DMP & Mutual Support Thread - Part 9

antonic

I have been DF now for 4 months, but I am pleased to say I still look for bargains whenever I go shopping.

Today I went to Asda and bought a lot of pasties and sausage rolls that I can freeze, that were on sale in the Oops fridge, the result being that I saved myself a few quid !.

Life is good now I`m DF, but I am definitely NOT getting back into debt again !.

Ellieseleven

Puzzcat wrote: »

Well done Ellie, I'm mildly jealous as only just starting out on my dmp... Spookily prior to you posting this today I've just started reading your diary....:)

I must say though Puzzcat that the three years or so since we started our DMP have passed by so quickly! It seems like only yesterday that we were starting out and I remember oh so well those scary feelings of pure dread as to what was to become of us:eek:

Things do get so much better and with each passing month the light at the end of the tunnel starts to shine so much brighter. I'm now looking forward to my debt free future (still got a while to go yet). I had credit cards for years and even though for a long while I was able to pay them each month there was always a niggle in the back of my mind that when we retired we would still owe a lot of money and that thought did haunt me a little. As it stands now, we will be debt free well before we retire and I know that when we curl our toes up, we're not going to burden our children and that in itself is a great comfort to me.

I'm glad that you've found my diary (and yes that's spooky), I like to look back at my diary from time to time to see just how far I've come and to remind myself of those dark days at the beginning (not that I need much reminding!)

My biggest motivation though by far is this thread, I love to hear the success stories and see people becoming debt free. It's the sense of not being alone and knowing that there is hope for each and everyone of us:T

Take care
Ellie xx

Boxchatter

Hi all,

I am have never posted before but have been reading the threads for a while.

I have decided to bite the bullet and face my debts, a scary and emotional few weeks but am feeling a little more positive since talking to SC. I have all the forms which I am nearly ready to send off, I have set up a new bank account and should be able to send all the details to SC tomorrow. I just have a few questions which I wondered if anyone could help answer, I'm sure they have been asked before!

1- my current account is with lloyds, I have set a new one up with natwest, I don't think they are associated?

2- Do SC contact all the creditors to let them know I will be on a DMP?

3- when do I stop making payments to my creditors and SC take over?

4- how do I change a Direct debit to my new account? For things like council tax? I have only ever had one bank account so have never had to do it!

Thanks so much for any help, it's nice to know that I am not the only one in this situation!

*Foolish*

Boxchatter wrote: »

Hi all,

I am have never posted before but have been reading the threads for a while.

I have decided to bite the bullet and face my debts, a scary and emotional few weeks but am feeling a little more positive since talking to SC. I have all the forms which I am nearly ready to send off, I have set up a new bank account and should be able to send all the details to SC tomorrow. I just have a few questions which I wondered if anyone could help answer, I'm sure they have been asked before!

1- my current account is with lloyds, I have set a new one up with natwest, I don't think they are associated?

2- Do SC contact all the creditors to let them know I will be on a DMP?

3- when do I stop making payments to my creditors and SC take over?

4- how do I change a Direct debit to my new account? For things like council tax? I have only ever had one bank account so have never had to do it!

Thanks so much for any help, it's nice to know that I am not the only one in this situation!

Hi, welcome and well done for taking the first steps to becoming debt free. I'll try and answer your questions:

1- no, they're not associated, that's who I moved from and to

2- SC do contact your creditors, however, they will send you a template letter so you can give them all the heads up as well, as some of them plead ignorance stating they've received nothing from SC

3- my DMP started quite quickly, some payments were due before it started, so I wrote to those creditors and sent a token payment of £1 with a covering letter. I would do this until the first SC payment is due.

4- the direct debits that you still need, ie council tax, mortgage etc, you need to contact those providers and inform them of your new bank details ASAP.

Hope this helps.

Sazzie23

Evening everyone,

Hi Boxchatter,

Good luck with your DMP, I am with sc too, they wrote to all my creditors. The sc website does give quite a lot of answers if you have chance to go through it. I sometimes go back there if I am worried about something, (like credit default notices and stuff).

Regards direct debits, I just rang up the council, gas etc and asked for a new direct debit arrangement, a lot filled the forms out by phone, one or two sent me the form to fill in, but it was pretty ok. I just said I am starting a new bank account - I didn't tell them anything about the DMP.

Come back soon if you have more questions.

