Unum Income Protection Challenge feedback thread

[AnnMumsnet]

This thread is for the 50 or so families taking part in the Unum Challenge.
For more information on Unum please visit the Unum pages on Mumsnet.

The families taking part in this challenge have been asked to see how they can cope if one wage earner in the household had their income dropped down to the level they would be entitled to if they became unable to work due to illness or injury and were receiving Statutory Sick Pay (SSP). We have a range of families taking part - those with only one income, those with 2 incomes, and a range of family sizes and income levels.

We'd like challengers to give feedback across the week. We'd like to see feedback at least 3 times (diary-style) plus a roundup of your thoughts at the end of the week.

The aim of the challenge is two fold:
~ to show how families cope with living on this amount - the challenges faced and to explore what families see as priority expenditure and what can be dropped. Those taking part also need to consider other resources they may have access to including savings, benefits, loans and family support. Obviously this varies from family to family so they will need to have a think about what would apply.

~ Unum say "above all we want you to think about how you and your family would cope if this was real life situation and it wasn't just for a week, but for a prolonged period of time. Does the challenge motivate you to put plans in place (if you don't already have plans)? Does it make you more likely to consider asking your employer about the sick pay policy and whether they offer Income Protection?"

Of course Unum know that every family is different and that circumstances will vary. They're asking folks to do this for a week just to get a snapshot of what their initial thoughts and actions are when faced with this challenge.

They want you to think about the following when adding your feedback...
~ What cost or expenses are easy to change and what's hard? What's impossible?
~ What sort of benefits do you currently get from the state / your employer?
~ What do you think you'd be entitled to (and when would they kick in) if this happened to you in real life?
~ What fixed costs do you have? Housing, childcare, utility bills - how would you cope with these in the short term and in the longer term if you had to live on SSP?
~ How are children affected by cutting costs? What do they think about the challenge?
~ What sort of family support do you think you could get?
~ Any other issues/ comments?

As a thank you for taking part there will be a prize draw of £100 of Amazon vouchers to 10 lucky challengers who add feedback as required

Thanks and good luck
MNHQ

Friday, cleaning day so didn't go out and didn't spend. think thats the trick stay in and you can't spend.
Saturday went for a coffee with friends £2.20 (£5 left) saving moneys great for the diet as I didn't have cake. We are off to a garden party tonight so free drink and food here we come!

I am ill today, so the busy (expensive) day we had planned hasn't really happened. DH cooked a (rare) fry up this morning for the 5 of us. On £85/week budget that wouldn't happen.

I can see that on £85 /week our life would be the situation described in CouthyMow's post. My glasses are 10 years old as it is, but I mainly wear contact lenses so they're very much a fallback. If I needed glasses on a budget I would be stuffed.

I do feel that living on £85/week would be somewhere beyond depressing. It would be survival. Personally I wouldn't miss the non-essentil material items (I can rarely bring myself to buy new clothes etc anyway) - although I would count washing machines, tumble dryers, hoovers, fridge/freezers, TV and internet as essentials (with a dishwasher as a 'nearly essential') and if any of those broke I would have to get them repaired or replaced - very difficult. We don't go on holiday anyway so I wouldn't miss that. I would really really miss the little luxury items - a cup of coffee out and about, an occasional lunch out, a magazine, a chocolate bar. Most of all I would miss mine and the kids activities - all of which would have to go.

This challenge is harder at the weekend as DC not at school, (and weather shit). I'm probably going to have to take them to cinema this afternoon but it's not city prices, so £15 total. I'm finding the whole thing very sobering, especially reading the posts from some people for whom this is a long term reality. I thought I generally watched the pennies and lived quite frugally as we have a small income, but this has shown that I can be quite profligate and can certainly afford some luxuries.

Oh spoke too soon. Because I have flu I have decided not to go and see ds2 in a performance he is in this afternoon, don't want to spread it. Which means I have to buy an official DVD to see him - £15. Had I gone we probably wouldn't have bought one (might have).

I think for me, I would find the inability to just buy things like the DVD above really hard. And of course that would be the case on £85 a week. And god knows how anyone affords school trips etc - ime they don't always give much notice.

