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Hey, my boyfriend took out a loan with Nemo Finance in 2006 for £50,000. The interest was variable and initially at 9.1%. Since then they've increased it a few times due to the Bank of England rate rising (that's the reason they gave) so now it's 10.3%. But when the Bank of England rate fell they didn't put it back down - they said they couldn't do that. He's been paying for over 6 years now and still owes in excess of £47,000. There are early repayment fees for the first 8 years and also an admin charge of sorts for early repayment. It feels like he'll never get free of them, he's already paid 6 years of between £400 - £470 per month, but they want more! It just feels so unfair. He was in a desperate position at the time and they take advantage of people who are in that position. Is there anything we can? The loan is secured against his house.
Thanks.0 -
angel1973.123 wrote: »hi there. I would really like some advice. During the christmas period, and in January, (as it was my twin sons 18 birthday), i took out 3 pay day loans, thinking I would not have a problem paying them back. But i was working 2 jobs at that point, but i have recently lost one of the jobs, and have had my hours cut in my second job!!!!! i owe approx £1000, and am supposed to pay this at the end of the month, but am not going to be able too. Is there anyway I can get payments reduced, and the interest frozen?
Thanks you
Hi Angel,
If you know that the payday loan payment is going to be impossible to pay then it’s better to stop it before they try to take a payment. Payday loans will usually make you sign up to something called a “continuous payment authority”(CPA) when you take out the loan, this gives them permission to take payments from your debit card.
While CPAs are trickier to cancel than a Direct Debit, it is possible. This blogpost will take you through how to cancel a continuous payment authority (http://moneyaware.co.uk/2012/07/how-to-cancel-a-continuous-payment-authority-cpa-on-a-payday-loan/) and provide you with links to template letters you might need. Bear in mind that you may incur charges for not making the payment on the loan, though if they request a payment and the bank rejects it you have these charges anyway plus the bank charges on top.
Once you’ve stopped the payday loan company from taking payments you need to start thinking about alternative ways of paying the debt. We can help you with this. We can help you plan out an income and expenditure budget, which will show what you can afford to pay towards your debts and we’ll be able to give you advice on how to deal with the debts.
You can get help from us online, using our Debt Remedy tool (http://www.stepchange.org/msehelp) or you can give us a call and talk to an advisor (http://www.stepchange.org/Contactus.aspx). It's up to the payday loan company whether they want to stop interest and charges, but quite often they will do this if you are offering them a reasonable monthly payment (we can advise you on this).
All the best.
JamesI work as a debt advisor for StepChange Debt Charity (formerly CCCS) and have specific permission from Martin to post on these boards to try and help those in debt. Read more information on StepChange Debt Charity in the Debt Problems: What to do and where to get help article. If you find you're struggling with debt and you need further help try our online advice facility Debt Remedy
If money worries are keeping you awake, read Paul's success story at Need to Sleep0 -
Hey, my boyfriend took out a loan with Nemo Finance in 2006 for £50,000. The interest was variable and initially at 9.1%. Since then they've increased it a few times due to the Bank of England rate rising (that's the reason they gave) so now it's 10.3%. But when the Bank of England rate fell they didn't put it back down - they said they couldn't do that. He's been paying for over 6 years now and still owes in excess of £47,000. There are early repayment fees for the first 8 years and also an admin charge of sorts for early repayment. It feels like he'll never get free of them, he's already paid 6 years of between £400 - £470 per month, but they want more! It just feels so unfair. He was in a desperate position at the time and they take advantage of people who are in that position. Is there anything we can? The loan is secured against his house.
Thanks.
Hi Snooze,
Thanks for posting and welcome to the forum.
As this debt is secured to your boyfriend's house it's important that he maintains payments to make sure his property is safe. I can understand how frustrating it must be to have paid so much but seen the balance come down very little.
I'm not entirely sure there is a lot he can do in this situation. It might be worth checking the paperwork that he signed at the start to see what it says about the variable interest rate, but I'd expect Nemo wouldn't increase interest unless that was established in the original agreement.
It's very hard to prove that a debt was provided unfairly, some people legally challenge their credit agreements as they don't feel they had the ability to understand what they were signing up to. This is more of a legal issue though and I've not spoken to many people who've been successful. If you'd like to explore this further I'd recommend speaking to Community Legal Advice (https://www.gov.uk/community-legal-advice).
