DMP & Mutual Support Thread - Part 8

[fermi]

Once again the old thread was getting a bit large, so here is a fresh thread.

The previous thread can be found here: Click ---> DMP Mutual Support Thread (Part 7)

Or click here for the last page of posts on the old thread. ---> Last Page

Good luck with your DMP everyone.

[Hopelessly Hopeful]

not sure if anyone here can help but thought I'd try... my son has just been awarded DLA. I haven't had a letter yet, but a lovely surprise lump sum when I checked online banking tonight, so I presume that's the 8wks of back pay from when we applied.

I asked yesterday when I spoke to CCCS how it works, as the money is meant to be for my son. He said we declare it as income, but then add the amount into our expenditure accordingly. Does anyone have experience of this? I just worry that if our 'sports/clubs/activities' budget goes up by a fair bit as we put down money for swimming lessons, extra soft play, etc. (he has cerebral palsy- so those are things that will help his muscles by being active!) and our clothes/shoes budget goes up another large amount (for special shoes) that our creditors won't be impressed with our level of spending in those areas! We also won't always need the full amount each month, but will need to put some into savings (his) for when we need big spends like new buggy, car seats, extra pairs of shoes........ do we just add this to the 'emergency fund' bit or somewhere where we have no spends, say 'medical/accident insurance'?

Em ..... re the above post...... outrageous. This money s for your son. Go back and challenge them. He deserves a childhood and a healthy one. I know you know this but that additional money is not to support the household budget (and in turn the debt) it is for your son's needs. You need every single penny for that purpose. You may have to declare as income but the legitimate expenditure needs to go beyond normal limits too. I can't tell you how cross their answer to you has made me.

Good luck and let us know how you get on.

HHx

[Hopelessly Hopeful]

Originally Posted by fermi

Once again the old thread was getting a bit large, so here is a fresh thread.

The previous thread can be found here: Click ---> DMP Mutual Support Thread (Part 7)

Or click here for the last page of posts on the old thread. ---> Last Page

Good luck with your DMP everyone.

Thanks for sorting us out Fermi. Hope life is treating you well.

HHx

[Em586]

Originally Posted by Hopelessly Hopeful

Em ..... re the above post...... outrageous. This money s for your son. Go back and challenge them. He deserves a childhood and a healthy one. I know you know this but that additional money is not to support the household budget (and in turn the debt) it is for your son's needs. You need every single penny for that purpose. You may have to declare as income but the legitimate expenditure needs to go beyond normal limits too. I can't tell you how cross their answer to you has made me.

Good luck and let us know how you get on.

HHx

Thank you. I don't plan on putting it into the household income/debt at all. No chance!! He's going to get all the things we've struggled with until now!

I didn't question the guy from CCCS at the time, as he did make it sound ok as in 'you declare it as income but then adjust the expenditure to show where you're using the money'. That made sense, it's just knowing that we possibly won't use the full amount each month but will need to save some and after I got off the phone I started wondering where you put 'savings' on a DMP expenditure! I've seen posts on here where they've said 'add a bit to x on the budget since you need to spend more in an area that's already near the acceptable limit' so that's what I thought would happen. Not that the money would actually be spent on anything other than him, just on paper it was marked as being spent elsewhere.

I don't think CCCS will be the problem at all, it was the creditors I'm worried about, but now that I'm less tired and have looked at the budget sheet again, I realise they detail the income, so everyone will see that there will be x amount for DLA and expect the expenditure to rise accordingly.

It's all so new and we haven't even started our payments yet, but this is the 3rd time our income/expenditure has changed in the 2 weeks since we started the process, and now I need to call CTC as that'll probably change too. GAH!

[Hopelessly Hopeful]

Originally Posted by Em586

Thank you. I don't plan on putting it into the household income/debt at all. No chance!! He's going to get all the things we've struggled with until now!

I didn't question the guy from CCCS at the time, as he did make it sound ok as in 'you declare it as income but then adjust the expenditure to show where you're using the money'. That made sense, it's just knowing that we possibly won't use the full amount each month but will need to save some and after I got off the phone I started wondering where you put 'savings' on a DMP expenditure! I've seen posts on here where they've said 'add a bit to x on the budget since you need to spend more in an area that's already near the acceptable limit' so that's what I thought would happen. Not that the money would actually be spent on anything other than him, just on paper it was marked as being spent elsewhere.

