why? How long have you got? House commitment issues is definitely one. Yeah, house commitment issues. We change our mind so much. And yeah, I just don't, we're just always like, we can buy a house whenever we want. Like, we don't need to rush it because also I'm such a home person. Yeah, it's important. If I own my own house, I'm not leaving. I'm not leaving. I'm not leaving. I'm not leaving. So we need to delay that as long as possible. Yeah. But like, so then embracing rental, embracing and romanticising that and accepting that. And accepting that. like it's waiting for you. All you can do is get your shit together. If you get your ducks in a row, house buying is a gorgeous experience.

Yeah. If you've not, it's like a stressful scenario where you panic, you agree to anyone that will lend you anything, stretching yourself. You're not a set over as credit score. Yeah. Like it's not a place of strength. Yeah. You are doing it from a place of strength and not enough people celebrate the process

and the flow that you've gone through to do it. And so more people should be inspired by what you've done. You should get a nice little apartment, little keyword. have like a year of just being on a mission, Bridget Jones energy. Like, solo. This sounds gorgeous. Yeah, just romanticised it as much as possible, like cook beans on toast. But like.

Please yourself. Like leaning. Yeah, just lean in. Yeah. It's not forever. No, that's what I mean. It's like, it's not forever. Yeah.

Pretend you're in like a rom-com. Yeah, you're never going to be a homeowner again. It's like, we're not saying that. We're just saying for now. Let's be in the shackles. We've always said this. As long as you are making good financial decisions whilst not owning, that's okay. Yeah.

What is bad is when people like don't move towards home ownership or come out of home ownership, but then like spray the money everywhere else and like, you know, you're low. So it is that if you are building up savings, paying down debt and or investing, it's okay to not own a house. That's all right. There's no rules about it. it's when you like don't make great financial choices with your money. So like if she, for example, sells the house and then doesn't pay off the debt.

Yeah, with the cash. And then spends all that. You've then gone backwards. And that's where you go, okay, if you're like to do that, then maybe you should just buy another house because at least you remove the equity over. But I think a lot of people will be surprised at our answer home. I don't think I'm a bit surprised. Okay, time for a second dilemma.

Did you know that over a third of women in the UK have no protection, in place compared to just 16% of men. We've partnered with Life Search so you can chat to an advisor for free and get the cover that you deserve. Head tofinichelle.com for slash protection to get your free quote today. My job expenses pushed me £5,000 into debt. Hi ladies. Firstly, I'm quite a newbie to Financial and I've downloaded the app and have recently enjoyed catching up on the podcast. I'm after some advice please as I haven't been amazing with my money, but I'm determined to change my ways this year. I have a credit card which I have done a balanced transfer on at 0% for 18 months, and through the app I have worked out what payments are required each month to clear the debt before I incur

any interest. All of this is affordable and allows me to still save money throughout the year and pay my bills. My debt has accumulated through my job. I currently travel across the Northwest, Cumbria, Yorkshire and the North East daily. Although I have a company car, which means I don't have any car finance or maintenance costs, we aren't given a fuel card or a company credit card. I have asked several times about this and it's always been a straight no. Because of this, I need to use my own money to claim it back each month through expenses. I got my credit card to purchase fuel and other ad hoc costs such as client meals out, gifts and fuel so I wasn't eating into my monthly spending allowance. The issue I have is that despite putting each monthly payment back onto my card, I've found that here and there I'm adding coffees, lunches and other items.

I'm now at the point where I have £5,000 to pay back. I'm reluctant to keep using a credit card now, as I'm keen to get my only debt, bar our mortgage, paid off. It's also really hard to keep track of expenses payments as well as monthly payments when I'm continuing the use of credit card every day of the month. I've debated using my own spending money again and then topping this back up once the monthly expenses are paid back to me. However, I'd really like your insight on how I can manage this better without using a credit card at all.

Sometimes my expenses can be over £1,000, but on average they're around £500, so it's a lot to have outstanding. Thank you in advance. P.S., I have started an emergency fund and spending pots, and I'm looking forward to seeing these grow. Yay!

Welcome to Finance Shell. It's so annoying. I'm real. I was so enormous. Should be so ashamed of themselves for like such a significant amount. We're not talking like a couple of coffees here and there. I do remember like when I first met Carl and his travel with the job he had at the time, he had a credit card because he was debt free when we met. But he had this credit card.

