DMP Mutual Support Thread - Part 7

happymoneysaver79

Hi!
Just a quick question. I am on a debt management plan and would like to rent, I currently own a property which is mortgaged but I would like to get away from my awful neighbours as they are making my life a misery. My mum and dad who are unaware of my situation want to rent with us. I dont want to tell them whats going on because they will be really upset and annoyed. What are the chances of me finding somewhere to rent through an agent with a debt management plan or would i be best to find a private rental?
Hope someone can offer advice.
Thanks

the_tooth_fairy

zoey86 wrote: »

Hey,

I've looked into this a bit more and found out that if you receive a second (or more) default notice on your account you can argue this and get the creditor to remove the more recent default notices from your file as long as you still have a copy of the original. You are only supposed to receive 1 default notice per account, as long as you haven't brought your account up to date with the payments the creditor is requesting - in this case they can then issue you another default notice.

This should be a useful link on another MSE thread https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/3134066

Hope that helps and makes sense

Zoey

Thank you Zoey, I read the link with interest, however in the second paragraph it mentions "if you have agreed a payment with the creditor". Neither of these accounts have had the sums offered agreed by the creditors. They still show on the Payplanplus creditor page as "pending". I'm guessing that is their loophole, which is why the sooner we get rid, the better.
Also, their exceptionally inept staff (one of them might have been called Frank Spencer) have no idea what to say when you speak to them. It was suggested that because I've slightly upped my payments that "it would be worth their while" to bombard me with calls. Not to mention getting a tear open "payslip type" advice to threaten me that they would be calling at my home!
Thank you for your advice, though, that was kind.

ttf

swifty16

I have been in a DMP with CCCS for about 5 years.
I originally had debts of about £22000 owed between 7 creditors.
One of these has been completed.
I currently pay £160 a month and haven't missed a payment..
I am happy with this and now owe about £11500 in total.
My problem is this.
One of my creditors is Barclaycard whom I owe around £1500 to at present. About 18 months after the start of my DMP, a new credit card arrived at my door from Barclaycard. It was addressed in my name but had my previous address. I left the card for a few weeks before giving into temptation and began ordering stuff online. The initial payments were manageable at around £40 per month. Things soon spiraled out of control and I began to use the card more often until I ended up with a new debt of over £6000 and needed payments of a minimum of £145 per month.
Obviously after my budget was drawn up with the DMP I didn't have much spare cash to finance my new debt. The statements kept getting forwarded to my new address and I continued to use the card. As a result my last two payments to my "new card" have been late.
They have been trying to contact me. I assume they realise that I am the same person as lived at my previous address.
My payments are up to date but I wont be able to make my next payment.
Please help.
Should I contact CCCS and reveal the full story to them?
I feel embarrassed and ashamed after they have helped me out so well these past five years.

GibbsRule_No3

swifty16 wrote: »

I have been in a DMP with CCCS for about 5 years.
I originally had debts of about £22000 owed between 7 creditors.
One of these has been completed.
I currently pay £160 a month and haven't missed a payment..
I am happy with this and now owe about £11500 in total.
My problem is this.
One of my creditors is Barclaycard whom I owe around £1500 to at present. About 18 months after the start of my DMP, a new credit card arrived at my door from Barclaycard. It was addressed in my name but had my previous address. I left the card for a few weeks before giving into temptation and began ordering stuff online. The initial payments were manageable at around £40 per month. Things soon spiraled out of control and I began to use the card more often until I ended up with a new debt of over £6000 and needed payments of a minimum of £145 per month.
Obviously after my budget was drawn up with the DMP I didn't have much spare cash to finance my new debt. The statements kept getting forwarded to my new address and I continued to use the card. As a result my last two payments to my "new card" have been late.
They have been trying to contact me. I assume they realise that I am the same person as lived at my previous address.
My payments are up to date but I wont be able to make my next payment.
Please help.
Should I contact CCCS and reveal the full story to them?
I feel embarrassed and ashamed after they have helped me out so well these past five years.

Not sure what to advise, but I thought one of the things with a DMP is that you agree not to take out any more debt or it could default the DMP. I thought Payplan told me this when I signed up with them. Having said this, the deed is now done, so ask CCCS if they can help. Good luck, 5 years in is a long time.

iwantafreshstart

hi, im new on here and have reached the stage where i think i need to contact CCCS about starting a DMP but im so scared of creditors contacting me at work etc.

if anyone has any advice id be really grateful as i feel like im at my wits end at the moment

i have started a thread on here if anyone can help

thanks in advance

swifty16

GibbsRule_No3 wrote: »

Not sure what to advise, but I thought one of the things with a DMP is that you agree not to take out any more debt or it could default the DMP. I thought Payplan told me this when I signed up with them. Having said this, the deed is now done, so ask CCCS if they can help. Good luck, 5 years in is a long time.

GibbsRule - Thanks for the response. I understand that I broke the agreement and I feel foolish now but after cutting up all my cards and joining a DMP the last thing I expected was to be handed a new card with a £6000 limit. I probably have no option but to go back to CCCS, but I was hoping to hear from someone on here who has had a similar experience and "fell off the wagon", so to speak.

ianmak

swifty16 wrote: »

GibbsRule - Thanks for the response. I understand that I broke the agreement and I feel foolish now but after cutting up all my cards and joining a DMP the last thing I expected was to be handed a new card with a £6000 limit. I probably have no option but to go back to CCCS, but I was hoping to hear from someone on here who has had a similar experience and "fell off the wagon", so to speak.

I don't think many of us fall off the wagon because we can no longer have any further credit, so the temptation is removed. Speak to CCCS and see what they say, but I don't think they'll be too happy and could drop you.