We went out to town today, we drove because it was raining (and I'm still in pain) and parked in a multistory at £4 for 2 hours. Once out we picked up some large pictures that we had had made (£50), spent £10 in Wilkinsons, went to a cafe for a cake (£5). Tomorrow DH is taking the DC to his parents 2 hours away.

Next week I have a dental hygienist appointment (£20) and a doctors appointment that will probably result in multiple prescriptions at £7 each.

I don't think any of this would have been possible on SSP. We would certainly have very limited use of the car, if at all. I am very good at finding bargains and buying ahead for birthdays (DD's presents for her recent birthday had a RRP of £70 but I picked them up for £15 over 6 months in sales and things) but that relies on having the spare cash at that moment to spend on these things. DC are both very young and luckily DD is not fussy over what she gets for her birthday, but I could imagine this being an issue in a year or two. Things like replacement school uniform, finding money for school trips etc would become an enormous struggle, I would buy a lot more second hand for a start.

A few weeks ago I took my shopping list and costed it at around £50-60 at Sainsburys. I managed to get it down to £35 by walking around town for three hours, carefully buying different things in different shops to make sure I got the lowest prices. It was cheaper but so much harder, especially with a toddler along for the ride. I had to continually work out what was the cheapest deal and remember all the special offers etc at different shops. I am actually ill at the moment, too ill to work (even to be a SAHM) and one of the things that is keeping me going is all the little treats, things that make life easier and more pleasant. DH went out yesterday and bought a £200 dishwasher so I didn't have to wash up any more, we have had lots of little shops of tempting foods to encourage me to eat, I have £45 worth of vouchers I have earned from surveys/reviews that I can spend on myself rather than essentials. When I am cold we can have the heating on, when I need new shoes I can buy them without thinking.

I wear glasses and they have broken recently, but luckily Specsavers were able to fix them for free both times. Were I to need new ones I would have to resort to sticky tape and superglue were we on SSP, or use one of the outdated prescription ones I have stored in a drawer. Rather than using the optician I suspect I would use one of the online spectacle companies to save money.

Appliances-We recently extended the warranty of our two year old washing machien to five years for £140 which makes sense as it is cheaper than a new machine. But we only had a month to decide on whether we would be taking up the extended warranty-not long enough to save up the money were we on a reduced budget.

I know I could make £200-500 a year by writing reviews if I took it seriously, currently I make £100 a year by writing one a week for one site. If I tripled this and posted on both sites, plus put the time into rating other peoples reviews I could make a lot more. I could make £50 more if I answered every survey that was sent to me rather than ignoring them, plus I would try mystery shopping which I currently ignore as I have the luxury of doing so. I don't do them because its hard work and incredibly boring/time consuming for slow rewards. I guess I wouldn't have the luxury were we on SSP.

We are very lucky in that we live in a very good area and DD has several friends who pass hand me down toys and clothes to us for DS. Also there are lots of opportunities for small profits e.g. DD's school fair has a toy stall where there are an awful lot of very good quality toys with little/no wear donated and sold for pennies. Charity shops are excellent too and I could take that further if I needed to. I have a lot of academic books and already sell in small amounts on Amazon and Amazon trade in which I do in dribs and drabs when I can muster the energy. I know what sells and currently don't h
have the time or energy to manage this, but would if I needed to. I don't think the money would go very far or last very long though.

Birthday presents for DD's friends would be harder. Currently I go to TK Maxx and pick up something there, especially in the sales and I have a present box full of things that I picked up very cheaply. This is fine now, but occasionally I do buy special things for her best friends (£10 Lego etc) which would have to be forgotten about and would make me very uncomfortable. Last birthday DD got lots of very generous birthday presents that were perfect for her. To give generic presents would make me feel very awkward in the playground and would make me less likely to accept birthday invitations.

Having done this challenge it makes me realise just how important it is to be well insured and protected and it increases my determination to save money rather than spend it. I thought we were pretty frugal but even I found it hard to live just for one week on £85 and I have an increased understanding and sympathy for those for whom it isn't a choice. It was miserable and timeconsuming and utterly depressing. A lot of the things that make life enjoyable would be gone and whilst we could live on £85 a week it would be utterly miserable.

Day 6

DS has gone to his best friends house and DH has been fishing earlier today. No more money spent today so still £83.25

Hoping not to spend any this weekend .....

