Thread 48- Covid GCSE Cohort - Summer before Year 2 Uni

[Oblomov23]

Summer ending. Year 2 for many at Uni about to start.

This is a support thread for our young adults post GCSEs 2020, regardless of their educational setting, and their results ( or life updates for those who went into work or have had results earlier). It is respectfully requested that all are supportive and helpful to each other. If you want to start a debate, e.g state vs private, uni vs employment please don't within this thread.

Some of us have been here since first thread back in yr10, some will be new. Everyone has been friendly and helpful in the past. Everyone is welcome. It is hoped this will continue. We were previously on the secondary board and then further education, now we shall be here in 'Parents of Adult Children' gulp

Our DS/DD may continue down various pathways ( employment, apprenticeships, higher ed). Experience is that everyone is welcomed wherever, whatever their child is doing we have some in work, gap years , apprenticeships etc too. Lots of contributors with different experiences and always sympathy and advice to be had.
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@JustHereWithMyPopcorn Yep, DS pays just over £100 per month for his bills package.

I think if your DS is keeping the loan and getting £65 per week he's onto a winner, or he is paying his rent and bills from that?

DS's rent is £510 monthly and we have been paying since mid June! 4 months paid already and he has only been in the house a week! To be fair it is one month in advance at least so will stop early next year in time for the next one to start.

For this year DS is again giving us his minimum loan payments and we transfer rent & bills money when they are due and a weekly allowance. I have told him that next year it should be monthly though so that he has to cope a bit better with budgeting. For this year, there is enough on his plate so we decided to leave it as it was.

Re online shopping, it's awkward now isn't it. There is an amazon locker on campus for DS but other items are tricky. His letterbox is tiny and right on a main road so nowhere safe to leave a parcel.

@Monkey2001 DS's is a bills package with huddle, it's £101 a month. That is what the others wanted to do and DS went along with it. The one benefit though is that you are only responsible for your share so if someone else doesn't pay then it's not your problem. There are 4 of them in the house.

DD is all moved in to her room in Aberystwyth. It's a lovely big room in a house of six, with a sea view from the kitchen window (if you look really hard). We've had to go out and buy a clothes rail as the wardrobe is tiny and her clothes are many🤦Aber appear to buy their curtains from a different stockist to Nottingham.

<reaches for gin> having just spent half an hour on the phone to the bank, from which I successfully withdrew money from DS’s trustee account last year, it seems I can no longer do so because he is over 18 (as he was last year!) until we have both taken photo ID together into a branch (most of which have closed down but there is one where he is, my nearest is 10 miles away in the opposite direction to my work). Wish we’d done this last week now. So that’s going to have to wait.

@EversoDetermined We had similar 10 days ago in that I took DS to take some money out of an account that his grandparents had put a bit in on birthdays. They wouldn't let him as a grandparent had to be physically present to remove themselves from trustee status. On the upside I was so hangry (on the inside, all smiles of understanding on the outside) that we stomped across the road and managed to get a late lunch at the new Mowgli and the food was delicious.

you did better than me @EwwSprouts I ended up burning my dinner. However I was super polite to the person on the phone when I pointed out that this would all be a lot easier if they hadn’t closed so many branches. When DS was approaching 16 I did go into a branch to find out what would happen to these accounts (DD has one too) and they said that provided I kept it in the same account I would remain as a trustee and the DCs couldn’t take it out without me, so I did that rather than just hand it over to them. It is good that there are these safeguards in place because I suppose otherwise there’s nothing to stop me blowing it all on a holiday but NOWHERE is any of it actually explained properly.

@EversoDetermined Oh dear a double annoyance. Agree about it not being explained anywhere. My dad is reasonably financially savvy and he was convinced DS could just access it once he turned 18.

@EwwSprouts Mowgli is the best! You now need to get a Mowgli passport so you can have an excuse to try out different venues. You get money off after 5 different venues. So far i have Nottingham and Birmingham. And always forget to take to my 2 nearest ones in Liverpool. I really hope you tried the Chat Bombs

We top up to maximum loan, and DD dips into savings if that doesn't work out (in theory, it's OK so far).

She is off to Spain today for her drawing trip! Yesterday afternoon the cupboard unit in their kitchen collapsed, damaging the fridge in the process. The landlord has been notified, so hopefully it will be fixed by the time she gets back...

