Life Admin, what is it?

[OneSugarOneSpoon]

Have seen the phrase a few times now, where people have little free time as they're doing this " life admin" most days
What exactly is it? My bills go by direct debit, shopping on line, kids stuff from school doesn't take that long...so am I missing something?

I haven’t included actual tasks such as cleaning, cooking etc. I don’t really see that as life admin.

@luxxlisbon
The op is literally asking 'what is life admin'. That's the question. She's asking people to list what they are doing that they count as life admin. On the thread you refer to I expect someone was asked, again, to list what it is.
So, it shouldn't come as a great surprise to you, if they list what they've done.
Yes, booking a restaurant is one such thing. One of tens of daily things.
No idea why you would sneer at someone literally answering the question.

It's what my dc call 'adulting'

I live on my own so my life admin is:

Life, travel, house and car insurance, dentist, opticians, GP,- once a year
Remortgage , change internet and phone contracts- every few years
Shopping, cleaning, phoning relatives, sorting out recycling, collecting prescriptions- weekly
Hairdressers or beauty appointments - monthly
Dealing with electricians, plumbers etc; booking holidays- every few months

I remember seeing someone on another post put ‘pick and book a restaurant for the weekend’ on their life admin

I realise you've put that there to mock someone, but, in truth nothing like that happens unless someone gets round to doing it.
Holidays
Theatre trips
Cinema trips
Meals Outs
Parties
Just 'getting people together' for anything - BBQ, a meal, a trip somewhere.

One of my dc had a birthday recently and wanted to go to a particular sort of restaurant that we don't go to often. First had to check diaries, and check her Dad's shifts (which I could do, as I'd previously made a note of the shifts - another hidden job)........and check her sister's fixtures to see if she'd be around or with her sports team away somewhere ........All fine, so I did a bit of googling to find some names.....checked menus....re-checked later after establishing one of the people was veggie and one had dietary restrictions.....then had to phone to book a table ....of course no answer from 1st 2 I tried....... and so on.

Now, I wouldn't particularly use the term 'life admin'. Nor did I resent doing any of that - it was nice to get the family + 2 friends together, but it took longer that you might think. Not a big deal, but nor was it the "two minutes" people often talk about on these threads.

Same as when I was sorting out car insurance last week. On hold to companies "experiencing unusually high call volumes at the moment" drains a lot of hours from my life.

Bloody hell some people are so patronising!

I used the phrase in a post earlier but I could just have easily said "housework, filling in forms, planning my risk assessments for my voluntary work, planning my voluntary work sessions, booking clubs/paying for activities blah blah blah"

I mean I also have direct debits set up and do most of the stuff above in the margins of my working day. But it is mental load and it is hard work to plan and manage at times, not to mention remember, as much as my actual paid job!

Does it matter that all the activities and tasks I and others have listed have a phrase that encapsulates them? And why are people so sneery about these jobs as being "just" little things? Sometimes they are, sometimes they're not, but they do take time, energy and resources!

@ProbAmU

I don't get all the fuss about it, it's just stuff you do as part of life.

You are fortunate not to know what it's like for people who struggle with 'stuff you do'. It's a shame you have such little ability to think though.

It’s when people painstakingly list out regular things that other people just do as if they’re a full time job. Such taxing tasks as ‘booking airport parking,’ ‘buying birthday cards’ and ‘organising dentist appointments.’ Usually it’s on threads about SAHP, I think it’s a sort of way for justifying why you ‘need’ the extra time or how actually it’s a full time job or whatever.

It's the little jobs you need to do that build up gradually. When I was single no kids and my parents younger there was very little of it. I've checked my calendar and now other people's hospital/ physio/ opthalmology/ audiology/ doctors appointments alone use up 1 day a month. Every month

Don't be daft, nobody said it was a full time job. Many of us have full time jobs, but all this shit still has to done, and it never ever ends. I have a household of six, with three different schools to deal with, childcare, renting, banking, budgeting, organising everyones lives...it's endless bullshit.
But its not like you can just not do it...

Something people on here pretend takes up a lot of time and energy

...or have a WhatsApp group, ask when everyone is available around the Xth of X. Sends links to restaurants, ask people which would suit them best and book. Most restaurant bookings I've done lately have been online.

Takes me at least 30 mins a day to do basic life admin. Total nerd but I'd spend an hour or two at weekend on macro economic picture for our family. Probably should setup a business 😂

I mean, 'another hidden job' - taking note of your husband's shifts? Surely he can say whether or not he's free for something fitting around work? You're not his secretary.

