Don't make debt your Groundhog Day

Today's date (2 February) marks Groundhog Day. Here's how to ensure you don't get stuck in a rut with your debt...

In the film Groundhog Day, Bill Murray is destined to repeat the same things, on the same day, over and over again, until he gets everything right. For a lot of people in debt, this is a situation they can relate to - every day feels like Groundhog Day.

For those that haven’t seen the film (one of the best comedies ever in our opinion), Murray plays TV weatherman Phil Connors, sent to report from a small town in Pennsylvania on the annual waking from hibernation of Punxsutawney Phil, a groundhog. The rodent is supposed to predict either the onset of spring or the continuation of winter every 2 February (an event that happens every year in real-life).

However, after getting stuck in a snowstorm, Connors finds that he’s unable to leave the town and has to stay the night. He wakes up the next day to find, unbelievably, that it’s 2 February again and the same events that happened the day before are occurring once more.

Again and again he tries to leave and every day he wakes up to find it’s still 2 February. Connors has to find more and more ingenious methods to change the timeline to get to 3 February so he can escape.

Of course, this is a far-fetched film, however for a lot of people in debt, every day can feel like it’s the same as the last. No matter what they try and do they’re stuck in a debt spiral. They try to borrow their way out of debt but by going down this path they’re ensuring that every day is destined to be the same as the last, financially at least.

We see this situation quite a lot. People consolidate their loans, overdrafts and store cards into “one manageable monthly amount”, with good intentions to finally sort their debts out. They think they can stick to paying one amount each month, cut back a little, and everything will be OK in the end.

However, as seen during the “easy money” credit boom of the mid-2000s, some give into temptation and borrow again to maintain their previous compulsive ways. Their debt spiral worsens and costs built up.

So they transfer available credit between cards to pay one off while building debt on the other (leading to the oft-repeated phrase we hear, “robbing Peter to pay Paul”). They are confused by why the debt doesn’t fall (because of the interest), and that previously friendly banks are refusing to give just that little bit more credit, to help them “just this one last time”.

Every day is the same struggle, trying to ensure that Bank A is happy with getting payment from Credit Card B on an overdraft and Store Card C is going to be paid off once the money’s in Bank A (the result of which is more interest on Credit Card B and more overdraft charges on the Bank A account).

In the end all their income goes towards paying the debt and there’s no money left to buy the groceries. So what can they do? Try and borrow more money.

We hope we’re not giving too much away by saying the Phil Connors escapes Groundhog Day eventually (apologies if we’ve ruined the film for you). For those suffering in debt, their ending might not be so happy. The debt spiral means that unless they wake up, it could end in insolvency, bailiffs or court action.

This is why we implore people to make their own ending and contact CCCS, to see how we can help – we provide online debt advice counselling and we have a Helpline that’s open Monday to Friday.

Unlike Groundhog Day we can help make tomorrow a new day.