Q. Do you have any recommendations on sticking to holiday gift budgets?

A. This is a tough one, since many people want to be generous with their gifts. The trouble comes in January, when credit-card users receive bills and discover they have the dreaded holiday hangover.

Say you go $400 over budget on a credit card with an 18 percent interest rate. If you can only afford a payment of $20 a month toward the debt, it will take you two years to pay your holiday shopping off.

At the same time, you'll have spent an extra $80 on interest costs.

The Consumer Credit Counseling Service of Hawai'i is well aware of the overspending that can occur during the holidays and says it starts getting calls in the weeks after Christmas as budget-challenged consumers try to figure out how to pay off their bills.

Setting up a budget is fairly simple and is recommended unless you're one of those rare people who don't have to watch where their money goes. There have been surveys showing people who don't create budgets and realistic gift-giving lists who end up spending more than those who do.

A survey last month by the Pew Research Center shows 56 percent of people set a budget and stick to it, while 41 percent hit the malls without a preset spending limit.

It found one-quarter of people have a difficult or very difficult time paying for their holiday spending, with this rising to 45 percent for gift-givers with annual incomes of less than $30,000.

Wendy Burkholder, Consumer Credit Counseling Service executive director, said the holiday season sometimes saddles more debt onto people who already have tight budgets.

"They're already up to their chins in debt and Christmas is enough to put them in over their heads," Burkholder said.

She recommends that people who are strapped for cash try to save for the gift-giving season throughout the year, even if it means going through the formality of opening a Christmas savings account at their credit union.

So for many people, it helps to come up with a spending limit and a gift list.

Take a second pass at this, searching your memory for other folks. This way you won't be running out to the mall two weeks from now for a gift for a neighbor or mail carrier whom you'd forgotten to include. Also budget for gift wrapping, mailing and food you're bringing to parties.

One other tip: Be sure to budget for yourself. A lot of people buy something for themselves while out shopping for others.

Once you have a realistic budget, your next task is to stick to it. There should be a column on your gift list/budget sheet that notes whether you've gone over or spent less than you've budgeted for someone. If you are worried about overspending, put away the plastic and get a sturdy envelope and place the gift-budget cash inside.

When that's gone, you're done shopping. Another way to avoid high-interest rates charged by credit-card issuers is to use a one-year bank loan.

You can help yourself stay within the budget by shopping early and avoiding the last-minute panicked gift-buying when budgets fly out the window. You also may be able to save some money by using shopping search engines such as Nextag, Shopzilla or Pricegrabber to find lower prices.

Do you have a question about personal finance, taxes or other money matters? Reach Akamai Money columnist Greg Wiles at 525-8088 or gwiles@honoluluadvertiser.com