Struggling with debt? Ask a debt advisor a question

brookkayl

TBS Trustcard credit card with an outstanding balance of around £3000 and an annual interest rate of 21.4% and would like to transfer this as cheaply and efficiently as possible. The average monthly spend is around £100. I have spent days reading through the various online guides on the subject of interest rates, balance transfers (including this site) etc but still cannot make sense of what might be the best deal for me. I have a paypal account linked to the card, along with a monthly broadband fee for internet access. What complicates this further is that I am self employed, and am on low earnings (frequently below my personal tax allowance). This seems to mean that I am not eligible to apply for many of the existing card deals because I don't earn enough annually. I also have a saving account with Nationwide, along with one of their credit cards

naycash

Hi

I quickly did a debt remedy assessmnet online and it said that my best plan would be to do a temporary repayment play as I have more going out than coming in.

Now what I want advice on is this:-

1. My husband and I have a joint bank acc and mortgage though the debt is in my name so can I apply to the creditors using my plan
or
2. Do they take into account that my husband has a wage coming in.
3. Is a repayment plan my best option??

I earn approx £9000 pa and owe £8000 on credit cards, £900 catalogue, £1000 overdraft, £800 store cards. The overdraft and £6000 credit cards are who I bank with and so is my mortgage.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

mum2one

is there a set minimum payment that you need to have avaiable per month for repayments, does this alter depending on whether your on a DMP or IVA?

Cheers
in advance,

StepChange_Pavan

scruffness wrote: »

Gosh...reading some of these posts you debt resolvers have your work cut out! (And I'm going to add to it!)

I'm scared...My partner and I have got into a bit of trouble with debts.

My partner wanted to change his career and earn more money so he got a £1500 credit card to pay for a plumbing course. He didn't get on with the plumbing course so left that (and the credit card payments) and got a driving instructor course on finance. He owes around £3500 on this still and can't afford the monthly payments of £117 month so hasn't touched that for a few months either.

He also had the rear windscreen of his car smashed and insisted on having a £400 alarm fitted and was paying £15 a month for a while but that soon stopped getting paid too so he probably owes more than that now.

He has now passed all his Instructor tests and is a fully qualified ADI and although he is pretty busy, he doesn't earn anything until he has paid over a £1000 to the franchise, car lease and car insurance. Then there's petrol and everything else he has to buy to keep the business running on top, so he's not earning a great deal. He has not kept any books or records on income etc or payed any taxes since he started last year in June. (another thing we're worried about!)

I was working around 17hrs a week earning £300 a month tops until October last year.

I went 'self employed' in October but was working for a lady earning around £500 a month and had a part time job earning about £120 a month. I was working around 28 hours a week, but I didn't inform the tax credits and still haven't yet. *blush*
I did declare myself as self employed on the internet though, and got my national insurance bill recently, which I also haven't paid yet!

My self emloyment has now ceased as I let 'my boss' down 1 DAY as I couldn't get my daughter to nursery (in another town) because I couldn't afford tax and MOT for my car. She told me to get a taxi which I refused as it would cost more than double of what I earn in 1 day...This was enough for her to 'sack' me as it was "pathetic"

So now I have my part time job of about 7hrs a week, which isn't a problem, I can get childcare for my 2 year old for that, but in order to get another job I will have to put my daughter back into nursery. As I owe her nursery £1300, they want at least £500 before they have her back there, so now I can't get another job. (and I can't pay the nursery because of this!)

I don't know where to start, I owe money all over the place and don't have anything to give them.

I'm guessing I was getting more than I should have been off tax credits but even with my wages, we still had more outgoing than incoming (and that was before paying any of our creditors!!) Now I don't have that income and I'm going to have to pay back tax credits and I can't get another job or pay off the nursery or pay off any other debts.

I'm scared that if I update the tax credits now, I won't get enough money to pay my mortgage and other priority bills.

What do I do 1st??

Sorry!
Hope someone can help!

Regards,

Sarah

Hi Sarah and thank you for your post.

