Ask a CCCS counsellor a question

JJBH

I recently rang CCCS and went through my whole debt situation 19'000 pounds only to be told that I spend far too much on my animals - 3 cats and 1 dog.
I asked what could I do about this as I feel them cheap food from Aldi and the lady basically told me that I needed to reduce my animal situation as it wasnt essential spending.
I felt very upset about this as she was basically telling me I need to reduce the amount of animals I have seeing as I buy the cheapest foods.
I was also advised about my petrol bill (I spend 200 pounds month) to get to work and drive around for work, the lady said I need to get a job closer to home.
I am unable to get a job closer to home as I have quite a specialist type of job and in this current economic climate is not sensible advice which I know as my job involves finding people work and I am very busy with alot of people being made redundant???!!!
I felt like the lady was in a hurry to get me off the phone and with the attitude of 'oh another person in debt to deal with'
I am doing a great deal to try to get myself out of debt including not putting my central heating on at all or using hotwater to reduce my gas bill, sitting with one energy saving light on at night, selling on eBay like crazy, making and selling jewellery, contacting credit cards to try to get payments reduced, aplying for a payment holiday from my mortgage to try to pay my debt off easier etc.
Please help ..........

cloudnine_2

lee81 wrote: »

Me and my partner have approx 30k unsecured debt and currently unable to make minimum monthly payments. Have spoken with CCCS they have advised the best option is DMP however I have heard bad things about these. )

Hi. I'm interested to know what bad things about DMPs please?

Thanks

CCCS_Matthew

debtman2007 wrote: »

Hi, wondered if someone from teh CCCS could a look at this for me and advise.

Received this letter today for one of my Citi accounts now held by 1st credit. Incidently this came direct from Citi in Derby.

Anyone care to take a look and tell me exactly where this leaves me. To be honest it doesn't make a great of sense to me. Also there is certainly no signed document anywhere.

---

Thank you for your recent request for information. We regret to inform you that section 78 CCA 1974 does not require CitiFinancial to provide you with a copy if the executed agreement as you appear to belive. It requires CitiFinancial to provide you with a "copy of the executed agreement" as defined by the Cusomer Credit (Cancellation Notices and Copies of Documents) Regulations 1983. the olbligation to provide you that document is fulfilled by the provision of teh terms and conditions, which are supplied on customers upon reissue or issue of their card, being printed on teh card carrier.
we enclose a copy of the terms and conditions for your account. this is an industry standard document and conforms to the Regulations. We set out below a summary of teh same for your information.

180 Power to prescribe form etc of copies.
(1) Regulations may be made as to the form and content of documents to be issued as copies of any executed agreement, security instrument or other document referred to in the Act, and may in particualr -
(a) require specified information to be included in teh prescribed manner in any copy , and contain requirements to ensure that such information is clearly brought to the attention of a reader of teh copy;
(b) authorise teh omission from a copy of certain material contained in teh original, or the inclusion of such material in condensed form.

The Consumer Credit (Cancellation Notices and Copies of Documents) Regulations 1983 make it clear at Reg 3 that the "copy executed agreement" is not required to be an exact replica of teh original agreement per se but an extract since it is allowed to omit certain information including any signature box, signature, or date of signature

yours Sincerely

Data Request Team

---

Then follows 15 pages of terms and conditions.

Any advice please?

Hi there.

Can I ask what type of debt it was originally? The letter you have had in response does seem to be a little confusing, and it appears that Citi are suggesting the debt is not covered by the CCA 1974 which is why I asked. Are you in dispute with this debt?

Regards,
Matthew

CCCS_Matthew

dont_want_to_be_in_debt wrote: »

We owe debt to credit cards, no personal loans or store cards. We owe in total 65k. Having filled in the questionaire on the cccs website, we have a question about the income section. On average o/h earns £2409 per month with child benifit and tax credit of £166 on top. The problem is because he is commission based. His income this year varied from £1849 at the lowest to £4090 at the highest. How can be deal with this difference on a debt plan?

Hi there.

There are a couple of ways this can be dealt with. If the comission is guaranteed, then we would suggest to total up his earnings over the last 12 months and divide it by 12 to use that average. On the months where he earns more than average, he would need to put it aside to cover the months when he earns less than average.

