Ask a CCCS counsellor a question

CCCS_Matthew

paulmyth wrote: »

Hi, My mum has a telephone appointment with you next week but I have a few questions before that if you can help:

At the moment I am paying all her bills, which costs me all my wages of £800 a month but we arent able to carry on doing that any more. She is presently claiming Bereavement Allowance of £90 a week (she turns 60 and will get a pension of approx £160 a week in July).

Based on her income only (£90 a week at the moment, and £160 soon), that wont leave much at all to pay her debts that are in total £29,000.

My questions are :

I have read in this forum that you recommend people to pay 3 percent of their total debt to you per month to distribute towards their debts...is that right???

Hopefully that isnt true...I just really would like to know approximately what sort of payment plan you may make with her, based on her (at best) weekly money of £160. With gas, electric, food etc coming off, she might only be able to afford £50-£100 per month to send to you on a payment plan.

Would that sort of payment be something that you could successfully negotiate with her creditors??

Hope you can advise,

Paul

Hi Paul, thanks for getting in touch.

Not sure where you read that we advise offering 3% to the creditors? This is certainly isn't true. No two situations are ever the same with our clients so it would be impossible to assume 3% of what they owe would be an affordable amount.

I couldn't say what kind of an amount your Mother would need for a DMP, as that is what will be discussed on the appointment after the counsellor has established how much she's got to offer, and how long it would take her to clear her debts with this. Furthermore a DMP is only one of many solutions we offer and is not always a suitable option for some people.

Try not to worry too much, all relevent options will be discussed when we speak to her.

Matthew.

howard1945

Matthew, I am in such a mess with my financial affairs but still struggling to come to terms with phoning CCCS and getting help. I am 63 and have always battled my way through and this feels like such an admission of failure. I did try to phone CCCS last week but their lines were so busy I couldn't get through and haven't worked up the courage to try again. I just feel like giving up but I can't and won't. I need to find a way of hanging on to the house for my wife's sake. We have been here 20 odd years. I am sorry, this all sounds so pathetic.

Is there another way to get in touch with someone at CCCS.

filbertchick

Hi,

I hope you can give me some advice. I have a loan with Northern Rock, but I've been unable to make the full payments since November as I have been in and out of work. I have been able to make small payments to them, perhaps £30/£50 a time. However, I have not made a payment for March. I last made a payment in February and they were supposed to be sending me a form where I could write down all my expenditure so that I could make reduced monthly payments until I was more financially stable.(I haven't received this) However, last week I received a letter from a Debt Collection Agency telling me that they they want full payment of £7900 by 2nd April!! What should I do? I was under the impression that NR were aware of my current situation. I have no letters from them to say that my debt was being passed on etc. I am sick with worry!

Also, I think I would like to set up a DMP with yourselves, I have other debts (some I have arranged lower payments with),but I just wanted to know where I stand on this matter before continuing.

Also, I am unsure of what I need to fill on the CCCS Debt Remedy calculator. I am currently claiming Job Seeker's Allowance and back living with my parents, but usually I rent a room from a friend. Should I fill this in as if I were still living with a friend? (I will be back living with them as soon as I have a job).

Really hope you can give me some adivce.

CCCS_Amanda

ladyday wrote: »

I have just received the first lot of paperwork from CCCS after completing the Debt Remedy on your website. I will be sending it off to you tomorrow so hopefully you'll receive it on Monday 30th March - does this give you enough time to process everything for me if I put that "my DMP is to begin in May" on the Notification of Debt Management Plan letters I send out to my creditors ?

Also, do the creditor statements and benefit letters I send to you need to be the originals or copies, and do I receive them back ?

Thanks for your help.

Hi ladyday,

As long as you include all of the required paperwork then there should be no problem setting your DMP up to start in May.

When you send us your paperwork we do not require original creditor statements, pay slips, etc. If you send copies through to us that will be fine.

Regards,
Amanda

Mikey3001

Hi Sarah,

I'm after some advice as I've found myself in a desperate situation. I have 6 outstanding payday loans totalling £1200 that were due to be repaid today. This was fine as my annual bonus was due and easily covered these along with my usual wages. I got paid yesterday but my bank account got hacked into and before I even knew, all my money was stolen out of my account. I've been left with nothing. The bank could'nt give me an overdraft or a loan because of my poor credit rating and they have advised that they will investigate but this can take some time and I may not get any money back at all. My boss can't advance me anything and I have no friends or family that I can call on to help. I wrote to these payday companies last night explaining the situation and offering a repayment plan but I'm at work today and have had constant e-mails and calls from them asking where their money is. I'm so worried, I don't have any money for rent or food and even the local credit union can't help. I'm scared I'm gonna have debt collectors on the door and I don't even have anything of value for them to take. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!!!!

CCCS_Amanda

JWM wrote: »

Hi, I have a complicated situation. Is it possible to go on a DMP but not include one CC debt? The card won't be used I'll just pay off the min, but for various reasons I want to exclude this one card. Can I do that?

If not, what happens if I just don't tell CCCS about it? Do you credit search to find all of someone's debt?