I moved all the money out of both DSs accounts just before they turned 16 so that I could retain control over it. That sounds awful but there’s no way I was leaving 16yo boys with access to that. Both boys have a savings account (still in my name) with Atom for when they are a bit older.

Moved DD into this year’s accommodation and it was SO chill compared to last year. Reasonable journey up, parked the car under shelter (it was pissing it down). Handed a shopping trolley by another family. Got her key, shown to the flat. Moved the car load in. DH and I went to the storage unit, got it all in the car, took it to the hall. Parked in the same place but the trolley had vanished, so it took a few trips - but there is a list this year. Left her to check into our hotel and eventually go out for dinner. Though DH asked when I’d booked dinner and was starting to arrange meeting DD when I had to explain the booking was for two … I did ‘invite’ DD but as expected she wanted to be with her flatmates.

The room this year is same width but longer, with the desk all across one end rather than L-shaped. It therefore looks wider with more floor space, so much more navigable yesterday with all the boxes and bags out! It’s a bit more tatty round the edges than last year but still fine. Her main lights don’t work and have been reported - the woman who showed us up thinks just bulbs but a little concerning it’s both lights. DD was also going to report a broken drawer but I fixed it (the bottom drawer was just off its runners). It seemed clean, they’ve got them the second fridge-freezer that was missing when the others moved in, and the staff seemed nice.

Calling back in this morning to see how it’s looking and take her out for brunch.

PS what did go wrong yesterday was we woke up to a disconsolate and floppy cat who didn’t want to eat 😩 He went to the vet before we left and our catsitters collected him before he had to go to the expensive out of hours vet.

I hope Dcat recovers quickly @DontCallMeBaby

I have just had to unfollow WIWIKAU (I have to do this periodically) because I am finding it too upsetting reading of so many students finding it so difficult. I really feel for them, it could happen to anyone and as a parent you feel so powerless.

@JustHereWithMyPopcorn that was my plan B, probably would have been easier with hindisght but as interest rates were so low the trustee thing seemed like the easier option. Little did I know! I have saved some of DS’s disability benefits for him (I only started handing them over to him when he left for uni so anything we didn’t spend before that was saved) and that is in my own name in a separate account but with accurate records kept. All official with the DWP as I act for him, it is too complicated for him to manage.

DCat sounds like he’s well on the mend - there is a total bromance going on between him and the catsitter so they’re both very happy.

WIWIKAU … I’m on the verge of leaving depending on whether/how the admins respond to me. I’ve tried twice to post advertising the trampoline club at UCLan and it’s just vanished. If it’s policy you can’t ’advertise’ like this (it’s not in the rules - I’m not ‘self-promoting’) I will quit. What’s the point of allowing endless wailing about how YP isn’t living their best life/finding their tribe (after 24 hours away from home) but not allowing things that might actually help with that?!

@Heifer Clearly I shall have to go back to try chat bombs as we didn't, and get a passport.

@DontCallMeBaby Such a worry when pets are unwell. Glad he is on the mend.

@JustHereWithMyPopcorn Wish I had thought the same. Going to building society with his grandparents will have resulted in another lecture on saving for a rainy day though 😁

DD's booked coach to Stansted airport was merged with a cancelled one and was full when it finally arrived in Cambridge!! So she and a friend are sharing a taxi, hoping to avoid the traffic chaos on the M11 (due to a vehicle fire). I'll be glad when she's on the plane!

@PhotoDad Will you then be tracking the plane (or is that just me) :-)

No! Not just you!

We always track flights too, which as DS1 flies about 4 times a month for work, often with multiple flights, means that Flightradar24 is always on my front page!

Is anyone up? I need help, urgently.

Hi @Piggywaspushed can I help?

Oh hello

Don't know what o do. DS just texted DS1 and said he wanted to kill himself.

Now speakign to housemantes but he won't let them in.

He says eh heard them say horrible tings about him and hasn't been sleeping.

WTF do I do?

I have spoken to him now but he hung up.

Do I send police round?

Sorry about typos

Does he have any history of feeling this way? School gave ds the numbers for various help lines, which he used. Not much help if he won't let you help though. I would definitely consider getting a welfare check somehow - police or ambulance service.