Having to hold everthing in your head, remembering to organise stuff for the family
Like dentists appointments
Pet booster vaccination
Birthdays and organise cards , presents etc
Comparing insurance quotes for car/ home
World book day/ nativity outfits
Remembering to put Bins out and renew garden waste collection
Paying window cleaner
Filling out forms sorting payment for kids clubs/ activities

Arranging haircuts
School permission slips
Arranging holiday
Booking kennels
Ordering Xmas turkey
Buying next size up school shoes
Checking oiltank and Ordering oil
Ordering and collecting prescriptions
Returning online purchases
Ordering groceries online
Taking and submitting electricity meter readings
I have DC with SEN and a mum with dementia navigating the system to get correct support for them is almost a full time job in itself of form filling, emails and phone calls

Of course when I was single and in my twenties my life admin was very very limited. But the older you get , the more kids you have, and as your parents age then life admin can seem to take over your life.

You clearly don't live with someone on a varying shift schedule! How many times a day are you going to ask him if he's free for any number of different things? No, you need to know the schedule and the many different possible permutations, to be able to organise everyone else....

The things being included as life admin here really are nuts, buying birthday cards and taking kids to clubs. What do you do all day if you include these as must do tasks and not just living?!

Who’s fussing?🤷‍♀️🙄

I don't know what point you think you are making her. I work all day. But they are must do things, as they are things I must do. They are also "living",...which is not very precise.
Do you not understand the topic at hand?

This week

Endless time in a GP phone queue at 8am several days in a row trying to get an appointment for relative.
2 hours on the phone to HMRC about tax.
Drive elderly relative to hospital appointment and sit in appointment and coach them through their answers then debrief afterward so they understand and deliver them home.
Two school open evenings. Including finding out about the existence of the events, online booking by creating online accounts on certain platforms, figuring out how to get there and where to park, actually attending and them filling in the feedback forms about them.
Filling in forms for car insurance claim.
Filling in forms for a benefit claim, not for me.
Ordering and collecting repeat prescriptions for two relatives one child and myself.
Online shopping for my household.
Weeks worth of meal planning and cooking for my household and another household where they can’t do it themselves.
Joining new WhatsApp group for one child’s school trip.
logging in to three different online platforms for schools - one daily for progress, one weekly for messages, one once or twice a week to manage online payments eg dinner money, trip money, milk money, PTA.
Listening to the dc read each day and filling in the reading books to say they have. Still have to fill in reading books for secondary as well.
Helping DC in senior high school year with homework, options, exams and revision timetables - ongoing but takes a lot of time.
Online banking, checked daily, money moved around, a new standing order set up this week.
Booking tickets for a show and juggling a babysitter around various plans
ordering very boring things on the internet like cat wormer.
Booking for one child’s parents evening which is on another child’s school open evening next week so emailing to ask if I can have a phone appointment to enable me to talk about one child whilst at another’s open evening.
Too much more to list

@OneSugarOneSpoon it’s finding a leak in the bathroom and knowing that I’ll have to find and book someone to fix it because DP won’t. He moved into my house, many years ago and in some ways I feel like I’m the landlord. It really fucks me off.

He is great in many other ways, definitely pulls his weight, but if there’s something to be done in/to the house, it’s on me.

Its adult life.

On here people seem to think its impossible to fit it around full time work, thus requiring a SAHP. It isn't, you just get less leisure time when you work. Such is life.

Good sample list.

For me, household chores and cooking are not life admin. Just this sort of shit.

My list never really gets smaller. It’s relentless. And I can’t figure out why!

Oh not this subject again.

It’s just one more way of spreading hate for sahms.

I really am beginning to wonder if there is a coalition of angry misogynistic blokes posting on Mumsnet making mischief with all of these threads.

The approach is slightly different each time but essentially every thread ends up bashing sahms. For what purpose I wonder? What is the ultimate goal here?

I don’t think you’ve actually understood my post. I was saying I usually see the phrase ‘life admin’ on posts where sahps list out normal things like ‘buy cinema tickets’ to make being a sahp sound like it’s a full time job.

I guess it’s a difference of view. To me it isn’t ‘endless bullshit’ or ‘organising everybody’s lives’ it’s just doing the bare basics of being a human being. Booking haircuts and ‘researching’ things I want to buy on Amazon isn’t back breaking work to me, it’s just life.