DMP & Mutual Support Thread - Part 11

Sazzie23

alyxzandra wrote: »

It has been a while since I posted, but have things changed! This past year has been a nightmare starting with the death of my mother. Six months after our elderly rabbit died and then our dog died 5 months after. Last November we discovered our walls were saturated and black mould in our home. Our home insurance found a pipe had burst under the floors and promptly moved us out as major repairs were needed. Ten days (five months later) after we moved home is when the dog died. And it was only 10 days before the first year anniversary of my mother's passing.

We had to put our DMP on token payments for 6 months as the insurance did not cover our water pipes and the whole network needed to be replaced. That is now paid off, but our boiler is going! GACK! Luckily, it may last until next year. But, no issues with the creditors.

I am facing redundancy from work, but with a payment. And we decided it is best I stay at home and we can still make the payments without it causing too much pain. Our son is autistic and we are unable to get childcare due to his violence. He is on the verge of exclusion from his special needs school and is very clingy to me. Our jobs made adjustments and it has worked so far. But, my job has said the role has changed and having me work the way I do is no longer sustainable. So, we are working out an agreement.

I will work a few hours per week in a more flexible job (e.g. as a carer) and claim carer's allowance. This will allow us to have less worry about our son. My husband has not been able to advance in his career as we never knew if one of us had to take emergency time off work, which has been a lot. It seems we are at the school every month and our employers are not happy. We will not be out of debt as soon as we would like, but our son is more important.

Spot on, family and preferably a liveable and stable home is so important for you all. I think being able to care for son might make your lives so much simpler and less stressful. Maybe a little miracle might happen and perhaps a different teacher or something could change things round for DS, I do hope so, but either way you'll know you did your very best and put him first.

I truly believe the debt busting will follow once the other parts of your life become settled. And I send you good wishes for more happiness and less heartache in the future.

Sazzie23

Ellieseleven wrote: »

I've got my sixth review coming up but have never had to provide evidence of salary since first setting up the DMP.

My payments gave been up and down, don't think I've been asked for any evidence of income. Even my secured loan, which I got into small arrears with earlier this year didn't asked for income or statements.

On a side note, I am paying these arrears with my additional out of hours income and hopefully if I can sustain that level of payment, and nothing bad happens to the car, I will try to up my debt repayments once the secured loan arrears are gone. and that will hopefully bring MY DFD down like Puzz and Ellie.

Been up the loft looking for things to sell, nothing much really, but at least if I get rid of some of the rubbish it'll be one less worry about the ceiling collapsing !

Sazzie23

carbootcrazy wrote: »

Could I be nosey and ask what you meant by 'a little' payment increase please? I am thinking of cancelling my pet insurance at the end of December and there's another very small DD I could possibly cancel. In total it only makes an extra £18 a month extra that I can make (and to be honest even that small amount would make all the difference to my cash-flow if I hung onto it instead:o).

I'm currently paying £732 a month to SC and it's spread over 8 creditors so an increased payment of £18 a month would mean some of the smaller creditors would only get about £1.00 a month extra. I'm thinking I should leave things as they are for all the difference it would make to my DFD and wait until my review in August. I'd welcome your advice please:A

Why not save half of it towards a F&f for a smaller creditor and use the other to put towards either making life very slightly easier, and I really do understand how £5 a month makes the difference, or Perhaps you might need to save a bit for vets fees if the pet insurance is going ?

[Deleted User]

Sazzie23 wrote: »

Why not save half of it towards a F&f for a smaller creditor and use the other to put towards either making life very slightly easier, and I really do understand how £5 a month makes the difference, or Perhaps you might need to save a bit for vets fees if the pet insurance is going ?

Thanks, Sazzie:T

I keep reading on here of people having success with F&Fs but have to admit I'm in the dark about how to go about it:o. I'm sure a bit more research will give me all the information I need but I haven't really looked into it too much because I'm on a DMP with StepChange and am very happy with how it's going.

My DFD will be September 2019 (won't sound so far away once we start 2016:j) so I've assumed it best to leave doing it until much nearer the end. If I decide to offer F&Fs to my smallest creditors, do I have to do it through SC or just do it myself? SC always says that creditors don't like it if some of them receive more favourable treatment than others and as things are going so smoothly at the moment and they are all playing so nicely I'm scared to do anything to rock the boat:o

alyxzandra

Sazzie23 wrote: »

Spot on, family and preferably a liveable and stable home is so important for you all. I think being able to care for son might make your lives so much simpler and less stressful. Maybe a little miracle might happen and perhaps a different teacher or something could change things round for DS, I do hope so, but either way you'll know you did your very best and put him first.

I truly believe the debt busting will follow once the other parts of your life become settled. And I send you good wishes for more happiness and less heartache in the future.

My son has been like this since he was a baby. He was thrown out of 9 places before being put into the special needs school at the age of 4. While he is autistic, he is very intelligent and knows how to manipulate. He wanted to be home with me and has tried everything he can to get thrown out of school. I told him I am going to be home for him as soon as possible and he seems happier. But, all of you are right. Family has to come first.

alyxzandra

carbootcrazy wrote: »

Thanks, Sazzie:T

I keep reading on here of people having success with F&Fs but have to admit I'm in the dark about how to go about it:o. I'm sure a bit more research will give me all the information I need but I haven't really looked into it too much because I'm on a DMP with StepChange and am very happy with how it's going.