You’ve done the right thing by contacting us for advice. The first step you need to take is to compile a realistic budget to work out how much you can afford to repay to each of these debts. We can help you to do this and also prioritise which debts you should concentrate on.

It’s really important that you update the tax credit people with your circumstances as soon as possible as putting this off could make your situation worse.

I’d recommend that you give us a call so that we can look at your situation in more detail and advise you fully. 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. If you do decide to call us, please have details ready regarding your income, expenditure and creditors, as this can help speed up the referral process. If you have all of the necessary information ready, it may be possible to refer you directly to a counsellor for immediate advice. Alternatively, we will arrange for an appointment to be booked at a time convenient for you.

Kind regards,
Pavan

StepChange_Pavan

JimmyTheOwl wrote: »

Hello

I'm just under £5000 in debt. The debt is spread out to 6 or 7 different creditors; some debt collection agencies, some the companies I borrowed from. I'm getting loads of phone calls and letters asking for amounts I can't afford.

I'm unemployed at the moment (on job seekers allowance) but would like to get a consolidation loan. Would I be able to get a consolidation loan in my situation? I'm not a home-owner.

I'm starting University in September (providing I get the grades) and plan to pay all my debts off with my student loans/grants (not ideal I know, but at least they'd be out of the way), and I would pay the consolidation loan off in full in september.

I've searched for companies on the internet who do loans for unemployed people, but the companies I've looked at seem a bit dodgy ie:
amateurish websites, poor written english on the websites, not much information given, etc....

Have you got any advice for me?

Thanks
James

Hello James and thank you for your post.

We don’t usually recommend taking out further credit to clear existing debts as this can often make the situation worse in the long run.

As you’re unemployed, it’s unlikely that any lender will agree to loan you this amount with a reasonable interest rate.

I’d recommend that you put together a realistic budget to work out how much you can afford to pay towards your creditors. You may find that you can only afford token payments of £1 per month to each creditor at this moment in time, but if your circumstances are expected to improve, you can offer them more once you can afford it.

If you’d like us to look at your situation in a bit more detail so that we can explore all of the options that are available to you, 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.

I hope this helps.

Kind regards,
Pavan

StepChange_Pavan

honory wrote: »

Hi, I had a DMP with the CCCS which finished with everything paid off in July 2007. Since then I have an immaculate credit record (i have a capital one cc which i pay off every month) and all other debts are fine. I kept to all agreements with the CCCS and since 2004 when i took out the dmp I have led a strict and unextravagant life!!
We have recently applied for a mortgage through our financial advisor and all was going well. The advisor thought we would encounter no problems and since all the arrangements to pay had actually been settled and cleared since 2007 he thought we would be fine. We applied for our equifax credit file and checked it (as did the financial advisor) and were very ready to proceed so the mortgage application was made and yesterday we received news that the underwriters had declined it. Our financial advisor is following this up but it would seem the problem is a Marks and Spencer Credit Card which is showing as settled in 2007 but it notes a Default (instead of an Arrangement to Pay) for one month is July 2006. It also shows a default/delinquent balance of £4755 at the same time as showing the account settled in July 2007. In fact on the credit record after the default of july 2006 it shows a green S in August 2006 followed by 3 months of U (unavailable data?) and then from there up to July 2007 it shows green in every month up to the final green S in July 2007. From 2004 - 2007 I paid this debt via the CCCS every month. I never missed a payment and increased payments to them as i cleared other debts. I contacted all my creditors when i first arranged the dmp plan and M+S were very agreeable and froze the interest rate and allowed the arrangement to continue until they accepted full and final settlement in July 2007. I am going to contact them to get them to investigate but apart from the last 4 digits of the card which appear on my credit file I have not kept any documents referring to this. Obviously I am hoping that something can be done their end but does anyone have any advice? All other debts that were processed by the CCCS in exactly the same way show AP in red every month of the agreement until the green S of settlement. None of them apart from the M+S card show a default/delinquent balance and none show a Default marker apart from M+S. Does this sound like a mistake?

Hi Honory and thanks for your post.

