need help- in dire straits- lloyds tsb have backed me against the wall! (long post!)

starsinmycrown

Hi, this is my first time on this forum, it was recommended to me by a friend so i hope martin and you guys can help , because i'm at the end of my tether.

I'm 24 years old and in going into my third year at university. I left school after my a-levels at 19 and moved out with my partner, and we got into some difficulty as i was on a low wage. I have had a select account with lloyds tsb since 2001. lloyds allowed me overdraft facilities online and i ran up an authorised overdraft of £1,500.

At 22 i decided to return to university to train as a special needs teacher. So i went into the bank to tell them i was now a student and i would need a student account. I asked them if they could transfer my overdraft onto a student facilty and stop the high amount of interest i was paying to them.

They said no. They told me that on a technicality, it would entail "closing" my current account and "reapplying" for a student account. (they transferred my current account to a select one quick enough, without even asking though!) They said i couldnt do this as i owed them £1,500. They asked me to pay it off. I said i couldnt- i was a student and had just left my full time job. they said i therefore couldnt apply to get a student account, and sent me out with my tail between my legs.

A few months passed and i found myself in difficulty- the small amount i had on credit cards (£300) and their repayments were bouncing with lloyds and i was being charged interest on my overdraft and struggling to make the repayments - one month i was charged around 100 for direct debits that went in before my wages. lloyds decided to rectify this by increasing my authorised overdraft. it ended up going to 1,770. I didnt want it to, but it got them off my back for a bit. i went to the student finance advisor who said he couldnt help much if i kept being turned down for accounts and the bank just kept asking for payment, he told me to ask the bank again for an account as it was my right and NOTE: he told me most of the grievances he deals with as a student finance advisor were from lloyds tsb- so students beware!

So, i tried to apply to the hsbc for a student account and was turned down. Natwest turned me down. i applied to the halifax too i think- i was also turned down.Then, last year a letter came telling me as i was not having a salary paid into my account and i had done nothing to pay off my overdraft, my account had been sent to debt collections and i was ordered to repay it. i was terrified. so i went into my branch telling them i couldnt pay it- how can i? i'm a student and i asked again for a student account.

They said maybe if my overdraft had been under 1500 they could help, but now- with my history -i had bounced direct debits, was paying bank charges hand over fist- some cases up to £75 pounds a month- which were going out willy-nilly and were unstatemented and getting me in yet more trouble with an unauthorised overdraft- which i was being charged for next month- they felt i couldnt manage my account. Tell me something i dont know!!

They told me that they could transfer my account to current from a select (stopping payments of £7 a month) but as my account was in debt collections that they couldnt deal with it or discuss it with me and instead told me to go into a room on my own and ring a number of an indian call centre and discuss it with them as the branch dont handle collections. i was stunned.

So then i struggled to talk to some stupid woman whom i couldnt even understand, who told me that i should just get another credit card to pay off the overdraft to them! :T i was stunned.

It took me four goes to get her to explain that what lloyds had done was that theyd removed my facility so that when my student grant and loan went in- it would have been eaten up! i was worried and i explained i was prepared to make a payment to them, but i wasnt getting in any more debt as i was in enough mess. i told her i had a credit card already with 500 on it- i didnt want any more! she said i should extend it to 2k and pay lloyds!! she said that shell take a payment- £75 a month.

i didnt know whether to laugh or cry! i kept saying i'm a student. in the end, with the threat of all the money i have being taken, i agreed to pay £50 a month. i knew i couldnt afford it but i had no choice. i went to discuss it with one cashier who was nice and she managed to make the overdraft interest free now, something to do with me making a payment, but i was gutted. How would i afford this? this was in october last year. and i still had credit card repayments to make- i couldnt transfer balances- because my bank account is in the debt collections dept, and no financial institution will touch me.:(

cut to may 2007, after the 6 months payment plan had expired- they did it again-wrote to me without warning saying my facility had been removed- i was still in collections and i had to pay it else they would take legal action.

once again- i was scared and rang them up, where they strong armed me into agreeing to pay £50 a month that i couldnt afford else theyd take my tuition fee loan. by now i had a lot of money on my credit card, stupid i know, but i took another one out with capital one to repay to lloyds charges- the interest is astronomical- but i have a dire credit rating because of all this. but the card has helped my credit rating a bit- because it means i'm repaying something. ive not missed a payment yet. ive got £500 on that too. but the apr is high- i'm paying about £30 a month in repayments on this one and £15 on my egg card ( Egg are wonderful btw- theyve been so understanding about this trouble ive been in with lloyds and helped me to reduce payments and covered any arrears ive had and the apr is okay) so i've been robbing peter to pay paul for two years now, making everything meet at the end of the month is a nightmare. ihave to pay this off until october- when i'm expecting lloyds to write me another letter threatening me again. the branch wont talk to me, because i'm in collections. i've tried to transfer my balances- but been turned down- because of the situation i'm in with credit.

