Without a paddle... support for anyone starting a DMP in 2010 (part2)

newbeginning_2

Hi and welcome Mephista!

Not sure about creditors writing off debt not seen anyone talking about here maybe ask on the main board?

As for the signatures go go into your profile and it says in there somewhere 'Edit Signature'.

Don't worry - better advice will be along shortly!

Mephista

Thanks. What's the deal with the paddle numbers? Is it some secret code?

Professor_Pat_Pending

Hi Mephista, ted is right, debts only really get written off in extreme circumstances.
In reality you prob have 2 choices, stay on the DMP, hope your debts are sold to DCAs and then try and save up for Full and Final settlements (these can be as low as 30%) or try the Unenforceable route, which can work, but also can be very stressful, although Dopey on here is doing it with some success.
As has been said most of us are taking the first option.
Regarding your reduced payments, if you are thru Payplan/CCCS they will do all that for you, but if you are on a self managed DMP then presumably you have to send an updated SOA to each creditor and go from there.
In any event, good luck and post on here whenever you need help. PP

Loubylou2

Welcome Mephista. We too are in the early stages of our DMP and have found this forum an absolute life saver for support. I honestly would have cracked as would feel so isolated.
As you say its impossible to tell family. Like you my mum would be horrified and even the thought of that makes me feel ashamed.
BUT at least we are finally taking action and as others have said we have all paid so much in interest to these financial institutions already!

Today I had a scary sounding message from Buchanan clark & wells (Collection agency for Post Office/BOI) on the answer machine. It tells us to ring and says .This is NOT a marketing call. It sounds automated as its quite robotic & stern sounding. I take it we just ignore? OH is away on a work course this week anyway. They should have had my recorded letter today giving the Payplan no and copy of our SOA so why are they ringing?
Will I ever stop being scared?

newbeginning_2

I'm still paddling along!!!

eyeopener2

Loubylou2 wrote: »

OMG sent three of the letters today. I did put a copy in with the Collection agency letter so hope it doesn't confuse them:D

A bit of me is still feeling I should be more submissive as debt is ours but then don't want to be walked over. I honestly wouldn't be sleeping if it wasn't for you guys.

Hi LL

just seen this.

Don't be submissive, it won't get you to your goal of being debt free, it will just make things worse for you as the banks want interest from you, they want to charge you AND they want the capital back. Most of all they want to control you.

By being strong, playing the game and doing it your way you should get interest frozen (for a while at least), maybe charges refunded and meanwhile your debt free date can be seen on the horizon in all its golden glory. If you do it the banks way you will never be debt free (its the last thing they want).

Keep going.

E2

eyeopener2

Loubylou2 wrote: »

Today I had a scary sounding message from Buchanan clark & wells (Collection agency for Post Office/BOI) on the answer machine. It tells us to ring and says .This is NOT a marketing call. It sounds automated as its quite robotic & stern sounding. I take it we just ignore? OH is away on a work course this week anyway. They should have had my recorded letter today giving the Payplan no and copy of our SOA so why are they ringing?
Will I ever stop being scared?

Ignore it and wait for the letters to do there job. You will stop being scared. I was terriffied at first but then I had other things to occupy me like trying to save my marriage after the sorry tale of my stupid spending came out.

It will settle down, apart from Mackenzie Hall sending me a couple of emails I haven't heard a peep out of anyone for ages, I havent had a phonecall from anyone since July. The payday loan lot tried a few idiotic things but not one phonecall, just emails.

It will settle down, trust us all, we know what its like at first but it will happen.

Loubylou2

Thank you so much.
You've no idea how much this forum is helping me ATM.

Mephista

tedsd wrote: »

Hello and Welcome Mephista,

Gosh you're having a hard time of it, sounds like one thing after another! :eek: although on a positive note your creditors have stopped interest for now...:)

No judgements here about being irresponsible, we've all been there for one reason or another.

You don't mention whether you are doing your own DMP or whether it's through the CCCS/Payplan? I have read about debt being written off but it's been in extreme circumstances, not when it's going to take a long time to pay debt off. A good few of us on here are on long term DMPs but are hoping that in time our financial situations will get better and we can clear it sooner.


If you are with CCCS etc, you could phone them about lowering your payments for a while or sending token payments until things get better. Recent government guidelines advise creditors to allow token payments up to 6 months. If you back track on the posts, you will find a link to the article. If you are on your own DMP, I guess the solution would be the same. CCCS will always talk through your options with you whether you are with them or not.

Not sure if that helps, maybe someone else on here will be along with some more thoughts.

Hope it goes ok,

Ted

ps We were issued with paddle numbers way back when Nataz started this thread but Nataz hasn't been on here recently so we've stopped issuing them as we lost track...

Hi Ted

Many thanks for your helpful words of encouragement. I suppose I don't need a paddle when I've got you lot!!!

Anyway, yes it has been one thing after another over the last year and that was - believe it or not - the nutshell version.

Anyway just to let you know I arranged my DMP through Citizens advice whenever my Sickness Benefit was taken off me by my Employers (if I get cross enough I will name and shame!!) for 2 months which left me with nothing to live on. Totally illegal I know but according to them - grrrrrr - totally justified. Anyway thats a story for another day. Needless to say I was lucky because at least my husband was working but he had the house and his own bills to pay so there was no way he could afford to give me out that kind of hand out.

citizens advice were extremely helpful and gave me guidelines on drawing up my Financial Statement. Once I sent it to them and they had assessed it for me as reasonable, they sent off the letters for me. The offer is still open for me to go to them whenever necessary to get assistance to review the situation and while I'm not quite there yet - I could be soon.

I kinda feel all the stuffing, fight and self confidence has been completely stripped from me and at the moment I am an empty shell of my former self. I just had hoped there was some other way I could look at this to improve the situation by doing something myself.

I have a medical condition which means I suffer pain on a 24 hour basis and because of that my husband and close family refuse to let me take up a second job to help the situation. My doctor is not a bit fan either. I just am at a loss as to what else I can do.

Thanks for the post. You did really help me to feel better and right now ... that's a start:undecided

Mephista

Professor_Pat_Pending wrote: »

Hi Mephista, ted is right, debts only really get written off in extreme circumstances.
In reality you prob have 2 choices, stay on the DMP, hope your debts are sold to DCAs and then try and save up for Full and Final settlements (these can be as low as 30%) or try the Unenforceable route, which can work, but also can be very stressful, although Dopey on here is doing it with some success.
As has been said most of us are taking the first option.
Regarding your reduced payments, if you are thru Payplan/CCCS they will do all that for you, but if you are on a self managed DMP then presumably you have to send an updated SOA to each creditor and go from there.
In any event, good luck and post on here whenever you need help. PP

Hi Prof (hope you don't mind my little familiarity)

Thanks ever so much for the advice. I think I'm happy enough with my plan and the payments. I realise the time it would have taken to pay it off but on my current salary I could still just about afford to live and I could survive without the cards - excepting emergencies of course.

My concern is that I've only just got things sorted. No-one is hassling me and they are happily receiving their payments. I get regular correspondence from them all which they have told me to ignore and just consider them as updates so I suppose I'm luckier than most in that sense. My worry is that this is the month when a lot of my costings go up because everything in terms of my bills for the house, pet and car are renewed and nothing ever goes down!!!

As it is I was going to have to ask them to reconsider my payments slightly. If I get a job at a much lower salary, I really will have to reduce payments drastically. Will they ever trust me do you think or will this just be another start of the phonecalls and hassle. I've only been at this a few months. I think I would have been less concerned about it all if I had've been making payments for several months.

At this rate I'm going to be retired before I'm free!!!!!