DMP & Mutual Support Thread - Part 9

Hopelessly_Hopeful

FreyaWillow wrote: »

Hi Everyone

I am new here and I've never posted before. I have been really silly and got myself into trouble with a number of payday loan firms and in total I owe them £2532 including interest. I had a couple of unexpected large bills over a couple of months which I stupidly took out payday loans to cover. I have been paying them back but I got into the trap of taking out more loans just to be able to afford to pay my rent etc each month. I haven't defaulted or missed a payment on anything yet but obviously I cannot go like this. My repayments for this month would leave me with 2p to last the rest of the month. I have contacted Step Change and they have recommended a DMP. I've just completed the paperwork and will be sending it off in the morning. I am completely terrified of what will happen though and I'm kicking myself for ending up in this situation.

To make matters worse I am currently suffering from clinical depression and the worry of how I am going to deal with this is crippling me. I doubt think I can handle the phone calls Does anyone have any advice? I am terrified of them hassling me all day and especially of them ringing me at work.

I know it's my debt and I completely take responsibility for the money I owe and I want to pay it back as quickly as possible and I will be selling as many of my possessions as I can. I can't talk to my family about this and I'm afraid of them finding out. Any advice or tips would be greatly appreciated.

Hello and welcome

Always a solution. They cant have what you don't have. There are many laws to protect you. Suggest you do as many of us did, stock up with fluids and start at the beginning of the threads (I went back a couple too me a day and half) it was so inspiring and I learnt lots too.

First thing to do is get your letters sent off recorded delivery, plenty of templates on debtline website. You can borrow paragraphs from different letters. In same one, inform them you are seeking advice, ask them to stop interest, send token £1, tell them contact in writing only and ask them to acknowledge your letter. Will stand you in very good stead. If you do answer the phone make sure you get name of who it is. Don't answer anything you don't want to. If you feel upto it tell them you have asked for contact only in writing and you will be reporting them. Trust me on this, they soon want to hang up. My how the worm turns

Hope you feel better soon for taking charge of the situation. It gets better, its not easy but it does get better.

Please let us know how you get on.

HHx

Hopelessly_Hopeful

Debtfreeday wrote: »

Yes we realise that this is the end of any credit for c11 years - but there is actually something very appealing about this, and it's better than BR (although we may still have IVA) as I can continue earning decent money and pay off sooner potentially. We are not worried about getting credit or changing the mortgage just getting to a point were we finally have our disposable income to ourselves - so long as we can hold onto the house and get a current account with a debit card and no overdraft we can make if work (IF the creditors play ball on the interest - if not I will present them with a choice:

1. Accept the SC offer and freeze interest = 100% of the capital nd interest to date paid

2. Force me into an IVA = c30 - 40p in the pound over the same period

3. Force bankruptcy likely nothing - we have no assets little or no equity in the property, and even with a payment order likely to release only 10 - 30p in the pound over 3 years

But I'm not an expert so no idea how successful we will be?

Hi and welcome

May be wise to post on bankruptcy and iva boards too. DMPs are informal with no rhythm or reason to interest stopping so you cant have this guaranteed. Even if they stop at the start many then have it added on later. On reflection I could have fought harder at the start re interest charges......I have paid around 6k interest in 4 years. Still much better than I could have managed with a loan so am comfortable with that.


Good luck

HHx

Hopelessly_Hopeful

hopeful_at_last wrote: »

So today I have plucked up the courage to get in touch with payplan. I have felt sick all week and tossed and turned with worry...about getting in touch and having to tell someone you are in debt. I left a message on their site last night and they rang me this morning. A lovely lady called Nikki booked me in with Steve who went through all my income and expenditure and my debts of £10900 :eek:
I have decided on a DMP as I really didnt want to go down the IVA route. Hopefully I will be debt free in 5 years or so...
Someone is ringing me back on Monday to finalise ....hope it will all be ok
I still feel sick but i'm so glad I have taken the first step

Welcome and good luck

HHx

Hopelessly_Hopeful

Samjangi wrote: »

Well I am a numpty! DH just patiently reminded me this is a loan and not a CC and so of course the interest has already been added! So the fact that they are not changing the interest is a positive thing as they are saying they are not going to add further interest. Honestly I am an intelligent woman

We all learn all the time

HHx

bertman

Hopelessly_Hopeful wrote: »

Thanks Bertman, great to see your signature going down too

HHx

Thanks HH,

In about 3 days our balance will be in the £50's..... Can't believe how its going down now. Still pretty high. But what is an enormous amount to some people isn't to others. I went past a BMW garage the other day and a car in the showroom was on sale higher than our debt - kind of brings things into perspective though!!

Sazzie23

bertman wrote: »

Thanks HH,

In about 3 days our balance will be in the £50's..... Can't believe how its going down now. Still pretty high. But what is an enormous amount to some people isn't to others. I went past a BMW garage the other day and a car in the showroom was on sale higher than our debt - kind of brings things into perspective though!!

Hi Bergman, great news, and amazing incentive to keep going

Well done

Hi Hopelessly

I was so scared of getting bailiffs I actually got a storage unit and stashed some of our valuables in it, with the idea to stash my beloved push bike etc if I actually got wind of them coming, so anyone out there recognising this type of fear, take action, you are not alone and it's probably not going to be as unsolvable as you think.

Equilibrium13

Hi all,

Could someone tell me if the estimated end of DMP is assuming that creditors freeze interest and charges or not?

Many thanks

Growurown

Equilibrium13 wrote: »

Hi all,

Could someone tell me if the estimated end of DMP is assuming that creditors freeze interest and charges or not?

Many thanks

Yes that is my understanding they assume charges and interest have stopped which is why they ask you to update your balances when you have your annual review. You don't want to get to the end of your DMP only to find you still owe loads.

Growurown

As there are lots of newbies starting I know the one thing we get most anxious about is whether creditors will stop interest, I thought I would post my creditor list. I have posted it before but with so many new DMPers joining I thought it may help set some minds at rest.

All the below stopped charging within a few months of starting the DMP

MBNA Virgin cc (OH's) now passed onto Aktiv Kapital
MBNA Virgin cc (mine) now passed onto Aktiv Kapital
Asda storecard (Santander)
Tesco cc
Mint cc
Nat West cc
Capital One cc
Nat West Loan now passed over to Moorcroft
Intelligent Finance loan passed over to BOS and now paid up in full
Halifax cc (mine) now passed over to BOS

The only accounts being charged are a Halifax CC belonging to OH and a Halifax bank overdraft.

Equilibrium13

Thanks very much for that Growurown.

I have another question (sure it's not the last either!)

I'm starting a DMP with StepChange and bank with Barclays - am including my overdraft as well as 2 Barclaycards. SC advised that i could open a basic bank account with Barclays as they have an agreement with them that they won't use the right to offset. I thought this was ideal as it would save me changing banks and i have been with Barclays for 14 years and never really had any problems with them. I'm now wondering if this was a mistake

i've just sent off the application for the account and it can take up to 2 weeks to set up. Until this is done and everything transferred over, Barclays / Barclaycard can't be informed of my DMP. I get paid on Friday and will take out any cash left after paying rent, bills and DMP and as long as i have the new account details in time for the Nov payroll cut off my next salary payment should go into the new account. SC have assured me this will all be fine, but i'm so worried something will go wrong.

Is anyone here with SC and did the same account-wise?