£10.5k spent since January on my credit card

[Heyheyheyyou]

I’ve spent £10.k on my credit card since January 2025 on food, clothes, petrol, eating out and other general stuff for me and the kids. This excludes bills & mortgage, which are paid from a separate account.

DH has become angry as he views this has excessive and points to things, such as take aways and coffee etc, which he considers a waste.
He’s basically made it clear, he wants to take over running the family finances or have completely separate bank accounts.

DH wants to save enough to help DC buy a house at some point in the future ladder. He was putting away £100 per month for a few years but has had to stop due to the cost of living.

Dors my spend seem excessive, I don’t think so. We have 2 primary school aged children.

The out of pocket spends need to stop going on the cc. £30 a week for frippery like coffees, etc, taken out in cash. Then you can see it disappearing and on what!

Perhaps something like monzo for other day to day so it's easier to keep tabs.

Why are you buying essentials (food, fuel kids clothes) on your credit card, ?that should come from a joint debit/cash account .I kind of agree with your husband IF you're buying them every day although I do enjoy the odd one myself .If you keep using your card at this rate you will have spent £15k by Christmas. Not including the interest if you're not able to do more than the minimum payment each month. I think the best thing for you would be to do a budget . Be honest with yourself. The Ostrich approach isn't helpful. Believe me, I know.

Does it include children's clothes and shoes? Your clothes and shoes? Fares and petrol? Subs for children's clubs and school outings?

I would just go through each item over the past three months and divide them into absolute necessities, very desirable luxuries (sports and arts lessons etc) and unnecessary uxuries (take out coffees and takeaways.) See where the bulk is spent.

Then just give yourself an agreed about per month for luxuries - say £10 pw. That way you can afford a couple of coffees a week or a magazine or book if that's what you enjoy, without breaking the bank. And you can save on stuff that isn't worth it. I hate wasting money on takeaways. Supermarket ready meals are a fraction of the price, just as quick and just as good, often better.

of course yabu if you 'cant explain' how you're spending over £1500 per month!
and if you are spaffing money away on takeaway coffees and can't save £100

It's nice to occasionally treat kids but (unless you can afford to do both) that's exactly what those sort of things should be - an occasional treat. Your children are going to benefit far more and be far more grateful for a £20k house deposit than a new princess costume they wear twice or a £3.50 ice cream from the shop every time you go to the park rather than taking one from a multipack with you, none of which they will even remember next year, let alone by the time they are in their twenties.

If they're moaning to you about how their friends can afford to buy a house due to their parents saving for them, how well is 'yes but remember all those times I bought you that spidey and friends comic when you were 4 and that £6 toastie at pret that you only had two bites of' going to go down?

This using a credit card every month is a perfectly sensible wsy of managing money that Martin Lewis recommends because as the above says you get rewards, you also have added insurance of getting your money back and it is easy to manage around pay days and see how much you earn.

indeed we have 3 - Cashback/nectar rewards and a clarity for using abroad.

that amount outside basic bills and mortgage sounds perfectly fine to me and is (outside of holidays) what we budget for within our monthly income

and unless you're getting cashback on that credit card you should look into alternative methods - with chase you'd get £15 per month back on that sort of spending!

I think you need to keep a close eye on what you are spending. I would suggest using cash as much as possible and checking your account every day to see what you are spending your money on when you have had to use your card.

It does sound like you have spent a bit free and easy so maybe it is time to tighten your belt.

I agree with your DH that it's unwise to spend so much on nonessentials while not putting anything into savings. Your family could easily cut back. If you are currently spending about £500 a month on fun stuff, it would be trivial to reduce that to £400 so you could save £100. I think you'd hardly notice the difference in your lifestyle.

However, his solutions of totally separate money or of him controlling all finances are extreme. You should only agree to one of those options if you have a track record of being quite irresponsible with money. There's no evidence of that. Be responsible together. Don't let him treat you like a child.

I think the two of you TOGETHER should come up with a plan of how much to save every month. Transfer that out by standing order every month. There needs to be a separate budget for fun stuff. Maybe put it on a separate card?

Over time you can experiment to see what feels like a reasonable amount to spend without feeling horribly deprived, and adjust the budget accordingly.

You still haven’t said if you work!!!

I had voted YANBU, as it works out at £1500 per month for food, clothes, petrol which I thought was reasonable. But then with more detail, you're only spending £120 per week on food, so out of £10500, you've only spent £3600 on food. I'd have thought the majority of that would have been food and fuel.

So, to me now, unless your fuel bill is high, I do think you're overspending. Takeaway coffees and takeaways soon add up. They should be the first and easiest to cut out. You'll soon see a difference.

