Husband made redundant and facing £1200 monthly shortfall, any advice?

[Tappings]

I'm probably going to get flamed in this thread judging by how others have gone.

DH has been made redundant, he was the main earner.

We're lucky that he'll get a decent payout, equivalent to 6 months take home salary.

I work 30 hours per week. I got a promotion in February and have a decent take home, above national average.

DH will be entitled to contributions based JSA and we'll get child benefit back, but even with those and cutting back our bills we'll be £1200 short per month. And that doesn't account for any personal spends, kids clothes/ uniform, adult clothes, birthdays etc.

Due to my recent promotion, me getting a better paying job is extremely unlikely, even if I went full time. I'm close to the ceiling of my profession. There's no option to go full time where I am either.

DH is (was) a well paid professional in a competitive field and was quite senior in that field. He's already looking for jobs, has sorted his CV, spoken with several recruiters and has an interview lined up for next week.

Any suggestions on what we can do? Advice/ support?

Have him sign on with a temp agency

Ive just been in the same situation. Husband made redundant but with a decent enough payout. My salary covers the bills but not much else. He applied for JSA. He has been applying for any relevant roles in his industry some above and some below his previous pay grade. He's had a few interviews and has accepted a role which is probably a slight step down from what he was doing but still a decent salary. Your husband needs to make sure he is open to other roles even if it means a reduction in salary

My niece was made redundant about 18 months ago from a very well paying job. She is very well qualified with a first class honours degree and 10 years experience in senior role in her company. We all thought she'd get another job quickly. It actually took her a little over 6 months and she gets paid less and has less good working terms and conditions now. She got through first interviews and often second interviews many times before she landed another job. She stretched her redundancy out, cut back her gym subscription and she and DH cut back a lot on personal spends so she missed a friend's hen party overseas etc. Now both she and her DH spend less, cut back to one holiday a year from 3 and save more in case something like that happened again.

Have you a tivated the mortgage charter? We did this in a similar situation. 6 months break from payments and added to the end of the mortgage.

Yes, I'm panicking a bit. Thanks for being nice about it.

Also go through your bank line by line. I cut 250 in subscriptions payments by doing this. I had things like 14 quid national trust, 5 quid museum member ship. It totalled 250 a month that i didnt realise I was spending as it was such small amounts.

Yes you can use them without a tv licence if you are only watching catch up/on demand, not live tv.

I personally wouldn’t at the moment as things aren’t desperate.
Have you got any credit card debts that are incurring interest.
Have you got any additional savings that you could use.

Thanks, that's really helpful to know about mine wage taken home.

Why are you cutting DC's hobbies now when you have ££££ in the bank and are only £1200 pm short?

I've been through this, in fact DH and I both lost our jobs in the same month, but it never meant we'd never work again.

Yes, cut out unecessary spending, that's a useful review to do anyway, and DH will have the time to do the cleaning, but also to make job hunting a FT job.

You have a big cushion, even if it takes a year.

Its called the mortgage charter. Google it. Its a legal thing they have to offer you a break and it does not effect credit rating.

I am not getting your maths there?

Could you look at extensions on your mortgage if needed? The payment goes down a lot if you're paying over 30 years instead of 20 although obviously total paid will go up due to extra interest. You can always overpay once he's working again.

I've been in a similar situation and it was scary but we tightened our belts hard straight away and that made a big difference. You'll be ok.

This is normal, it’s a shock both in terms of the practicalities and in terms of the knock to his confidence.

You have options, and time, so try not to catastrophise.

Or ditch all the other subscriptions and just pay for a TV licence which will get you loads of "free" to air channels including BBC and iPlayer. Clarkson's Farm and Rivals will have to wait until he gets a new job 🙂

My sympathies OP, it must be very stressful.

I've been made redundant three times so I known how stressful it is, but try not to panic too much just yet. He could have a job offer next week!

I've give it a month or so before cancelling all subscriptions and making an mortgage changes. That will give you time to figure out what the job market is like.

Contribution element of jsa/UC is only paid for 6 months, op. As you have small children you may be eligible for UC/WTC other elements to help going forward . Do a benefits calculation. It depends on savings etc, but worth checking on a legitimate website like entitledto or turn2us.

Look at Married Tax Allowance.

What sort of agency work? In his field there's contracting (which he's looking in to) but that's different to agency work.

He only found out yesterday afternoon so he's definitely not been sat waiting for the phone to ring!

Sorry to hear this @Tappings. Must feel awful and frustrating.

I assume you have already changed supermarkets/looked at food spend?

What about signing up for things like Top Cashback, JamDoughnut and the like?

As some one already mentioned pause any subscriptions (you may have ones you’ve forgotten about so worth going through banking app to check).

Delivery jobs? If not Tesco (Iceland are always looking for drivers in my area), things like Pharmacy Delivery?

£21,800 per year is £1,600
per month net, which is 33 hours on minimum wage.

Look at a water meter if you're on water rates. They're generally cheaper.
Look at spreading your council tax over 12 months instead of the usual 10. Most councils will allow it if you're not in arrears.

When my farm labourer father was made redundant, he got not one penny in redundancy pay and instead was given one week to get out of our house (tied to the job). That's the way things were, then. And they call them the good old days! Fortunately he was taken on by another farmer, even though he was sixty years old. But it still broke our hearts to leave the village we loved. Good luck to your husband in finding a job. At least you are not penniless, as we were.

Change to the subscriptions with ads. We did that to save money and we barely get any ads. If you do make a cuppa! I know some would argue it’s a luxury but it’s cheaper to watch Netflix at home than to go out and do something.

No, I'm on the cusp of higher rate tax, so all the extra I get would be taxed at 60% and I'm still paying my student loan off. I'd come home with about £450 a month more (I've used salary calculator website to check figures). And then we'd also lose child benefit!