Can husband apply for DRO without my wage being considered?

samwich1979

My husband has debts of £10,000 and wants to apply for a DRO as he is a stay at home father to our son and has no income at all. Only thing that worries us there is no information about if my wages will be taken into account? I earn £1379 per month after tax and this pays for everything. I've even been paying his debts leaving us skint and hungry.
Does the DRO go on the fact he earns nothing or will my wage stop him getting this? We are so fed up of the debt and feel its wrong I should be penalised by paying his debts as they are solely in his name.

SPELLKASTER

If you are not named on any of his debts, then you shouldn't have to pay them.

If you contact National Debtline they will be able to advise you.

There website is https://www.nationaldebtline.org.

If you phone them they will do an income and expenditure.

They did mine, and whilst they did take my partner's earnings into account, I still qualified for a DRO, but cant progress yet as I am waiting for a failure certificate to come through.

Good luck, I was on an IVA which became unaffordable so I had to cancel.

You need to pay for a £95 fee, and I understand it can take around 6 weeks or so to arrange.

You will need a list of all the debts and who they are with etc etc and you will need to obtain your credit report.

National_Debtline

Hi Samwich1979,

Debt Relief Orders (DRO) can seem quite complicated when you start the process, there are a lot of different rules that affect whether a person qualifies or not. The basic criteria is that an individual must have less than £15000 worth of debt, less than £50pcm available money to pay towards their debts, and less than £300 worth of assets (with the exception of a car that may be worth up to £1000).

When someone is assessed for a DRO, the first thing we must do is complete a SOA (as Spellkaster mentioned). We need to look at all of the household income and all of the essential living expenses, such as bills, food, travel, clothes, etc. these things always come first (before any debts) and we can work with you to help make sure you are budgeting enough for these sorts of things. We do not take any debts into consideration at this stage, because the money that is left over, after the living expenses, is the money that could be used for debts.

We will then calculate how much of this disposable money is yours and how much is the persons’ who is applying for the DRO (is their share less than £50pcm). In your case it would be very simple, if your husband has no income of his own (salary or benefits) then his “share” of the disposable money is nil, because he did not contribute anything to the household income to begin with. So, please don’t worry, you will not be asked to pay anything towards your husband’s debts. There are several reasons this assessment is done, it can be because if both people have an income, we must ensure the household expenses are shared fairly but also to ensure the household is not spending more than the income moving forward.

The fee for the Debt Relief Order is £90; this is a one off payment. A DRO is a form of insolvency and you can only be in one form of insolvency at any one time (this is why Spellkaster needs the certificate of failure from the IVA before continuing). We have a factsheet about DRO’s that you may find helpful - https://www.nationaldebtline.org/EW/factsheets/Pages/37 EW Debt relief orders (DROs)/Default.aspx

Laura
@natdebtline

fatbelly

samwich1979 wrote: »

My husband has debts of £10,000 and wants to apply for a DRO as he is a stay at home father to our son and has no income at all. Only thing that worries us there is no information about if my wages will be taken into account? I earn £1379 per month after tax and this pays for everything. I've even been paying his debts leaving us skint and hungry.
Does the DRO go on the fact he earns nothing or will my wage stop him getting this? We are so fed up of the debt and feel its wrong I should be penalised by paying his debts as they are solely in his name.

No problems on that score.

If he has no income he can't have surplus income in excess of £50 per month.

Get him to get in touch with one of the Competent Authorities

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/66642463#Comment_66642463

samwich1979

Thanks for your replies that puts our minds at rest that we don't need to worry about it affecting me.
One other question, my husband has direct debits which go out of his basic account monthly but I pay these and always have. They are mobile phone bills and our rent, we did this as at the time we wanted to keep his account in use and the mobiles are in his name. Items have also been purchased.
When giving details of this account for the DRO will it go against him? Any money in the account has been put there by me, none is his own.

samwich1979

Also his national insurance number will show he hasn't worked for 4 years won't it?

fatbelly

samwich1979 wrote: »

When giving details of this account for the DRO will it go against him? Any money in the account has been put there by me, none is his own.

If his bank account is not overdrawn it does not get a mention in the DRO application.

samwich1979

fatbelly wrote: »

If his bank account is not overdrawn it does not get a mention in the DRO application.

Even when they are looking at your accounts to see what money the person has? As they want bank statements from him to prove any income or none as in my husbands case.
Just thought it may look bad money being put in his account to pay for things even though its mine.

fatbelly

samwich1979 wrote: »

Even when they are looking at your accounts to see what money the person has? As they want bank statements from him to prove any income or none as in my husbands case.
Just thought it may look bad money being put in his account to pay for things even though its mine.

Those are just things you need to discuss with your intermediary.

The DRO unit doesn't routinely trawl through bank statements and the Experian check doesn't reveal income.

Who is he doing his DRO through?

merlin68

Also have you claimed any benefits you may be entitled to as you say your wage pays for everything tax credits and child benefit.

samwich1979

fatbelly wrote: »

Those are just things you need to discuss with your intermediary.

The DRO unit doesn't routinely trawl through bank statements and the Experian check doesn't reveal income.

Who is he doing his DRO through?

He has started the application through Step change. Just waiting for some paperwork to come through the post.