Sazzie23

catandy wrote: »

and another update from me :-

I'm back to nominal payments of £1 a month to all creditor after losing my job again - back claiming JSA and living on the absolute breadline again. better than I was this time last year though because at least all the interest is frozen on all the accounts so the figures are coming down. Operation job search starts again in earnest today

Hi catandy,

Sorry to hear about your job, but you sound so positive it's inspiring and I just know you will find something good with that sort of attitude.

Good luck with the job hunting

Hopelessly_Hopeful

Boxchatter wrote: »

Hi all,

I am have never posted before but have been reading the threads for a while.

I have decided to bite the bullet and face my debts, a scary and emotional few weeks but am feeling a little more positive since talking to SC. I have all the forms which I am nearly ready to send off, I have set up a new bank account and should be able to send all the details to SC tomorrow. I just have a few questions which I wondered if anyone could help answer, I'm sure they have been asked before!

1- my current account is with lloyds, I have set a new one up with natwest, I don't think they are associated?

2- Do SC contact all the creditors to let them know I will be on a DMP?

3- when do I stop making payments to my creditors and SC take over?

4- how do I change a Direct debit to my new account? For things like council tax? I have only ever had one bank account so have never had to do it!

Thanks so much for any help, it's nice to know that I am not the only one in this situation!

Hi and welcome

I agree with the others. Just a few bits to add.

2) Write recorded delivery yourself too. Get your moneys worth by in the letter ask them to freeze interest and stipulate you only want contact in writing. Ask them to acknowledge the letter. This letter will be very powerful for you as if they don't play ball you can then report them. Without recorded delivery they will likely say they never had it.

3) General rule of thumb is make sure they get something even if just £1 token within a 31 day period.

4) Banks can do this for you. Been a big government initiative recently to make switching easier. I just called my DDs individually and reset them up, doesn't take too long.

Good luck

HHx

Mossop01

Hi all, all still quiet on the dmp front here, so far after reducing our payments due to budget review we have had no feedback from any of the creditors at all, although there's time yet I'm not holding my breath! SC did say that as long as the budget is reasonable and within their limits (which it is) then there's nothing creditors can do about it. Wish I had done a reasonable budget from the start and cannot stress to newbies enough not to scrimp on their budget, it's tempting to throw every penny at debts because it feels like the right thing to do and for me the guilt was crippling but if ur in this for the long haul like me, life really does have to be worth living or there's no point!
Good luck to those just starting out it's an adventure!

Rookoo_2

Hi all

Like most, I've been reading these boards for a while and finally thought I'd share my experience so far with everyone.

I've been in debt since my 18th birthday when I could get credit, 10 years later I'm still paying for many mistakes. I guess I should be thankful, at it's worst my debts were around £24k, currently they are at £9.5k, which I was managing up until the beginning of the year, my circumstances changed and I ended up over committing on credit and got some payday loans and finally realised the mess I'd gotten myself into a few months back when after paying all my bills I had around £50 for the month to pay for food, travel, everything. After having a bit of a breakdown I pulled myself together and decided I'd had enough of this and contacted Stepchange for help.

I filled in the forms online, printed off the bits, signed and returned them, within a week they'd set everything up and said they'd be getting in touch with my creditors. All very good, the only negative I will say is that I don't feel they communicate with me that well, for example, around 2 weeks after returning the form, I decided that I should probably contact my creditors myself, firstly to see if they'd received anything from SC but to inform them if they hadn't, that they would be. Some of them hadn't and agreed to freeze my accounts for 30 days until they had heard from SC, but a couple said oh yes we received and accepted the offer made already, which I was never told about. I guess it would be alot of extra admin work for them, but on the other hand, it does put your mind at rest knowing a creditor has accepted the offer, so I have just made a note for my own piece of mind to give all my creditors a call once a week to find out, I know I don't need to but now that I've started to get back in control, I don't want to lose it.

My first payment to SC was made 1st October, I don't think this has hit any of my credit accounts as yet, however I haven't received any demanding phone calls or letters, which I can only assume is down to the fact they have been informed by both myself and SC, and are hopefully just sorting whatever they need to for my DMP to work.

The best thing is that I'm finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, and as long as all goes well on Monday 2nd February 2015 I will be making my last payment to SC and I will be debt free for the first time in 12 years. I can not explain how happy that thought makes! :T

So anyway, I realise I've rambled on for a while now but wanted to say hi, share and hopefully help someone else who might read this.

I'll keep you all updated on my journey!

Good luck to all!!! :j

Puzzcat

Quick question if you please....!

Anyone know how long it takes for Sc to send the welcome pack to you...? This will be the details of how much they are offering each creditor etc... They said they would post or email and that was a week ago....

Thank you.....

Puzz. x