What happened last month was typical- lloyds took £50 out- not on the agreed 26th- it came out on the 13th! lloyds charge you whenver, and its a lottery as to whether ive got the money in there or not! i hadn't.

this then left me overdrawn without any authorisation, because i'm not allowed any overdraft. next month then, they took back £35 charge, plus £50 again, so £135. which left me with no money in my account. in comes my credit card direct debit, i panic, because i cant pay it, i remove my DD. (£15 charge is better than (35, right?) so it bounces. then i owe my card company my minumum repayment, plus a charge, plus next months minumum repayment- and i get a deafult mark. Then i had all this plus next month's payments. This is the circle i've been trapped in. My budget is so tight, it just takes so much as £1 at the wrong point in the month, ( which happened the other month) and its a £35 down next month. i check my accounts every day and it leaves me in a position where every time i see any kind of date written down anywhere i panic in case some payment is due, or i wonder how much money ive got left until i get paid again!

The current situation is, my saturday job is paying off my 50 to lloyds, plus 45 quid in minimum payments on my cards, plus leaving 30 quid in there for charges that i will probably incur- because there is hardly ever money in my account- if something goes through, on the wrong date i'm in real trouble. then back to square one next month. i'm broke by the 5th of the month, one bill like the one i got from ebay for sellers fees can throw me totally out and leave me even shorter, i've had to move back with my mum (who can't help me either cos shes on her own) and i'm looking for another part time job, but thats no picnic as i now live out in the sticks and i (obviously) can't afford a car. i'm so stressed, i can hardly afford to go out, if i go out and spend even £20 i feel wracked with guilt, then i just feel that i hardly care any more. When i go back to university, it willcost me £80 in transport a week because i have to use two buses! i despair! my friends are worried and lending me money left right and centre. i'm so angry because i'm a student and i havent been allowed ANY student facilities that my friends have, instead of running up debt like most students- i'm paying it off hand over fist.


I applied to halifax for a student account with overdraft last year. i was flatly refused. last week (after sneaking in as a current customer with my halifax web saver with £2 in it! whoo!) and pretending i didnt want any credit facilities- i was at last accepted for a student account. halifax were really nice and explained that it was the collections thing with lloyds and the deafult payments on my credit card that meant that nobody would touch me so far as credit goes! so now- at last!!! i have a current account, so i can begin to break free from lloyds. i wanted to reclaim bank charges ( god knows i deserve it!) but i couldnt do this without another account, in case i angered lloyds, and they shut my account or got nasty over the overdraft. which is something i'm scared of doing at the moment!

i now owe lloyds £1400 down from 1800 at its highest point, because i'm trying to repay them, and i use my loan to get my credit cards down too, it angers me because i'm only in about 2k of debt, but i feel like its 15k the amount of hassle i'm having!

What I'm asking is for people's advice as to what i can do now. I've got another year to go like this before i go for my PGCE (when i'll be working practically full time on !!!!!! all money- yikes!) which is another year. i cant take two more years of this stress before i'm qualified to teach! please can somebody advise me as to what i can do? i feel like quitting uni and just getting a job sometimes and repaying it all, but i've come too far. Any ideas anybody? because i've just run out of them over the past two years!

thank you for your time! x

melancholly

wow - that's a total nightmare for you. i don't really know what specifics to suggest, but if you've already been dealing with payment plans you could try contacting the the citizens advice bureau or trying to arrange an appointment with student services who may be able to help.

in the meantime, until someone with more banking knowledge comes along, have a look at the thread on access to learning funds - you should be able to apply and may get a sum of money. it won't fix things, but should make things easier to deal with for now. (i'll find the thread and bump it up the board) if you now have the halifax account, start making claims for charges as that money would put a huge dent in your debt.

can you post how much you owe each bank/credit card and what the APR on the debt is, what your incomings/outgoings/minimum payments are - although you might get better help on that on the debt free wanabee board. there's a post by southern scouser on how to do a statment of affairs (SOA) like this. people can pick at it and make suggestions, but it may also be helpful to you to have a list of what you have to pay each month.... once you have a list and can start making progress, hopefully the panic will go away

and also - have a hug! :grouphug: sounds like you need one

FANMAN1965

I don't know too much about the accounts etc but one thing you need to do for sure is claim back the charges. There is a link on here about it and i know someone who has done this. If you count up what you have paid in bank charges it might take a fair bit off what you owe. Good luck

http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/reclaim/bank-charges

raeveth

That sounds a lot like my story...

