I bought it when I had money

[Ginger Tea]

As I am not registered at CS I am not able to add to this thread more specifically this post

Just what she spent on the tats along probably could have paid a few bills. I have nothing against body art, but I do have a problem with adorned people crying poverty. WTF???

Similar sentiments were echoed either towards tats or large price items yet crying poverty yet Seshat is the only one to really say

Body art (and some of the other signs of 'being well off') is permanent. You can get it when you do have money to spare, and become poor later on.

Now the OP didn't say that the non paying woman bragged about getting a brand new tat days after failing to pay bills, so this is moot. But if someone three years ago had a job and saved up and splashed out 2 grand on tattoos covering most of their body with only perhaps a few in prominent display then later on became unemployed (not due to the tats but that could be cause for uproar) the tat's are not still being paid for, you don't rent them nor do they go away, the bailiffs can not take your tats away in lieu of money for the electric, although that would be fun to watch (laser removal or skin graft?).

Others had more valid concerns regarding loaning money to friends / family in need and for them to squander it on something that isn't keeping a roof over their head.

I have that worry with my brother, I am his guarantor on the rent and due to his last job fucking up his wages three months in a row I had to pony up the rent for a month and a half myself and told him when his wages eventually came in to pay rent ahead to avoid it next time, I only have to hope that he did as I would be pissed if I was to later pay rent on his place on top of mine when he had a job.
Hell I'm even more pissed that I had to physically go oop norf to sign the paper work when he moved and as he had just been made unemployed did not have the money to pay the deposit rent and pet fees, so I in all was £1200 down and on (paid) leave for a week.
He's unemployed at the moment and gets his rent paid by the council, but he occasionally taps me for £20 or £30 for food, but now I too am unemployed it's more annoying.

But I have redundancy preventing me from signing on as they have a maximum account balance which I'm pretty sure I am above, so I have no outside help in my bills, but I'm not dirt poor either, so much that I am looking at 46" HDTV's to hook up to my brand new £750 i7 rig that I had been meaning to buy for a year saving up 50 here and there, I had the money saved ages ago I just coulnt get the time to buy it.
But either way if I choose whilst earning a wage or in my case using my redundancy to treat myself to a £400 TV on top of a grand in PC and games/hardware, I could have it for a year or more and should something happen that makes me 'poor' but not eviction poor, prior purchase's are irrelevant.
Actually being unemployed (or as I can't sign on I'm just between jobs) means I have time to get moped/scooter lessons, I just have this funk of apathy to get over first, managed to stem the Agoraphobia for now, whilst working I rarely had a day off in the last year, or any of the 9 TBH as I was the go to guy for overtime, so I would probably cancel a lesson in favour of more money unless I would be out of pocket on the lessons.
I don't have to save up for a basic scooter (need to price up what IS a basic scooter) I can buy it out right and widen my job search due to the greater distances offered via cycling, or just cut down the time. I could upgrade some part of it (but not the CC of the engine as I am going to be limited via licence) cos hey I've got the money, but land lord wont see that in the garden and say "but you cant pay rent?" as I am sensible enough to make sure I can pay 6 months in advance if I so choose, unlike other house mates who are behind in rent yet can get stoned and or pissed frequently (yet still avoid eviction, fuck it I might as well get 3 months behind in rent too just because a precedent has been set).

[Aethian]

I've seen this more then once. I used to deliver to a area that was ALL state paid in carrying degrees. It was said how many times the rent-to-own truck was there. Several of them were living a LOT better then I was. Of course the community started telling the rent-to-own store about evictions ahead of time because if they weren't there to get there stuff it would be gone.

Now on the other side I ran into someone driving a nice car, wearing nice clothes, and using food stamps. She used to work at one of the big offices that not to long ago went under, all her expensive stuff is from when she had a huge paycheck. People give her weird looks but they also don't have the back info I know.

[Ginger Tea]

Back in the early 90's I worked for an independent PC shop, Amiga and Amstrad PC's were the norm at this point, they used to sell ST's too but they lost the 'war' and as the 8bit systems were out of flavour what stock of 1.99 tapes we had got off loaded to the shop a few doors down.

Guy comes in asking if we sold C64 games and we told him we didn't and told him to look in corner shop.
Get's into flashy car and Manager or owner said "If he didn't have such an expensive car he could buy a proper computer to play games on."
I have to admit the old style of reg numbers denoting the year never stuck in my brain so I do not know if it was a brand new car or an old one in good nick, he might have had the £400 going price for an A500, he just might still have a soft spot for the 64, hell another forum I go to a 15 year old has just posted images of a C64c he was gifted, he would have been a child when the Amiga died and not even born when the C64 was last made.
Edit, nope both systems would have been long dead, keep forgetting it's 2013 he would have been born 98ish after the Escom and Gateway buyouts and collapses.

[patiokitty]

I never take a person at face value because you never know what their circumstances were before they walked in. I am inked and pierced and have spent time on Welfare and I did have people assume that I used some of my Welfare money or Child Tax refund to get inked or pierced - they had no idea that I had this stuff done before I went on welfare or that I had used my GST refund to pay for my tattoo or piercing (one of the GST refund dates falls directly on my birthday and it tends to be the only refund that I use for myself as the rest go towards stuff my son or the house needs).

Seriously, it never pays to judge people because you simply never know what their circumstances are. Now, if you know for a fact that they are frauding the system that is an entirely different story - I'm one of those ones that when I can present proof that somebody is frauding the system I will report them.

[Ginger Tea]

I used to chat with a big issue* vendor in the late 90's who had a few visible piercings and she told me she got shit for them "wasting her money on jewellery when she should be feeding herself".

She asked me how much it cost to get my nipples done (took em both out within two years, well one worked its way out) and I told her, she asked how much the actual jewellery was and I said a way lower amount.

THAT is what she paid, she either knew someone she could trust to not fuck it up and infect it or she did it herself, I forget exactly, but it was done more in the old school punk safety pin style of boiling it and then using a heated pin of the right size (not quite kilt safety pin).

So what cost me to get one nipple done, she could get 5 or 6, I honestly forget the prices so long ago as they are, pieces of jewellery and get the piercings done for free.

Same with tattooists if you have friends or family you can get it at cost if your nice about it, what might cost a co worker £200 might cost the tattooists mate a bottle of Jack.



Big Issue is a UK based weekly magazine sold by certain homeless / sheltered accommodation people, I rarely read it when I used to buy it regularly back in the day as it was normally politically leaning and not at all entertaining, but I did buy it none the less.
The business plan was vendors bought the magazine each morning for a price and sold it for cover (or more if people chose, unless you are John Prescott then you get it for trade price cos your a twat) set aside some money for the next days stock bought food and tried to save the rest to get closer to being off the streets.

Given the choice between giving £2.50 the current cover price to a vendor a vagrant or a chugger and receiving nothing in return (like I said sometimes it wernt worth reading) I would give to the vendor.

[Lace Neil Singer]

I own a designer coat which I got in the sale. I didn't actually hand over the money, my fiance paid for it; it was £50 but was originally priced at about five times that price. I'm sure that on the cold winter days when I visited the council offices a good few people were looking at me and thinking, "If she can afford a designer coat, then why is she claiming benefits?" when the fact is that the coat was a sale item and I do need benefits sadly cuz I'm being taxed to oblivion. If the government allowed me to keep more of my pay packet, I probably wouldn't have to claim.