Can I claim back interest ??

mandij30

After reading through these forums I cannot find an answer to my question, so figured I'd start my own, in the hope someone can advise me.

here goes...

I was in debt with virgin credit card, and was struggling to pay back the money, Anyway I referred this over to my debt management company. Gregory pennington they set up an arrangement with them so that I paid them £76 a month, whilst looking at Virgin CC statements I noticed the interest wasn't frozen. So out of that £76 a month that was being paid to them by Gregory Pennington they were taking £52 a month in interest and only £24 was actually paying off my debt.

After discussing this with my DMC adviser, he looked into it, and now Virgin have finally frozen interest. But for at least 6 months I was having interest added, am I entitled to ask for the interest to be refunded to me.

I was of the impression that when a Debt management company takes on your account, your debtors are supposed to freeze the interest. So that you're paying directly off the debt. My NEXT storecard froze the interest, but not the virgin cc.

I may just be clutching straws here, but if its something I can claim, its better off in my pocket then theirs.

all help and advice is very much appreciated

esmerellda

The creditors have no requirement to freeze interest on accounts even in a DMP. A DMP is voluntary on both sides. It is up to the debtor and creditor (or debtors representative in your case gregory pennington) to negotiate terms of the DMP with each individual creditor.

You can ask GP to write to Virgin and ask them if they would consider refunding the interest (to reduce the balance) but the are under no obligation to do so.

It would be an issue with your DMP provider (GP) for failing to negotiate a freeze of interest when setting up your DMP really/.

mandij30

Ok, well it was a long shot, no harm in finding out.
Back to fighting HSBC then lol

Thanks alot for your invaluable advice esmerellda