My DFD will be September 2019 (won't sound so far away once we start 2016:j) so I've assumed it best to leave doing it until much nearer the end. If I decide to offer F&Fs to my smallest creditors, do I have to do it through SC or just do it myself? SC always says that creditors don't like it if some of them receive more favourable treatment than others and as things are going so smoothly at the moment and they are all playing so nicely I'm scared to do anything to rock the boat:o

I did a few full and final settlements on my smaller creditors. You call them up and say you wish to come to an agreement on it. They will ask you to make an offer. I always say 50% of the debt. Some will say no way to it and then will say what they will accept. Mine accepted 75% of the debt. They are now gone. I am going to save up to make some F+F settlements towards other smaller ones I have now. And SC said the same thing to me. But, they just removed the debts from my list and nothing was said. They have seen this before.

2spicy

carbootcrazy wrote: »

I keep reading on here of people having success with F&Fs but have to admit I'm in the dark about how to go about it:o. I'm sure a bit more research will give me all the information I need but I haven't really looked into it too much because I'm on a DMP with StepChange and am very happy with how it's going.

My DFD will be September 2019 (won't sound so far away once we start 2016:j) so I've assumed it best to leave doing it until much nearer the end. If I decide to offer F&Fs to my smallest creditors, do I have to do it through SC or just do it myself? SC always says that creditors don't like it if some of them receive more favourable treatment than others and as things are going so smoothly at the moment and they are all playing so nicely I'm scared to do anything to rock the boat:o

CarBoot, a F & F is basically an offer of settling the debt with a creditor by offering an acceptable sum (from around 40% of the total outstanding balance upwards). to them.

You can offer it directly to your creditors, if you want a template letter I posted one a few months ago, or I can send you one.
make up something like "A family friend has offered me an interest free cash loan" or something as creditors will on occasion ask you if you are going into more debt to get the cash.
Once you have made the offer and gone through the bartering, inform SC that an offer has been made and just request them to remove it from the DMP & re-issue amended offers to the remaining creditors.

Sometimes they will decline the offer and invite you to increase your offer, while others will stick to their guns and tell you they will either only accept full payment or they will tell you what they will accept.

There are downsides to having a creditor accept a F&F in that they will record the debt "satisfied" but only "Partially Settled". This will remain on your credit file and what it will mean is should you apply for credit in the future, it will not auto approve, but will require manual approval, and this may delay or cause them to question the "partial" entry.

HOWEVER .. having said the above, there is another thing that you can do, and that is, you can check your credit file with a company like "Experian", and, you have the right to reply to any entry on the credit file......
This means, you can ask for a concise piece of text to be added to the entry that mitigates against the entry.

Ill give you an example...

Credit file reports Bank A account is "Partially Settled"
Your reply could be "Following discussions with the creditor, an offer was made and subsequently accepted for the creditor to accept a reduced payment on the account as a full & final settlement of the debt."

This then lives on your file for 6 years

Hope this helps explain and doesn't patronize

Remember also, while SC may be managing your DMP for you, you are still in control. Dont be afraid to question them. SC do things one way, and PayPlan do it slightly different. As long as your creditors accept the repayments, any additional funds you want to give to one creditor is YOUR DECISION. there is no clause or rule to say you cannot. your treating them as equals as part of the DMP, its just common sense that if you can remove one debt from your DMP sooner because you have a sum of money that will be acceptable. Plus, by removing that small debt, everyone else will get slightly more money as the DMP payment is re-distributed.
The only way you will rock the DMP boat is by not paying it

On a personal note, I would bank the surplus cash, add it to the emergency fund, maybe use it to make life a little more comfortable on occasion when you are feeling down.

[Deleted User]

alyxzandra, thanks very much for your response to my query:T. It's nice to know SC were OK about it.

2spicy wrote: »

CarBoot
Hope this helps explain and doesn't patronize .........

.......On a personal note, I would bank the surplus cash, add it to the emergency fund, maybe use it to make life a little more comfortable on occasion when you are feeling down.

2spicy, thanks a million for your long and comprehensive reply. Told me all I needed to know and certainly was NOT patronizing in the slightest:A

Ariel82

Can I be nosey and ask...
What is everyone on a Dmp left with after all the bills are paid each week?
I'm left with £60 for groceries, clothing, leisure, pretty much everything, is this a reasonable amount per week?

Puzzcat

Ariel82 wrote: »

Can I be nosey and ask...
What is everyone on a Dmp left with after all the bills are paid each week?
I'm left with £60 for groceries, clothing, leisure, pretty much everything, is this a reasonable amount per week?

Hi,
It would depend on your circumstances, size of family, petrol usage, hobbies etc. Best base whether it is reasonable to you based on the sc budget that you do. My advice would be to allow some wriggle room as it is a long journey for most of us!
Puzz.x