Not sure what else to say. Sorry.

tricky_plus

ianmak wrote: »

I don't think many of us fall off the wagon because we can no longer have any further credit, so the temptation is removed. Speak to CCCS and see what they say, but I don't think they'll be too happy and could drop you.

Not sure what else to say. Sorry.

Very true. I'm rubbish with credit and if I had a usable credit card in my wallet I'm sure I'd be using it. As it is I'm on a DMP and have no access to credit which is one of the big appeals really. Speak to CCCS, nothing to lose really.

sam89

I've posted this on it's own but hopefully no-one will mind me repeating it here. This was the thread that helped me most when I was starting out .

Hi all, :wave:

My annual update post to reassure and bring some hope to those just starting out on a DMP.

We entered a DMP with Payplan in September 2007 having run up £104,000 of unsecured debt :eek:. Yes you did read that right :eek:, I'm still not quite sure how it got that bad but a huge percentage was using credit cards to pay interest on each other creating a downward spiral of increasing debt. If that's what you are doing now please STOP and ask for help, it will only get worse if you leave it. We didn't stop until we had reached the end of our credit and had no money left for food or petrol on any of our many cards, only then did we contact Payplan for help . Six months earlier would have made a huge difference.

I can't stress enough how helpful, non-judgemental and reassuring Payplan were. Anyone who is hesitating about entering a DMP please understand it is the best thing we ever did. It's quite simply given us back our lives!

So, four years on our debt is £36,500 . Still a big number but we plan to clear this within the next 2 years. Budgeting was really hard to learn and we still have months where we overspend at the beginning and are counting pennies in the last week but overall things are much better with a little buffer against any financial surprises .

I know that one of the biggest worries on starting a DMP is how the creditors will react so here's a quick run down of each of ours.

MBNA, accepted DMP, stopped interest, still stopped.

TSB, did not accept, increased interest, phoned constantly and had me in tears. I accessed the details of the CEO on the business register and wrote directly to him complaining about his rude staff and crippling interest. Accepted DMP, interest stopped, phonecalls stopped, still stopped.

Citibank (now Opus), accepted DMP, stopped interest, still stopped.

Egg, accepted DMP, stopped interest, still stopped.

First Direct, accepted DMP, largest creditor £21,000+, charged interest at 0.5% over base rate. Now charging 6.5% interest as we are exceeding minimum payments.

M&S, accepted DMP, stopped interest. Now charging 18.9% interest as we are exceeding minimum payments.

Debenhams store card, refused DMP, increased interest. Sold account to CL Finance who accepted DMP, stopped interest, still stopped.

Capital One, accepted DMP, stopped interest, still stopped.

I'm not sure how much longer we'll stay on the DMP as we are exceeding minimum payments on all our accounts now. I'm going to keep an eye on things and if more accounts start charging interest I think we'll come off the DMP and snowball instead but for now the DMP is still working.

Thanks for reading and I hope I've managed to reassure some-one the way this site reassured me when I was starting out.

Cheers,
Sam,

Hopelessly_Hopeful

sam89 wrote: »

I've posted this on it's own but hopefully no-one will mind me repeating it here. This was the thread that helped me most when I was starting out .

Hi all, :wave:

My annual update post to reassure and bring some hope to those just starting out on a DMP.

We entered a DMP with Payplan in September 2007 having run up £104,000 of unsecured debt :eek:. Yes you did read that right :eek:, I'm still not quite sure how it got that bad but a huge percentage was using credit cards to pay interest on each other creating a downward spiral of increasing debt. If that's what you are doing now please STOP and ask for help, it will only get worse if you leave it. We didn't stop until we had reached the end of our credit and had no money left for food or petrol on any of our many cards, only then did we contact Payplan for help . Six months earlier would have made a huge difference.

I can't stress enough how helpful, non-judgemental and reassuring Payplan were. Anyone who is hesitating about entering a DMP please understand it is the best thing we ever did. It's quite simply given us back our lives!

So, four years on our debt is £36,500 . Still a big number but we plan to clear this within the next 2 years. Budgeting was really hard to learn and we still have months where we overspend at the beginning and are counting pennies in the last week but overall things are much better with a little buffer against any financial surprises .

I know that one of the biggest worries on starting a DMP is how the creditors will react so here's a quick run down of each of ours.

MBNA, accepted DMP, stopped interest, still stopped.

TSB, did not accept, increased interest, phoned constantly and had me in tears. I accessed the details of the CEO on the business register and wrote directly to him complaining about his rude staff and crippling interest. Accepted DMP, interest stopped, phonecalls stopped, still stopped.

Citibank (now Opus), accepted DMP, stopped interest, still stopped.

Egg, accepted DMP, stopped interest, still stopped.

First Direct, accepted DMP, largest creditor £21,000+, charged interest at 0.5% over base rate. Now charging 6.5% interest as we are exceeding minimum payments.

M&S, accepted DMP, stopped interest. Now charging 18.9% interest as we are exceeding minimum payments.

Debenhams store card, refused DMP, increased interest. Sold account to CL Finance who accepted DMP, stopped interest, still stopped.

Capital One, accepted DMP, stopped interest, still stopped.

I'm not sure how much longer we'll stay on the DMP as we are exceeding minimum payments on all our accounts now. I'm going to keep an eye on things and if more accounts start charging interest I think we'll come off the DMP and snowball instead but for now the DMP is still working.

Thanks for reading and I hope I've managed to reassure some-one the way this site reassured me when I was starting out.

Cheers,
Sam,

Well done and thanks for sharing.

I made some token payments last month with CCCS advice as had huge car bills to sort. I wrote the all creditors and sent receipts, a number have reinstated interest so am considering options, gggggrrrrrr

HHx