I don't think CCCS will be the problem at all, it was the creditors I'm worried about, but now that I'm less tired and have looked at the budget sheet again, I realise they detail the income, so everyone will see that there will be x amount for DLA and expect the expenditure to rise accordingly.

It's all so new and we haven't even started our payments yet, but this is the 3rd time our income/expenditure has changed in the 2 weeks since we started the process, and now I need to call CTC as that'll probably change too. GAH!

Most people have a rocky start. changes can be made on dmp but they can really rock the boat so this is the time to get it sorted if possible so it is all happening at a good time. Be polite but be firm!!!!!!

HHx

[BlushingRose]

Urgh, having a panic today about how little we've got to live on until the 24th.
We currently have £50 in the bank, and that's for food and petrol. The car currently needs petrol and we've been putting in £5 every so often although it's starting to feel like the car just swallows it up.
We will *probably* be fine....we've had NSD in Jan and will continue to do so (have to!!) but I'm just having a cold, blind, panic about how little money we've got to play with.

[wannabee_in_credit]

Originally Posted by BlushingRose

Urgh, having a panic today about how little we've got to live on until the 24th.
We currently have £50 in the bank, and that's for food and petrol. The car currently needs petrol and we've been putting in £5 every so often although it's starting to feel like the car just swallows it up.
We will *probably* be fine....we've had NSD in Jan and will continue to do so (have to!!) but I'm just having a cold, blind, panic about how little money we've got to play with.

It is scary at first but it does become quite liberating once you know that you're managing your own money.
I went on dmp before I found this site, and took £200 to max my overdraft and live on that whilst it was all set up.
Then it's been a case of keeping spending diaries and nsd's etc.
You will feel better - I didn't feel better immediately - it took about 3 months. And even now I have days where I could just cry, but not like the old days where I couldn't sleep.

[BlushingRose]

I'm looking forward to the feeling of liberation lol
It's partly because I know that we have no OD or CC to fall back on. The money we've got to last us is all the money we have...
As I've mentioned before, we had some unusual spends after the last pay-day, but I don;t think we were paying enough attention to what we were doing at the beginning of the month. Mr BR seems to think we'll be absolutely fine, but I just worry that we'll run out of money before pay-day.
I know we should have done some token payments for a couple of months, but we didnt and there's nothing we can do about that now. Again, as it's Mr BR's DMP (but we're in it together and his is currently the only income) it was his choice of what we did re: DMP...

[typhoo]

Hi all,

So my DMP plan is starting up. I've set up another bank account and my first payment to CCCS will be 1st Feb.

Few questions:

I have to pay MBNA CC bill on 22 Jan for £80 and today I sent them a postal order of £10 recorded delivery. I made it payable to 'MBNA', is this correct? Also, how will I know if this payment is accepted? Also, do I need to let CCCS know that I sent this token payment? I also mentioned in the letter that for February, CCCS will take money and distribute to my creditors pro-rata and that they will receive around 25th Feb (couple days later than scheduled bill date) and hence please don't charge me. but my main question is how I can track these payments etc? What shall I do if they DO charge me?

Thanks for reading.

[hopeful1983happy]

Hi Everyone,

We are coming up to our 1 year review and unfortunatley our income has gone down a little and we all know that prices are going up....

I jsut wondered has anyone had any experience of reducing their payments and the creditors reaction to this? I am a bit scared they will get all aggressive if we have to reduce them. I think we will we have really struggled the last few months mainly due to the reduced income.

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Thanks H1983H

[Hopelessly Hopeful]

Originally Posted by hopeful1983happy

Hi Everyone,

We are coming up to our 1 year review and unfortunatley our income has gone down a little and we all know that prices are going up....

I jsut wondered has anyone had any experience of reducing their payments and the creditors reaction to this? I am a bit scared they will get all aggressive if we have to reduce them. I think we will we have really struggled the last few months mainly due to the reduced income.

