Boyfriend in a mess with Student Loans

Gemmz31

My boyfriend is in some sort of trouble and it appears to be with SLC.

It all started when we had an enraged call from his father claiming bailiffs had turned up at his door at 9pm one evening asking for him. As my boyfriend and I now share a rented house his father sent them away. They left no information for him to get in touch regarding what was going on.

He's now received a handful of letters all reading PRIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL. They are all still registered to his old address at his father's house so he has only just been given them.

He hasn't opened them yet but on closer inspection one of the addresses on the back seems to be for SLC.

He attended a Foundation course, and then the first year of a course in Uni in 2011.
He dropped out after that.

I have a feeling that he hasn't resolved this with Student Loans and it has come back to haunt him.

I am currently stressing out as we share a house and I cannot have people taking my belongings for a mistake that isn't mine. I'm happy to support him through this but this is not the first time he has gotten himself in a mess financially and not opened up to me about it (overdrafts, wonga loan) so as you can imagine I'm really not happy.

I was just wondering if anyone has had a similar experience or any advice at all on what we can do? As Bailiffs have now been involved it appears this is getting more serious and all this could have been avoided if he just pulled his head out of the sand and dealt with his problems.

redpete

Tell him how frustrated and worried this is making you and tell him to grow up and deal with his problems that are affecting you.

SeduLOUs

Obviously he need to make contact and find out what is going on. It may not be as bad as it first seems, but they have gone to extreme measures because they can't get hold of him.

I can understand your frustrations completely if this isn't the first time - nothing worse than money for putting strain on a relationship. I guess the important question is how is he reacting to all of this? Is he desperate to make contact and resolve it, or does he still have his head in the sand and wants to ignore it as long as possible?

If it's the latter then I think you could be in trouble - it's great that you are wiling to support him, but only he can sort it out and has to take the responsibility himself.

Back to the issue at hand - there's bailiffs and there's debt collectors. Many (most?) don't have any legal right to enter your property unless you let them in. Also, they can't take anything that belongs to you regarding a debt that belongs to him. I don't know much more detail than that I'm afraid, but I'm sure someone else will be able to advise. I suspect you probably need to find out and provide a little bit more information about who is actually knocking on the door.

Candyapple

Are you sure they are baillifs and not just debt collector's agents turning up? You partner needs to open his mail, go through it and contact each lender and come to an arrangement. He should also speak to one of the debt charities such as StepChange.

With regards to the SLC, he really should have contacted them when he dropped out. They are not as scary and unreasonable as a lot of people make out. My partner did one year at uni and decided the course wasn't for him - he contacted the SLC and they have deferred repayment of the loan for the date he would have finished the course.

Gemmz31

Thank you for the responses. I found the fact that they left no contact information a little bizarre.

According to his father there were no other letters other than these so it appears that they have skipped to scare tactics.

I'm going to be speaking to him tonight about this (We're both in work) so we can look through these letters and proceed with the appropriate action.

I will update this once we have more information on the matter.

Thanks again!

burlington6

If he doesn't get his problems with debt under control now, he probably never will.

If I were you, I'd give him one last chance to sort all this. If he doesn't.....move on with your life and find a man who is responsible.

If you were married, and he kept up this way of thinking, it wouldn't be good for you

chesky

The bailiffs may not have left contact information but if the letters are opened, then there will be details in them about how to get in touch, if not with the bailiffs, then at least with SLC. If he won't open them, then you should - at least then you'll know the score.

If you're not willing or able to manage the finances as a couple, then you should really consider whether he's the person for you, otherwise you may grow increasingly resentful of his behaviour.

Gemmz31

Thank you for your replies. The last issues we had were around last Christmas when the overdraft and the payday loans came out. Since then I thought he had notably improved but its taken a lot of work.
He genuinely has no idea what he's doing with his money.

I've been sat in work all day with all these potential scenarios running through my head and its not good.

I want to help him as best I can and move past this if possible. We were very happy and there were no other issues up until this point.

I just feel like I'm watching any future possibilities of Mortgages etc. go up in smoke because his credit rating will surely be shot to bits by this.

CLAPTON

Gemmz31 wrote: »

Thank you for your replies. The last issues we had were around last Christmas when the overdraft and the payday loans came out. Since then I thought he had notably improved but its taken a lot of work.
He genuinely has no idea what he's doing with his money.

I've been sat in work all day with all these potential scenarios running through my head and its not good.

I want to help him as best I can and move past this if possible. We were very happy and there were no other issues up until this point.

I just feel like I'm watching any future possibilities of Mortgages etc. go up in smoke because his credit rating will surely be shot to bits by this.

make sure he gets copies of his credit files to see what damage has already been done (all three)

iolanthe07

He genuinely has no idea what he's doing with his money.

Ask him to keep a spending diary, making a note of everything he spends. It is tedious and a bit of a pain, but it will tell him what he is doing with his money.

daytona0

If it helps but I dropped out of uni about 8 years ago halfway through a term and the SLC rather forcefully asked me for me to repay a portion of the loans which I was not entitled to due to dropping out. The letters went to my old uni address and I either got served a CCJ or got a letter threatening it - thankfully I went back to pick up the mail and so was aware of the letters in time to pay it off in full (within a week of receiving the letter).

In conclusion: Get him to open those letters IMMEDIATELY because, in my experience, SLC are slimy little gets who will pursue you relentlessly and do not care about your credit rating in the slightest*. Either just pay it off or make an offer for repayment plans.

You also want to tackle the root cause of the financial problems. Why did he take money out from wonga/overdraft? A 2011 SLC finance issue is probably going to be similar to mine, and just something which people will easily overlook - and certainly not linked to wonga/overdraft loans. If your Oh is taking out money to buy food/presents etc then it isn't the end of the world, just try and be supportive of him as he is probably not skilled in money managed. But if he has a drug/alcohol/gambling problem then you have something bad on your hands....



*although some people may argue that such action is a good thing. I agree to an extent, but in my experience they just didn't care one bit. It's not like a CCJ would have made me pay them any quicker!!