I’m not sure whether you’re questioning the default or the date of default. They are within their rights to mark your credit file as you were making reduced payments and defaulted against the original agreement.

However, if you think that this or the date is wrong, you would need to contact M&S directly as only they can remove it. This credit explained booklet gives you more information on what to do.

Kind regards,
Pavan

StepChange_Pavan

faekah wrote: »

Hi

I really need some advice for my parents. They have a small property which they rent out which in turn helps them pay the mortgage on our family house. The tenant initially paid her rent on time, but has not for 5 months now !! This has left my parents not being able to pay their mortgage on time and running of feeds and debt. They were being nice to the tenant and letting her have time as she had to give up her job due to her teenage son being in hospital. However since then she has been saying she is waiting for compensation or their is a problem with the bank account or that she is owed housing benefit and the council are not paying it.
Over a week ago the council admitted to my parents that they have been paying this tenant money for the rent, but she has not been passing this on - effectively stealing it is the phrase they used. She denies this but several people in the council have confirmed. The council have failed to stop payments to her - we asked could it come directly to the landlord - and now she owes my parents a lot! In addition she has purposefully caused damage to the property (pulling a radiator of the wall, breaking the shower, causing damp and water leaks) - we are presuming because she wants to state that the property isn't up to use - presumably because she wants a better one from the council!! We really don't know what to do!! We're shocked a tenant could do such things.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated. I don't know if anyone has had such issues with tenants before?!

Hello faekah and thanks for your post.

Unfortunately this is not something we are able to advise on. You could try posting on this thread instead: http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/forumdisplay.php?f=16.

Alternatively they could try their local CAB or Community Legal Advice to find out more about their rights.

Kind regards,
Pavan

StepChange_Pavan

brookkayl wrote: »

TBS Trustcard credit card with an outstanding balance of around £3000 and an annual interest rate of 21.4% and would like to transfer this as cheaply and efficiently as possible. The average monthly spend is around £100. I have spent days reading through the various online guides on the subject of interest rates, balance transfers (including this site) etc but still cannot make sense of what might be the best deal for me. I have a paypal account linked to the card, along with a monthly broadband fee for internet access. What complicates this further is that I am self employed, and am on low earnings (frequently below my personal tax allowance). This seems to mean that I am not eligible to apply for many of the existing card deals because I don't earn enough annually. I also have a saving account with Nationwide, along with one of their credit cards

Hi brookkayl and thanks for your post.

Unfortunately this isn’t something we can help with as we advise on repaying debts for people that are in financial difficulty and can’t afford the minimum payments. We don’t usually recommend taking on further credit to repay existing debts.

You could try asking this question on the main forum instead as you may get some useful answers on there.

Kind regards,
Pavan

StepChange_Pavan

naycash wrote: »

Hi

I quickly did a debt remedy assessmnet online and it said that my best plan would be to do a temporary repayment play as I have more going out than coming in.

Now what I want advice on is this:-

1. My husband and I have a joint bank acc and mortgage though the debt is in my name so can I apply to the creditors using my plan
or
2. Do they take into account that my husband has a wage coming in.
3. Is a repayment plan my best option??

I earn approx £9000 pa and owe £8000 on credit cards, £900 catalogue, £1000 overdraft, £800 store cards. The overdraft and £6000 credit cards are who I bank with and so is my mortgage.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Hi naycash and thank you for your post.

It’s difficult to advise you without being able to see the details of your situation.

As you’ve already completed Debt Remedy, I’d recommend that you call our web support team as they will have access to all your information and can advise you fully.

Kind regards,
Pavan

StepChange_Pavan

mum2one wrote: »

is there a set minimum payment that you need to have avaiable per month for repayments, does this alter depending on whether your on a DMP or IVA?

Cheers
in advance,

Hi again,

This really depends on your individual circumstances in terms of your surplus and the level of debt.

As you’ve already completed Debt Remedy, it’s best that you contact our web support team as they have access to your information and will be able to advise you fully.

Kind regards,
Pavan