And he in one year, for example, had like 28,000 pounds worth of expenses because the company, like all his travel was booked on his card. and his travel was international. It was transatlantic. So he would be doing trips like over, trip overseas, internal flights, sometimes hire cars, taxes, it would be hotels, it would be like client meals. Client meals. So he would do like two to three weeks or at least two if he was over, we did America,

would do two so it could do lots of like different clients. And then, so it was his food every day. And I was like, you absolutely kidding me. And they were never ever, like they were poor at paying, not because they weren't financially, but it was just like this delay. And then the business got acquired. And it was like it was the end of the second, because they were all remote. And Carl was like doing all this travel.

Luckily, it did slow down a bit because the company that acquired them were American. And they would take a lot of the America trips and he would do the European ones. But I've never known it is what I'm saying before. And suddenly it's like thousands of pounds at any one time. And he was very, very diligent with never using that card for anything. girls and he would be very diligent about chasing them to make sure that they paid in time so that he didn't incur interest. But I must admit, as a household, when the international travel went, well, the transatlantic travel went, it turned to just European, we then cut the car, we stopped the

card and he had like a pot and we would fund it, but we're talking about, again, when that happened, the travel was paid differently. So it was just a few meals here and there. It's a lot. And what, For anyone that says, or I get a card and I use it for work expenses, she's just proven what's happened because in the nicest way, she says, I started to use it here and there, five grand. It sounds like the five, roughly. Let's say if it's even four and a grand of it's what she's owed. The five's hers now.

Yeah. It's not. And that's what happens. And this is what happens with credit cards when people talk about. I use it just for normal spending. We use it just for big things. It is a slippery slope because it's there. It's temptation.

and you are human. It's meant to be used. That's what these credit companies know what it's for and it's meant to be used. And so before we talk about anything else, I'm annoyed for you because in this day and age, your company should provide, especially if you've never had an issue with expense claims,

they should provide a line of credit, a company card that's not yours. It's not fair. Yeah, I looked online as soon as I got this dilemma through because I was like, oh, I want to help this person, like, straight away. Sometimes we deal with the dilemmas a few weeks late when we've sussed out who we should, featuring, making sure they're all different,

while giving you something that you can, like, associate with, and we're not repeating them. It was like, companies aren't required to give you a credit card or a card for expenses, but they must be reasonable in that if your job entails a hell of a lot of travel, a hell of a lot of gifting, client hosting, travel, you have to be reasonable. So I think she should go and chat to UPT.

I think you should write a letter to your own. company explaining strongly worded email yeah that it is work out how much maybe that you've spent on your own personal credit card over the last two, three years I bet it comes to a significant amount

if it's between a thousand pounds it's going to be 30 grand because of a few years 500 I think you've hit the threshold for what is reasonable expenses on your own and you can just say I'm not quite happy to continue my job 90% because the thing is the people that are giving the yes or no rubber stamp

are arguing with people that just work from the office every single day. They don't get it. And can't empathise with someone that is having to balance the books constantly. And you can just say, look, it's not reflecting, it's not working for me.

I can't manage it. The delay and all that kind of stuff. The cash flow is unfair. You know, it is, whilst it seems like she is getting paid on time so that she can pay it off. And it's like,

it's none of their business, whether you've added stuff on or not as well. You can leave them, leave it out of it. But you shouldn't have to cash flow it. And while, so you cash flowing it through credit, at any one time,

that's impacting your credit report. It's impacting your affordability. You know, if anyone comes and looks at you for if you do want to buy a home or remortgage or whatever, they're going to look and go, use credit card a lot because it's yours. You are fully liable. If your company goes bust, by the way, in the meantime, at any point, they are not liable for that 1,000. You are not getting it. You're the bottom of the...

That's going in the CHAPGT letter. Yeah. Well, hopefully, chat GPT can use that as well, but... Build a case for it. Show that you're responsible nowadays. Yeah, I'm responsible. never had problem with expenses. Everything's always been signed off. And you've got no room for maneuver. So I know you need to financial and you're saving your emergency fund, but you are new

and you might not have all the sinking funds in place. You are like one broken washing machine down from having to use credit because you're waiting for the money to be paid back. That is the difference in your budget. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. So you're personally liable for it. And I think there's lots of really good products available on the market now for companies, for small businesses to use. I've seen them. I've seen them advertised on LinkedIn. So it's not like they have to give you a visa and you're like company card. Oh my God. It makes me think of Anna Delved. Anadette. Could put it on your company card. Don't put that in your chat cheap Tila. They definitely won't. That'll put them off. But they're all like, I feel like there's even like corporate debit

cards or that could be topped up, you know, and you can use that. Yeah, they might have a limit. You don't, give me a limit. I don't need, I don't spend. Look at your expenses. What's the median? Be like, I don't spend more than a thousand pounds. So can you give me a 1,200 pound limit? So I can't go and go crazy. But why are they saying no? That's a red flag. Why are they saying, if you can give them all this evidence and be like, there you go. You should quit your job.

