Credit card bill

[Creditcardshame]

I am not sure if AIBU or not here.

We have a good income - DH is the main earner and I work PT. All the money goes into one pot and all the bills and savings come out, we then have our own accounts into which our personal spending money is paid. Our expenditure is quite high because we recently moved house and had some work to do on it. We are not on the breadline.

The savings are joint but DH keeps a close eye on them and I have to get his agreement to transfer any out.

DH has always had more personal spending money because he had more expenses - travel to work, lunches etc whereas I have always WFH. He has WFH since March 2020 but still gets £150 a month more than me.

However, I spend a lot of "my" money on the kids - a magazine, a hot chocolate after swimming, that kind of thing. I also spend my money if our joint account is a bit light.

I set some money aside for Christmas each month out of my spends usually as DH goes mad at the amount I spend. When I stopped buying for his side of the family he agreed with them not to bother with presents anymore, although he does still buy for his mum (which this year was something from Amazon and he used my account). This means the only other present he buys is for me and that is about £50.

I had to use most of my Christmas fund of £600 in November because we had to get an emergency plumber out for a leak. I used my credit card to buy presents etc instead as our joint account was also practically bare - bad month for things needing to be paid out plus DH spent an absolute fortune on the Christmas food (I guess around £500).

My credit card bill is £800 and DH has hit the roof. This breaks down to about £150 on the DC (including things like a Christmas jumper, new Christmas pyjamas etc), £200 on my sister and her family (there are 4 kids), £120 on the Christmas tree, some decorations, stocking Knick knacks and 24 Christmas crackers (we had both of our families over during the Christmas period) we also needed a new table cloth as we have a new table, £90 on presents for his 3 team members (yes, I buy them 🙄), his mum's present £40, my mum and step dad £100 (who do an enormous amount for us in terms of childcare), £40 for my dad and a wine order for £90, there were also small bits like postage for cards abroad.

I had to set out what each item was and who it was for. He says he will only give me £130 towards it for his mum and team (I have also suggested he will need to split the kids' presents and the wine but he is grumbling that he did not "authorise" these payments). It will take me about 3 months to clear the rest and leave me with about £50 a month to spend. Meanwhile we have £20k in savings.

I don't actually think I have spent more than usual, it's just that I usually cover it without any input from him from my personal spends.

@Akire

For starters the £1,800 extra he’s had for WFH has been spent on what? It should be shared going forward if he’s not going back to the office.

Stop spending your pocket money on the kids it’s unfair and creates dishonest affairs in the accounts. He thinks it costs much less run a home and look after kids because you use your spends on this.

Where did you get 1800?

Does he also need to approve you washing the clothes or cleaning or cooking the dinner? Does he need to approve you cleaning up after the kids? Or is it only the things he can use to bully you that he has to approve? He sounds like a right pedantic bastard. Tbh I wouldn't approve doing anything for him for the foreseeable.

Out of interest, do your family buy him gifts? If so I'd countercharge the tight bastard that value

Yeah sorry I couldn't live like this. Tell him to shove his 'authorising' up his arse.

@TueWed
150 a month x 12 = 1800
OP wrote Extra money he’s had because he’s working from home

Where did you get 1800?

The DH got an extra £150 per month from the budget to cover his travel, but he has been WFH so over a year that is £1800.

I'd be taking my contributions from the joint savings and putting them in my own account until he stopped behaving like that.

Just take it out of the savings account.

You both have different attitudes to spending.

You are more of a spender than he is. Yes, spending on the DC should be equal, but if he thinks you should spend £50 on presents and you think you should spend £200 then you do need to come up with a compromise position. Equally, you seem to have spent a lot of money on family presents (for your family) for Christmas relative to the amount of personal spends you have.

The only way is to come up with a strict budget and stick to it. both of you.

You say you are not on the breadline, but equally you have had to resort to credit cards this month, so you're not at the point where you can spend without worrying.

Some hard talking needed, I think.

I honestly couldn't live like this. I would hate having to justify or set out what Iv spent and I can sometimes be a bit extravagant. DH knows I might have picked up something extra for the kids here or there and that's fine. If my husband dared said he didn't authorise something it would make me feel like shit. How dare he treat you like that when you've had the mental (and seemingly financial) load of Christmas! Get rid.

