Wherediditallgo’s ‘path to enlightenment’ bankruptcy diary

Mike_St_Helens

wherediditallgo wrote: »

Yes, it can. Please make sure it's got the name Busy Cartright above or below it as the writer & copyright owner, though - I'll get in trouble with Equity if I don't specify that. If you put "Copyright owned and retained by Busy Cartright, 22 April 2007. Reproduction only with my written permission", that will be fine. Thanks.

Thank you Thank you Thank you so so so so so much... Im gonna make a whole page with this... XXXX

wherediditallgo

No problem. Thanks for the comments, everyone.

jbaugh

Easy come easy go
ask the OR they should know
Once so well thought of
now you are shunned
oh boy the neighbours they will be so stuned

the flash car the farawy trips
the plush shag carpet its all but a fix
little do they realise
you used it just to stabalise

food on the table clothes on your back
praying to god you dont get the sack
wanting to be normal wanting to be free
wiling to start again at the bottom of the tree

so with your sly grin and you niggly digs
dont you dare look down on me you self gratifying figs!




was going to put pigs but i thought that was rude lol amasing what a gallo white grenache can do for ones wax lyrical side lol

jbaugh

have to say where did it all go yours is fabtastic!

wherediditallgo

jbaugh wrote: »

have to say where did it all go yours is fabtastic!

Thanks. And also thanks to Mike for putting it on the BCSC site.

wherediditallgo

26 April - got paid yesterday. Waited until this morning to use the Co-op's internet banking to see if my salary was there, & it is! :j:j:j My account has a nice healthy balance for once. I know loads of it's going to go on bills etc so that I can catch up on last month, but it's so nice to know that NONE of it will be going on bank charges, an overdraft etc.

Still haven't heard anything from the OR. They told me a few days after my hearing that I would be getting an IPA, but I've heard nothing about it. Part of me thinks they must be doing a lot of checking on what I've said on my SOA or be very unhappy with what they've found out so far, but I can't think what that could be. No diamond mines, no off-shore accounts, no property in Monaco, no 'bride for cash' deals - nothing except not enough money or health to meet my outgoings. Sometimes I wish they'd just give me a figure so that I can decide what to do from that point on. At the moment, I'm in limbo - I paid some of the cash I took out just before BR into the Co-op account last Saturday, & I've still got some of the cash here, but I'm too scared to touch that unless I have to until I know what the OR's got in store for me. I'm going into hospital next week for hopefully my last operation, so I'll write to the OR to let him know he won't be able to reach me until I'm discharged. Maybe that letter will remind him that I exist.

wherediditallgo

27 April - Didn't get a chance to put the letter in the post to the OR, as he rang me at work today! :eek: As it turned out, it was a good conversation, well as good as I could possibly have hoped for. He went through my SOA with me for about 15 mins - he managed to fit a lot of questions into a short time, but maybe that's just the way it came over, & as I didn't have any of my papers with me I had to think on my feet. First question was about my personal loan - he wanted clarification of how much it was for & why I got it. I explained that it was around the £10k mark when I got it in 2003-4, so with interest it had risen to about £13k. I told him that at that time, I'd had more credit cards than I had now, so I'd used the money to pay off a lot of credit card debts, but didn't earn enough money to get a large enough loan to clear them all, so was still left with some debts to deal with. He asked when I'd last used the credit cards - I told him I hadn't used them for at least 2 possibly 4 years in some cases, but hadn't been able to close the accounts as I'd been told that if I wanted to do that I'd have to settle the whole card debt in full, which I obviously couldn't afford to do. I was therefore dealing with statements showing old debt plus interest. Never will I go the "consolidation loan" route again!

He asked about my company pension scheme. He said they can't claim off my pension as I'm not getting it yet & won't be entitled to it for several years, but they need to have details about it. He therefore needs details of the company, pension address, policy number etc. I don't mind phoning to ask, but it's an NHS pension scheme so I don't know how much they'll tell me before they want to know why I'm asking for the info. He also wanted to know whether I had any vehicles (I said no, as I don't drive), whether I owned any property (I said I never had) & whether I had any large amounts of savings (I said possibly a small building society account with a few pounds in it, which I'd put on the SOA, but my premium bonds had been cashed in ages ago).

He asked about my courses, & said my employer should be covering the costs of work-related study. I told him one of my courses was the ECDL (European Computer Driving Licence), & that though my employer will cover the cost of the course itself & the exams, you have to provide your own internet connection, your own computer & do the study in your own time. I said it was necessary for me to do the course because I was older than many of my colleagues, & my pay as well as career progression would be affected if they did the course & I didn't. He seemed satisfied with that, but time will tell.

He asked if I had any questions, so I took the opportunity to tell him I was going into hospital, so he shouldn't contact me by 'phone until after I'd let him know I was back at home. Also told him that Lovefilm/Screenselect had just put a DCA on me because after closing my account I'd returned all their dvds to them, & now they were saying that one hadn't been received & were threatening court action etc. He asked how much they wanted. I told him it was only £10, but I knew I didn't owe it so didn't see why I should pay it. He said I could pay it if I wanted to as it's a small amount, but alternatively I could send the letters to him as any debt incurred before BR was covered by the BR, so I said I'd do that instead.

