BALANCING the books is a skill from which everyone may gain advantage, Christians Against Poverty (CAP) has said on the launch of its campaign to encourage people to learn how you can budget.
Darren Green has recently accomplished CAP’s free money-management course, and would recommend it to anyone. With the charity’s recent YouGov survey showing that 40 per cent of individuals have no idea how you can budget, there could possibly be loads of takers (News, 10 November 2023).
His family’s situation is removed from unusual when, owing to a drop within the household income which coincided with the cost-of-living crisis, they were left almost imperceptibly drifting into debt.
“I used to be an ostrich with my head within the sand,” he says. When he walked into the money-management course at Welcome Church, in Woking, he didn’t expect to remain beyond the primary session.
Instead, he accomplished the course, and the sensible advice and support helped him to confront the gathering storm and to take motion. A way of life overhaul was not required, he said, just higher management and planning to get the family funds back on an excellent keel.
CAP continues to supply advice and support to those in debt across the UK, working with local councils and other service providers to assist those whose borrowing has left them in a desperate situation.
The money-management course has run for several years alongside the debt counselling, helping people to forestall the ruinous cycle before it really begins.
At the beginning of this yr, CAP launched a campaign, “Budget not Blues” (News, 5 January), encouraging people to take control of their funds and embrace budgeting, and it has scaled up the supply of its free money-coaching courses.
Welcome Church runs two courses — one on a Saturday, and one other on a Monday, which is a component of a drop-in café at which individuals also can use other CAP services.
On Monday, as people began to assemble for lunch, one in every of the church’s pastors, Dub Everitt, explained why they were so glad to work with CAP. “To start with, we were just giving out a free lunch and hoping it will change people’s lives.” With CAP on board, “we’re equipping people to vary their lives.”
Tony Little, who worships on the church, is one in every of the cash coaches on Mondays. He also emphasises how vital budgeting is for everybody. “It doesn’t matter what your income is — you’ll be able to be making a snug living — if in case you get used used to spending to the limit, it is vitally easy to search out yourself overspending.”