Well, most are like, are they that financially not stable that they can't do that? I'm pretty sure they are because they're paying you back. It sounds like they pay you back on time. This isn't the issue. But you should not be, when you're working in some sort of sales role like this, you shouldn't, I don't really come across it often where you would expect. And I think only when Carl probably worked out how much. was on that credit card over time, he might have then gone, actually, I don't feel comfortable,

putting 28 grand on a card. No, luckily, it changed. I think between us, we would have gone. We would have gone a minute. And gone back to them. It's just that he, I think when it's not a problem. Yes. And so he was particularly diligent.

It is particularly strange. And so he never got caught out and they were so good at paying it that it all worked out. Okay. But it's just one day. Someone might go off. sick and then it's not paid. But like Laura said, you do have to take some responsibility and you have, but the dilemma is like, my company put me into five, like because of the company card. I'm like, no, no, you're in debt because you use the card for things that you shouldn't be

using it for. So my biggest thing would be getting rid of that debt first, using the snowball method, although it's on one card. So squeezing your expense as much as you possibly can, throwing every can at the debt. Because what she's done is she's worked out what she needs to pay off it to clear it before the nought percent. And so, Big tick for that, but what we always say at financial, this is if anyone listening, don't think you did something extra special and got a 0% deal. The 0% is just it doesn't grow like it for 28%. Great.

We like that. But you have to clear this quicker than the term. So she's doing more than minimums with that I've worked out what it needs to be. But go do the playbook, get you an emergency fund, which you're growing at the moment, and you're sinking funds in place. But this debt needs to be gone well before the end of the term. I think did she hear 2029? 27 was it?

18 months. 18 months, yeah. So this debt needs to have gone like in the next year, in the next half year. Five grand, you can do that. If you're, I'm making judgments. I think you're paying me quite well

if you're in a job where you might be in sales, you might be in business development, a company car. I'm hoping that you can get the cash from your budget to overpay this. Get it gone out. your life and like Holly said, go with them to solution with solutions, go get this company card gone. This is how easy it is, guys. This is not your fault. This is so easy to run up debt, isn't it?

Yeah. And if it's still a firm no on the card front, once you paid it off, I would be tempted to close it. And then it's like, that's a chapter of my life done. Open a fresh one that you literally, the rule is, I can only put business expenses on it. This is not mine. This is the company's like reframing it in your brain. Do you know, like, then you're never tempted to go in it. You're like, this is not my money. And I don't want to be in that position. again. I've got an extra suggestion and this is what Carl does now. So he does have his other job. He does have some expenses that he can claim and we use our money. Yeah. We like create a pot for it. And when the expenses money comes in, we're kind of like a month behind. So we're like let's, I'm going to make it up.

But let's say we put 500 pounds once we put 500 in it and it's like a float. He uses that for the expenses that he incurs while doing this particular job. but anybody like parking and a bit of life. It's not a lot. And he gets paid it a month in arrears, and that just goes in the pot. And once you've done it once, you're going to be very diligent with your expenses when it's your money.

But once you've done it once, you're not out of pocket. You're not out, but you've just provided the float. And it means that you're not tempted to, well, just put that on the card, because it's not the card, it's money. And so it helps to really demonstrate

why we talk about cash is king versus than credit, because you don't overspend, you don't just whack something on because you want the money, Once the money's gone, the money's gone. Whereas when you've got a credit card with an allowance, you do it. So if this is for anyone that has to pay for their own expenses,

please be tempted to once create a pot, set aside for it and use cash. Yeah, that's good advice. You can do it in like, you can set pots up in Stalin, Monzo, Chase, I think even Revolut. I think the point is it just gets messy. So let's keep it as clean as we possibly can to avoid that gray area. Yeah. Yeah. And what possible separation of powers, it's their cards for their,

stuff and your cars for your stuff. Okay. That is it for this episode. The Vault is now closed. And just a quick disclaimer in The Vault is just a chat around life of money topics. We're not giving financial advice. By the way, if you're enjoying these conversations, please make sure you are following the podcast. Sharing it or leaving a quick rating really helps us keep this going.