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.

Oh, and if he won’t compromise or see your point of view, or let you pay off the credit card in a one-er, then yes, he’s a controlling bastard.

The whole financial set up sounds like a chimps tea party.

Why do you accept this OP?

He sound's tight as hell. He has to pay half towards everything. Otherwise what's the point in your relationship, sounds like he wants to save his money and spend yours!

My mate does this

She has double figure amount of children and has to pay for all the Xmas presents. Never got it. Weird set up x

He needs to "authorise" your spending? Are you married to my ex? Because that's the sort of shitty thing he used to do, and it is shitty - things for the children should be paid for out of the joint account, whether or not he 'approves' of them. FFS, a magazine here and a hot chocolate there is hardly wildly inappropriate expenditure.

I think you need to reset your financial arrangements - yes, you each have 'your' money but it's evened up now he's WFH as well, and stuff for the children doesn't come out of that. Neither do things like plumbers, or 'shared' Christmas things like trees and food.

If he won't agree to it then I'd tell him I'll be spending some of the joint savings on a divorce solicitor and he can shove his "authorisation" up his tight, controlling arse.

Well, it's a strange setup that benefits him and penalizes you.
I could never live like that.

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.

Tough titties for him. These should be shared costs, not costs for you to cover out of 'your' money because he doesn't want to have to pay for them.

I think your DH is being utterly fucking U here. Have you scrutinised his spending? Or won't he let you?
He seems to be financially controlling you with his 'authorisation of expenditure', especially as it looks like hardly any is on you. I've had this. Periodically, my now ex would whine about the credit card bill (delivered to his inbox as he decided we didn't need paper copies - but that's a whole different story, involving his expenses on other people outside our marriage!) I would go through that and the joint current account and detail every single thing in biro, demonstrating what a twat he was being.
Funny how it works out.
Have you called him a selfish, greedy bastard yet?
Pay yourself back for house/family spending out of the joint savings asap, or you'll be massively out of pocket

I would be dumping him and his shitty attitude and paying the cc off with the proceeds from the sale of the house, The sheer fact you have to ustify anything to him is ridiculous OP you are not a child,who does he think he is?

You're married to a wanker. The question is though, why do you accept this? Why do you think it's okay? Or if you don't think it's okay, why don't you challenge him on it? What would happen if you told him he no longer gets to authorise your spending? What would happen if you pointed out to him that he doesn't need that extra £150 since he's now WFH? Challenge him on it. Or ask yourself why you feel you can't do that.

It’s a bit weird but my DPs (and, now me in turn) kind of think like your DH. Kids don’t NEED Christmas jumpers and new pyjamas, you didn’t need a new tablecloth. That said, we didn’t have a lot of money when I was growing up, certainly not £20k in savings.

However, £90 for a joint of beef?! Was it the whole cow?

Never ceases to shock me when I hear about these type of controlling men especially when you are comfortable and both work.You’d be better off being with a poor man, who would be willing to share and give you his last penny .Does he enjoy a pension conversation ?, usually find these types do.

He’s a financially abusive twat.

How DARE he sit there controlling the 20K in JOINT savings and berating you for spending £4 on a fucking hot chocolate or whatever???

Just awful.

Sorry you pay for the kids food and he pays for adult food. Do you ever feel like he’s forcing you to cover the costs of having children?

On the plus side this is all documented on your accounts sp when you divorce him you can demonstrate clearly financial control and abuse.

I’d be sending him a bill for all the unpaid women’s work you do, followed by an estimate from child maintenance options of how much he’d pay you every month based on his salary, how many dc and him having them every other weekend and half the holidays. Then send him the cost of holiday clubs.
Then remind him how much of the marital assets and pension he’d have to give you in the event of a divorce to house you and dc presuming that’s 3/4 of the family =75%, maybe more since you’re earning potential is low following being the primary parent.
He’ll soon see things more clearly.

This is not ok. Financial abuse, pure and simple.

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).

Please tell me you pay for the basics and kids food from the joint account, or are you using your personal spends for this too??!

Omg OP with each post have you really not thought why am I with this awful, miserly controlling man.

Really we are only here once. I wouldn't be spending one more minute of my time with this creature.

He's being financially abusive and controlling. He doesn't have much respect for you or the children.

You need to start giving him back some responsibilities.
You should NOT have spending money covering for normal expenses such as commuting. (Esp as in the last two years, they’ve all but disappeared anyway).
If he wanted to get the same plumber back? HE should have organised it and dealt with how to give a bath to the dcs wo hot water, no heating (?) etc… Otherwise, money comes out of the main account.
Stop buying for his team!! Especially if you are using ‘your’ money. Plus it’s his responsibility really.

And please, please do NOT automatically put money onto the joint account if it’s short if he never does that. You have saving accounts. That’s what’s it’s for! Plus it means he still has no idea that maybe there is a need to review HIS spending money.

It’s always very easy to ‘hit the roof’ more spending when you have more disposable money AND less expenses.

Totally weird set up. Raise your bar op.

We have a similar set up to you, in that it all goes into one pot - the same amount is transferred out to each of us and this is purely for us to spend on ourselves although we do buy presents for eachother out of it. EVERYTHING ELSE comes out of joint funds, so anything for DD, presents for family (although we keep don't go over the top except on my Mum who's her own and spends far more on us that we do her), DH travel to work and things like he unexpectedly needed a DJ for a one off work function we came out of joint funds. I think we need to keep a closer eye on funds than you do, but DH trusts me to buy what we need and use my judgement over how much to spend.

You either pay individually for all presents relating to your side of family/colleagues or agree everything comes out of joint funds. Providing you really needed the extra decorations, table cloths etc, then again out of joint funds unless it's something you really wanted and he didn't.

I honestly could not live like this. All our money goes into joined pot and we both take out what we need. I am definitely more of a spender and dh more of a saver. We would always consult each other on bigger purchases, but I have never been interrogated or confronted for any personal buys. DH has been main earner with me working part time, so earnings have not been even but I did more chores at home as it was only fair. I was never made to feel like my contribution was less or I didn’t deserve an equal share of money. I am working full time now and contributing more financially. OP, sorry but your dh is controlling. Expenses for children should come out of joined pot. You have 20k in savings but have to use a credit card for the plumber? What are you saving for and have you got access to that pot of money?

I agree this is financial abuse. Has he always been like this? He definitely does not want to pay for your children. This is not normal at all. I would not be able to find this man attractive at all.

The immediate solution here is to divert your salary to your own account.

I'd suggest a proper sit down talk with him with pad and pen and a whole fresh look at finances. You're either a family and share it all or you're a couple who keep everything separate and agree on a fixed amount into a shared account each month

If he's not open to sorting this out in a way that doesn't financially hinder you, then you've got bigger issues in your marriage