These are the fixed regular household expenses that you incur each month. Many are required to maintain a basic standard of living and will include items like your mortgage or rent payments. Some, like mortgage and loan payments or life assurance premiums will be fixed in their amount and paid on the same day of each month.

Be careful with items that are paid annually like road tax. Although road tax is paid annually, for the calculator to work properly, please divide the annual amount you pay by 12 months i.e. £180 per year cost should be entered as £15 per month.

Whilst not considered fixed costs, items of expenditure in this section like food, heating and lighting bills and car running costs can often be a very similar amount each month. Other items like dentistry costs may only be incurred once or twice a year and should be averaged over 12 months for the calculator to function correctly.

These are the expenses that you incur each month that are, in the main, voluntary. Items in this section are generally the things that are paid for out of the money that is left over each month once you have paid out essential expenses like your mortgage, food, heating and lighting and transport.

These are the expenses that you won't necessarily need to incur to maintain a basic standard of living but make life much more enjoyable when you do.

Some expenses in this section such as holidays, sports club subscriptions (golf fee's for example) or the money you expect to spend on gifts may only be incurred once or twice a year. For the calculator to work properly, please divide the amount you expect to spend over the year on enjoyable pursuits like these by 12 months i.e. £1,200 per year on holidays should be entered as £150 per month.

For the purposes of this budget calculator, the income entered should be your net income, i.e. the income that is actually received in to your bank account each month after all taxes etc. have been paid.

If you are self-employed, use your estimated net relevant earnings for the current tax year divided by twelve, after you have allowed for tax and national insurance payments.

Use the other income to mark down items such as child benefit, working family tax credits, or investment income.

Your income

Your partner's Income