DMP Mutual Support Thread (Part 5)

MummyOnAMission_2

Morning all! Not sure what Im trying to ask here but if I get it all off my chest then Im sure the question will pop out, here goes.

Ive been on my DMP wth CCCS since Nov so made two payments and slowly creditors are accepting and we have been lucky enough to have no phone calls or threatening letters yet. Anyway just b 4 starting my DMP i had gas and electric with British gas paying monthly 49 and 40. But I was always in credit and I rang for refund but wouldnt let me have one. So was getting rather annoyed that always in credit but cudnt have this refund or lower payments so i told them to cancel it and I would start paying quartly by cash. So did this but then end of dec got my two huge bills thru even though sum credit taken off and cos it was pre my sensible dmp days no money had been saved for it. So was gunna delay payment few weeks then pay but then decided no i really did need to pay monthly and these bills we were going to struggle to pay even in few weeks. So i rang back feeling rather silly to say cud we pay monthly again but include dec bills as struggling. So did but now payments are 72 and 64 :eek: on phone I just went oh ok cos darent ask if cud b bit lower cos didnt think they would let me. But now its bothering me cos its sooo high. i know in 4 or 5 mths it will prob go down abit each month but its a huge amount really. I dont want to alter my CCCS payments cos everything is moving nicely cos luckily we can pay a decent amount at the mo. Dont want to change everything when some creditors have only just got our proposal. I know its cos we added the bills to it but we would really struggle just after xmas to pay them. So i supose my questions is, do u think if i ring BG up they mite let me reduce it slightly? I know i cud ring them to ansa the question but feel rather silly ringing again! And cant even change provider til paid these bills anyway.

thanks in advance

candygirl

Grrrrrr I posted my budget form from CCCS to all my creditors over a month ago.MBNA have now decided to input it on an income and expenditure form, so looks like they haven't even taken any notice of it till now and have got RMA to ring me about 50 times a day since.I'm still getting charges and late fees from all 3 creditors even though I have paid them all on time albeit a £1 :mad: :mad: :mad:

Toffee_Penny

Really feel the need to throw a wobbler tonight :rolleyes:

I called CCCS tonight and I told advisor I wasn't happy Halifax credit card had begun charging reduced rate of interest as we would be only paying off a fiver a month from £40!! I asked if they could remove Halifax from the list so I could pay £1 or nothing until they pass on to a DCA, ccj or stop interest altogether and she said 'NO' you would have to all your creditors on yourself, there is not much you can do' 'have you thought about bankruptcy'?

!!!!!!!! If we wanted to go bankrupt we wouldn't have bothered paying you lot for the past 7 months would we? :mad: (obviously I didn't say this BUT come on???)

We are in the process of waiting to hear back from a few of our creditors regarding ppi, if its a success we are looking at refunds of over £15,000+ I reckon so bankruptcy is not an option and a refund to the debt would bring our total debt down to a ''not so shameful amount''.

All she said was she could write to Halifax on our behalf and try to get them to stop the interest, usually they only stop it for a temporary measure but we will never be able to pay them at the full rate again due to OH job situation.

So what do I do? OH said to keep with CCCS for the time being as he can't be arsed with the hassle of it all and I don't mean to slate CCCS but I really wanted them to offer real honest advice on what to do for the best. I wanted her to say 'look if you are not that bothered about ccj's then do it yourself they will pass it on quicker to the DCA' but she didn't just kept saying 'what about bankruptcy?' like it was the only thing left for us to do.

I owe £10k, I work and so does OH so how the hell can we go bankrupt? The creditors would still require us to pay something each month for 1 or 3 years (can't remember which) so whats the point of having to sell my car, my laptop, having your name in the paper for what???? What would we gain? We'd still be paying!!! :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: I don't want a quick way out, I want the bloody creditors to stop being greedy!!! :mad: :mad:


So I have decided I will write to Halifax to explain if they continue to charge reduce rate of interest then I will have to reconsider the offer of payment as the debt will increase and will never get paid.

We have our review in March, if they still charge interest next month then I'm taking it all on myself. I can't be arsed with this !!!! seriously, it's our bloody money and I'm not wasting OUR time wasting OUR money waiting for creditors to decide to pass it over or sell it on when its maximum debt. We started off with a debt to Halifax for about £6600 it is now £7300, its disgraceful and shouldn't be allowed when you are struggling to pay what you owe already.

CCCS said there is nothing you can do, you wanna bet? They will get sod all if they keep adding interest and we'll just offer a fair payment when it goes for a ccj or gets passed on.

I am so annoyed!! :mad: I wish I could swear!! :mad:

callywally

Hello,
Just wondeed if any one has any advice please.
Started a dmp with cccs in nov, all was going ok til my car had to have urgent and unexpected repair just before christmas, also had to tax car and with extra expence of christmas etc i now have almost nothing til end of the month. Have reduced my payment to cccs this month but as i need car to get to work, need money for petrol and food etc and have no one able to lend me money til end of month really dont know what to do.
The dmp was going ok til this happened and hope to get back on track next month just wondered if any one has any advice on how to survive til end of jan?
I have put a few things on ebay but not likely to bring in much and have very little food left in cupboards as have been useing every thing up over last couple of weeks, also need to get to work so need petrol money cant get there by public transport and no on able to give lifts. Any advice would be welcome thanks

newlywed

Cally - is your employer approachable? Can you ask for a "sub", or to borrow a bit until payday and explain about car tax, etc and running short?