Would like to add that I'm not trying to pull a fast one, just have a non-standard situation.

Thanks

Hi JWM,

Normally we do require that you include all of the debts that you have on a DMP. However, there are always exceptions if, for instance, including the debt will affect your employment etc.

When you have your appointment with the debt counsellor you are always best to be honest, this will ensure that you receive accurate advice. If you want to keep a specific debt separate and we can not put you on a DMP, you would be advised on pro rata payments.

Regards,
Amanda

CCCS_Sarah

tamara1 wrote: »

Hi, At the moment I have £7,500 loan with Natwest. In total I supposed to pay out more then £10,000 (loan & interest). However I can see that quite a few banks and even Natwest offer loans with much less interest. How could I swith my loan and pay less interest? I have avarage credit score. Thank you

Hi Tamara,

Thanks for posting. With us being a debt advice charity, we do not really give a lot of detailed advice about obtaining credit. Obviously it is important to make sure that any new loan you take out is affordable, which you can calculate by planning out an income and expenditure budget.

It is also worthwhile obtaining a settlement figure for your current loan to see how much you have outstanding, while some interest is usually refunded for clearing a loan early you may still owe more than you originally borrowed.

If a new loan is a cheaper option then you would need to research the best loans available, there is loads of good advice on this sort of thing in the main Moneysavingexpert website, under the Cards/Loans tab.

If you are struggling with the payments on your current loan I would advise getting impartial debt advice before committing to any new finance arrangements.

Hope this helps.

Sarah

CCCS_Sarah

Starburst wrote: »

Hi Sarah

Id like to ask you a few questions. By looking at the link for debt help on here, im not actually in a 'debt crisis' in the respect that i havent missed any payments. However i have been borrowing money off my parents to pay some of the minimum payments so without their help i would be in a 'debt crisis'.

So ive got loads of Credit cards, a mortgage, and a loan which finishes next january (£225.00 pcm better off them) i havent defaulted on any and i wont because my income is steadily rising, so by end of june i will have enough income to comfortably pay my outgoings.....
EXCEPT for the problem overdraft... Halifax gave me an overdraft of £3500, then a £3.75 DD took it over and i got charged, told then i couldnt pay it, anyway to cut a long story short they have put £500 charges on the account, i rang them to arrange to pay it back but told them i needed to access most of my wages otherwise my dds would bounce and id have to pay more charges, they agreed if i paid in £510 by 15th march, thats passed and i havent been able to pay it in, simply havent got it and my parents couldnt lend me it because theyre going on holiday and just paid for it.
Phoned again to make another plan and they told me that there was a letter in the post and id have to make arrangements to pay the whole £4000 back at at least £400 per calendar month, well i cant afford that, what can i do?

Will cccs be able to negotiate a more realistic arrangement for me? jsut on the overdraft, or am i forced into a IVA, bankruptcy or a DMP, which i dont want as i think theyll be on my credit file and i want to apply for another mortgage over the next few years.

I should add that ive stopped my wages going into that account and opened a new account, so that i can pay my dd's, and avoid more charges.

Any advice is greatly appreciated.

Hi,

I think £400 per month would be much more than most people could afford to pay back an overdraft debt, particularly when you have other commitments to cover.

From the information you have provided above it seems like you might benefit from planning out an income and expenditure budget, to work out how much you can afford to offer Halifax after covering your living costs and other debts.

Unfortunately we are not able to negotiate payments for individual debts on behalf of people; this would be something you would need to do directly with the Halifax. The only circumstance where we contact our client’s creditors to offer lower payments would be if you were on a Debt Management Plan, which would need to include all of your debts, to ensure they all receive a fair amount of your available money.

If you contact us I can promise you that we will not “force” you into any kind of arrangement you are not comfortable with. We are a charity and our advice is completely impartial, and obviously you can choose to ignore our advice if you are not happy with any suggestions we make.

Without knowing your full details it is difficult to give specific advice, but our online tool called Debt Remedy can give you advice tailored to your situation as well as help produce an income and expenditure budget. Click here to go directly to Debt Remedy.

Hope this helps.

Sarah

Starburst

Thanks Sarah, I think i need to see somebody, i'll phone the helpline now and see when I can get an appointment. Thanks again x

CCCS_Sarah

icecube2009 wrote: »

I have just set up a DMP with CCCS (on line) but am not sure of the next step, it sent me a copy of the debt Remedy by email & said I would hear something in the post. I have read on this thread that I am suppose to stop payments (my first one on this month being due in a few days) & send just £1 token payments to the creditors, and assumed CCCS would give me some sort of template letter to send out with the token payments, but not sure about this, can someone advise me plaese, or does someone have a copy of a letter I can send out please, Thanks

Hello Icecube,

If Debt Remedy recommended a DMP and you clicked this as your option then your advice booklet should contain a template letter with the heading “Notification of Debt Management Plan”. You can use this outline to write to your creditors to let them know what you are doing, and at the same time send them a token payment.

The Debt Remedy advice booklet should contain details of what your next steps are, but if you are not certain please get in touch.

Regards

Sarah