DMP Mutual Support Thread (Part 6)

ianmak

Two more newbies, welcome!

whichwaynow 341
Gpuk 342

Hope everyone has had a pleasant weekend, I've had a great one, but starting to feel tired now...

2009timeforchange

Hello everyone,

It has been a while since i have been on here but I really think i need to start posting more regularly to keep a grip on things.

We have been on the DMP since March.

Abbey, Tesco, MBNA all have acccepted the lower payments and frozen interest.

But

Nationwide - gosh they are a funny bunch arnt they!!

We have an verdraft with them who have accepted the lower payment and frozen interest. We also have a personal loan with them which has been passed to their in house collections and heard very little from them so not sure if they have accepted but they are takin the lower payments and touch wood nt giving us hassle.

But Nationwide Credit card - they just dont give up! We have had a CCJ from them which I will proably do a seperate post about later.

The budget is working well most months. we have recently had a review and increased our payments by £45 a month which knocks off a few years from the DFD.

I am also looking to increase my hours at work from October which hopefully will add a few more £'s to give to CCCS.

Im trying to remain positive. It is lovely not having to work out each month who to pay at what time and passing money from Peter to pay Paul etc etc.

pinkpower

I've just sat down and gone through the paperwork for the last month - surprisingly little apart from Egg about my loan account with them. Have sent a secure e-mail to advise (again) about CCCS helping me etc - we will see if it does any good. Have also written short letters for M&S and Barclaycard reminding them that I have asked for help. Apart from Next though, no-one has accepted the DMP, but then again no-one has rejected it either!.

I have worked out how much I'll have left to last the month at least I'm dealing with it!

Talking about age when this is finished, my DFD is 4 years 6 months. I will try to get it under 4 years so that I will debt free before my 50th year ends.

serenity34_2

pinkpower wrote: »

I've just sat down and gone through the paperwork for the last month - surprisingly little apart from Egg about my loan account with them. Have sent a secure e-mail to advise (again) about CCCS helping me etc - we will see if it does any good. Have also written short letters for M&S and Barclaycard reminding them that I have asked for help. Apart from Next though, no-one has accepted the DMP, but then again no-one has rejected it either!.

I have worked out how much I'll have left to last the month at least I'm dealing with it!

Talking about age when this is finished, my DFD is 4 years 6 months. I will try to get it under 4 years so that I will debt free before my 50th year ends.

Just a quick note about Egg still contating you directly while you're in a DMP - you may or may not be aware but under the OFT Debt Collection Guidance ( you can find a copy on the OFT website; I'm afraid I can't post links yet! ) they cannot refuse to deal with your appointed agents. In your case this would be whichever company is running your DMP.

I would send a complaint letter stating this. If they continue to contact you ( remember to send your letter recorded delivry and keep a copy ) then you can complain to your local Trading Standatds, the FOS ( Financial Ombudsman Service ) and the OFT themselves ( although the OFT won't look at individual complaints; they look for patterns of complaints against particular companies )

pinkpower

Thanks for that advice serenity. My DMP only starts on 1st September, so I'm inclined to give them the benefit of the doubt tfor this time. If it continues, I will do as you suggest though.

pinkpower

I have had a fast response from Egg asking them to phone them so that my query can be resolved promptly. As my purpose in e-mailing them was to demonstrate that I wasn't ignoring them, and letting them know something was happening, I don't intend phoning - unless someone on here thinks that's a bad idea.

yellowpinky

GPuk, LondonFraggle Whichwaynow and others, so pleased you've got to the next stage this week.

LF, I'm like you, once the initial relief after the Payplan phone int has worn off (I was fully expecting them to say "Well, we've looked at your circumstances/budget/options and found there's nothing we can do for you, kthanksbye!", and of course, they didn't) there's all the "what if's" about what will happen next, but I'm just going to take it a step at a time.

Gpuk wrote: »

So now I have to make the token payments (she suggested £5-£10 per card).....any idea how best to do this??I was going to do the whole letter/postal order/recorded delivery thing????
Do I need to send all my creditors DMP letters or will Payplan inform them for me?


Payplan said I will recieve some papers in the post next week - any idea what these are??

GPUK, glad you're on the right road and so quickly! I was a real baby and dithered for ages before finally telling NDL I wanted to try a DMP.

