£2500 Debt - Advice Needed Please

micky007

Hi Guys,

I cashed an American cheque in on the 21st January 2011 from a company who owed me the money from myself doing freelance online marketing from them. There were a few rumours that they were going bust so I was worried I would never get paid. However to my surprise I received an international cheque from them and cashed it in my Halifax Account. I had to fill in a form which they then sent the cheque off to be processed, I was told I will get a letter in the mail letting me know when the cheque has cleared and the funds have gone in my account and also how much had gone in as the cheque was in USD not GBP. Now I was still worried that it may not clear because of the rumours, 7 days later the funds became available in my account so I was guessing that the cheque had cleared, so I then went ahead and used all the money to pay off things like my Student Finance and other bills. Yesterday I went to the bank to withdraw some cash and it wouldn’t let me and showed I was in negative balance of over £2,000. I contact the bank and they said the cheque had bounced and I will receive a letter in the mail with the cheque returned explain why it bounced. I then complained and asked them why did you clear the funds in the bank if the cheque was still being processed and you didn’t know if it had cleared or not. She told me as stated in the T&C that they have up to a month to bounce a cheque from the date it was cashed in, which of course I didn’t know about and was not informed about. I still don’t understand why they cleared the cheque in the first place and now they are saying on the last day of the bounce period that it bounced.

So I'm now over £2000 in debt and I'm in need of some help, what’s the best way for me to go about this as now I cannot use my bank account or debit cards because I’m in negative balance. Should I get a loan to pay it off? Should I get a credit card and maybe charge the credit card £2,000 from PayPal and then withdraw the funds from my PayPal account to the bank account?

I'm really stressing out over this and not sure what to do, I'm currently unemployed and Ex-Student (finished my HND) if that’s any use to you guys. Any help/advice would be gratefully appreciated.

Thank you.

ellesbellesxxx

Oh no! Sorry I can't help but didn't want to read and runxx

Tixy

If you are unemployed then I doubt getting a loan or a credit card is going to be an option for you. Also how would you afford the repayments for it? Presumably your halifax bank account does not have any agreed overdraft?

I would first set up a new bank account asap with a bank that is not connected to yours. If you are struggling to get accepted for a full account then ask for a basic bank account. Once you have that ensure any money you have coming in (benefits etc) get switched to the new bank account.
Once you have done that you need to write to your current bank and explain the situation and that you are not currently in a position to repay the money in full as you are unemployed. Instead offer them a monthly amount you can afford and ask them to freeze interest & charges on your account. State in your letter that should your circumstances improve or if you get further funds from your debtor you will increase your offer or repay the outstanding balance.

Are you chasing the firm in America for your money?

micky007

I've just tried to get hold of the company today but noone seems to be answering the phones which leads me to believe they have offically shut down their operations. My minds all over the place because of this, im now searching for jobs just so i can help repay back this money as soon as possible.

I'm going crazy here.

fatbelly

Tixy's advice is good. The most important thing is to protect your income. There's a list of basic bank accounts here:

http://www.moneymadeclear.org.uk/pdfs/bank_accounts.pdf