DMP & Mutual Support Thread - Part 10

Growurown

Yes please do and don't forget there is always someone around to help out or just to make you feel better when things might be getting you down. There's a lot of us aboard the good ship DMP so happy sailing!

Suseka

Just jumping in whilst trying to catch up... lots of great advice as usual so not much I can add really.

For those of you dealing with Barclaycard.. keep at em I've no debts with them but OH does and we keep hassling them about their interest charges. So far we've managed to get them to freeze twice. but whilst promised a default it doesn't look likely.

I finally won my battle with Halifax, albeit only after submitting a claim to the FOS.

Still four years to go, but will keep plugging at it and I reckon at some point I'll have to go self-managed. A year ago that would have been really worrying, but with the help and advice given on this forum by our time served stalwarts, I no longer stress about it

Time_to_face_the_music

monkey1000 wrote: »

Hi Guys, just wanted a bit of advice as I'm pretty worried. Have sent off my DMP pack today to step change - opened new bank a/c etc. We owe £86K, and will hopefully be paying it back over next 4.5 years at £1516 a month. My question is, what if none of the creditors agree to freeze the interest and keep accumulating it? Will we end up owing 100's of thousands when the DMP finishes? I dont really understand and am now pretty scared:(

Hi monkey and welcome :hello:

Our debt level was very similar to yours when we started out 29 months ago and it looked like an insurmountable mountain to us then, we thought we would retire and possibly die while we were still in debt. Today it's a whole new world and we can actually see the light at the end of the tunnel.

If your creditors refuse to freeze interest/charges, we will help you get them stopped. Pretty much anything you need help, advice or support on, someone here will try and assist you. We have all been in the place you are in now, so please don't feel alone.

TTFTM x

Puzzcat

monkey1000 wrote: »

Hi Guys, just wanted a bit of advice as I'm pretty worried. Have sent off my DMP pack today to step change - opened new bank a/c etc. We owe £86K, and will hopefully be paying it back over next 4.5 years at £1516 a month. My question is, what if none of the creditors agree to freeze the interest and keep accumulating it? Will we end up owing 100's of thousands when the DMP finishes? I dont really understand and am now pretty scared:(

Hello and welcome to another monkey!!! Hope your just as naughty as our other monkey mb of g!!!
Welcome to dmp wonderland and the best thread on the forum..
Puzz.x

antonic

GrinC wrote: »

I'm a newbie here. Just spoke to payplan and i am determined to get this sorted. Any advice, tips or words of wisdom?

Please be gentle - i've never been so emotionally fragile in my entire life. It doesnt help that i am doing this alone. I literally cannot speak to another soul about it.

Hi Grin,

As you can see from my sig, I did a 90 mth successful DMP with Payplan , and never regretted it.

My tips :

1) Budget

Payplan use guidelines for monthly spending on items - use it to the full

Also give yourself some wriggle room in the budget , because you never know what may happen in the future AND because your in this for the long term !

2) Interest & Charges

Monitor what happens with your accounts - its your responsibility to challenge any interest charged and account fees - not Payplans.

3) Communicating with Payplan

Use the online messaging facility within your Payplan account if you have any questions - they are usually pretty quick in getting back to you.

4) Account balances

The figures that Payplan have at the start *MAY* vary significantly from those at the end - dont be afraid to ask what they are at the end !

and finally

Well done on realising that something needs to be done and for dealing with it.

As someone who has been down this road myself, I can tell you that its not always easy, but the feelings of

1) Having it under control and

2) Finally achieving DF status are amazing !

Good luck !

Sazzie23

Hi to all the newbies

Bit pushed for time this am but wanted to send positive thoughts to Fuzz
Hope it goes well for you today.

FuzzyDF

Sazzie23 wrote: »

Hi to all the newbies

Bit pushed for time this am but wanted to send positive thoughts to Fuzz
Hope it goes well for you today.

Many thanks Sazzie, won't find out until 6pm :eek:

Kate_fixing_it

Oh no Fuzzy! I'll be keeping everything crossed until then!