He said that with my income, my IPA will be at least the £50 minimum. He said that I'd done the right thing in putting down everything I paid for, but some things weren't allowed - he didn't specify them, but I'm guessing he's talking about my Sky & my broadband. He didn't query any actual figures with me, which I was very relieved about - hopefully, that means it's not the amount they have the problem with, it's what the money pays for that's the issue. I politely told him that I appreciated they had a lot of cases to deal with, but I was finding the wait for a decision very stressful, especially with my impending surgery to think about as well, & needed to know what it was going to be asap so that I could start to move my life forward. He apologised for the delay (volume of work) & said that what used to happen was that all your income & outgoings were put into a pot & put before the court, but because of the volume of cases they now try to agree an amount with the BR. So if I was asked for £100 & felt it was too much, I could appeal & they'd discuss it & try to come to an agreement with me. It's only if we couldn't agree a compromise figure would the matter have to go to a court. Take it from me - if they ask me for £100, they'll be getting that without any dispute on my part. I was paying near enough that to one creditor alone! He talked about how BR was usually for 12 months, but in some cases was suspended & longer, but said my case seemed quite straightforward so that wasn't likely to apply to me.

The one thing I had to be careful about was the use of forum abbreviations. I found it very difficult not to say OR instead of Official Receiver, BR instead of bankrupt, SOA etc & that's from spending so much time here. I just didn't think it would go down very well if I started talking like I knew what was what, especially when the IPA hadn't been set yet, so I watched what I said very carefully & played the innocent novice for all I was worth.

Anyway, it's been a good day. Lovefilm/Screenselect aren't getting the money for their blessed dvd (which I'll delight in telling them & their DCA), & it looks like I'll be getting an IPA for under £100. I can't wait for the letter now.

wherediditallgo

28 April - Had hoped to go to the BCSC meet-up today, but not a chance. I've just spent all afternoon consoling a friend who's been well & truly stitched up by her ex. Part of the reason they split up was because of their money problems, but yesterday she found out that he'd gone BR without telling her - she found out because a copy of his BR order was put through the door while she was at work (I bet he got someone else to do it in case he was seen). Everything they had was in joint names - the flat, the loans & the credit cards. When he left he said rather than make her sell the flat to get his share of the proceeds, he'd be happy for her to stay there as long as she covered the mortgage & all the bills, & he offered to sign a document confirming he was no longer living there, & she thought he was doing her a big favour as she loves it & really didn't want to sell up. She was so pleased at him being so understanding she didn't think to get him to sign away any financial interest in the property - he's only been gone a few months, so everything's still very new & raw for her, & she was just glad the relationship was over. But the result is now that, with him going BR on Thursday, she's responsible for all the joint debts - she reckons there's at least £20k on cards alone, because she remembers when they got them & why, but now she's worried it's more than that. She hasn't even looked at the loans yet.

She works part-time & there's no way she can pay that level of debt off on top of her own debts. She's been crying & drinking all afternoon, but has just about retained her sense of humour - she said she can't even jump off a bridge because she's now too drunk to get there. I know going BR is her only option, but I want her to calm down before I say anything about it to her.

Why do people do this? If you don't want to live with someone any more, fair enough. But why do something you full well know is going to saddle them with your debts, ruin their credit rating etc, just because you can?

allofadither

Oh WDIAG, I feel so sad after reading todays diary entry. My heart goes out to your friend. It's one thing to go BR when you've made that decision yourself, but to have it thrust upon you thru no fault of your own is just awful. What a dreadful shock for her, and perhaps the only saving grace at the moment is that she has you to help her thru this crisis. I'm a firm believer that what goes around comes around and one day her ex will get what he truly deserves!

wherediditallgo

I've posted about it in the thread "Some ex's are really nasty when you split up" , as I'm wondering if anyone in the forum has experienced/done the same thing. I really don't get why someone would do something so horrible. We've all heard the revenge stories - women cutting up the OH's clothes or putting fish in the car, that sort of thing. I've always known this guy to be pretty crafty - one of the first to spot a deal/opportunity etc, but never did I think he'd do something like this. To be honest, it didn't occur to me that anyone would do that to someone else. It's not even as if they had a horrible break-up because of someone else - they just gradually fell out of love, & were really getting on each other's nerves by the end (plus the money problems didn't help), so they agreed it was for the best, & it all seemed pretty amicable. It seems so cold & calculated - even if he didn't originally intend to do this, he must have known what he was doing a few days before, when he saw her out shopping but didn't say a thing to her.

When my ex & I split up it was my decision, & I don't regret it. But I'm so glad I remembered my mother's advice to never have joint accounts on anything. Our split was pretty acrimonious, but at least I didn't have this horrible situation to deal with afterwards. My friend dealt with the split reasonably well (there are times when it gets to her, e.g. people ringing who don't realise he doesn't live there any more), but this has really broken her. I've never seen her so upset.