NDL supplied this letter template with their DMP application pack, for sending with a token payment -

Dear Sir/Madam,

Re:- Account/Reference Number xxxxxxxxxxxxx

I am writing to inform you that I am in the process of setting up a free debt management plan with the assistance of National Debtline/CCCS/Payplan.
I have been informed that it may take several weeks for the plan to be set up so I would like to request that you freeze interest and/or any other charges accruing on the above account.
In the meantime, please find enclosed a token payment of £x to be credited to this account as a token of good will.

Thank you for your understanding in this matter, and please await further details from my debt management provider in due course.

Yours faithfully

As regards paperwork, I've had an "Authority to Act" mandate to sign, just a page to give them permission to handle my finances with my creditors, then after my actual phone interview last week they sent me another mandate to sign confirming my budget was true and correct, and also a standing order mandate to send to the bank. I'm not sure what paperwork comes next - I was given access to their Justabank website which has all the creditor and budget details you've given them and will show all your payments to PP, how much goes to each creditor, and will give you "statements", as if it's a bank account.

Hope everyone has had a good BH weekend, yay for no phone calls/letters (no phone calls from Egg for five days now!)

whichwaynow_2

Thanks for the number, have updated my signature and will add the amounts soon.

Just a quick question, I have sent off the DMP notification letter, along with token payment. I am just about to cancel Direct Debits, but how do I set them up with my new bank. Do I have to get in touch with each individual company or can I do it through the bank?

CASR25

Originally posted our problem on the general Debt Free Wannabe forums - they've suggested I ask you on this specific thread....there are lots of questions people have answered and have left my husband and I with a few questions about dmp. So, I was hoping you could answer a few specifically on DMP - we're not sure if we should go with one or go it alone and do a plan/budget/diary etc etc. I've also posted my SOA, so worried as we a re so in debt - but have had the lightbulb moment and need my mind at least half at rest before baby is born!!!

thank you so much, this was our first post...

My husband and I are hoping you people on this site will be able to help us. We are in a rather bad situation and have finally realised it and so really need to sort it. But, we need help/advice?!

We are having to put food and general living expenses on credit cards each month, all of our income is accounted for before it enters our accounts - we have a problem. It is entirely our fault - for years we've lived as though we earn 60k between us and now we nearly do we can't use it - the live for now pay for it later group I suppose.

I'm about to go on maternity leave with our second child. I'm a teacher and earn £32k my husband earns £25k (basic he does get commision but we don't rely on it and have often paid some debt off if he's earned a bit more than we need to live on!). I'm having to go back as soon as mat pay ends, after 4mths, which is so early in my opinion - but our fault I suppose!)

So this is where we're at....

We have 3 un-secured loans, with 40k remaining on them. We pay back 700 a mth and the latest one to end is in 7years. (Doesn't inc Student Loans or Odrafts)

We have 9 credit cards with 31k on them, pay back 1000 a mth. 2 are 0% but most are just the normal high rates! We've tried to get more 0% but have been declined.

I checked my credit rating this time last year and it was poor my husband's is excellent - most of the debt is in my name as I have always earned more and have been in work for longer. (we don't have any ccjs or anything like that, and no missed payments int he last year I'm certain - i think mine was low as I'd forgotten to pay a card that we'd yet to put on dd and because i've so much debt in my name)

We bought our house for 130k, paid 10% deposit - 3 years ago - have bought it back to life, it was a wreck, it was valued at 155k 2 years ago. However, I rang our mortgage people, nationwide, last week to see if we could do a mortgage break while i'm on maternity and they said the house was in neg equity, worth only 123k! They calculate this using the market situation and houses that have sold on the street recently (2 yes - both needed central heating putting in before habitable!!!) Anyway... so we're in neg equity.

What should we do???? We thought...

A 31k loan over 7years, paying back 500 a mth. That would mean after 7years we'll be debt free an we'll have 500 per mth to live on.
Ideally that would clear the cc debt.

But, where do we start to look? We had a fab ind financial advisior who got us our mortgage, do we call him? Do we go secured?????? What on earth should we do. We really don't want to go to iva or bankrupcy stage - but is that out only option now????

My husband and I hope some of you lovely people on this site could give us some pointers????

We've got ourselves into this stupid situation and need to get out, I'm panicing.

Could you help?

Thanks,

Cx

CASR25

Here is our SOA I hope it makes sense - there's alot to take in!

I need to sit down with all the bills and work out apr etc for the ones that weren't that obvious.

