Update on my friend!

daxon

Don't know if any of you remember but I am trying to help my friend sort his debts etc at the moment - well......... you were right it's a roller coaster!
Brilliant news! Halifax have repayed him all his bank charges, court charges, interest etc through the on-line court system!! Thanks to the info on this site I found it really easy to do. :beer: So he had £1500 paid back to him on Monday and was over the moon! :j
£1000 he owes to me for loans over the last month or two and also I paid the costs. He was really happy he could repay me and planned to spend the balance on taxing his car (been running it without for 2 months! :eek: ) and putting it through its mot (it has no hand brake at present! :eek: ). It would hopefully have left him a little bit left to keep him going till next pay day.
Yesterday his wifes car broke down! She's hassling him to get it fixed as she has no money and he is having to risk being late for work etc as he now has to take her to work & kids to 2 different schools.
After only a day of having to do this and getting constant earache from everyone who has to wait around for him (also he won't be able to afford the petrol for the round trips soon!) he now thinks that it will be his only option to give her the last of the refunded money to mend her car & forget about the mot and the hand brake on his :sad:
I sent off for his credit report but was surprised that he got back a form to fill in - I thought he would get the actual info within 7 days?
I have pursuaded him to do a very brief budget which shows plainly that he just cannot survive on his present salary and he is still talking about a re-mortgage of the family home. He has seen Ocean Finance offering deals to people with CCJ's - anyone had any experience of them? They are advertising 7.4% I think which is about 2% more than he is paying at the moment.
So from great news to down in the doldrums again all within a few days!
I suspect there will be more to come!

angchris

hiya well done with trying to help your friend:T i wish i had had someone there for me when i was going through it! it sounds like they are going through a bit of a rough patch financially and its really difficult for us to offer any suggestions to help him as we cant see the full picture. maybe you could print out a soa form from on here and take it around to his house and help them fill it in? is there anyway you could maybe pay for his mot/car tax and repairs and get him to pay you back monthly? i know this is by no means ideal but at least he would be legal on the roads! best of luck... angchris

daxon

I will offer to pay for his car prob whether he allows me to is another matter! The full story is a bit more of a prob - he & his wife have split up and she can be difficult. She removed all the money from their joint account last week and went out in a new outfit and didn't come back till 7 in the morning! Don't get me wrong he is definately not blameless but I'm just trying to be there to help him. At least his doctor was sympathetic and has given him some tablets which are helping with his depression.

angchris

sounds like a tricky one! his wife certainly isnt helping the situation either i think a decision has to be made and the quicker the better so everyone knows where they stand, if they are split up then they need to go their own seperate ways into their own accomodation with their own finances to sort out, so at least then your mate has an idea of whats coming in and whats "not" being withdrawn by her and he can then go on to sort himself out properly.

Tiff_2

daxon wrote:

I will offer to pay for his car prob whether he allows me to is another matter! The full story is a bit more of a prob - he & his wife have split up and she can be difficult. She removed all the money from their joint account last week and went out in a new outfit and didn't come back till 7 in the morning! Don't get me wrong he is definately not blameless but I'm just trying to be there to help him. At least his doctor was sympathetic and has given him some tablets which are helping with his depression.

Hi Daxon,
Regardless of the blame/reasons for the split, I'd think his immediate priority would be to set up an account in his own name - can personally recommend The Co-operative bank account which gives you a debit card - not a credit card - and the same can be said of the STEP account with NatWest - they offer a debit only Solo card.
Get him to write a letter to the bank manager (has to be a letter) saying that after whatever date, you will no longer be responsible for any further new debts from that account as my marriage has irretrievably broken down since whatever date.....
Rightly or wrongly, she shouldn't have cleared out that account. I personally don't think he should pay for her car. He should politely say that as their bank account was cleared by her last week, he does not have the funds to pay for her car repairs. I don't know the situation or the lady and it isn't any of my business, and I certainly don't mean to be nasty to anyone, but maybe she'd like to take the dress back?
Just as he has to take responsibility for the finances, so does she. The children come before cars or dresses. Take the children to school yes, but could she not take the bus to work? She has to start planning for herself and the family financially too for the times like these when things go pear-shaped.
Does she have family or friends that could help her out?
Have you been to CAB with him yet? Are any written agreements regarding bills, money etc. in place yet? These are important things.
If his car isn't on the road, then his earning capacity will also be in jeopardy which he cannot afford. I think he should take care of car repairs and MOT or Tax first so that he can carry on earning.
Also if he's seriously depressed, and it's going to go on for a long time he can get Disability Living Allowace if he's affected badly enough. He must stay in touch with his GP for monitoring. Again CAB can advise on these matters.
May I offer some unwanted advice? Make sure you are supporting and guiding your friend and not doing everything for him. It will boost his pride and confidence to know that he took part actively in trying to solve the problems.
And finally, well done you for being the friend that a lot of people would appreciate. You're giving sound advice. Just make sure that you take some time for yourself too - step back once in a while. Hope I've said something that helped - didn't mean to get the soap box out. Best wishes to you all.

bikerqueen

if he hits someone in a car with no mot his insurance wont pay out. If he's driving it, it needs to be roadworthy.