Pop over to the old style board and look for the "Storecupboard challenge". Then post up whatever random things you do have in your stores and they will help you to come up with ideas to stretch it as much as possible

Toffee, I can understand the frustration, but I think CCCS' point is that they want to treat ALL your creditors the same. In the case of bankruptcy you would stop paying them ALL, not just hellifax.

I was reading some new guidelines for credit cards and not raising interest if people are in debt and not using the card and trying to pay off, CCCS are quoted on there saying it's not quite enough and that they should be forced to stop all interest and charges if someone is in a DMP - so unfortunately it can't quite be forced yet

First Direct are still charging me a low rate of interest, have all along, thankfully though it's only about a quarter of my payment to them so the debt is going down. As I pay other debts off, the payments to them (and the others) will increase and so eventually the interest will reduce.

Plus as the base rate has reduced, so has my interest charges as they are charging 1% above base rate or something like that

debt_daisy

Hi All,

Haven't had a chance to post for a while as have been ill with a virus which they have now found out is an infection due to blood tests so am on antibiotics and trying to rest up.

I've sort of put the money worries on the back burner due to this. I just feel i don't want the stress of this whilst trying to recover. I think everything is ticking along nicely though. Made my first payment in January. I do keep getting arreas letters from a few creditors and the ones that have bypassed the arreas letters have sent defaults but have been assured that this is standard practice. So far I believe that only one of my creditors has sold my debt- Sainsburys, to Eversheds. This company when I had to phone them once on xmas eve (yep great time for their paperwork to arrive!) were extremly rude! I know my payment would have gone to them but they keep phoning my mum's house (where i used to live). All creditors were written to and given my new address and contact numbers and this would have included Sainsbury's who I presume gave Eversheds my details. They sent paperwork here but they keep ringing my mum's house and it's not fair on her. How do I get them to stop this? I don't really want to phone them again directly as they are so agressive but is this the only way? I could write to them and request that they don't as I do not live there and maybe say it is bordering on harassment the amount of times they have called my mum and that I will report this if it does not stop- they have the right to try and scare us/be rude all the time so maybe i could have a little go too ROTFL!! Any advice would be grately appreciated. Also some people often say they would prefer the debt to be sold on to a collection agency- why is this?

I haven't really had any statements as such from creditors so not sure if the debt is going down or accumulating more with interest and charges? A few I can guess. Does CCCS update your amounts online each month so you can see what you've paid or what's left or do most of you just keep a note of this yourself?

Also what is the benefit of requesting CCA's from your creditors- i often see people talking about them but never really understood them that well? Are they something that you try and request before claiming charges etc?

I hope that the rest of you are all having a healthy new year so far.

x DD

newlywed

debt_daisy wrote: »

They sent paperwork here but they keep ringing my mum's house and it's not fair on her. How do I get them to stop this? I don't really want to phone them again directly as they are so agressive but is this the only way? I could write to them and request that they don't as I do not live there

I think that is the best way forward. Just tell them you no longer live there and to stop phoning and ask them to contact you via letter only (worth a try).

debt_daisy wrote: »

Also some people often say they would prefer the debt to be sold on to a collection agency- why is this?

Because in some cases a DCA is easier to deal with and usually it means all interest and charges stop

debt_daisy wrote: »

I haven't really had any statements as such from creditors so not sure if the debt is going down or accumulating more with interest and charges? A few I can guess.

I keep a spreadsheet with the figures on as I think they are. Every 6 months or so I do a £2 credit report (paper version) request. Then when that comes in I check the date the credit report was last updated for each debt and then check the balances there against what I thought it was that month Or, if they are nice creditors, you could ring them and ask the balance.

If you have had a default notice then the interest should now stop for that debt.

debt_daisy wrote: »

Does CCCS update your amounts online each month so you can see what you've paid or what's left or do most of you just keep a note of this yourself?

CCCS update the figures online but they are only calculating from the figures you give them. Eg they take your starting balance you told them and then simply remove the payments they have sent each month - so if interest and charges are added it will go adrift.

You can also update the debt figures yourself on CCCS website to amend if there has been interest etc added and CCCS will continue to auto calculate each time your payments go out (but you will have to carry on adjusting if interest is still being added).

debt_daisy wrote: »

Also what is the benefit of requesting CCA's from your creditors- i often see people talking about them but never really understood them that well? Are they something that you try and request before claiming charges etc?

If they cannot supply the CCA within a certain time then you can report them and apparently if they try to take you to court for recovery of the debt then you can argue that it is unenforceable as they have no CCA - they are obliged to supply this by law.

I didn't go down this route as I feel I have had the money and should pay it back - signed agreement or not. However if any cause me problems then I will consider trying this.

Rumpleteazer_2

New Year and new start!! Posted paperwork off to CCCS for DMP yesterday. Hopefully this will get things back under control again and we can feel safe to answer the phone again - we have credit card companies phoning daily at the moment. We have made token payments and explained that we do not have any money to pay any more, but they still keep phoning :mad: .

newlywed

Rumpleteazer wrote: »

New Year and new start!! Posted paperwork off to CCCS for DMP yesterday. Hopefully this will get things back under control again and we can feel safe to answer the phone again - we have credit card companies phoning daily at the moment. We have made token payments and explained that we do not have any money to pay any more, but they still keep phoning :mad: .

Tell them you are contacting CCCS to start a DMP - most of the creditors I spoke to said they would put a hold on phone calls for something like 30 days to give CCCS time to write to them Seems like it doesn't work for all creditors though :rolleyes:

debrag

what happens if I loose my job? if it ended up on benefits then I'd have very little left to pay my creditors