Money Matters
I love fashion,
make-up and everything that makes me feel pampered and spoiled, but all of
these things comes with a price, and if one is not careful you might as well
looking at your savings account in your closet.
In light of above, I have
decided to do a few articles on money matters.
Every season has its
own trends, fashion staples and “must” haves. A smart way to shop is when
the majority of the retailers have their
annual “end of season” sale. Prices are normally
sliced by 25% – 75%, and if you are smart you will have saved up a few bucks to
do a little shopping, and you will be surprised with the number of items you
can walk away with.
My purse contains
cards with all major retailers.. I’ve created a simple income and expenditure
sheet , and wrote down all the payments
I had to fork out every month for my accounts. I monitored it over a
period of months and decided enough is enough . Up until a few years a ago I
decided to pay it all, but I didn’t have the heart to close the accounts or
destroy the cards ..
Needless to say I have been very disciplined
and it became more of a habit buying items cash, or saving up for something
expensive. Its interesting to look at your account statement and pay closer attention to the interest you are charged .
There are retailers
that take laybys’. The Foschini Group is
one of them. This is smart way to minimize debt, and by that I mean if you cannot afford to
pay the monthly instalments anymore due to unexpected expenses, you can cancel
the layby, so you are not bound to an installment.
Your credit
rating is so important! You can have a check done every year at the
Credit Bureau to see how your rating is.
Even when applying for
employment these days, this is one of
the checks that companies do, and it may affect your application if you have a
bad rating. If you have accounts that you paying every month, make sure you are paying them on time each
month, paying late may rate you as a “slow payer” , all of which affects your credit rating.
If you cannot afford to make a payment,
contact the creditor and inform them and make some sort of payment arrangement.
Make sure you write down the agents name and ask for a reference. Overall, try and conduct your payments on
time and be disciplined.
Thanks for reading
CK XXX