Tiff_2

bikerqueen wrote:

if he hits someone in a car with no mot his insurance wont pay out. If he's driving it, it needs to be roadworthy.

I agree bikerqueen. The most important part of all is "if he hits someone in a car..." - PLEASE do the smart thing and get it fixed! Could your friend live with the other possibility? After all, the world is full of people thinking "that could never happen to me".
And then it did...

daxon

Thank you so much for your advice Tiff and the others.
He decided yesterday that he could not bear the hassle of picking her up & taking her to work everyday as well as the kids (partiacularly as she rings to ask him how long he is going to be stuck in traffic for!) so he is going to pay to have her car sorted. He agrees that his has to be done and has asked if I can lend him the money. So cars sorted.
Next bank account - he has got a application form for the Co-op and will hopefully take it into them tomorrow. He has got a form to fill in to get his credit report.
I appreciate what you are saying about support and advice as opposed to doing everything for him. He really needs bullying into doing anything but I keep stressing to him that if he doesn't do these things he will sink further. He is very afraid about confronting his wife about financial money as he feels guilty over the split. He is so depressed he just cant face the arguements! Still he is definately much better than a month ago when they first split and he was talking about ending it all - once i have done as much as i can of course it will be up to him.
It has been a comfort to me to have somewhere else to share my involvement! Thanks again

Tiff_2

Hi Daxon - Thanks for the thanks
It sounds as though he's definately depressed. Does the GP know he thought of ending it all? Glad he's on anti - depressants - may take a while to really kick in so tell him to persevere with them, althogh the GP should be checking on him.
I hope you didn't get the impression that I meant you to abandon your friend because I didn't. You're doing the right thing - involving him when he can and stepping in when he can't. The new bank account will be the start of recovery - he'll be in charge again. Once you admit to having a problem it's very scary and this will be a small part of knowing that there's another life for him to create. There's nothing scarier than the unknown. The Co-op people are very nice and he should be accepted - think it took about 7 days, maybe a bit more and the same with NatWest.
Ok, cars sorted.
Obviously, there's a bad situation for whatever reason that has led to his marriage ending. Next thing I'd suggest as I said would be CAB - or you can go onto their website as they have all kinds of advice sheets on their that you can read at the time. That way, if you need to go to them, you'll have an idea of what they might say. The debt section on there is very good.
I don't know how long it's been since he's been in this situation, but he is bound to be going through a grieving process with the separation. Just make sure he checks in with the GP, who can also refer him on to other services such as counselling etc.
Good luck to you all. If you need any further help, there's lots of very well informed people passing through MSE.
And don't forget to fill out the sections in Martin's MSE Debt and Budgeting areas - it takes out all of the emotional pain and makes it all black and white and easier to work with especially if you're going on to consult different agencies.

daxon

Sorry don't mean to depress anyone - just felt like needing a shoulder to cry on!
Well, he paid for her car & got it on the road - I got his on the road. Then last week she told him she had decided to get a joint loan for £20k (against the house which is in his name), proceeds paid into her current account. He finally tackled her about why she needed so much and she can only account for £10k but still insisted on wanting £20k. He refused to sign the forms; huge row.
Last Sunday night I got a text from him to say - you've been a good friend, goodbye. I spoke to him to try to calm him down and then he rang me on Monday morning saying he just could not go on. I don't know the whole story after that (I cannot ring his family as they see me as a cause of trouble between him & his wife) and believe they got the police to find him.
He is now in hospital pretty poorly following an overdose.
Tuesday she told him she was going to stop him seeing the children, yesterday he text me to say she wanted to give it another try!
I'm sorry to go on about this - but I have really no-one else to tell. I think it is now time for me to bow out and leave them to sort it out themselves - I just hope they don't end up as yet another horrible debt statistic.

whatatwit

I have just read through this and you have supported your friend through everything so far.
All you can do now, is to be there for him when he wants to sound off, but if he does get back with his wife, you don't want to be the one who said to dump her, as this is what he will always remember, rather than how you bailed him out when he needed money.

I know it's none of my business, but does he still owe you money, and are you able to cope with writing this off if he does?