Basically I took out a loan to buy a car. I was on an ok wage with low outgoings so it was affordable. I got made redundant a month later and couldn't find a job for 9 months. During this time I had no income whatsoever for 6 months as the Job Centre messed me around. I had to live swapping between my parents' and a friends house to survive off their kindness.

Because of the lack of income I went into defaults on 2 credit cards and the loan. NatWest closed my current account after it kept going into unauthorised overdraft and so I got a basic account with A&L.

Sorting out the credit cards was easy because they were very helpful and we made an arrangement on payments as soon as I got a new job, however I could only manage a third of the minimum on the loan. Consequently they keep reporting that it's in default. I have paid off one of the cards in a year and have paid about 25% of the other one. Thankfully NatWest aren't charging me any interest on the loan now but they are charging around 20% or something for the remainder of the overdraft.

Now I'm going to be a student as of September, but nobody will give me a student account, even halifax who I have had two savings accounts with as well as a sharedealing account and a children's savings account. I had to have these accounts because I needed some money for certain future expenses and if i didn't set them up on an automatic transfer I would never have saved a penny. Obviously I would have otherwise used the money to clear my debts.

But now I'm stuck with my non-overdraft, non-interest paying A&L account and I do worry that I won't have enough whilst at Uni. What should I do?

student_advisor

My heart really goes out to both of you who have reported serious money problems here. I know how hard it is to deal with these situations, especially when it feels like you have been messed around by others who are meant to be there to help.

My first suggestion is not based on money, but general well-being. Most universities will have a counseling service and if these situations are getting you down, you should access them for some emotional support. This is as important as practical support as you have a degree to do and need to be able to focus on that despite all the other things going on.

Now for the money. First, apply to the access to learning fund. This is the uni's hardship fund and is there to help students stay in education despite financial difficulties. Make sure you are honest about your financial state and it's affect on you as there may be a panel who will make the decision.

Second, use your uni's student services/welfare advisor to help you search for additional funding from charities. There are some that support higher eduction. Focus on the need for funding for educational costs, travel etc, not your debts, as charities will not help with that.

Try to renegotiate any repayments that you can't make, Citizen's Advice Bureau can help with that.

Ensure that you set up a budget, and make it realistic.

starsinmycrown-you're now in your third year and want to be a teacher, could you spare a few hours a week to tutor privately? You could charge up to £20/hour depending on level of tuition and where you live. You could tutor other undergrads in different years, GCSE or A-Level students, or even younger (though I don't necessarily agree with tutoring 11 year olds or younger) Summer schools are also a great way to make cash over the hols (too late for this year unfortunately) as they can pay over £300 per week and look great on your CV.

Hope this helps. Please don't give up. Make sure your support network is in place and working. Talk to your tutor too.

Gemmzie

Definitely get over to the Debt Free Wannabe board and if you can post up a list of your SOA (there's a sticky on the forum which explains it).

The guys over there are great at this sort of thing.

Best of luck, hth

moonpixiewitch

i now owe lloyds £1400 down from 1800 at its highest point, because i'm trying to repay them, and i use my loan to get my credit cards down too, it angers me because i'm only in about 2k of debt, but i feel like its 15k the amount of hassle i'm having!




Please hang in there ! Remember something someone once said to me when I was facing Bankruptcy due do my ex-partner - "they can't hang you for it" - this comment got me through the worst times when I had bailiffs at the door & creditors hounding me with phone call after phone call.
Good luck with sorting it all out , as someone else said - CAB debt advisors are fantastic!

jobbingmusician

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Rikki

POST 8 and poster REPORTED. :spam:

beambeam

Can fully sympathise with the OP about dealings with Lloyds TSB - nothing but scum, I've had the stupid collections debate where they can't do anything and make you call an Indian Call centre from the bank and then when thats sorted you go back through and see the cashier, absolute joke.

They do indeed seem to please themselves and my story is a bit like yours, back to the wall, bowing down to their demands but eventually I snapped, ended up going in the bank and making all sorts of threats and a couple of people spoke up in my defence saying their children at university were also struggling mainly to TSB... You'll get there in the end and the guys on this forum will help you out no end. Definitely apply to your hardship fund and speak to someone in the committee to maybe go over your application - Once in the past I was successful in getting £2500 from them! So it can be done!

Good luck.

autismmum

*please remember its just money* i know that sounds easyy for me to say, but i worry that people with debts like this for just trying to move forwards will get really depressed. re: stars in my crown, a sen teacher is a fantastic goal have you looked at bursarys etc, have you applied for hardship funds from the uni? did you know at colleges and uni they have trained counsellors not just for the mind but for practical help too. i really hope you get there keep going but smell the flowers too now and again for sanitys sake.