I felt the same but rather than stop using the credit card, I just make lots of small (or not so small if I’d made a big purchase) payments throughout the month. Generally I pay off the credit card every 3 or 4 days. It also means that as I’m constantly checking my CC statement, the one time someone stole my CC number, I was able to report it immediately.

Op, you can explain it if you look at your credit card? It shows every single transaction. You aren't taking any responsibility for your spending at the moment, so I can see why DH would be worried.

As PP have suggested, download everything into a spreadsheet and analyse it out. See how much you spend in certain areas.

You are making a choice, you need to accept that, to spend this money rather than save it.

If you can identify where it is going, then you can change your spending habits/OR show your DH that some of it is actually essential spending and work together on how to change some of it that isn't.

It might be better for DH if all food, takeaways, DC clothes and family days out and joint spending comes out of the main account, and then you have your own account with a small fixed amount in each month for trivial things like coffee.

Yes - I work part time. The salary isn’t great but it covers the bulk of the credit card bill

You have an emergency fund and savings. You pay it off every month. You just need to communicate with your dh. Sounds absolutely fine to me.

I think you are spending without thinking and he wants to take it far too much the other way. Sit down and work out a sensible monthly budget that means you can do the stuff you want but not spend too frivolously - coffee etc maybe can go

Would you like to buy a house like your husband does? Is your lifestyle now more important than his future goal? This is why you need to talk about it, if you're not willing to compromise he needs to know.

The problem is clearly that dh feels like he is the one saving for your child's future while you're the grasshopper who sang all summer.

I voted YABU - until I read your update that you pay the credit card balance off each month and so are not accumulating debt.
I also do all my day to day spends like food, petrol etc on a credit card to earn the cash back, and then I pay it off in full.
I don’t think £10K seems that excessive when you break it down over the course of 8 months of day to day spending for a family.

However, to save more money you will have to cut down on some of the ‘luxury’ things take away and coffees etc.. and stick to a budget as it’s just not feasible to have these treats as regularly with the current cost of living if you are not then in a position to save.
You never know what is around the corner, so in that sense I agree with your husband that some of this spending a bit wasteful and you probably need to reign it in a bit, prioritise the essential things and then set what’s left aside for savings.
You could have a separate ‘pot’ set aside for treats, days out etc.. which you discuss as a family before dipping into.

If you're not saving anything ATM then I'd sit down together and look through those random fivers and tenners and decide what to cut and what to keep. You don't need to cut it all, I'm sure you could still hadn't some luxuries. And obviously don't cut disproportionately for either of you.

I presume you both have full access to all money?

He’s basically made it clear, he wants to take over running the family finances or have completely separate bank accounts.

Sounds like a bit of an knee jerk reaction. As a team you should be sitting down together, going through statements and totting up what you are both spending money on, agree what your joint goals are and working out a budget.

It is fine for one person to do the financial admin, but you both need to know what you are aiming for and be equally in control of spending/transparent on where the money is going.

Being an adult is a bit boring at times!

Perhaps you'd best google it as I am afraid you are wrong.

You say you are paying it off every month, which is good as you are not accumulating debt.

Reviewing the credit card statement is a good way of answering the question "where does it all go" when you analyse your income, your budget, and your spend.

Moving to cash will hide it.

Never spend your money, always purchase things using credit where possible. Pay the balance off each month in full.

Posters above are incorrect about using your bank account. You get all the rewards and no debt. Why risk using your bank cards which can be stolen, lost or cloned. When you have protection of credit cards.

The bulk of 1,500 a month could mean you are taking home about say 1,300 a month or 18,000 a year gross? I presume your dh is the higher earner and therefore shouldering the mortgage and big ticket items.

It sounds like he wants you to pull more of your weight financially, which you can do by either earning more (increasing your hours) or cutting down on your spending.

Because of the disparity in salaries between you and dh, it is best to calculate income and expenditure on joint basis and putting it into a pot deducting all essentials (and this includes the weekly shop and petrol and children's expenses you are currently paying) to work out how much discretionary spending is left. Then divide by 2 so that each of you has the same discretionary spend as the other.

It could mean that he ends up paying you more a month but he will have to trust you can control your spending first.

I'm not sure why posters assume op is spending £500 a month on frivolous stuff.

She said it was general spending for her and the kids. If the kids are in lessons: activities, that can add up quickly. We spend about £85 a month on stuff like this for our son (swimming, football and a language lesson each week).

I understand these things aren't essential but they aren't frivolous if you can afford them.

The idea that anything apart from mortgage, bills and food is frivolous is a bit ridiculous.