Hope this helps.
JamesI work as a debt advisor for StepChange Debt Charity (formerly CCCS) and have specific permission from Martin to post on these boards to try and help those in debt. Read more information on StepChange Debt Charity in the Debt Problems: What to do and where to get help article. If you find you're struggling with debt and you need further help try our online advice facility Debt Remedy
If money worries are keeping you awake, read Paul's success story at Need to Sleep0 -
Hi there
I haven't been on this site for some time but was wondering if you might be able to offer me some advice.
Between my husband & I we have around £35k debt! The majority in my name £30k plus we have worked my husbands to be around £3k so we have contacted all his debtors and come to a monthly arrangement.
The problem is now clearing mine. I haven enquired about an IVA but decided it wasn't for me. I know that and IVA takes all your spare money the problem with that is that we want to adopt and if all our spare income is completely tied up in an IVA then although it will be good that we are clearing the debt it will show we won't have a y spare cash to bring up a child. The debts are from when we were a lot younger and stupid! We have certainly learnt from this.
Anyway we discussed yesterday that perhaps I should try to come to monthly agreements with my debtors my self?
Also i know of at least 1 large debt that does not feature on ANY of my credit reports? Should I just wait for them to get in touch?
I also have 3 CCJ's how do I go about getting touch about starting to clear those?
And lastly once we have repayment plans in place does this start to have a positive impact on our credit scoring? We know its going to take 5-10 years to clear this but I am only 30 and we would like to try in the future to buy our 1st house but are aware we will not be able to do this with bad credit so we just want to make sure anything positive we are doing is actually having a positive affect on our credit score?
I hope this makes sense.
Any help/advice you could provide would be greatly appreciated!
Mrs WardMurphy's No more Pie's Club - Member No. 182 & very proud
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Hi all, it looks as though I may be heading towards a DMP
One thing is worrying me, alot of my debt is with HSBC, so I am going to move banks to ensure they don't try to take away my overdraft when I get paid.
The problem is I am on the bank mandate for a Charity (which is incorporated by gurantee - so I am a Director/Trustee), the Charity also banks with HSBC and has money in the account, this is a seperate legal entity, I just want to check that HSBC couldn't use the right of set off with my debts and take money out of the Charity bank account? I need to stay on the mandate for the Charity as I am one of the main signatures?
Could anyone point me in the direction of the rules?
Many thanks0 -
Hi there
I haven't been on this site for some time but was wondering if you might be able to offer me some advice.
Between my husband & I we have around £35k debt! The majority in my name £30k plus we have worked my husbands to be around £3k so we have contacted all his debtors and come to a monthly arrangement.
The problem is now clearing mine. I haven enquired about an IVA but decided it wasn't for me. I know that and IVA takes all your spare money the problem with that is that we want to adopt and if all our spare income is completely tied up in an IVA then although it will be good that we are clearing the debt it will show we won't have a y spare cash to bring up a child. The debts are from when we were a lot younger and stupid! We have certainly learnt from this.
Anyway we discussed yesterday that perhaps I should try to come to monthly agreements with my debtors my self?
Also i know of at least 1 large debt that does not feature on ANY of my credit reports? Should I just wait for them to get in touch?
I also have 3 CCJ's how do I go about getting touch about starting to clear those?
And lastly once we have repayment plans in place does this start to have a positive impact on our credit scoring? We know its going to take 5-10 years to clear this but I am only 30 and we would like to try in the future to buy our 1st house but are aware we will not be able to do this with bad credit so we just want to make sure anything positive we are doing is actually having a positive affect on our credit score?
I hope this makes sense.
Any help/advice you could provide would be greatly appreciated!
Mrs Ward
Hello,
Thanks for posting. There are a few questions to answer here, so I'll number my responses to make sure everything's covered.
1) I wouldn't rule out an IVA just because your finances are likely to change. While it would definitely need to be taken into account when applying for an IVA, it would be possible to adjust the payments if your situation changed (called a variation). I don't know enough about your finances to say if an IVA is right for you but it's worth considering alongside all the other things. (Good luck with the adoption by the way)
2) Coming to monthly agreements with your debts is a reasonable strategy. Again, I don't know if it's the best thing for your particular situation but it is for many people. If you go down this route it's important that your payments offered are realistic and fairly distributed between your debts.
