Struggling with debt? Ask a debt advisor a question

Rochdale_Guy

CCCS_Sue wrote: »

If you back up your offer of payment with a copy of your income and expenditure, they will be able to see your situation. They will also be able to see that you have sought professional advice.
They don't have to accept your offer of payment, but send the money anyway. You can't pay them money you don't have. Make sure you maintain the payments every month.
If you want to speak to someone in more detail about the suggested options, then you can call our debt remedy support team
If you decide to go ahead with the bankruptcy, then we do have a specialist bankruptcy support team who can give you ongoing support

Kind Regards
Sue

Thank you Sue.

I am almost in tears typing this....

So, do I ask if they will freeze/lower the payments, or do I make an offer of what I can pay them back each month over the phone. Surely the ball is in their court?

I don't have internet access at home so can only get on here at select times of the day due to work.

Do you in all honesty think I would get accepted for a consolidation loan?

Thank you so much.

StepChange_Pavan

Stellawella wrote: »

Hi i came home from college to find a letter from jacobs bailiffs 24 hr notice saying i owe £206.42 + costs.... i need to know a couple of things.

A) when will they come back?
How much are the 'costs'?
C) If i ask them to deduct the money from my income support do i have to sign a walking possessions order?
D) Can the council take the payments instead of them?


Stella wella in distress

Hi Stellawella and thanks for your post.

It’s important that you come to an agreement with the bailiff to repay the money. You can ask for the council to take the debt back so that you can make the payments to them instead, but this is not guaranteed.

The bailiff is there to recover the money, whether this is by a payment arrangement or by taking goods from the property and selling them at auction to pay off your debt.

Bailiffs cannot break into your property unless you have already allowed them in or they entered through an unlocked door or window, on a previous visit. This is called ‘walk in possession’. Once the bailiff has ‘walk in possession’ they can use force to enter again in future.

A walking possession agreement means that you have agreed that levied goods now legally belong to the bailiff and can be removed at any time if the debt is not paid. If you sign the agreement, the bailiff will allow the goods to remain in the home for you to continue using, provided that you maintain the agreement you have made.

It’s important that you don’t let the bailiff in. Try to negotiate with them outside of the property or through an open window.

If a bailiff enters your property, they will not take any goods on the first visit. They will usually make a list of items in the house which they can take in future. Once they have done this, it is an offence for you to remove any of these items from your house.

However, the bailiff cannot take items that don’t belong to you. If there are items belong to other people in your household, you would need to prove this.

The bailiffs could come back at any time – they may mention when in the letter.

The fees that bailiffs can charge for recovering money vary. There are fixed fees for bailiffs collecting council tax; for example, from 1 April 1998 fees for the first visit by a bailiff are £20 and £15 for a second visit, where no levy or seizure is made.

All bailiff fees (with the exception of magistrates' court bailiffs) can be looked at by the county court to see if they are reasonable or excessive. This is known as 'detailed assessment'. If you think that the bailiff's fees are excessive you should contact your local county court.

I hope this answers all of your questions, but if you’d like us to look at your situation in more detail, you can call our free helpline to speak to one of our debt counsellors.

You can book a telephone based appointment by calling our helpline free on 0800 138 1111. Lines are open Monday to Friday 08:00-20:00.

Kind regards,
Pavan

scrummymummy2011

Hey
Me and my partner are £18,000 in debt with 12 crediters!
At the moment we have been struggling to pay the majority of them (leaving out the ones who dont charge us for not paying!)
This has ammounted to us paying out £300 a month and leaving us with £100 a month left to live on (feed us, tolitries etc) This isnt practical as we also have a little one and a baby on the way so we cant continue this way.
My question is if we go onto a dmp and say pay £15 a month to each crediter totaling £180 would the interest be stopped?
Because if it isnt stopped then we going to get more and more in debt esp with overdrafts (interest being £40) credit cards (interest being £60) and so on. It just depresses me, is there a light at the end of the tunnell :-(
Is it best for me to not pay the minimum for a little while and pay what i can afford before i go onto a dmp, if i carry on paying the full ammount are they likely to question why i cant now and not stop the interest because of this? (ive heard of this in another forum)
Is it best for me to wait till they gone to debt collecters?
Also another question is what happens when i have my baby in april? I will then get £200 child tax and £80 child benifit for my baby, will this be expected to be used for my dmp?
Sorry im just trying to work out what is best for us, i dont want to incur loads of charges and i also dont want to carry on being charged the interest because if thats the case then i may aswell not bother trying to clear it as it will never happen anyway!

StepChange_Pavan

globalloon wrote: »

Hi I have a question

I have a few debts and have just been given notice of redundancy and I anticipate being on JSA for a period as vacancies I'm qualified for a few at the moment.

I have a bank loan for £5K, monthly repayments £98
I have a 0% (until July) credit card for 2k, min repayments £30 per month
I have a 0% (until March 2012) credit card for 5k, min repayments £100 per month

I own my own house.

what's the best approach to the companies I owe money to? can I just ask for a freeze until I find another job? all the loans are unsecured but can they still come after my house?

Hello globalloon and thank you for your post.

You may be able to ask for a payment break but there is no guarantee that they will agree to this.

I’d recommend that you write to each of your creditors and explain your situation. You should also supply them with a copy of your income and expenditure as proof of your situation. You can offer to pay them £1 per month until your circumstances improve as a gesture of goodwill.

