Budgeting for a new phone for a client

Speaker 1: Hey Iain, how's it going?

Speaker 2: Good. I'd like to buy a new mobile phone, but I'm not sure how long I'll need to save for before I can afford it.

Speaker 1: OK, do you know which one it is you want?

Speaker 2: It's one with a really good camera so I can make films with it.

Speaker 1: OK and what's the cost of it?

Speaker 2: It's £179.99.

Speaker 1: Ah OK, well would you like me to go away and work it out and then get back to you, yeah?

Speaker 2: Yeah, thanks Josh.

Speaker 1: Brilliant, OK. (TO AUDIENCE) OK, so I need to see how long Iain's going to need to save for to buy the phone.

I know he needs to save £179.99.

So, I'll need to look at his current balance, his income from his benefits and his weekly outgoings.

Then I can work it all out.

I know he'll want it as soon as he can.

Speaker: (TO AUDIENCE) Iain has given me permission to look at his account and support him with his finances.

Right, so, I've got everything I need here to work out how long it'll take Iain to pay for his new phone and I know the phone he wants costs £179.99.

I'll just round that up to £180.00 to make it much easier.

I can see he's already got £52.00 saved, so the first thing I need to do is take that away from the price of the phone…

…equals £128.00. OK, so I can see that Iain gets £139.75 in benefits each week and his budget is £95.00.

So, to work out how much spare cash he has I need to take the amount he spends from the amount he has coming in.

OK, so that's £44.75 per week spare.

In theory, he could save that much per week but I want him to have a buffer for any extra treats.

So let's say, £30.00 a week?

So now I divide the £128.00 by the £30.00 to find out how many weeks he'll need to save.

4.2666. That's 4 weeks and a bit.

So let's call it 5 weeks to save and he should have some extra money left over too, because if he saves for 5 weeks that's 30 times 5, which is £150.00.

Great stuff, I'll go tell him.

Speaker 1: OK Iain, so you wanted me to work out how long it would take you to get your phone.

Speaker 2: Uh-hmm.

Speaker 1: So the phone was £179.99.

But I've rounded it up to £180.00, it just makes the maths a little bit more simpler.

Would you like to put your savings towards the phone?

Speaker 2: OK.

Speaker 1: So then I've worked out that you could save £30.00 a week for 5 weeks, OK?

Speaker 2: Sounds great.

Speaker 1: So if we have a look at the calendar, that is 1 week, 2 weeks, 3 weeks, 4 weeks, 5 weeks.

So that will be the 11th of June.

Speaker 2: OK.

Speaker 1: OK, and you're actually going to have some money left over, so would you like to maybe spend that on a phone case?

Speaker 2: Aww fab I'm really happy about that. Thanks Josh!

Speaker 1: Brilliant!