3) The CCJs should be the thing at the top of your list to sort out, to avoid further action being taken. If you call our helpline(http://www.stepchange.org/Contactus.aspx) we can talk you through how you adjust them to affordable monthly instalments. It'll involve submitting this court form: http://hmctsformfinder.justice.gov.uk/courtfinder/forms/n245-eng.pdf.
4) I doubt organising payment plans will improve your credit history unless you're payments are equal to or more than the full payments. If you're paying less than that your credit report will record the lower payments. On the other hand, having agreements in place should reduce the chance of further CCJs which make your credit history worse.
I'd recommend getting in touch with us for in depth advice, we can help you plan a budget and give you recommendations on which options would suit you best. You'd still have the option of negotiating directly with your creditors but could use a budget you planned with us to help you.
You can get advice by calling our helpling (link above) or by using our online advice tool, Debt Remedy (http://www.stepchange.org/msehelp).
All the best.
JamesI work as a debt advisor for StepChange Debt Charity (formerly CCCS) and have specific permission from Martin to post on these boards to try and help those in debt. Read more information on StepChange Debt Charity in the Debt Problems: What to do and where to get help article. If you find you're struggling with debt and you need further help try our online advice facility Debt Remedy
If money worries are keeping you awake, read Paul's success story at Need to Sleep0 -
Hi all, it looks as though I may be heading towards a DMP
One thing is worrying me, alot of my debt is with HSBC, so I am going to move banks to ensure they don't try to take away my overdraft when I get paid.
The problem is I am on the bank mandate for a Charity (which is incorporated by gurantee - so I am a Director/Trustee), the Charity also banks with HSBC and has money in the account, this is a seperate legal entity, I just want to check that HSBC couldn't use the right of set off with my debts and take money out of the Charity bank account? I need to stay on the mandate for the Charity as I am one of the main signatures?
Could anyone point me in the direction of the rules?
Many thanks
Hello,
I wouldn't feel too glum about the prospect of a DMP, for many people it's the start of things getting better!
Moving bank accounts is a good idea, even if HSBC aren't going to take your money it will give you peace of mind if you're getting paid into a bank account they can't access.
There's a little bit of information about the right of set off here: http://www.fsa.gov.uk/consumerinformation/product_news/banking/new_guidelines.
It sounds like the charity account you are involved with isn't actually in your name, which means the bank shouldn't take money from it for your debts. The right of set off affects bank accounts that you're named on - so they may take payments from your own current account to pay a loan. They shouldn't take money from an account that isn't in your name, even if you're a signatory on the account.
You may want to talk to the bank just to make sure that the accounts are set up this way, but it sounds like you'll be fine.
Kind regards
JamesI work as a debt advisor for StepChange Debt Charity (formerly CCCS) and have specific permission from Martin to post on these boards to try and help those in debt. Read more information on StepChange Debt Charity in the Debt Problems: What to do and where to get help article. If you find you're struggling with debt and you need further help try our online advice facility Debt Remedy
If money worries are keeping you awake, read Paul's success story at Need to Sleep0 -
Please help.
I am about to setup a plan with stepchange but I've now been told by another company similar to stepchange that payday loan companies do not deal with debt charities.
Is this a lie?
I need someone to answer this please.0 -
Please help.
I am about to setup a plan with stepchange but I've now been told by another company similar to stepchange that payday loan companies do not deal with debt charities.
Is this a lie?
I need someone to answer this please.
Someone from stepchange will be along in the morning, - but rest assured youve been told some porkies....
Some companies charge 3 months payments for setting up the plan then a % of your monthly payment for handling your account, where as with stepchange every penny you pay them, goes direct to your creditors.
Creditors are more than happy to deal ith stepchange, as they know that they are a reputable firm, (thats from one of my creditors) xxxx rip dad... we had our ups and downs but we’re always be family xx0 -
Someone from stepchange will be along in the morning, - but rest assured youve been told some porkies....
Some companies charge 3 months payments for setting up the plan then a % of your monthly payment for handling your account, where as with stepchange every penny you pay them, goes direct to your creditors.
Creditors are more than happy to deal ith stepchange, as they know that they are a reputable firm, (thats from one of my creditors) xx
Firstly, thank you.
It was specifically in regards to payday loan (high risk loan) companies that they allegedly don't accept dealings with stepchange.
I hope the stepchange advisor here can shed some further light on the matter.
Thanks again,
-Paul0
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