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Thanks H1983H

I have had to reduce mine 3 times in 20 months. Each time the madness kicks off for some of them even though was on CCCS advice and I let them know in advance myself too etc. Be prepared for some letter writting!

Good luck

HHX

[Hopelessly Hopeful]

Originally Posted by typhoo

Hi all,

So my DMP plan is starting up. I've set up another bank account and my first payment to CCCS will be 1st Feb.

Few questions:

I have to pay MBNA CC bill on 22 Jan for £80 and today I sent them a postal order of £10 recorded delivery. I made it payable to 'MBNA', is this correct? Also, how will I know if this payment is accepted? Also, do I need to let CCCS know that I sent this token payment? I also mentioned in the letter that for February, CCCS will take money and distribute to my creditors pro-rata and that they will receive around 25th Feb (couple days later than scheduled bill date) and hence please don't charge me. but my main question is how I can track these payments etc? What shall I do if they DO charge me?

Thanks for reading.

They will find and cash it, they can sense blood in a stone that lot!!!!

Have you looked on post office site re PO's?

HHx

[dazla]

Originally Posted by hopeful1983happy

Hi Everyone,

We are coming up to our 1 year review and unfortunatley our income has gone down a little and we all know that prices are going up....

I jsut wondered has anyone had any experience of reducing their payments and the creditors reaction to this? I am a bit scared they will get all aggressive if we have to reduce them. I think we will we have really struggled the last few months mainly due to the reduced income.

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Thanks H1983H

Hi hopeful

I'm in the same boat as you, my first yr review is not too far away but my disposable income is going down this year, because I'm a civil servant and i have to start paying £60 a month extra for my pension. Also my gas bill has gone up too. Payplan have told me that creditors like to see an increase in contribtions each yr of the dmp, so I am worried they may get a bit angry if I don;t increase the payments

Daz

[BlushingRose]

We were talking about perhaps having to reduce our payments soon, and we've only just started our DMP.
I think I'm a bit depressed as I can't stop worrying and crying at stuff these days. I've been prone to depression in the past. Mr BR says he's really worried about me, as I just seem sad all the time.

[bitbot]

Hi All

Any advice greatly recieved. I am in a dmp with payplan and one of my creditors (Halifax) have been quite difficult. Basically I owe them about £8k and the payment to them is £148 a month however they charge £131 in interest. After numerous letters requesting they freeze or reduce the interest giving my current situation which were ignored, I wrote a complaint letter quoting the lending code etc. This letter was ignored so I complained to the Financial Ombudsman Service. Halifax wrote to me today denying they recieved my letter of complaint (despite it been sent recorded delivery!). In the letter they have reimbursed 6 months interest, but state they will still be continuing to charge the high amount of interest from this point on as their policy is to reduce interest for 12months, followed by 12months on standard interest before considering this again.

i feel as though this is still against the lending code in terms of how creditors should deal with customers who are in financial difficulties, and i should pursue the complaint with the financial ombudsman service? Based upon the amount of interest they are planning to charge over the next 12 months it would take 42 years to pay the debt off....and the lending code states that the time to pay off the debt should not be "excessive", I think most people would say 42 years is excessive!

Halifax have also suggested in the letter that it may be an option to pass the debt over to the recoveries department, which would mean a default notice been issued, however more likely to freeze interest and charges....would most people pursue this option? I hope this makes sense! any advice greatly appreciated!

[Hopelessly Hopeful]

Originally Posted by dazla

Hi hopeful

I'm in the same boat as you, my first yr review is not too far away but my disposable income is going down this year, because I'm a civil servant and i have to start paying £60 a month extra for my pension. Also my gas bill has gone up too. Payplan have told me that creditors like to see an increase in contribtions each yr of the dmp, so I am worried they may get a bit angry if I don;t increase the payments

Daz

Folks, they like to see an increase but so we would. Fact outgoings have gone up! They just need to know situation reviewed. They can't have what you haven't got. Get with the mantra. Come on, we can do it together.