If the comission is not guranteed, then it might be better to budget his income based on the minimum he will recieve each month, and then every few months perhaps make a lump sum payment into the DMP with any extra comission he's earned to knock a big chunk of the debt off.

Regards,
Matthew

CCCS_Matthew

rufus_t wrote: »

Hi,

I've got a good friend who has debts of around £80k - all unsecured loans and credit cards (he doesn't own his home or have any other assets).

He's been battling hard to pay them for the last couple of years and now it looks like he's going to lose his job and he's struggling to cope. He's so fed up that he wants to throw in the towel and 'run away'. His girlfriend is from Spain and the only way out he can see is to leave it all behind, not tell anyone, and go and live with his girlfriend's parents.

I've told him that if he does it, he should do things properly and go bankrupt - or at least speak to experts first. He is that down with it all though and says, why should he add the embarrassment and the drawn out process of going to court to everything else he's gone through when he can just leave it all behind.

I'm not an expert, but I think if he does it this way he will have problems further down the line and I'd like someone who is an expert to give me the facts about what problems it will cause if he does it this way, so that I can try and talk him out of it. Also how long will it take him to get back on track if he does go bankrupt.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

Hi Rufus.

If you're friend ignores the issue and runs away from the debts, he will certainly have to deal with the issue again if he ever needs to return to the UK. Furthermore, there seems to be an increase of international creditors passing chasing people abroad for UK debts. Obviously they can only do this if they know where he is, but the risk is always going to be there.

Without knowing more about his situation I couldn't say if bankruptcy would be the best thing for him. If it was, then he would only be bankrupt for 12 months. In that time he wouldn't be able to get further credit, but it shouldn't effect him living in Spain if this is something he still wanted to do.

My advice would be that he needs to do something to get things sorted. The next step for him would be to perhaps ring for an appoinment with one of our debt counsellors to discuss his options and help point him in the right direction. If he wants an appointment, our helpline can be contacted on 0800 138 1111.

Hope this helps.
Matthew

CCCS_Matthew

chunkey101 wrote: »

Hi

I have recently filled in the debt remedy tool on CCCS's website and I think I have been accepted on a DMP, as I have received my welcome pack including info on paying token payments etc. I have started to send off £10 postal orders to my creditors in the order they would normally receive payment via cheque or direct debit. Yesterday I cancelled a direct debit to one of my creditors using my online banking account with the Nat West ( I have a new bank account setup for when our (joint) DMP starts. The Nat West have today paid the DD which has taken me about £250 over my agreed overdraught limit. I have a number of questions I would like to ask about this :-

1. Should I try to scrape together the £250 to take me back to the agreed overdraught limit ?

2. I have a personal loan and an overdraught (both listed on my DMP) with the Nat West. Do I have to make two seperate token payments and will it be ok to send the payment(s) to my local branch ?

3. The Nat West branch are trying to contact me already but I haven't sent them any token payments with the details of my DMP. Should I contact the branch and advise them of my forthcoming DMP or just send the token payments with the covering CCCS letter ?

Thanks in advance

Chunkey

Hi Chunkey,

1) You don't need to worry about trying to get within your overdraft limit if the debt is being included in the DMP.

2) If it's just a gesture payment for the month prior to the DMP being set up, you can certainly make the payment in branch. I would advise spitting the amount in two and making two seperate payments to the overdraft and loan.

3) It's up to you how you want to make the payment, either include it within the notification of a debt management plan letter, or just pay it in branch. Either way, they will have on system that you've made some sort of a payment.

Hope this helps.
Matthew

CCCS_Matthew

gwazi999 wrote: »

Hi. Not sure I am in the right place but wondered if you could help with a problem I have. About 18 years ago my mum took out a Barclaycard. Then about seven years ago she stopped using it just paying the minimum amount every month. The debt when she stopped using it was about £9000. Three years ago my dad died and her pension dropped dramatically as lost his pension and war pension etc. (She is now 89 years old by the way). We contacted Barclaycrd and they put her on a payment plan of £62 per month which she has paid without fail and on time. Her debt is now £4000 odd. She is deaf and had a stroke and is housebound. I rang Barclaycard to request a new payment book and they were unhelpful not speaking to me even with her sayso. Because she is deaf and the telephone conversations were mainly of the "I'm sorry I can't hear you type and please speak to y daughter" they actuall hung up on her. These calls were to India we couldn't find a number anywhere for the UK.
She is worried and I'm just getting more fed up trying to solve this problem. She has no savings and doesn't own any assets but being of the old school doesn't want to owe anybody when se goes as she puts it.
I had been thinking of requesting the original cca thing and would they deal with me anyway. The call centre at India just says tell her to go to a local Barclays and tell them. When I said she is 89 housebound with a stroke they said I should go with her!!! Not really aproblem solved there then.
Any suggestions will be gratefully received.

