Money My Way - Spending priorities
When you're thinking about taking better control of your money, prioritising what you need to spend is a good start. This means that you'll pay for the most important things first, and can be especially important if you have bills or debts to pay. This page will help you to get to grips with which debts are most important.
Before you start
If you're facing a debt emergency, it might be best to talk to someone who can help as soon as you can, rather than work through this page. The Money Advice Service website has information about where to get free debt advice, and how to talk to the people you owe money to.
Task 1: What are your priority bills?
Make a list. What are your top 5 priority bills? Think about each thing you write down - why is it a priority bill? What would happen if you didn't pay this bill?
Visit the Debt Camel website, below. The Debt Camel website can help you to understand the difference between priority and non-priority debts - do the priorities listed on here match what you've written down?
Task 2: Help Ewan prioritise his debts
Meet Ewan. You can find out more about Ewan's story by following the link below. You'll be asked to help Ewan prioritise his debts using the sheet below, as well as decide what to do with his non-priority debts.
Extra Resources
Snowballing your debts' means paying off the minimum amount of all debts except one, and overpaying that one by as much as possible each month. Follow this link to go back to the Debt Camel website and find out more about snowballing.
The Money Saving Expert has advice about using savings to repay debt and getting back into saving after doing so.
Session Plan For Tutors
If you're a tutor, you might find it useful to use the session plan below to support this topic.