What does feeling skint mean to you?

[ssd]

Honestly?
Just asking after recent conversation with someone close who feels skint (3 days ago) and today told me they've just spent £500 on furniture.

It makes me realise my skint and their skint is world's apart.

So what does feeling skint mean to you?

I have made one! They were really apologetic, they offered vouchers as an apology but I feel daft going in to pick them up incase I see the woman again.

Pick the vouchers up!! She is nothing, forget about it. The vouchers will be so helpful if things are tough!

minielise God that is awful, what an unkind bitch! Its not an unusual request and not difficult to do for her!

One variation of skint for me is using coppers in the self-serve checkouts because that's all you've got left until payday and you're only buying yellow sticker stuff anyway.

Its waking up at 3am in a panic. My anxiety correlates to my skintness and my insomnia.

Or, listening to your colleague talk about how she only goes to work to pay for her holidays abroad and how sad she is she can only have a 'staycation' in the UK this year, and you can't even afford days out. So I suppose skint is in comparison to your colleagues and peers.

Waking up feeling sick every day at the amount of debt you're in. Feeling sick and hiding when someone knocks on the door in case it is bailiffs (it sometimes was). Having no money to ever do anything - not even go to a friend's house for dinner because they were well-off and wouldn't understand someone being unable to afford to bring a bottle of wine or flowers. Having my sister call me when she was incredibly ill with flu and ask me to buy some basic shopping for her family as she was too ill to stand up, and having to walk several miles to her house to ask for the cash up front then back to the shops then back to hers, as I had about 7p, instead of arriving, as I so longed to do, with big bags of shopping and not ask for any money for them.

'Skint' to me was asking one of the nice chefs at work to throw me a burger on the grill when I arrived at work after being at uni all day, because I had no money for food, earning a little under £4 an hour because at 20/21, they didn't have to pay minimum wage, so they didn't. Everything I earned went on rent/bills. Although I couldn't afford the heating. We had snow that year and I got I'll from the cold. I worked in the kitchen too and no one would have ever said no. Even though it was against the rules and I should have paid 50%.

A few years later, I'd brought a house and the boiler was condemned. I used all the money I had and was right at the end of my overdraft. Had moved into an entry level job in my field of study at this point. Ended up making soup for lunch with whatever veg was looking ropey to get through til payday.

I shall never use the phrase skint in relation to my own situation unless it truly warrants it after reading some of these. I have DC now and the idea of not being able to feed the children chills me. I've worked for a charity that helped people really in poverty and I've supported as many related causes as I can, which I shall definitely continue doing.

Just saw
Timeforabiscuit. Description of fucked. Is me.

Ah @monkeyonthetable, you're a lovely sister to have done that. Love is truly a verb. I hope things are better for you now.

What a lovely thing to say @EmiliaAirheart (great name btw.) I've always felt sad and ashamed at that memory. Never occurred to me it was actually a nice thing to do in itself. And yes, things are way better now. I got out of debt and stayed out.

Thanks so much for all these honest stories.

Going into overdraft /borrowing off friends /family is not an option. In fact being able to borrow is a luxury not many people have.

Doingtheboxerbeat Yes!
When I was properly skint I considered being able to borrow money from friends as a step up.
Because it implies you have some hope of money in the future and some expectation of being able to pay them back.

@minielise - that story is shocking. She has no right to belittle you as a paying customer and you have every right to ask for a tally - not exactly hard for her - she just has to glance at the till from time to time. I'm glad you complained. Take the vouchers and spend them on some treats for your husband and yourself. Why not? The shop is trying to say sorry for poor customer relations. You don't need to go to her till. Or, if you felt cheeky, you could go to her till and say, 'I was given these vouchers by your management who were embarrassed by how rude you were to me last week.'

Skint for me means I have only enough in my current account for bills and food and I can't buy something I see that I would like. I get worried if I have less than my buffer. (A months wage)

I have savings accounts though with plenty in them, but they are assigned for other annual expenses so I don't "count them" as such.

I am aware that my "skint" isn't actually skint at all.

Skint was when I was over my overdraft & had to return some food shopping (tins) to get back in my overdraft limit.

I've been really in debt in the past (loans & overdraft), luckily not now.

I have a low wage & PIP but my sister helps me manage my finances now & I keep my head above water.
I have MH illness & can overspend so I've given her my debit card & have a cash amount each week to use for essentials plus some money on a Post Office card.
All my bills go out on monthly Direct Debits so I know they're paid for.

Having to walk to the shop looking at the ground and then go around the car park searching the ground to try to find some extra coins to get a loaf of bread and some milk.

Not enough money for outgoings.

Skint to me means no money for luxuries. I'm skint this month because I've spent £300 on tarantula stuff...that's my 'fun stuff' budget gone for the month. So I'm skint.

depends on your definition of skint. fro some it is having no spare allocated cash (might have savings but these aare not for going to the pub or a takeaway, but enough for food, petrol,rent/mortgage and emergency white goods/car repair say)

or down to not having enough for food this week.

we have been the first category. at which point all discretionary spending is stopped. thankfully never more skint than this. Having to do without as a child really messes with your head though and even when you do have some savings, or even quite a bit, you can still feel the fear and feel skint... ) (I have savings but there is the possibility that I may need to supplement carers allowance, child benefit for the next 6 years or so until disabled children are independent and due to m y conditioning worsening and finding it too hard to work as yet. )

When I was working part time trying to scrape enough money to study and better myself. The shame of phoning in sick one day because I couldn't afford the bus fare. Surviving on 35 spaghetti from Sainsburys dry with no sauce because it's all j could afford. Fishing change out of every bag/pocket/ the street outside to drop into the self service machine at the supermarket to pay for bread, makes my face flush hot with Shame thinking about it

Borrowing money to feed my kids etc. I know people who complain they're skint and can't afford bills or rent yet are always out to eat, wear expensive clothes and drive flash cars. It always made me wonder what they really define as skint

When I first started work - having to count every penny and save up for any purchase that was outside necessities. We had a rented house and our furniture was all borrowed, second hand or from my bedroom at my parents' house. We borrowed an old black and white TV from my parents (rather than a portable colour TV they offered us) so we could save on the cost of the TV licence (at the time it was about £25 for a B&W licence and £90 for a colour one). Checking my bank balance before every withdrawal. Hardly ever going out socialising (at a time in my life when I wanted to!) I was far skinter working and renting than I ever was as a student.
Things improved after I'd been working for a year or so because I was able to get a mortgage, which was about half the cost of renting at the time, and my salary gradually went up.

Living in overdraft, having to put groceries on a charge card (yes, I know they have to be paid for eventually but I don't have enough funds at present), borrowing from my 87 year old father. One day (hopefully) I will find a job, but at nearly 61 it's not going to be easy, and at the moment I'm living on a JSA and a few (very few) temp jobs.