HHx

[Hopelessly Hopeful]

Originally Posted by BlushingRose

We were talking about perhaps having to reduce our payments soon, and we've only just started our DMP.
I think I'm a bit depressed as I can't stop worrying and crying at stuff these days. I've been prone to depression in the past. Mr BR says he's really worried about me, as I just seem sad all the time.

Sorry to hear that BR. Try to think about what you have achieved too. Compared to the alternatives you have made some significant steps. Hope you feel brighter soon.

HHx

[Hopelessly Hopeful]

Originally Posted by bitbot

Hi All

Any advice greatly recieved. I am in a dmp with payplan and one of my creditors (Halifax) have been quite difficult. Basically I owe them about £8k and the payment to them is £148 a month however they charge £131 in interest. After numerous letters requesting they freeze or reduce the interest giving my current situation which were ignored, I wrote a complaint letter quoting the lending code etc. This letter was ignored so I complained to the Financial Ombudsman Service. Halifax wrote to me today denying they recieved my letter of complaint (despite it been sent recorded delivery!). In the letter they have reimbursed 6 months interest, but state they will still be continuing to charge the high amount of interest from this point on as their policy is to reduce interest for 12months, followed by 12months on standard interest before considering this again.

i feel as though this is still against the lending code in terms of how creditors should deal with customers who are in financial difficulties, and i should pursue the complaint with the financial ombudsman service? Based upon the amount of interest they are planning to charge over the next 12 months it would take 42 years to pay the debt off....and the lending code states that the time to pay off the debt should not be "excessive", I think most people would say 42 years is excessive!

Halifax have also suggested in the letter that it may be an option to pass the debt over to the recoveries department, which would mean a default notice been issued, however more likely to freeze interest and charges....would most people pursue this option? I hope this makes sense! any advice greatly appreciated!

I would refer it back to the FOS to say you don't feel suitably dealt with. Yes you are quite right, totally unreasonable.

Please let us know how you get on an stick around to show others support.

HHx

Good luck

[wannabee_in_credit]

My dmp payments have gone down in both reviews since I started. Pay freeze and increased cost of living. I'm hoping to increase payments once I have my next review in April, but I think I might lose my tax credits this year (over the income threshold) so who knows. My creditors have so far been ok with this.

BR it is an incredibly stressful time for you at the moment. If you're prone to depression is it worth you speaking to your doctor? January can be miserable at the best of times, never mind with this big change going on.
As I say, it will get better for you. x

[BevieB]

Originally Posted by bitbot

Hi All

Any advice greatly recieved. I am in a dmp with payplan and one of my creditors (Halifax) have been quite difficult. Basically I owe them about £8k and the payment to them is £148 a month however they charge £131 in interest. After numerous letters requesting they freeze or reduce the interest giving my current situation which were ignored, I wrote a complaint letter quoting the lending code etc. This letter was ignored so I complained to the Financial Ombudsman Service. Halifax wrote to me today denying they recieved my letter of complaint (despite it been sent recorded delivery!). In the letter they have reimbursed 6 months interest, but state they will still be continuing to charge the high amount of interest from this point on as their policy is to reduce interest for 12months, followed by 12months on standard interest before considering this again.

i feel as though this is still against the lending code in terms of how creditors should deal with customers who are in financial difficulties, and i should pursue the complaint with the financial ombudsman service? Based upon the amount of interest they are planning to charge over the next 12 months it would take 42 years to pay the debt off....and the lending code states that the time to pay off the debt should not be "excessive", I think most people would say 42 years is excessive!

Halifax have also suggested in the letter that it may be an option to pass the debt over to the recoveries department, which would mean a default notice been issued, however more likely to freeze interest and charges....would most people pursue this option? I hope this makes sense! any advice greatly appreciated!

Did the FSO write to you about your complaint? If not why dont you ring the Halifax and make a statement over the telephone stating that you feel that they have not resolved your dispute and that you will be contacting the FSO again for them to look at it as their action will not improve your situation.
Regarding the default/recoveries department this most prob would be the best option all round. We are with the Halifax and after compalining they have refunded all interest/charges since Oct 11 although they have not given any information about time scales although with our OD they did say that normally after 12months its passed to the recovery.
Dont you just love the Halifax.