Hi there. Sorry to hear about your Mother's situation. If it's just a case of trying to get a payment book, your best bet is to try and officially allow Barclaycard to deal with you as well as your Mother to save her the stress of trying to speak to them which is obviously a difficulty. To do this, you will need to write a letter of authority and sent it recorded delivery to Barclaycard. In the letter you need to get your Mother to write (or you can write on her behalf) that's she's happy for you to deal with her behalf with Barclaycard. Make sure she signs the letter, then send it to them which should then give you the ability to speak to them without them worrying that they are breaking the Data Protection Act. Once you've done that you can get them to send your Mother a payment book to her address.

Hope this helps,
Matthew.

CCCS_Matthew

scoobydebt wrote: »

Please can you help. We are upto date with all the payments on our loans and credit cards (just) but my hubby's wage has dropped by half with him working in the construction industry and therefore we are short every month and only just getting by by using credit to live on. . .
We have a four month old baby and I am having to go back to work full time in five weeks but even going back to my normal wages we are still going to be short!!!
We owe £16000 in unsecured loans, £8000 in overdrafts and £42000 in credit cards!!! All the cards except one have put the interest rate up to well over 20% mainly being 24.9 and above and we cannot get any 0% cards due to the mount of credit we have. I have had a personal message about the credit card agreements could not be enforcable but am wary that this is not true??? Also is it a good idea to ask for copies of the credit agreements when we are paying ok?
I have done your debt remedy and it suggests a low start dmp or an iva but would like to avoid this really.
Thanks

Hi Scooby.

I would only suggest sending off for the CCA's if you are disputing the debt. I'm not sure who sent you a PM about debts being written off, but it's most likely to be someone trying to make money out of you by telling you something that isn't strictly true.

As far as your situation is concerned, there isn't a lot I can suggest. If Debt Remedy has suggested a low start DMP or an IVA then your not in the position to service the debts you currently have with minimum payments. The only way you can would be to increase your income or reduce your expenditure, and without seeing your budget I don't know whether that would be something realsitic or not.

Regards,
Matthew

CCCS_Matthew

hearthfire wrote: »

Hi there,
I already have a DMP with CCCS but have been paying into it for a year now and am getting nowhere fast. I have never missed a payment and have a reasonably high payment of £736 per month.
Most of my creditors are still charging me interest and HSBC with whom I have the biggest debt have still not accepted my offer of payment and are increasing my debt by £25 per month.
At the current rate it will take me over 100 years to repay my credit card.
I have written letters and CCCS tell me thay have too but nothing is happening, what do I do now?

Hi there.

If your DMP is going to take 100 years to run, you definitely need to ring up for a review to discuss other options as that is not a realistic timescale to repay debts. Did your original counsellor suggest any other options on the intitial call?

Either way, please ring us for a review so we can look at alternatives to get your debts cleared sooner.

Regards,
Matthew.

CCCS_Matthew

hectorcarol wrote: »

PLEASE help me some-one.....
Is there a way out of this ???
I am really frightened now

Hi there, sorry to not get back to you quicker. We're not ignoring you it's just that we're trying to answer each post in turn and there have been a lot of requests over the last couple of days!

You say you've gone through Debt Remedy and it says that you need to call us, have you managed to do this yet? Please try not to worry, there is always a solution to every debt problem. If your in the situation where you have £35 to live on for a week because you are paying debts off you need to start putting yourself first. The sooner you ring us, the sooner we can discuss your situation so we can advise you on the best way to move forward.

Our lines are open 08:00-20:00, and the free helpline on 0800 138 1111. In the mean time, you might want to start a thread of your own to discuss things with the other regulars on here, as this thread is just for specific debt related questions.

Regards,
Matthew