I do consider myself careful with our finances, wheras actually this has shown me that there is so much more that I could and will do

My total spend for the week has been £87. But that is just 'incidentals' - birthday present, lunch out, extra groceries from Co-op, petrol. That's aside from all the stuff I have to pay (mortgage/bills etc). DH has spent almost nothing on incidentals as he has been working and claims his mileage. But we had a car tax bill of £250 this week. There is always something.

If we had to live on SSP now we would get rid of the car, sell the house and downsize and be creative about the kids extra-curricular activities - eg DS1 would have to fund everything through his washing-up job, DS2 would have to apply for grants and funding for his sport and DD would have to move school. It makes money - or the lack of it - all you think about. It becomes incredibly boring. It's existing, not living.

There are other creative ways of 'paying' for stuff. I belong to a LETS scheme (Local Exchange Trading Scheme). eg I donated five (old) chess sets to the primary school who were starting up a chess club. I got 10 'LETS' a set (virtual tokens). Someone else in the scheme is a hairdresser who charges 10 'LETS' for a haircut. I have used my LETS for haircuts for my kids. I am going to earn more LETS by walking a neighbour's dog and spend them on eggs and veg from another LETS member. It's a virtual bank account. Sure, it won't pay your mortgage, but I think local trading schemes like these are good for communities.

Hello challengers - nearly at the end of the week....

Unum have asked me to add these final questions for you to think about in your round up.
Has doing the challenge changed your attitude towards protecting your finances?
Do you think you are now more likely to put a plan in place to safeguard your income?
Are you now motivated to ask your employer or ask your partner to ask their employer about income protection as part of their employee benefits package?

Thanks, Ann

Have spent the week trying to spend not much, but spent £52 on shopping today which has left me with not much at all. I'm not sure how anyone could do this for long. I'm basing my week on my DH's wage would cover rent and bills and we would live on my wage. Feel very hemmed in as wanted to go for a coffee but went home instead. All the nice things in life are very restricted.

This week has madee watch every penny rather than buying what I want- not that I want very much. I think that I will try to remain more careful- the money I have will be reducing when I go back to work and I have been worried about surviving. I will survive, but I don't that £85 a week is a living wage.

Day 6.........we spent £7.19 on a top up shop (bread, milk, apples and bananas), prices have really gone up of late, especially fruit (I buy frozen veg where possible now as this is cheaper). The children accepted the no treats response as they were excited about getting to the library to sign up for the summer reading challenge and their free stickers!

The children need hair cuts but I will leave this until next week, for the sake of this challenge to keep my spend down ; if we were in receipt of SSP then I would have to do it myself......my last attempt would suggest that this really is a last resort option. DH is currently making tortillas from scratch for tea to save a £1!

Will round up the week tomorrow.

So last day tomorrow and have £8.10 left. Took my DS to swimming earlier as that is prepaid I am not including it in the costs however I had to pay for parking which I had not thought of before.
The last bit of money will be spent on a bottle of wine or something as we are going to a friends house for Sunday lunch and would feel awful turning up empty handed

Has doing the challenge changed your attitude towards protecting your finances?
Not really - see post above. Basically my employer coverage is pretty generous and no company would touch dh anyway. I have massively rethought our spending/saving targets though and hopefully when dh is back at work we'll be in a better position as we'll be less likely to waste money.

Do you think you are now more likely to put a plan in place to safeguard your income?
No - see above. It's just too expensive for people on our income versus likelihood of it being useful. The "worst" has happened in our case, and income protection wouldn't have paid out (pre-existing, unpredictable period of sickness, lots of short(ish) periods of sickness as dh makes multiple attempts to return to work).

Are you now motivated to ask your employer or ask your partner to ask their employer about income protection as part of their employee benefits package?
No. My employer already offers good sickness t&cs and I doubt a private firm would offer better. It'll be a cold day in hell before dh's employers offer their staff anything like this (they don't even do childcare vouchers).

DW and DD had a very quiet day after a trip to the local library. But did go to Boots and used Boots points to buy a couple of necessities to value of £3.49 so as not to go futher over budget. I took DS to a history event which cost £2.50 and spent my remaining cash on milk and a copy of The Daily Mail.

