Joint payment systems for Bills and food

[MusicTeacherSussex]

Me and my DP of 7 years have recently purchased a house together, rented together for 5 years, mortgage for this last year.

He works 9-5 and, after me being the lead tenant for most of our time, is I charge of paying the mortgage, service charges, tax, and insurance

I'm self employed and work very flexibly, and pay the internet, pet insurance, bills and do the pet insurance.

We earn the same amount and split everything 50-50 but we are forever pinging money backwards and forwards to each other and to be honest it's doing my head in. I want to get a way of paying jointly, but because I havent got a clear idea of the best way, he is reluctant to go for it as he doesnt see it as the huge inconvenience I do (book-keeping and chasing each other up)

What i want to know is what works for you all in terms of credit cards/prepaid debit accounts, anything else you might have by way of a system.

Please help, I'm sick of going through grocery receipts each week.

Joint account for ALL household bills (which may in time include costs for DC if you decide to have any).

Each pay in an agreed figure. This may also change over time. Right now 50:50 is fair, but in the future (if you have DC) you may have to split costs proportionately. (You may also choose to do this if one of you takes a career break, goes PT or into training.)

Make sure you are both paying into pensions (my DH and I have agreed to call these payments household costs - relevant as it's preparing for our joint future). We also maximise employer contributions.

Have your pay go into personal accounts then transfer the agreed amount into the joint account. Our day for that is 28th monthly.

The surplus in our personal account is for personal spends. I use that for newspaper subscriptions, donations to charity, personal mobile bill, gym membership, gifts for my DH and socialising. I also save (building up a fuck off fund)

Our food bills come out do the joint account but DH likes wine and whisky so pays for that himself out of his fun money. (IMHO he spends too much on that so I wanted it off the joint costs)

Another vote here for a joint account. The amounts we each put in has changed over the years.

I know everyone’s saying joint account, you’re lucky in the UK bank fees are not so high...
Where I am they’ve just increased to €72 per year for my current account, and! there’ll soon only be 2 banks left in the country.
(Sorry complete thread derail)

I would open a joint account for bills and household expenses, own accounts for personal spends/savings.

DH and I have a joint credit card with Tesco and all household spending gets put on there then paid off in full at the end of the month. We get Clubcard points that way and it can easily be paid on the app from various different accounts so could always do it that way.

We don't have a joint account. DH pays the rent and I pay for all bills and food and savings. We worked it so that we're paying the same each month, and then just check every year that things are still split evenly.

I have a budget for food, and if he wants anything extra (eg snacks, takeaways) he pays for it himself.

@CarolinaWeeper

I would open a joint account for bills and household expenses, own accounts for personal spends/savings.

DH and I have a joint credit card with Tesco and all household spending gets put on there then paid off in full at the end of the month. We get Clubcard points that way and it can easily be paid on the app from various different accounts so could always do it that way.

I'm pretty hard on the clubcard! I definitely make sure he only gets petrol from Tesco and we get everything there. Have you gone for the plus? I think we spend enough there to make it worth it

@Hopeislost

We don't have a joint account. DH pays the rent and I pay for all bills and food and savings. We worked it so that we're paying the same each month, and then just check every year that things are still split evenly.

I have a budget for food, and if he wants anything extra (eg snacks, takeaways) he pays for it himself.

That's interesting, how does that work? And how do you check without doing a massive forensic check? Are you married or cohabiting?

My DP just proposed last weekend so well after I posted originally- so is now DF! Definitely have been on him and he agrees about a joint Bills mortgage etc now, we have to make an appointment for Barclays blue