Household Information
Number of adults in household........... 2
Number of children in household......... 1 with 1 due in 2 weeks
Number of cars owned.................... 1 (husband has company car that inc petrol)

Monthly Income Detail
Monthly income after tax................ 1936
Partners monthly income after tax....... 1410 (does not inc his commission which can range from 50-1000 a month)
Benefits................................ 118 (this is working tax credit & child benefit – this will go up once no2 arrives)
Other income............................ 0
Total monthly income.................... 3458

Monthly Expense Details
Mortgage................................ 720
Secured/HP loan repayments.............. 0
Council tax............................. 84
Electricity..& electric........................... 167 (we were in debt, now in credit - changed provider last year)
Water rates............................. 31
Telephone (land line)................... 15 (quarterly payment to BT – need to get rid of this and go totally with sky)
Mobile phone............................ 30 (I’ve recently reduced this by changing package - husband has work phone)
TV Licence.............................. 12
Satellite/Cable TV/internet...................... 45 (need to reduce this when we add land line to package – we’ve looked into this already)
Groceries etc. ......................... 250 (we know we can do this, although we often go over with unessential things – we must reign it in, I know)
Clothing................................ 20
Petrol/diesel........................... 50
Road tax................................ 15
Car Insurance........................... 38
Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 5
Childcare/nursery....................... 250 (my mum is a childminder and gives us reduced rates - our daughter takes her place!)
Other child related expenses............ have inc these in groceries and clothing
Pet insurance/vet bills................. 7 (have just knocked this down from 12)
Buildings & contents insurance..................... 45
Life assurance ......................... 54 (apparently this is high, don't know why will look into it.)
Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 10
Haircuts................................ 30
Entertainment........................... 40 (we can do this, although we often have not!)
Holiday................................. 0 (have not had proper holiday for 3years)
Emergency fund.......................... 0 (know we should but we don’t)
Union fees.............................. 13 (a must have as a teacher)
To cover od fees........................ 10 (we trans 10 to our A&L od each month to cover interest etc)
Children's mutual trust fund............ 20
Total monthly expenses.................. 1964


Assets
Cash.................................... 0
House value (Gross)..................... 123000 (according to bank - puts us in neg equity! 130000 minimum I hope though, what we paid for it 3 years ago, when it was a wreck - valued 2 years ago at 155)
Shares and bonds........................ 0
Car(s).................................. 2000
Other assets............................ 0
Total Assets............................ 132000



Secured & HP Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly.. .APR
Mortgage...................... 0........(720)...... (not sure what we’ve paid in 3years) 5.3 fixed till 2011
Total secured & HP debts...... 0.........-.........-

Unsecured Debts Some of these I can not work the apr out unfortunately.
Description.......Debt, remaining......Monthly................APR
IF.............................12892.............. .......293...................5.9
IF.............................4583......142...... .7.9
N ROCK.........................22603.....269.......7 .9
student loan...................8000......106.......0 (I tend to ignore this as the apr is so low - my husband also has student loan which comes diredctly out of his account and we know know difference)
HSBC OD........................400.......0.........?
A & L OD.......................1500......0.........?
HSBC OD .......................1000......0.........?
BARCLAYS.......................5788......130...... .0 (3300 is 0% after a balance trans)
CAP 1 .........................4800......200.......0 my mother in law got this 0% card for us in dec, we pay 200 regardless, which was a terrible thing to do we know, but she offered and we were desperate.
CAP 1..........................9116......273.......18
TESCO..........................980.......25....... .?
HALIFAX........................3000......80....... .0%
MBNA...........................1331......40....... .?
VIRGIN.........................2864......50....... .?
VIRGIN.........................830.......25....... .?
EGG............................701.......25....... .19.9
EGG............................4916......120...... .21.9
Total unsecured debts..85304.....1778.....




Monthly Budget Summary

Total monthly income.................... 3,458
Expenses (including HP & secured debts). 1,964
Available for debt repayments........... 1,494
Monthly UNsecured debt repayments....... 1,778
Amount short for making debt repayments. -284 which we've put on cc and any other over spends!


Our daughter has recently moved into her 'big girls' room - I sold all of her baby girl clothes to decorate & furnish it via ebay. Don't have much more to sell now!

I also see, now it's in front of us, that we've been so silly and in some respects are so lucky compared to many i.e. mum a child minder & husbands petrol, car & phone, I think weve just lived the good life too long!

What do you think is going to happen to us our finances?

Scared and worried.

Thanks,
C