In answer to the official questions:

Has doing the challenge changed your attitude towards protecting your finances?

No not really because my work package pays me full-pay for about six months of illness so quite generous really although my salary package isn't particularly good for my skill-set and experience. Plus we have a mortgage protection insurance policy.

Do you think you are now more likely to put a plan in place to safeguard your income?

No not really unless I were to change job and not get 'generous' illness benefits. As I've said we have mortgage protection and we have been questioning the merit of that. We haven't used it in 11 years and have contributed £1200 per annum so would have built up a nice little nest egg if we'd just put that money away. So if anything it has made us scrutinise our payment further and truly consider whether it is just 'money down the drain'

Are you now motivated to ask your employer or ask your partner to ask their employer about income protection as part of their employee benefits package?

No I don't really need to as mine seem okay, but if DW were to go back into the job market it would be something to consider. In a way a lower salary but with better sickness benefits might be preferential to higher salary with SSP ones in the event of protracted illness!

Well everything was going well until yesterday when an unscheduled trip to the doctor meant buying a prescription and a couple of other bits. £19.42 later and the £85 budget has been blown. Thankfully the antibiotics are kicking in so I'm beginning to feel better but in reality I would have either had to forgo one of the medicines or borrowed from my mum.

The food has lasted well and the economies we made have been successful, however, it's proved to me that planning is the key to everything.

Because we had blown the budget we had a very low-spend today. The dc wanted bacon rolls from the bakers for their lunch (we walked past the village bakers on the way home from walking the dog) but as I had a loaf of bread and bacon at home we made our own.
The constant rain has meant we stayed home the rest of the day, watching tv, etc. Of course whilst this meant we have not spent any money as such, our electricity usage would be higher than on a day when we are all out. That thought scares me, that unless you are in bed asleep you are spending money...

We had to go to the pet shop to buy dog food. Total spend £7.72. Were already overdrawn so what would we have done in reality? Not fed the dog? Got rid of the dog?

Awful thought, awful way to live

In answer to the questions:

Has doing the challenge changed your attitude towards protecting your finances?

We don't have any mortgage protection or income protection. We can't afford it for starters. What we are going to do is build up a 'rainy day' fund which we can use should dh lose his job. My job pays peanuts and the money is for hobbies, clothes, etc. But dh's salary pays mortgage, bills etc. We need a bit set aside to use in an emergency.

Do you think you are now more likely to put a plan in place to safeguard your income?

No. I don't know how we could safeguard our income apart from being careful with what we spend. Dh has been made redundant several times, luckily he has always managed to find work again quickly. He is keeping up with developments in his industry and the latest regulations to remain as employable as possible.

Are you now motivated to ask your employer or ask your partner to ask their employer about income protection as part of their employee benefits package?

Neither dh's work nor mine offer any sort of employee benefits package. So this is not an option.

Has doing the challenge changed your attitude towards protecting your finances?
Only in the fact that I will try my hardest to save more. I really can't afford those 'income protection' things that I'm probably not going to need, and if I don't then it's money down the drain.

Do you think you are now more likely to put a plan in place to safeguard your income?
The above answer covers this as well.

Are you now motivated to ask your employer or ask your partner to ask their employer about income protection as part of their employee benefits package?
No. I work on the 'bank' at the local hospital. There are no schemes for me as I am not part of the permanent staff.

I did a longer round up above but have come back to answer the questions.

Has doing the challenge changed your attitude towards protecting your finances?
Answered above-more likely to save rather than spend. Reinforced the need to be well-protected.

Do you think you are now more likely to put a plan in place to safeguard your income?

We are certainly going to recheck our existing plan and re-evaluate.

Are you now motivated to ask your employer or ask your partner to ask their employer about income protection as part of their employee benefits package?

I know about the level of income protection in DH's employee benefits package.

I spent £20 on DN's birthday present today. I'm going to use
an old gift bag for it, as I usually would when possible.

I know that if we were trying to get by on £85 a week I wouldn't be buying presents, or anything else, in John Lewis.

When things have been tight we have had to buy Christmas presents at Poundland, "regift" and sell presents on Ebay. It is so wearing living like that.

