Urgent advice

ploddingplodding

My partner is seperated from his wife and they are currently divorcing. My partner and I do not live together but are planning on doing in the future.

My partner and his ex have a joint loan for approx £12k in both of their names. Payments do not look to have been made on this loan for a while.

My partner has received a letter to his address from a debt collection agency chasing the debt. the letter is in his name only so it looks like they are chasing him for it rather than his ex wife or both of them. Obviously as the debt is in joint names my partner does not want to be liable for it all. He also does not have the money to pay it all, but he is willing to try and work out something to start getting his half paid, but only has small amounts to do this.

He has not yet contacted the debt collection agency. When he does does he just give them his ex wifes name and address and tell them to chase her for half of it? At the moment it looks like they are only chasing him so she is going to get away without paying anything towards it. the loan was taken out to buy a static caravan which has been sold and i believe that the money from the sale was used to pay off other debts.

My boyfriend is too frightened to phone the company but i have offered to do it for him, just need to know what to say so that both him and his ex pay half each and it is not all down to my boyfriend.

Looks like there have been a couple of letters to my boyfriend at his address about this debt but to date he has not contacted them.

Many Thanks

happycamel_2

Hi, joint loans are normally make people "jointly and severally liable" this means both of them are liable for the whole debt. If his ex wife stops paying they can come after him for the whole amount. They just don't see it as having lent half the amount to each of them.

This should be dealt with by the solicitors in the divorce settlement. It might be best to write to the creditor and explain that the joint creditors are undergoing divorce and the debt will be considered when splitting the estate.

Good luck

Marisco

Hi plod, welcome to the boards. My oh was in this situation - joint loan - and when I did his DMP I calculated half the payments, as I thought it was not right for his ex to get away with paying nothing (he was already paying debts she'd clocked up:mad:) The CSA were taking nearly half his wage in maintenance payments, so we gave her the option of paying us her half or her paying it herself. My oh and her were not on good terms, so you can imagine what she said!! Which made me even more determined that she'd not "get away" with it!!! Anyway, upshot was we got a letter off the creditor saying that the payments were short and we had to pay it all. So what I did was give the creditor her new name and address (she married and moved) and told them that oh would continue to pay his share, but if they wanted more, then go to her for it. I don't know what they did, but that as the last we heard of it. You'll have to work out what his half will be, and keep a record.