Barclaycard 1 year into a dmp

Florida15

hi, one year into a dmp with stepchange. Last months statement from barclaycard showed a higher monthly payment was asked for. I rang stepchange and they said not to worry and they would send them something. However, today we have received this months statement and the payment needed is even higher as they didn't receive what they asked for last month.

Is this something to stress about?

Thanks for any replies

phoenixx

Of all the creditors I have dealt with, Barclaycard are one of the worst. My experience is that they drag their feet ridiculously in terms of freezing interest; take little notice of DMP companies or individuals and rack up the biggest payments they can. Virtually everyone but them has frozen interest and is a proper pain when they keep failing to reply.

Sometimes they have lowered interest for a couple of months after persistent calls from us and then proceeded to reinstate interest at a higher rate a couple of months down the line, even though our situation has not changed. Sometimes they deny all knowledge that we are in a DMP (even though we have since 2011!) If anyone on the forum has advice about dealing with Barclays I imagine lots of people would be grateful to hear it.

heatherks

the same as pp one of the worst i have dealt with and the only one who insists on charging inteest ..even though its now 3 % or something they did put it up to 12.9 % at one point

i'd tell them your circumstances have not changed and Stepchange are dealing with you

Be aware if you increase payments over 1% of your debt then your interest will increase or so BCard told me when i complained about the ammount of interest they were adding compared to what i was paying them esp as i was on a DMP with CAB

phoenixx

Has anyone successfully complained to the FOS about them? At the rate they rack up the interest we will never be free of the debt to them. OH discussed them with SC when we had our review and SC said there was nothing else we could do. As our DMP payment goes up, so will Barclays interest...

It is one of the main reasons I am thinking of self management. But perhaps that won't help either.

pinnit2014

Hi Phoenix, totally agree regarding Barclaycard. When with CCCS they kept doing this...CCCS (or step change now) weren't interested in this so i ended up badgering them myself - took 6 months but they finally stopped adding the interest - that was such a push that they never offered to refund...

Regarding self management - i self manage my own DMP now and it seems to be going well and i've had no issues with any of my creditors, apart from some deciding to review the plan every 3 months, which seems a bit OTT....

sourcrates

If a creditor wont play ball, like BC appear to be doing, simply stop paying them.
Allow the debt to be sold on, hopefully to someone who will take a lesser offer.
You may think this is a drastic thing to do, but it does work.

Time_to_face_the_music

sourcrates wrote: »

If a creditor wont play ball, like BC appear to be doing, simply stop paying them.
Allow the debt to be sold on, hopefully to someone who will take a lesser offer.
You may think this is a drastic thing to do, but it does work.

Totally agree. When we moved from Stepchange (then CCCS) to self managed DMP, I found 3 months token payments of £1 worked wonders for getting interest stopped.

[Deleted User]

phoenixx wrote: »

Has anyone successfully complained to the FOS about them?

Come close to it and still am considering it!!
For their late updating... agreed one thing done another :mad:
received proper back dated letters too saying they were already doing something then an unexpected email out of the blue saying something else

Although a different subject from my PPI days, I remember being told this was one of the only creditor's who writes the same to everybody regardless, that's why they must seem ignorant at times initially for what of putting it better and the only way is to persist, that's why when I heard it, it kinda makes sense in other area's

Ah no wonder why people are offered formal solutions without going into negotiations with BC which I likely was, so in some respects I'm not sure if that should cancel my beef with them!
Got to wonder :cool:

sentientpoet

My experience with Barclaycard is that the agreement has to be reviewed every 12 months - I had this in November when I suddenly got a statement with a big arrears and minimum payment request attached. Called up the customer service team, reiterated that this was an ongoing DMP arrangement and they agreed the previous terms and said they'd reset the account. I think the sudden demand for more is just because the 12 month period is up and the system kicks in to auto.

Either call them up or go through your DMP provider and it should revert to your standard DMP proportional payment.

phoenixx

BC just seem to change the goal posts whenever it suits them, be it interest, charges or review process. Thanks to all posters for the good advice...definitely food for thought and things to try!:mad:

Florida15

I will call stepchange again tomorrow, I have tried calling barclaycard but failed the security questions, as haven't rang them for years. Should I write to them ?

Thanks