barclaycard debt - freezing interest?

mistrey

Hi

My husband currently has a debt with barclaycard of £18000. We are struggling to keep up with the payments and seem to pay off the minimum then spend up to the amount we paid off each month, therefore never getting the debt down. What do people think the chances of them freezing my account of interest are if we write to them explaining our situation, and why we are struggling and offer to pay them as much as we can afford (we will obviously make a reasonable offer of a monthly payment)?

Have they been known to do this in the past? It would make such a difference if we could do this, otherwise we seem to be looking at an IVA or Bankruptcy.

Jilly38

Hi there

I am just in the process of a DMP with payplan but now looking at the DAS scheme (only available in Scotland). All I can say is so far the majority of my creditors have been very understanding apart from Barclaycard! I owe around £3500 and also was finding that every month when I paid nearly all went back on interest! So far I haven't been impressed with them at all.......I have telephoned them and sent several letters but so far not willing to play ball. Just got a statement from them today again, lots of charges etc.

They must have heard from Payplan by now but have not had any acknowledgement at all from them. From reading other posts it would seem people have different experiences. I expected MBNA to be a nightmare but so far they have been quite understanding and received an understanding letter from the today.

Well good luck. In total I have about £20k debt. Have you contacted Payplan or CCCS. I must say Payplan have been very helpful and got things up and running in no time......only downside so far is they can't guarantee interest etc is stopped. Might be good to give them a call.

Regards
Jilly

katevw1

Hi, I got reduced payments accepted by Barclaycard when I couldn't meet mt payments. The didn't freeze my interest but they did reduce it substantially without my having to ask for it. They marked my credit file as "arrangement" but at at least it doesn't say late or missed payments. Without doubt they have been the most helpful company within my rather large financial mountain.

Ellieseleven

Hi, it's hard to know exactly what they will do as they seem to treat everyone differently. They have passed my OH over to a DCA but on my account they have accepted reduced payments and frozen the interest. OH owed Barclaycard a couple of thousand more than me but that was the only difference

Ellie xx

Sparkle78

All 5 of my maxed out credit cards have been willing to take £1 a month with no interest. 2 asked for £7-15. Will obviously never pay anything off (hence selling my house) however it is helping in the meantime until I get myself sorted. They were taking more in interest than I was paying! It's a weight off your mind til things improve. All I did was get the template off a debt advice site and wrote down every single outgoing (adding a few extras here and there to decrease available cash) and they were totally fine, saying it would be reviewed in 6 months but all have been running for over a year and no contact from them apart from the monthly statement. You can pay as much as you like. It's better to pay something rather than nothing but it affects your credit rating however, in this day and age, does it really matter if it improves your life right now when you need less stress... good luck!

mistrey

Thanks for all your replies. I suppose there is no harm in asking them, does anyone know where I can get a template letter to do this? He owes £18,000 on this card, an inredible figure considering he only earns £15,000 a year. He is currently on some special deal, whereby if he spends £25 a month on the card he pays greatly reduced minimum payments (around £250 instead of £400) however this just means that he is being charged greater interest on these purchase as they are obviously putting his payments to the lower APR things.

eyeopener2

mistrey wrote: »

Thanks for all your replies. I suppose there is no harm in asking them, does anyone know where I can get a template letter to do this? He owes £18,000 on this card, an inredible figure considering he only earns £15,000 a year. He is currently on some special deal, whereby if he spends £25 a month on the card he pays greatly reduced minimum payments (around £250 instead of £400) however this just means that he is being charged greater interest on these purchase as they are obviously putting his payments to the lower APR things.

Woah! He needs to stop spending on this, the interest charged will be going through the roof. OK the minimum will go up but he will NEVER pay it off, the balance will be increasing every month by £150 by the sound of it (thats without the purchases)

Do other people read it this way? I've never heard of this system, Seems a bit dangerous.

Sparkle78

National Debtline website has a section for sample letters!! Honest, the banks etc will try and help you, I didn't think they would but they would rather have something rather than nothing.