This man sounds deeply unattractive. Not allowed a hot chocolate once a week? Yeah fuck that for a game of soldiers. I’d be out.

Also the hypocrisy of saying the kids aren’t allowed a hot chocolate but then buying himself lunch at work every day before he was WFH? Why wasn’t he taking a pack up instead?

He is financially controlling, which is a form of abuse.

The plumber should be paid for out of savings even if he disagrees with who was used.

Shared budget needs to be revisited if there’s not enough. Begrudging his kids a weekly hot chocolate out of family money?! That’s so stingy it’s embarrassing.

I couldn’t live with this level of scrutiny and control.

I'm all for separate spending accounts based on earnings rather than 50/50 split but even I think he is massively unreasonable here OP

I'm the higher earner by a looong way - I take on the chin that I pay for the Household repairs/ maintenance. Lunches, travel and gifts for his family are all DH expenses and come out of his spending. Stuff for the kids, the "nice to haves" at Xmas like pyjamas and jumpers and crackers (!) I pay for

He's taking you for a mug sorry

What a miser! How unattractive

I admit I do spend a lot on my sister and her kids. She is a single mum of 4 and still manages to help me out with my 2 when I need it (she often has them for a day or two in the holidays for me). She doesn't have much at all - she stayed here Christmas Eve and so I got my nieces and nephew the same Christmas pyjamas and stocking as mine as I didn't think it was fair to not get them the same. Then they each got a present for about £25 and I spent £60 on my sister.

Yes, my family get DH presents, nice ones too. We get nothing from his family (as agreed) but we hosted them on Boxing Day with a £90 joint of beef (I am vegetarian) which apparently is fiiiine. I admit I have no idea about the cost of meat. DH is the cook in this house, I do the kids meals and he sorts out ours.
Even our supermarket shopping is dysfunctional- I do all the basics and kids food and he does the fun things and adult food (all from the joint account).

I think we need to sort out the money situation and get a proper budget together.

He doesn't buy any lunches out or pay for any travel anymore but still happily takes the £150 a month set aside for this and puts it in his sole account.

He son to a winner, any kids expense he can veto as waste of money knowing full well you pay them out your personal spends. Win win!

What a dreadful sounding man.

@TueWed

Where did you get 1800?

He gets £150/month additional spends for lunches etc but has been WFH. That's £1,800 additional funds for no purpose, and no oversight.

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This wouldn't be the first time someone with children posted a seemingly trivial difference of opinion around this time of year, only to have the realisation finally dawn on them that things in their family are just not fair.

Time for a serious financial review, starting with his additional £150, the cost of plumbing and presents for his mother and his colleagues. Honestly. Start of a spreadsheet of his, hers and joint spending. A lot of items need to be in a different column.

@Waxonwaxoff0

He is financially controlling. That's that.

Yep.

You need to have a proper discussion and be honest with yourselves.

The plumber situation was a drip feed OP - I don’t agree with your husband’s take on it, but you didn’t reveal the whole situation. You knew before you spent on the credit card that it would lead to a row. You also chose to spend a lot of money on Christmas despite knowing you weren’t going to get that plumber money back.

Your husband is tight, but sees food and entertaining people as areas to splash out. Your extravagant spending is in other areas. You both need to find a way to accept each other’s view and come to a compromise. He must also unclench about the plumber and let you have that money back from the savings.

My husband and I are like your husband - we like to spend a lot on good food, especially at Christmas, but we don’t do presents and are very thrifty in other areas. That’s not to say we’re right and you’re wrong.

Your problem is that you aren’t eye to eye on this.

Your husband is both controlling and selfish.

I'd definitely be buying the kids hot chocolate from the joint account from now on. Cheeky bastard

To be clear - this is the first time I have ever had to ask for money to clear my credit card.
I get £300 a month into my spending account, £50 goes straight into my Christmas pot. I usually have other little pots too for clothes, hair, trips out etc but I have been using my money to bolster the joint account because we seem to haemorrhaging money on the house and DH is always complaining about it.
I honestly didn't think he would have a problem with what I spent, it isn't more than usual - I don't think he has ever thought about how much we spend and I usually have the bulk of it covered.

I also think it is a bit mean not doing presents with his family. Especially for the kids - they get presents from their other aunt and uncle but not from us. I find it a little strange as I love Christmas.