Just looking for a little assistance

gtturbo

Hi there everybody,

Been lurking on these boards for the last few days seems to be some knowledgeable people on here. If anyone has any input it would be much appreciated. Whats happened is when I split up with my ex 3 years ago (i'm 26) i didnt really have any debts only 600 which i borrowed to buy a car and was comfortable paying it off. Then I started going out a lot more living beyond my means (i did have a half decent job at the time). As is nearly allways the case the cards started creeping up & up. Before long I was just managing to make the minimum payments each month and not getting any headway. I have 3 cards. Then guess what in the space of a month I lost my job and me & my new pregnant partner got an eviction notice (we were renting up north). After that we didnt have much choice but to move back to the midlands were i'm from and seek homeless accomodation. Any way during this period we were in a temporary house and i managed to find some work. The first thing i did when i got paid was phone the credit card companies and arrange a reduced payment plan. 20 a month on each. The lions share of my debt is on a nationwide visa and I also stupidly got paid into my nationwide flexaccount. Went to use the machine card refused went into branch and after some harsh words i spoke to collections. after first speaking to a half human half pitbull I spoke to the supervisor who I explained to that I couldnt live if they just kept my wages ( we had a 3 week old baby at the time & no benefits) so i agreed 40 a month which was fair enough.
The work dried up 6 weeks later so i couldnt afford even the reduced payments it took them 12 weeks to sort our benfits out by which time we were obviously pretty desperate. anyway skip to 6 months later we now have our council house we have some luxuries but they are all in partners name as she had a windfall (hdtv etc). I have not informed my creditors of my new adress until i decide what to do, but still pick post up from my old address and the letters just stopped (I dont think no news is good news in this case). I am not a dosser who doesnt want to work but the market is very bleak at the moment. I have a car which is worth a few hundread on a good day. I am just so sick of being paranoid every time the phone rings. We enter the house via a rear entrance now and I am constantly on the look out for baliffs. I just want to wipe the slate clean, since i cut my cards up a year ago I havent had any credit for anything I dont want it! I dont really talk to my partner about all this because i dont want to worry her. It is definatley effecting my mental heatlth i used to be such a happy outgoing person now im a paranoid freak half the time.
A quick round up of my debts are
nationwide 4800
mbna 2300
virgin 1200
What i had in my head was going bankrupt as i do have a bit of cash i can use for that. While reading on here last night i fell upon the dro stuff and i think that could just be the answer for me, it just the waiting till april. I made every effort to pay my debt but on the reduced payment which is all i can realistically afford and thats when i am working id be looking at 12 years. Sorry for the essay but what thoughts does anyone else have?

robsimps53

hi there, first of all you should complete the debt remedy found on www.cccs.co.uk at the end of doing this it will give the options available to you. Although i think that bankrupcy may not be one of them as your debts are not realy that much. im in the same situation as your self and im also considering bankrupcy, i have debts of over 23k and also a mortgage.

I realy think that you should speak to the cccs or your local CAB and they will be able to point you in the right direction

gtturbo

hi there thanks for your responce i will try that. Although I have heard of people on here going bankrupt for 5k, also the new Debt Relief Order coming out in april is for debts up to 15k if i can hold out that long. Good to hear someone is in the same boat guess im not going nuts after all.

philnicandamy

If the debt was 5million or 5p if you cant pay you cant pay.....you need to get some advice gt ASAP from one of the free debt helplines, they will explain all you need to know about the implications of bankruptcy....its not the easy way out some people think