Help with RBS loan...can't afford the payments!

raachel29

I'm looking for some advice regarding an unsecured loan my partner took out 3/4 years ago.
There is £17,000 outstanding, all of the interest has been paid off already.
The payments are £435 pm and we really cannot afford them. My partner is self employed and is struggling at the moment, and I'm not currently working as I'm expecting twins in July.
We have called RBS to see about extending the loan over a longer period to reduce the payments, or offering reduced payments but they have refused.
To date 4 payments have been missed, and last week we received a letter saying they were shutting my partners bank accounts with effect from June.
We have sorted out the bank account side of things by him coming onto my account with a different bank, but I'm really concerned about the loan repayments.
We are not refusing to pay it back, but we literally cannot afford the repayments at all at the current rate.

Tixy

Hi

If your partner cannot meet the repayments then if this is his only unsecured debt suggest that he writes to them and explains his circumstance and sets out how much he can afford to pay a month. There are useful template letters on the national debtline website which could help with this.

Do his bank accounts with RBS have outstanding overdrafts that he will also need to repay?

This will mean that a default is marked on his credit file for the loan and that will stay on his file for the next 6years, though they may have already issued a default notice after 4 missed payments.

In the letter its worth asking them to freeze interest & charges on the account - they don't have to but they often will if they believe you are paying all you can afford (he hasn't actually paid all the interest off already, he will have paid some capital and some interest).

If he has other unsecured debts then it would probably be worth getting one of the debt advice charities involved for them to help him and to help calculate what you can afford and make offers on his behalf (a debt management plan).

Hopefully the bank will accept his reduced payments until such time he can afford to increase them. Given the large amount of the loan its possible they may still consider court action to obtain a CCJ, but even if they do he can still ask the court to be allowed to pay in installments at a rate he can afford.

It might be useful to post up a statement of affairs on the debt free wannabe section of the forum, where people can help you work out how much to offer a month for the debt, and can perhaps help you find ways where you may be able to cut your outgoings.

opinions4u

Talk to CAB or a debt charity.

Visit https://www.makesenseofcards.co.uk and complete a statement of affairs. SOA.

Post that on the Debt free Wannabe part of this forum and ask for help there.

Make sure you prioritise your bills appropriately. This loan is LESS IMPORTANT than rent, council tax, food, water, lighting, heating etc. But it's more important than Sky, mobile phones, newspapers, Starbucks, Tesco Finest, fortnightly haircuts etc.

raachel29

Thanks....this is the only debt he has. There are no overdrafts on his accounts, so nothing else to repay back to RBS.
We don't have Sky, Virgin etc, and the mobiles are PAYG so we just don't top them up lol

heartbreak_star

Pop on the DFW board, post an SOA and let the lovely folks on there see if they can help!

HBS x

raachel29

What's an SOA?

Tixy

SoA - statement of affairs - basically a list of your debts, income & expenditure, we use the calculator that opinions4u posted a link to in post #3.

JJT

We are currently in exactly the same situation and RBS where of no help to us either. I submitted a complaint back in February stating how disgusted i was with the way we have been treated as they always say go in and speak to them if you have problems. To date they still have not responded to my complaint apart from an acknowlegment. Its like you say its not that you wont pay you just need a little temporary help. I really hope they come back and give you some help. Keep us posted!