Letter from NatWest

Macca1983

Just received a letter from NatWest saying they want to discuss my overdraft in terms of reducing it.

Sounds fair enough to me, would like to do so but by doing this could they possibly make things too impossible for me? Falling into their trap for example.

Gordon_Hose

I had one back in September 2010. I had a £1000 overdraft and was in it every single month. Basically they will discuss your options to clear it. Mine were to set up a payment plan each month to reduce it, or extend the loan I have with them for an extra year to free up the money need to pay off the O/D in full, there and then. Taking the loan worked out better interest wise, so I took that option.

They are very helpful, and you don't have to do anything they suggest.

Tixy

Hopefully if you can propose a solution / repayment plan they should accept it. So before you contact them I'd try to work out how much you could afford to reduce the overdraft by each month.

They could decide your repayment plan is not satisfactory or not quick enough and might decide to recall the overdraft in full or a proportion of it straight away, but if they've asked you to talk to them and you don't then this is even more likely to happen.

One thing to watch out for, and be very wary of, is if they try to sell you a loan to pay off the overdraft, if they try to do this I would ask to take away the loan documentation with you and then come back to them, don't sign up then and there, make sure you give yourself time to read them, understand the rate and cost compared to the cost of your overdraft etc. Remember that regardless of what they say to you, if they offer you a loan its because thats in their best interest not yours.

Gordon_Hose

Re-financing with them saved me money in the long run.

Tixy

Gordon_Hose wrote: »

Re-financing with them saved me money in the long run.

It definitely can for some people - but there are also a lot of cases of people signing up for agreements which either cost them more due to much higher APRs and due to a fluctuating balance on an overdraft, or that they could not afford to stick to (and realistically never could have done). Its just best to take some time and do a bit of research before agreeing to new commitments.

stclair

Macca1983 wrote: »

Just received a letter from NatWest saying they want to discuss my overdraft in terms of reducing it.

Sounds fair enough to me, would like to do so but by doing this could they possibly make things too impossible for me? Falling into their trap for example.

You may want to consider a reducing overdraft so the overdraft reduces by X amount every month until it gets to a suitable and manageable level.

Remember that overdrafts are repayable on demand so they could pull the plug on it at anytime... :eek: