Discount for early repayment

lisa701

Only just found this forum, so nice to be able to chat with people in a similar position to me who won't judge.

To cut a long story short I've just made a payment arrangement for my halifax bank account. The company who has taken it on said that if I could repay it in full at any time they could offer me a discount. Clearly I'm not in that sort of position as yet, but has anyone else got any experience of this? What sort of discount would they be likely to offer?

Many thanks

FireWyrm

It really is 'how long is a piece of string'. Even if you compare settlements from the same company, you will find big differences in what was offered as a 'discount' and it's really down to individual circumstances, how good you've been at paying, how desperate they are for a settlement and how much you can offer. My experience is somewhere around the 10% off mark is a good starting point, but some anechdotal evidence suggests some companies might be willing to take a 30% hit in favor of getting something at least.

SusieT

As above there is no set discount, it will depend on a lot of things like who owns the account how long it would take you to pay off at the current rate what likelyhood they think there is of getting all the money and if you are defaulted on the account! If you have not defaulted and are going to pay it off in the next year or so and want to keep a clean credit file then you would be looking at paying 70% or more of the amount outstanding, if like me its going to take ages to repay and its been defaulted and sold on then I have current offers of 50% which neither I nor my family can afford and have previously settled one at under 25% so over 75% discount.

lisa701

Thanks for your replies. My credit file is rubbish anyway so I don't think it can get any worse!

I was just interested to know how much they usually offer. I don't see me coming into a lump sum in the forseeable future but it would be nice to know how big a lump sum I would need to clear a debt of £1300 with any potential discount.

Will just keep on paying and see what happens in the future.