Monetary musings #2

[kittiwake]

Starting this week my team are all being expected to work a fair amount of overtime on a particular project. I'm quite pleased, as it seems like a long time since I've much overtime at all. I used to be able to rely on getting enough to pay for a good holiday (and I do have rather expensive tastes in holidays), but in the last few years the pickings have been slim (due to our bosses insisting on more realistic timescales). With luck I should get a fair amount of overtime for the rest of this year, but it isn't guaranteed.

We receive our overtime quarterly, so the payment for April to June will be in my July pay-packet. I really should use most of it sensibly, so these are the options:

1) Pay off my credit card - currently £760 outstanding from buying my new Mac (but I'll be paying some more off in June).
2) Start funding a Mini Stocks & Shares ISA for 2003/4.
3) Top up my Nationwide Cash ISA & buy a Nationwide Members ISA Bond for 2003/4.
4) Pay off a chunk of my mortgage (extra payments have to be £500 minimum).
5) Spend it home improvements.

Current thoughts on how to spend it (of course this will depend on how much
overtime I get):

April-June (paid July):
sensible - pay off credit card
sensible - mortgage
fun - buy a DVD player

July-September (paid October):
sensible - cash ISA bond
sensible - new microwave
fun - holiday (into holiday savings a/c)

October-December (paid January):
sensible - mortgage
sensible - home improvements
sensible - stocks & shares ISA
sensible - Christmas/January sales spending (pay off credit cards)