DMP & Mutual Support Thread - Part 9

Mossop01

dmp2013 wrote: »

Ahhhh on the phone to HSBC, not getting very far!!!! Stepchange paid them £17.94 for my overdraft and I was charged 17.75 interest and 25.00 charges!!! They have just refunded the 25.00 this time as a goodwill gesture! But that means this month I have paid just 19p off my overdraft!! They are not very helpful at all! I am 281.24 over my limit and wondering if I should try and scrape together this money to lower these charges?? That is what the online advisor advised. What do you think? Any help greatly appreciated.

I can invisige us having the same conversation with them before long, although first i have to get them to actually ackowledge my dmp!
Good luck, will be reading with interest!

Find_The_Real

Afternoon All

Well done on everyone for having some money left over at the end of the month, I am also in the Credit Balance Club and also managed to put a small amount of savings away earning me a whole 2p in interest. Small but a start.

Sorry to hear of your problems with the interest dmp2013, I do hope you get the interested sorted. I am still waiting on Lloyds to acknowledge me on the DMP, they can send enough letters out when they want me to take out their useless PPI.

dmp2013

Hi all, thanks for your replies. Hubby has said that I shouldnt pay the money to get myself back witin my overdraft limit, but I am still tempted to try, altho if they still keep charging me interest then I guess I will go back over it again?? It's catch 22. I also rang Halifax today, as after their interest (which is 'reduced') I am paying them just £1.37 a month- ahhhh!! Im going to be in my DMP forever at this rate! Man I spoke to was not very helpful and said ask Stepchange to ring us, which Stepchange don't do!! So Stepchange advised me to write them a letter saying I'll give them 8 weeks to respond or else I will be contacting the FOS! I am going to send a similar letter to HSBC too. These big banks make soo much money, u would think they would be more helpful! Thanks again for your help :-)

dmp2013

Sorry for that ramble ;-) Just read it back.... haha

Time_to_face_the_music

dmp2013 wrote: »

Sorry for that ramble ;-) Just read it back.... haha

It's not a ramble, it made perfect sense

Write to both creditors, make the letter clear that it is a complaint, contact the FOS at the same time. You don't have to wait for the 8 weeks to contact them, you can do it at the same time, then they are ready to immediately act if the creditor does not respond in the 8 weeks.

http://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/consumer/complaints.htm

If you need any help with template letters, just shout out and we will help.

Mooglet71

Am back after an absence for a while. Things have been ticking over since I started my DMP back in Nov 11. Well apart from DH being made redundant, luckily the DMP is just in my name.

Just got off the phone with Stepchange for my annual review (which was a bit late). Not a lot has changed with my income and expenditure as my salary is permanently frozen and luckily our mortgage has only increased by a little.

I informed Stepchange that I am pregnant (very, very unexpectedly having suffered had fertility issues for a number of years and in fact had given up trying altogether). The baby is due in July. I thought they would discuss reducing my DMP payments with me. I currently pay £805 a month. I thought I would be able to negotiate a reduction to half payments as I will need to save up some money to get me through mat leave. Am I being naive here? The advisor said I should just call them when I have had the baby, or in his words 2-3 months after when I know what the expenses are. I tried to explain to him that my mat leave is 4 weeks full pay, 2 weeks 90% and the remainder is half pay plus SMP.

I have worked out that to enable me to stay off 6 months, I will be down by £2.5k (my calculations include reduced payments to Stepchange at £400 as opposed to current figure of £805). I thought I would be able to save up the money from now to cover that shortfall.

Has anyone been in this position? Or am I asking too much?!

Mooglet71

Ps. None of my current calculations include stuff I will need for the baby. Obviously I will be getting second hand via eBay etc. But I haven't even got any money for that (sorry feeling a bit sorry for myself here).

dmp2013

Thanks TTFTM for your post, I would love to see some template letters if that's ok? That would be a real help. Do I contact the FOS with a letter too? Thanks sooo much, I really appreciate everyone's help x

Hopelessly_Hopeful

Mooglet71 wrote: »

Am back after an absence for a while. Things have been ticking over since I started my DMP back in Nov 11. Well apart from DH being made redundant, luckily the DMP is just in my name.

Just got off the phone with Stepchange for my annual review (which was a bit late). Not a lot has changed with my income and expenditure as my salary is permanently frozen and luckily our mortgage has only increased by a little.

I informed Stepchange that I am pregnant (very, very unexpectedly having suffered had fertility issues for a number of years and in fact had given up trying altogether). The baby is due in July. I thought they would discuss reducing my DMP payments with me. I currently pay £805 a month. I thought I would be able to negotiate a reduction to half payments as I will need to save up some money to get me through mat leave. Am I being naive here? The advisor said I should just call them when I have had the baby, or in his words 2-3 months after when I know what the expenses are. I tried to explain to him that my mat leave is 4 weeks full pay, 2 weeks 90% and the remainder is half pay plus SMP.

I have worked out that to enable me to stay off 6 months, I will be down by £2.5k (my calculations include reduced payments to Stepchange at £400 as opposed to current figure of £805). I thought I would be able to save up the money from now to cover that shortfall.

Has anyone been in this position? Or am I asking too much?!

Most importantly congratulations! How exciting.:T:j:beer:

Must feel very frustrating when you are trying to be sensible and plan and it fell on deaf ears. The advice can be variable I find so it is worth calling back.

Re mat leave cover - I suspect they wont let you save in advance for this, however, it could well be then when you take off the time you need if your payments drop to tokens then so be it.

Re things for the baby. I would make a list and call them back tomorrow, explain that not being able to plan for essentials is stressful which is not helpful for you or the baby.

Worth posting your experience on the ask a debt advisor thread, may well shame them into action!

Have you checked out costs on ebay etc?

Also do you mortgage or rent? If mortgage do they do a baby break or interest only issue?

Hope that helps. They cant have what you dont have. You have the most precious thing and no money can make up for that

HHx

Mooglet71

Thanks so much for your reply Hopelessly Hopeful. I am really pleased about the pregnancy, it's like a miracle. Obviously when I entered my DMP I had no idea that this would happen. Ironically it was the depression caused by the infertility which helped me spend money and get into this mess in the first place.

I have been looking on eBay for stuff. so yes I could make a list. We already have an 8 year old so I am pretty aware of what is a necessity and what isn't.

We are on a mortgage, I could check with them and see.

Thanks again for your help, it is much appreciated