How many times have you done this?
By katsmeow1213
@katsmeow1213 (28716)
United States
July 10, 2008 9:54am CST
My husband called to see how much money we had for him to spend on gas, and when I checked the online account, it showed a negative balance. He'd been doing the checking for the last few days, so I checked the ledger and found a few things he forgot to add, so we had a bit less than we assumed, and of course we spent what we assumed we had. Now we're overdrawn and we're going to be hit with fees from the bank for overdrawing. Ouch! It's a bit depressing.
It's been a long time since we've done this. We had been getting so much better, but I guess mistakes happen.
Has this happened to you?
4 responses
@gemini_rose (16264)
•
10 Jul 08
This used to happen to us all the time, we were getting into such a mess a few years ago and things were really tough. I would write cheques out for things and then post them off, but then the people would not cash the cheques for a few weeks after by which time I would forget and spend the money on something else. Then we would be overdrawn and get charged, we have just got ourself out of this position and now I find I am terrible about making sure there is enough money in at the end of the month so I do not get into trouble again!
@katsmeow1213 (28716)
• United States
10 Jul 08
We were like that too, because we just kept the total in our head, and checked it against the online balance. We rarely ever kept the ledger updated. Now lately I've been very good about the ledger, and my husband knows to give me his reciepts so I can add them to the ledger. But since my surgery he's been doing it himself, and forgetting to add things.
One of our other problems was we would write a check a day or two before the money would be in the account, hoping the check would not go through until the money was there, but then the check would hit before the money.
@mistissa (1349)
• Netherlands
20 Jul 08
Hi there, ofcourse things like this can happen. But it does not happen to us anymore. I keep a close eye on alle the expenses and costs we make, because we don't have money to spend on luxury, every penny counts here. And my husband should never be left in charge of the money haha. I am the one who does all the balancing and money stuff. As long as I keep everything going, my husband is fine with it. He just cannot handle having money, he will spend it all on nonsens.
@katsmeow1213 (28716)
• United States
20 Jul 08
That's the way I am as well. He gets a $10 allowance each week for fast food while at work, and he can spend gas money as needed. Any other purchases or spending must be approved by me first, as I handle the check book and pay the bills. That was just a rough week as I'd been in the hospital for surgery, and while recovering I had no desire to balance the check book.
@DonnaLawson (4032)
• United States
10 Jul 08
Too many times to count.. I once had a knock down drag out with my bank, they won, of course, but it was over a .03 mistake.. I wrote a check for a $7.00 candle and it bounced, I had to make the $7.00 check good and the add another $35.00 for the bank and another $35.00 for the check cashing company that told me I couldn't write another check if I didn't give them the $30.00.. sounds like a scam but I would never have been able to write another check without paying them, sounds more like the mafia than just a scam.. And I had been doing business with the same bank for over 20 years.. I ended up paying $77.00 for the candle.. My husband wasn't going to ever let me burn it, he said it was the most expensive thing that we owned and he didn't wan tot see it go up in smoke.. I was livid with the bank, but it didn't do any good.. But I have never got to live down the $77.00 candle..
@katsmeow1213 (28716)
• United States
10 Jul 08
I've been in fights with my bank so many times it's not funny. I was big on checking the online balance, but it isn't always up to date. I could check the balance and see $20 in there, so go to the store and my debit card is rejected. I went to the bank and yelled at them for the confusion with the online balance, but there really wasn't anything they would do.
@Kierstal (142)
• United States
10 Jul 08
It's happened to us a few times in the past, though back then we didn't pay much attention to what we spent, so we wouldn't know that we were overdrawn until our debit card was refused. :/
Now, though, since we've moved into our own place and have been forced to be financially independent, we are taking very special care to check the account every day online, save receipts, and always keep at least $200 in our checking account as a "Zero Sum" in case one of us makes a mistake and we spend more than we think. Every week I download a .pdf of our account activity from our bank,
We are going to start a new practice of withdrawing a certain amount of cash from the bank every month and having that be our food budget; since the majority of the transactions on our debit card are just for food, that way it's easier to see how much we spend using our card.
Mistakes do happen though -- but this is one of those things that you have to keep on top of every day!
@katsmeow1213 (28716)
• United States
10 Jul 08
That's a good idea to keep that $200 as a zero sum. Unfortunatly we aren't in a position to do that as we are living week to week. It is difficult to be financially comfortable in this day in age while feeding a family of 7.