I have been thinking about how this challenge has affected my week, and it reminds me if when I was at my poorest, and when anything unexpected or extra came up i'd be totally stuck. I've had to call in sick for work because I couldn't get there, eat plain jacket potatoes for a week as I couldn't afford anything else. I've been terrified to become like that again and my full to bursting cupboards, fridge and freezer are testament to that fear. I don't think I will ever get over that as it was my way of life for about 10 years. I still feel poor but the thought of living on so little makes me feel shaky and anxious.

Went to costco and whilst considering this challenge wondered whether tea could be the 24 packets of instant noodles for the six of us for 4 days......they were 3.99....

My shopping budget has gone over 85 this week even though everything i bought was value. One of my biggest costs is meat for the family (veggie myself) and incontinence products for my daughter which i obviously cannot forgo. Ive still had to travel towork, but ive declined all invites out and done nothing today as the kids werent interested when they found out it was a walk to the local gardens.

We dont drink, smoke, go out weekly or anything anyway and this whole exercise has just awakened me to the drudge of daily living and how sad I am.

Back to reading books now.....

I have struggled to stick to this this week BUT have been here before (not too long ago) and know I can stick to £85 a week if I needed to.
When dh was dx with cancer a few years back his work allowed him 4 months off with full pay, and my work I had four weeks off full pay. We are very lucky to work for great companies.
We also have a different situation to most with two disabled children, and while I'm not willing to tell the world about what benefits we get, but just know that I know we would be ok, and while things would be very very tight, we would live.

I still remember when we first married only having £20 left a month to pay bills, we are very used to budgeting, and even now we aren't rolling in it but manage to get by and pay the bills.

To answer the questions for a roundup

Has doing the challenge changed your attitude towards protecting your finances?

Well we both have critical illness cover and dp gets a decent package from work so I think we are in an ok position. We may look into alternatives that go beyond the years protection we do have. But to be honest we re not in a financial position to add anything to our current outgoings in they way of paying for payment/finance protection.

Do you think you are now more likely to put a plan in place to safeguard your income?

We do a yearly clear up of finances every January and sort of budget for the year ahead. We might look at a plan for safeguarding this.

Are you now motivated to ask your employer or ask your partner to ask their employer about income protection as part of their employee benefits package?

DPs income is protected for a year, and possibly more depending on what happens. We are in a lucky position to have this.

Fourth post

what cost or expenses are easy to change and what's hard? What's impossible?

Its easier said than done to cancel our additional costs. I personally would happily cancel gyms,mobiles,tv etc but they are all contracts we have agreed minimum length on. I know through a 3rd party who chose rent over tv in a real life situation had the tv cut off but kept acruing debt because they wouldnt cancel an account in arrears but kept charging the full whack for the service that was cut off...

Impossible is our costs with Dh wage and SSP only. Our rent is high because there are so many and I earn too much for us to have entitlements beyond standard and DDs DLA. We are very lucky and I have no idea how other families manage.

What sort of benefits do you currently get from the state / your employer?

Employer gives 6 months paid sick leave for me. DH receives no Sickness benefits from work.

What do you think you'd be entitled to (and when would they kick in) if this happened to you in real life?

I dont know - is it nothing but SSP unless medically retired or on incapacity for long term illness?

What fixed costs do you have? Housing, childcare, utility bills - how would you cope with these in the short term and in the longer term if you had to live on SSP?

As shown in a previous post my essentials outweigh DHs wages and SSP, and this is only including rent,gas,water,leccy,ctax and food. We would have to eat less, consume less resources and consider rehousing to a council property to afford rent (not a problem for us but limited council housing and long lists would be an issue)

How are children affected by cutting costs? What do they think about the challenge?

Our bunch are quite resilient and can take a no but it doesnt stop requests for cash! They think im being overly harsh for reducing elrctrical good usage but they are bored without their cost activities and dont see utilities as a cost the same because they do not witness the exchange of money, i think. And its always available.

What sort of family support do you think you could get?

None?

Any other issues/ comments?

I really feel for anyone that has to live thisway for real, and i only hope theres more out there for families than what i think. I was quite poor as a young single woman but just got on wuth it and made my sacrifices, its different when you have kids. I walked everywhere and ate one meal a day and didnt have a tv or computer etc , didnt harm me. But i couldnt do that to my kids, i would do it over and over so they wouldnt have to.