How to avoid tension over joint bank accounts: Sarah Coles

This isn’t just something that children can fall into. It can happen with any group, from work colleagues to friends, and between couples. It can sometimes come from the best of intentions, because people want to work out why something has gone wrong - to stop it happening again.

So for example, if you have a joint account with your partner and you keep dipping into the red at the end of the month, you might want to look through your statements to see what you have both spent money on. The problem is that this can easily tip over into you both pointing the finger of blame and having a row about whether it’s the dinner out that one of you bought or the taxi the other one splashed out on that’s at fault. Instead of solving a problem, you create another one.

A significant part of the problem is the atmosphere can quickly turn negative during these conversations, which means unhelpful behaviours emerge. Some people fall back on denial when they feel under pressure. They will simply insist that their actions are perfectly normal, because everyone else is doing the same thing, so they can’t be at fault

This is very common when it comes to borrowing. The fact that more than two thirds of adults use a credit card in the UK can encourage people to be blasé about borrowing, and if they run up significant debts, they point to the fact that everyone else has a card so there can’t be anything wrong with it. They overlook the worrying extent of their borrowing because they’re focusing on the search for evidence that it’s nothing to worry about.

Others work through deflection: pushing the blame onto someone else. So they might claim, for example, that they only spent more than they could afford on a new TV package because their partner was complaining about having nothing to watch. This simply spreads the misery because whoever they try to pin the fault on then feels compelled to either deny or deflect, and the cycle continues.

By focusing on trying to shift the blame, you lose focus on solving the problem. There’s a decent chance the atmosphere will have deteriorated so badly that you’re not in the mood to collaborate on the best solutions anyway. And because nobody is prepared to admit to being at fault, you both keep making the same financial mistakes.

Over time, things can deteriorate even further. In a relationship where mistakes lead to arguments and finger-pointing, couples can be unwilling to own up to their mistakes. In some cases, this can have catastrophic consequences. The person who is struggling to stay within their budget can go further into debt, while the one who has stopped making pension payments can fall well short of what they need in retirement, without their life partner having a clue about the problems lying in store.

The solution isn’t just to stay out of one another’s finances. When you have joint responsibilities and plans, this isn’t necessarily feasible let alone advisable. Instead, you need to work on your approach, so you build an environment where people don’t feel the need to blamestorm.

This starts with modelling good behaviours yourself, so that when you make mistakes, you own up to them. You’re clear about what happened, come clean as soon as possible, and then ask the other person to work with you on a solution. This doesn’t mean accepting blame when something isn’t your fault, just to keep the peace, it’s about facing the consequences of your actions.

It also means being mindful about how you react when someone else owns up to a mistake. You may be frustrated and angry, but try to express that as calmly and rationally as you can, before focusing on solutions.

You will eventually want to have a conversation about exactly how something has gone wrong and how you can be sure it doesn’t happen again, but this isn’t something to try in the heat of the moment. It’s a completely separate chat to have after the dust has settled and you’ve had a chance to think things through. During this conversation, the best approach is to focus on the future not the past. It’s not about a forensic examination of what a fool your partner has been, it’s about setting things up so you avoid this mistake from now on.

Kicking the brainstorming habit isn’t easy, but over time you can set new patterns of behaviour, so a more productive approach comes more naturally. Of course, we’re all only human, so it’s also perfectly acceptable to have a whinge about it later to someone else. It helps if you have a newspaper column in which to complain that you shouldn’t be the only person in the family with a functioning memory and that it’s not your fault the teenager refused to listen when you explained the risks of investing in gold.

The energy price cap

The energy price cap rose an eye-watering 13% this week, and while millions of us have taken every step we can think of to cut our energy use over the past couple of years, there are also ways to keep your bills down without taking drastic energy-savings steps.

There’s a decent level of competition in the market, so it’s worth shopping around to see if a different company offers a better deal in your area and if you can save by switching.

At the same time, you can consider a fixed tariff. Some are charging less than the current price cap, so you could save money immediately. If you don’t fancy fixing, given the price cap is currently forecast to fall in October, you can try a discounted tariff. These are variable, so they’ll rise when the price cap does, but they will still save you money when compared to the price cap.

If you have a smart meter, you can look into tariffs that offer cheaper electricity at weekends or in the evenings too. You can time things like washing clothes and charging an electric car for when the energy is cheaper.

There are ways to save with your current supplier too. Providers will offer a cheaper deal to anyone who moves onto a direct debit payment plan. Ofgem says this alone can save £143 a year. Most providers also offer a discount if you get both your gas and electricity with them, so if you’re with different providers, check if you can make a saving.