DMP & Mutual Support Thread - Part 9

DanielleNic87

Does anyone know if I can overpay my DMP online or if I would have to phone Stepchange? Thanks.

leecthompson

Posting this here on advice from another poster, I did make a thread about it...

First off, I'm an idiot. I went to StepChange a few months ago and had a massive weight lifted off my shoulders. However the weight of Christmas and some money I owed to a friend lured me, stupidly, into taking out payday loans to tide me over. It was a desperation move really because I have no way of repaying them (all of my disposable goes into my DMP!) and now in hindsight after doing some research I realise I've broken the terms of my DMP which I've only been on for 3 months. Will StepChange kick me off my DMP? What can I do? Help!!!!


I was already making a reduced payments due to a car breakdown, then Christmas came and a family member I owed money to really needed to call in the debt. I felt I had nowhere to turn really. I've cancelled all the CPAs on the payday loans and contacted StepChange, but to be honest I wouldn't blame them for not helping me here

Monkeyballs

DanielleNic87 wrote: »

Does anyone know if I can overpay my DMP online or if I would have to phone Stepchange? Thanks.

Hi Danielle,

I was wondering the same thing and spoke to SC about it.

You can't make a payment through their website but you can transfer money to them from your bank so long as you include your DMP and surname as reference and then call them to confirm the amount you have paid as soon as possible to allow them to allocate the money in their payment system.

I believe you can also make a payment over the phone but I don't think it's recommended as you can only do it 3 times in a 12 month period and they prefer it to be used if you miss a payment or something urgent crops up and you need to agree a reduced payment with them.

Hope this helps, if not just buzz SC to set your mind to rest

MB

Growurown

leecthompson wrote: »

Will StepChange kick me off my DMP? What can I do? Help!!!!

Hi Lee, not sure really what they will do. You have broken the terms of your agreement. The mantra is 'no more credit when on a DMP'. You could plead ignorance/stupidity/please miss I'll never be naughty again and hopefully they will sort you out. If not you could try another free provider like Payplan or do a self managed DMP. I would see what they say first and then take it from there. Let us know what happens.

Growurown

DanielleNic87 wrote: »

Does anyone know if I can overpay my DMP online or if I would have to phone Stepchange? Thanks.

Hi Danielle, are you sure you want to do this? I would be inclined to put any spare cash into my emergency fund, but then I do have a very disagreeable car:(

Growurown

Time_to_face_the_music wrote: »

Hey no judgement here, we all have done daft things in the past

Oh haven't we just:rotfl:

Monkeyballs wrote: »

I think I'll go ahead and do it, they are two of my smaller debts anyway and as the balanace to repayments made mean they would be repaid before the others anyway - plus it's two less creditors on the list!

Hi Monkeyballs (interesting name btw, conjures up all sorts of images!). I asked SC the same question when my mother gave me some money that eventually had to be spent on afore mentioned disagreeable car that needed a new and very expensive clutch. The person I spoke to didn't say no I couldn't do it. The impression I got was if I wanted to pay off one creditor I could.

maganan

Monkeyballs wrote: »

Hi TTFTM,

Thanks for the warm welcome I only joined the thread and I have a question... I have spoken to Step Change and they've given me a diplomatic answer but thought I'd run it past y'all too

So, my brother has offered to pay off a couple of my creditors - they're not massive but it is obviously hugely appreciated but I'm not sure of any potential repercussions to my DMP

He has offered to pay Welcome Finance £195 and my Barclays Overdraft £65 which account for £40 per month of my total £500pcm repayments.

In theory this means that more money goes to my other creditors more quickly so why would they object? But the diplomatic answer which I got was that they may see it as breaking my DMP...

How likely would this be? Has anyone here ever paid off a single creditor and carried on with their DMP and what was the outcome?

Thanks,

MB

I paid off my Santander overdraft of £400 (was a struggle!) they were charging me £20/mth in fees and as the smallest debt were only getting £25. No one said anything at SC and Santander never tried to get the other debts I have with them. I was a bit nervous about it but I'm glad I did it, it was so frustrating paying so much in charges, go for it and good luck with the plan

Monkeyballs

Hi Monkeyballs (interesting name btw, conjures up all sorts of images!). I asked SC the same question when my mother gave me some money that eventually had to be spent on afore mentioned disagreeable car that needed a new and very expensive clutch. The person I spoke to didn't say no I couldn't do it. The impression I got was if I wanted to pay off one creditor I could.

Wotcha

Hmmm... Yeah that was pretty much what the guy told me but it was preceded with "generally we would advise people to pay any additional money into the pot for equal distribution but..." which I took to be a diplomatic answer meaning yeah LOL

I've already spoken to my brother and he is going to give me the cas at the end of January now I just need to convince him to pay my Provident balance...

Cheers m'dears!

MB

DanielleNic87

Thanks monkeyballs :rotfl: and Growurown.

Ideally what I would like to do is to start overpaying my Argos card ( balance of £500) which is still charging interest and thought that I couldn't do that.... But comments following suggests I could possibly do that.

Monkeyballs

DanielleNic87 wrote: »

Thanks monkeyballs :rotfl: and Growurown.

Ideally what I would like to do is to start overpaying my Argos card ( balance of £500) which is still charging interest and thought that I couldn't do that.... But comments following suggests I could possibly do that.

Ahhh... Thats slightly different as it is making additional payments to a single creditor which is basically favouring them over others and as your DMP repayments are factored by %age of debt I'm not sure how that could work?

I think you could save and pay them off in one go without any problems but I doubt SC would intentionally allocate any overpayments to a specific creditor on your behalf and if you approach Argos directly then they may even cancel their agreement thinking you can and should repay more every month!

Sorry if I'm scaremongering, basically I don't know and suggest asking SC for advice unless anyone else here has any experience/thoughts?

MB