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?

How about in audit roles. I see quite a lot of tech based internal audit roles coming up at the moment and they are always looking for first line experience.

I wouldn't suggest he takes anything and works all hours to make up the shortfall, or at least not yet.

He has a very useful payout, to cover bills for a long time. Let him use the time to decompress (being main redundant can hit hard mentally, as well as financially) and make a proper project out of finding a new equal or better job.

If he can pick up a few hours to get him out of the house and bring in some spending money, great, but slogging unecessarily all hours makes no sense, when the time can be invested in finding well paid work.

It's also an opportunity to get some decorating etc done....

If you are getting six months pay, can you be frugal and make this last longer?

The job market is brutal out there. My dh signed on with recruitment agencies to help him.

Be AI savvy and get your cv AI proof. It’s not like it was in the past.

Have you taken into account the first £30k of redundancy is tax free?
You are doing all the right things. He does have 6 months to find another job, so try not to worry too much.

He did all sorts of agency stuff - general admin, some driving - basically whatever they had!

I didn’t mean to say your husband was sat waiting for the phone to ring but you do hear people saying I can’t do that it’ll ruin my cv or it’ll take the time away from being available for interviews and stuff but in reality agency work is very flexible and says to a potential employer “I’m a worker” and have a good work ethic.

A few things that might help:
The first £30k of redundancy is tax free - so that buys you more than 6 months for him to get another job.

Work notice rather than take payment in lieu of notice due to tax effect and keeping work benefits for as long as possible (health care, death in service etc). Work may be gardening leave...
Some companies offer outplacement services that can help with CV and interview assistance.
Sign on immediately for JSA because that cannot be back dated.
He will have paid PAYE tax on earnings until leave date (and possibly some of the redundancy payout), that can be claimed back either in-year or via self assessment next year.
Child benefit may be affected by lower income - i.e. you might get to keep more if it.

Ensure your mortgage conditions are covered. Most require some life insurance that is often fulfilled by being an employee and having that in the company pension agreement. As you are working you could be fine.

Whilst out of work there may be things he can qualify for, such as whether your local council does: "free off-peak and weekend gym and swim access at council-run leisure centres".

Higher rate tax is 40%

Yes, if we look at it as just the £1200 shortfall it will last longer.

But that is essential bills only, so that's after I've cut everything but mortgage, utilities, broadband, food and car expenses. So doesn't allow for the kids needing new shoes, or the dogs vaccines etc.

Honestly OP unless there is a backstory of your OP being a lazy useless fecker ye will be absolutely fine . The payout will probably even be a bit higher than the six months as they will usually pay out holidays as well. DH was paid in full for the November when he actually finished in the October. He will be allowed time off for interviews so he could end up going straight into a job and not being unemployed at all. I know this has pulled the rug from under you and you are feeling shell shocked and totally addled right now but honest to god it will be fine and if anything you’ll have a bit of a lump sum to enjoy. Try to think positively about it all.

Why did you think you'd be flamed? You couldn't help this situation and you're doing everything you can. Wishing your husband luck in finding a new job.

He's unlikely to get a good senior post if hes working full time on minimum wage plus doing all the childcare. Applications and interview prep takes time.

He needs to balance all of this, or have a time frame set up e.g.

1 day to lick his wounds
1 month to dedicate to the senior job hunt, speaking to all his contacts and recruiters, getting CVs in shape, thinking about what he wants.
If nothing solid then he starts to look at part time work in addition.

You just dont want to get to month 6 and not have anything lined up and you've not cut back at all, its all a balance.

Is he role one he could do any interim / contracts / consultancy?

I really feel for you, its brutal for the whole family

If you are earning £100,000 on 30
hourd per week then 40 hours would be £133,000.

That takes your net up from around £5,400 to £6,100.

If you are struggling then why not do this?

A friend of mine delivered pizza when he needed more hours.
It could fit in with you getting home from work. It's minimum wage and petrol.

You can't watch any live tv without a licence or anything at any time on iPlayer but you can watch catchup on ITVx, All4, U etc. It's recoomended you wait until at least 2 hours after a program ends before watching on catchup as many channels have a +1 channel on TV, so if you watch immediately after a program ends you could fall foul of that.

I’m always surprised when people suggest NHS, council, civil service etc. These have recruitment freezes and redundancies. There are only six jobs on my local council website - things like senior finance officer and social workers. That’s it.

I’d assumed by the mention of 60% tax that the OP meant she was just below the £100k cliff-edge.

If she’s on £50,00 per year then yes, it’s not a 60% marginal rate.

Going from 30-40 hours work would see take-home go from £3,100 to £3,800.

Streaming services aren't live though. You can watch them whenever.

They do stream live tv. I’d missed the catch up bit though, although several people have covered this since. She can use them as long as she doesn’t watch live

Senior specialist roles can take a long time to get hired into (6+ months from start of interview process is normal) and full time work may really hinder this process

As part of my redundancy package I was given some sessions with an employment consultant who helped with my CV and suggested career changes using my experience.

If DH isn't been offered that, I'd seriously consider investing in it.

15 years on, I am still using most of the wording from that CV, having developed it using the same principles for subsequent jobs, and have never, ever failed to get an interview when using it.

I'm also in a completely different field, which fits me much better the the old one ever did. You could say being made redundant was the best thing to ever happen to me, although it didn't feel it at the time.

I've also found that having once left a long term "secure" job, changing jobs is much easier than I ever realised.

It will all work out.

Not incurring interest but we do have about £8k on an interest free credit card. We did have a DD set up to pay it off before the term ended but I'm going to switch that to minimum.

While he would need a take home of £1600 to cover the shortfall, if he got one where the take home was only £1400 you'd still be massively better off as you'd only be eating through the redundancy money at a rate of £200 a month, so it would last you ages.

He'd be better to consider everything at this point, as long as it is more than JSA and any commuting costs

The £1200 shortfall is ONLY if I cut those sorts of things. If I don't then the shortfall is closer to £3000, plus discretionary spending.

Yes for mortgage holiday. Actually really easy, one phone call.

Why, that makes no sense? Pay it from the settlement if you need to before paying interest

I think you need to step away and spend a day doing something lovely with DH. The day we got the news, we went for a walk, with a flask of soup, and realised actually simple pleasures are the best, especially with the right people. It was a useful reset.

Then, once you've calmed down and stopped catastropisizing, make a sensible plan, which includes structure in DH's days of job hunting, childcare and household tasks.

Once he's in work again, you'll have things organisised so you can stop living beyond your (substantial) means and don't take on more debt.