If you are making token payments for a long period of time, your creditors may go down the standard debt collection route. You can read more about this on our CCCS website. They can only apply for a charge against your property if

• you have a county court judgment and have missed payments, or
• the application for a judgment asks you to pay immediately or ‘forthwith’ and you have not asked the court to change this.

If you’d like some help with putting together a budget and making token payments, you can either use our online advice facility Debt Remedy, or ring our free Helpline to book a telephone appointment with a counsellor.

Debt Remedy will assist you in completing a financial statement which includes information on your household, employment, income, expenditure and debts. All this information is used as a basis to determine the options available to you to deal with your situation.

Once you’ve followed the process through and completed all the required information you will immediately be presented with an advice booklet, which will provide tailored advice for you based on your current circumstances. It will also provide advice on ways you may be able to improve your situation.

Alternatively if you would prefer to talk to a debt counsellor about your situation, you can book a telephone based appointment by calling our helpline free on 0800 138 1111. Lines are open Monday to Friday 08:00-20:00.

Kind regards,
Pavan

StepChange_Pavan

stassy23 wrote: »

hi sorry its me again i received a letter from cccs today saying they cant set my dmp up yet coz i havent opened a basic bank account coz the bank account i gave cant be used coz its attached to my dmp but it isnt i used this account on my last dmp with different company what shall i do thanks

Hi Stassy23 and thanks for your post.

If you have debts with the same bank as your bank account, you need to move away and open up a basic bank account elsewhere. This is because they could swallow up your income to pay towards their debts, leaving you with no money to live on.

This should have been explained to you on your appointment, but if you need further clarification, please give us a call.

Kind regards,
Pavan

StepChange_Pavan

terriblemess wrote: »

Morning people

The more i confront my past mistakes, the more debts creep out from the woodwork :mad:

I have now found an old debt to hm customs and excise for a paye tax underpayment back in the days when i had a business. It is for about £5200 from Mar 2005.

Now they havent chased me for this debt, and the last letter was from them in May 2009 saying it had increased with interest to approx £6200.00

Im no longer prepared to hide from these things, so would appreciate any advice before I call them this week?

Does the taxman accept deals? Would he waiver the interest? Does a tax debt disappear after 6 years?

thank you

Hi terriblemess and thanks for your post.

It seems strange that they haven’t chased you for this debt.

The advice depends on whether you had a Ltd company or not. If you did, you would need to contact Business Debtline.

If you were a sole trader, you would need to come to an arrangement with them as soon as possible. The debt is not covered by the Limitations Act so I’m afraid it won’t ‘disappear’ after six years.

As we’ve said before, please get in touch if you’d like help in putting together a budget or need further advice.

Kind regards,
Pavan

CIS

The fees that bailiffs can charge for recovering money vary. There are fixed fees for bailiffs collecting council tax; for example, from 1 April 1998 fees for the first visit by a bailiff are £20 and £15 for a second visit, where no levy or seizure is made.

The visit fees are currently £24.50 & £18.00 for council tax.

driver24ian

hi, currently have a dmp with cccs, 1 out of the 5 of my creditors has sent out court papers through a solicitor for the arrears on the debt, all the other creditors are fine with what im paying back.

As i dont want a ccj on my file and can now afford to pay a little more into my dmp would it be ok to pay the creditor(NRAM)direct an extra £20 a month to sort this out, i also have a mortgage with them too. i heard you cant be seen to taking preference to creditors but its really going to affect me when it comes to my mortgage term coming to an end and looking for a new one and the thought of a ccj on file worries me.

I am also going to make extra payments some months when my funds allow me to into my dmp so all the creditors will get extra, i just want it gone.

didnt want to get my wrists slapped by the cccs for doing this or should i just keep my mouth shut and not say anything to them.
Thanks

trying_hard

Hello,

I have a DMP with CCCS which has been ticking along for the past 5 years. I think the CCCS are great and have been very kind to us.

I am now not working due to gov cuts (no redundancy as ongoing contract came to an end) and I am setting my self up as self-employed on ebay. I have been selling loads of our personal stuff and as I cant't seem to get a job anywhere I though I would go self-employed. My aim is to bring in the same wages as what I was on eg £400.

What I would like to know is how do I tell the CCCS or prove what I am earning at the next review?

Thank you for reading.

StepChange_Pavan

Snugglebunny8 wrote: »

sorry cant help, terriblemess, but wanted to offer support, the people in this thread are wonderful and will be able to give you an answer, in the meantime well done for facing up to the issues and starting to sort them, thats a big step - hope you get it sorted xx

Can I ask also about the Revenue? we are struggling with a couple of debts due to a property sale falling through, but my husbands self assessment has to be completed before Monday online and he will owe them money (hes PAYE now and was only s/e for that one tax year) - its around £800 Ive worked out but we don't have it, Im really worried about this along with other things, so would also really appreciate knowing what they will do, will they take it from his PAYE for nex tax year through his tax code? or will they insist its all paid now, or will they agree to installments? thanks xx

Hi Snugglebunny8 and thank you for your kind words about the answers we provide on this thread!

I’d really recommend that you contact them and come to an arrangement. The worst thing you could do is to ignore it.

They may be willing to accept instalments. Taxaid is a charity that helps you to understand tax and gives you information on what to do if you can’t afford to pay it. They have a free helpline and they should be able to advise you.

I hope this helps.

Kind regards,
Pavan