MBNA letter

gpee_2

Hi. I've just joined these forums hoping for some advice.

I have debts totalling £14000 across five different credit cards. I am currently up to date with payments on four of the cards but I have been consistently behind and over limit with my Virgin credit card for what is probably more than a year now.

I have just received the following letter from MBNA...

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Dear Mr ***

As you are aware your account is currently one payment(s) in arrears and within the next week may be outsourced to a third party agency, who will contact you to discuss payment on our behalf.

Once the account is placed with them you will need to make payments directly to the third party agency.

To prevent this action an immediate payment of £199.64 is required to be applied to your account by Friday 29 March 2010. You can now make a debit card payment online at [MBNA website] (to register you will need your most recent statement to hand) or please call 0800 028 0685 to make a debit card payment without delay.

If you have made a payment to this account to cover these arrears in the last 3 days pleace ignore this letter.

We are here to help, Monday to Thursday 9am to 9pm, Friday 9am to 6pm and Saturday 9am to 1pm.

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I have recently been promoted and have received a raise of £400 per month so I will be able to bring this account up to date and start taking steps to reduce my debt. I will receive my first payment at the higher rate this week so will be able to clear my arrears on Monday 22nd.

What I want to know is this... is this letter a scare tactic to get me to phone them? Are they able to pass my debt to a third party collection agency before issuing a default notice? If they are allowed to do this and I subsequently pay the arrears will the account be passed back to MBNA and thus cause no further impact on my credit record?

I'm quite sure my credit record is already in a state but would like to do whatever I can to keep the damage to a minimum and get my debt down to zero as soon as I possibly can.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

DarkConvict

Debts can be sold at any point, they just have to notify you. Remember companies on TV like goldfish, there credit cards have been sold from bank to bank to bank.

Its just DCAs tend to collect amounts rather than allow you to continue using the card.

Once a debt is passed to a debt collector, the collector does not have to return the debt. The debt can be collected on behalf of MBNA or it could actually be sold to them. Either way you will be told what has happened.

So if it is passed to a DCA and you start making payments then the card will most likely not go back to MBNA, they will probably default you, send you the notice, close the credit card account as well as passing it to a debt collector.
If you can make payment do so before it is passed over, unless you would prefer to negotiate a settlement with a debt collector at the risk of a default.

p.s. Give this calculator a whirl - http://www.whatsthecost.com/snowball.aspx

creditmunched

MBNA are sharks, they rang me the other week about a late payment and then started going on about how much debt I have with other creditors etc - which I felt was totally out of order, as if I wanted to speak to them I think I would phone them not the other way around - my advice is pay the money asap to get them off your back - well done on your pay rise especially in this current economic climate - good luck with getting straight!!

thepedestrian

yes get shot of MBNA they act really quickly getting their mongrel dogs Restons in to land you with a CCJ

gpee_2

Thanks everyone for the replies.

I have had plenty of late payments over the last year or so but don't really want to add defaults or worse to them so I'll do my best to scrape the money together.

If I'm unable to pay within their time frame what do you think the chances are of them extending it by a couple of days to when I get paid? Or is this date likely to be set in stone and they'll pass the account on regardless?

magical28

Yeah MBNA / Virgin seem to be the nasty ones out of them all. I am starting my DMP with CCCS in April and all my creditors have written nice letters back saying sorry to hear of my problems and offering to talk it through and giving me details of the debt charities.

MBNA however sent a really nasty letter telling me if I try to use the card it will be rejected and I should call them now! I also get daily phone calls from them demanding my personal details and when I politley explain I'm with CCCS they hang up and call back an hour later! They even call my work number which they must have traced when I have called them from it previously, I think this is really out of order. As it happens I work for myself and can blcok the number but if I was with an employer this would be so embarassing!

At the end of the day, they are getting their money back eventually, they're just peed off becuase they won't get the ridiculous amounts of interest they charge.

hype

I must say I have had a very good time with MBNA, they have been the best from the bunch of my creditors. Over £20k with them.

I got into trouble last year but didn't leave it until I got in arrears though. They went through my income/expenditure and immediately froze all interest and charges on the 2 cards I had with them. I pay them £1 for each card per month.

Perhaps it was because I was classed as being in hardship?

magical28

hype wrote: »

I must say I have had a very good time with MBNA, they have been the best from the bunch of my creditors. Over £20k with them.

I got into trouble last year but didn't leave it until I got in arrears though. They went through my income/expenditure and immediately froze all interest and charges on the 2 cards I had with them. I pay them £1 for each card per month.

Perhaps it was because I was classed as being in hardship?

well, that's good to know. At least I know they do accept it. I'm offering to pay them £100 per month to cover both cards (9k debt) so it's not like they're not getting much out of me is it? Maybe it's because they haven't yet had any payment from CCCS so they're panicking! I sent them a token payment last month though and only missed two payments to them ever!

skintandfat

MBNA (and Barclaycrap) were really stroppy with me

MBNA actually advised me to obtain a secured loan to pay them off- the guy changed his tune when I reminded him the call was recorded (told them in writing and requested they notepad my account that ALL future calls would be recorded)
I asked him if MBNA were now breaching OFT guidelines by advising people to change unsecured debt to secured debt. The guy bottled it and told me 'it was only an option' :rotfl:

I am really skint (and still fat ) but they still get £1.00 per month and are happy with it- my tax return showed a loss the last year, so that helps