Ok, so let me introduce myself....

tenbob84

hi, i was in just about the exact same situation as yourself, i was living with parents and found myself in a right mess with payday loans, basically i was taking out a loan to cover what i had just paid back, both with wonga and payday uk. over around six months i paid over 1500 in interest and felt like an absolute mug. as no-one else would lend me money due to my credit rating i had no choice but to turn into a recluse for a few months, very hard it was but its the only way out of these messes.

i know exactly how it feels and what your doing is spot on, counting where all the pennies go really helps to stop wasting money, thats all that got us into the mess in the first place.

lashley82

So with Pay day on the horizon its time to go through everything I owe and my plan of attack, and work out my owings to the penny

I currently owe the following to PDL Lenders. My sig is wrong, theres 4, not 3 PDL's left and my amounts owing are incorrect. Details are f'in important!

Swift Sterling - £503.92
Money Shop - £250 left out of the original £350 I had
WDA - £259
Quickquid - £194.25

Pounds to Pockets Loan - £1537.63. £1132.80 paid, £404.83 left in 3 instalments

Creation Finance - £1305, £362.50 paid £942.50 left over 26 instalments

HSBC Overdraft - Sat at £1093.37, My limit was £800

Capital One card Balance £297.22, Limit £300
Barclaycard (Old Egg) Balance £741.20 Limit £750
Barclaycard (Orange) Balance £1017.20 Limit £1000

lashley82

So what progress have I made. I owed well over a bag of sand to Wonga which I managed to grit my teeth and pay over 2 months. I also had a small debt to Zebra Finance which was the cost of my season ticket for the football (a perk I have rescinded for this season)

So what am I going to do. this month the Swift Sterling PDL is the first to go. Makes sense as its the biggest. I have another instalment of P2P coming out for £141.60 and Creation for £36.25

The original plan was to kill off another PDL, either WDA or the Money Shop. But HSBC havecome to the fore. I have been talking to them a little ove the overdraft situation. Where my account has been dormant (yet over the limit) I have been left alone. Now I got a few calls from them saying basically if I don't start paying money in the overdraft could be taken away. Apparently I still have a limit, but if I don't bring back within that limit before the months out they will refer me to a collection agency, if i dont pay within 40 days they will officially register the debt as a default on my credit file. Which while I have taken a battering I don't want. I checked to see whether the 40 day period would hit my next payday but sadly it wont.

So instead of being another PDL light, weighing up the options another £300 will go to the bank

Its going to be another very tight month. But then I knew that

Then roughly I can pan out the rest as follows

End of Oct - Remaining Pay Day Loans Disappear
End of Nov - final P2P instalment paid off, clear Capital One card (being largest APR) and cancel, payment towards overdraft
End of Dec - Pay a wodge towards the Overdraft at least 50-60% of whats remaining, larger payments towards 2 credit cards
End of Jan - Investigate the possibility of Clearing Creation Finance in one hit. Further OD payment
End of Feb - Clear Barclaycard
End of Mar - Clear as much of Remaining Orange Balance as possible

1st April - Celebrate April Fools by knowing I am a fool no more

Obviously these are rough guidelines. I may not make it in time for the 1st, but thats my target. Lucky 7 paydays to do it

Wish me luck

CarolynCh

Good Luck

I like your long term plan - it's a really good idea to have a goal which is then broken down into smaller chunks as you then get a high when each of the "chunks" are achieved.

I wonder if you should leave the Creation Finance for the time being (obviously still making the monthly payments of course!) as it is a structured loan and so long as you are servicing it properly it will be fine as it is. Think of it as a monthly expense for renting your pc (if I remember rightly) rather than as a debt until everything else is clear. Surely it would be better to clear the credit cards first? I also wondered about your Barclaycard/Orange credit card - are you able to get it back within its limit this month as won't they be piling on the extra charges/higher interest if you are over the limit (never mind bothering you with letters/phone calls no doubt)? Just a thought.

lashley82

A quick update(as I know its been a little while)

Upon payday I started attacking as I intended. Sadly I couldn't clear all the payday loans that I wanted but have cleared some. The £300 that I needed to urgently pay to HSBC put paid to that, but thats £300 off my overdraft with them. I cleared £189.77 from Swift Sterling, and £75 from the money shop and delayed the rest. I rolled over WDA and Quickquid as planned and sadly thats £136.35 in interest charges alone but is a charge I've needed to swallow. I've decided to look at it as an idiot tax.

On top of that I paid off £63.05 across my cards. My instalment on PSP was £141.60 and my creation finance instalment of £36.25 also went

So in total I have spent in repayments and fees £942.02

Ouch

I knew the first month would be the toughest.

tenbob84

chin up mate the figures ARE getting smaller and it wont be long untill payday

tinkerbel

You're doing well Lashley! At least the numbers are going down and not up!!