I'm on holiday!!!!! Lying in until 8am felt like lunchtime :rotfl: we're truly an MSE family now - I took myself off to Tesco for yellow stickers last night and organised picnic food for around a tenner and we're off to a local park with a water feature (and free parking ) later. Last year it would have been the most advertised place and overpriced fast food for lunch

Other than that our plans are physio for me tomorrow and a trip to Ourgate (at the end of our garden ) Tomorrow is payday and I'll be buying a railcard and booking advance rail tickets for the much anticipated trip to London at the end of August. I've already booked the (free) entrance tickets to the hall of dinosaurs at the Natural History Museum so we don't have the 90 minute queues to navigate. All this is coming in under budget and paid for IN CASH

Not much debt-wise from me. I have sent a written complaint to HSBC about bank charges from a template here. I doubt anything will happen but they're not the only ones that can send snotty letters and at worst I've only lost the price of a stamp. You never know - they might refund the £5k I've paid over the last 13 years and wipe out my debt to them (I very much doubt it )

AND finally, with the end in sight for two outside DMP debts (£160 per month) I have looked into martial arts classes for DS2. At £3 per week it's easily doable and he'll love it

I'm feeling really happy and positive. Off to get some eBay listing done now and make some extra cash to offset my spends

Kate x

Karen777

Kate_fixing_it wrote: »

You're sounding like an "old hand" already dare you to go back and re-read your initial posts, I'll bet my backside you'll come back grinning at the progress you've made

You sound so upbeat in this short post. I absolutely love the positive posts from others and whilst there's a wistful "wish it was me" fleeting thought I know it will be soon

Kate x

Tee hee. I may well just do that. I know I have learned a lot in a seemingly short time - including my whole debacle of thinking interest had been frzen and thinking pp figures were accurate - ouch that stung when I realised not. You sound like you have your stuff in hand at the moment. Ourgate - very good

Seeing as I am such an old hand and was feeling pretty pleased about managing my own DMP I just had a bump down to earth whilst making all my monthly payments. HBOS have just taken 2 hours of my life refusing to take payment, telling me I had no loan with them, passing me around every department that exists (including to lloyds at one point???) and then finally accepting that I do owe them some money but not allowing me to pay anything other than the figure they pronounced which was different from the agreed dmp figure and telling they would charge me extra interest if I paid a different amount - then telling me I could only pay on a certain day of the month or from a halifax account (they have frozen mine).. finally .... I can make an online payment from my bank account of whatever the hell I like (I'm paraphrasing) so after having done that I may go for a lie down.

Grin - welcome - no one knows about my situation apart from the kind folks on here and very recently one other person in my daily life (who has been more supportive than I could ever have dreamed of) so I know how you feel but there may be someone you can tell in real life at some point. Most people are so judgey and then I wonder how many others in my life are secretly hiding their messy finances.

On the financial upbringing thing - our family don't talk about money - end of. Well that served me well!!!

Fuzzy - fingers crossed for your health. (I'm sorry that sounds awfully inadequate but is meant with kindness and well wishing).

Hello to everyone and keep trucking on. We'll get there.

Kate_fixing_it

Well how's this for bizarre??? HSBC letters were posted late yesterday (23rd). Today I checked the account online and it's a lower balance than I expected. Looked at details and they've refunded a month of overdraft interest on the 23rd! I have 3 debts with them and this is the only one charging interest still.

Guess they're either going to default or have realised that the balance is only reducing a few pounds each month. I had the complaint letter all ready to send too - that's saved me a stamp

It also means that tomorrow when SC pay them, two accounts with them - overdraft and credit card, will drop down to the next 100! Making the balances £13XX and £19XX

Payslip has arrived and they've sorted out last month's mini mess so I'm £79 up on what I was paid last month too :j

Just one creditor to fight interest on now - sygma (asda) credit card and they have already reduced it so I'm not sure how that'll go.

Had a fabulous afternoon at the park though did push the boat out and spend £6 on a McFlurry each on the way home (ice cream van at park was extortion - £2.50 each!! And there were 5 of us!) and over all our day was more of a success than any theme park little kids are both exhausted, teens are relaxed and I'm just delighted at their happy faces.

Off to "Ma's-gate" tomorrow en route to physio - have to drive that way anyway so I'll be using the same fuel and kids get another day out and DH wants to do something on Saturday before going to a BBQ that night. The way things are going I'll need a holiday to get over this one

Hope you've all had a good day (still crossing everything for you Fuzzy!) and even if you haven't remember that we're all another day closer to debt freedom folks!

Kate x