DMP mutual support thread part 13 !!

January2015

Loobylou07 wrote: »

Hi,

A quick update from me.
We are a couple of weeks into our sm DMP.
So far all 'holding' letters sent. I've been really impressed so far with the Nedcab website. It's like having a virtual assistant!!
So far only Hubby's cap1 have replied. A surprisingly pleasant letter advising they will be freezing interest and charges on his account for 3 months. They continue to send me standard emails and texts reminding me that my monthly payment is overdue. I find this a bit odd, as identical letters were sent for both accounts? Maybe my pleasant letter is on its way??
Heard nothing from anyone else, all Oct payments are now officially overdue so I'm expecting some responses over the next few weeks.
In the meantime, my budget planning is going really well. I have a lovely spreadsheet running nicely with frugal but realistic figures in each category. So far we are on track to have a decent EF in place for February. For the very first time in our lives we know what we have available for what.
Having our budget in black and white (and some boxes in yellow, pink, blue and green!!) has really focused us. I would even say, we're quite enjoying it, we're having a bit of a competition on the nsd's and it's a score draw at the minute with 3 weeks of our month left. We both want to win so this spurs us on!
A slight worry is that I start a new job in November, with a different pay date. And apparently I will owe my current employer 20 hours of annual leave which will be deducted from my final salary, so we might be a bit short, we have accepted a super frugal month will be needed and if we have to dip into the EF for a couple of weeks we accept that too. It will work itself out come December hopefully.

Thank you again for all the advice and support given on this board, I couldn't/wouldn't have had the courage to self manage without it.

❤️❤️

Loobylou.

Well done :j Lovely post - life really does improve if you take control and really start to live within your DMP means.

Gotta love those spreadsheets with colours

Loobylou07

Moveslikeagger wrote: »

Anyone have any advice for this?

Hi,

I'm sorry, I can't help with this as our sm DMP is totally joint.
What I will say though, is that we have a good idea of what we can afford and what we want our repayments to be when they start early next year. A little playing with the budget sheet achieved a good result. Don't get me wrong, I haven't lied on the budget but I have 'fiddled' around with the amounts to get an achievable, fair amount that we're happy with.
I'm not sure if you could do something similar by including your OH's income and therefore being able to include their expenditures also?

Good luck with your journey.

Loobylou.

Loobylou07

January2015 wrote: »

Well done :j Lovely post - life really does improve if you take control and really start to live within your DMP means.

Gotta love those spreadsheets with colours

Thank you.
Yours was one of the many diaries I read start to finish!!

It's such a massive support knowing that others have been or are in similar situations and facing similar challenges. Finding this board was actually my biggest LBM!

Loobylou

Moveslikeagger

Thanks for the replies! Will try and find some other expenses I can add!

reflex1234

I am finally facing up to my debt problem. I owe £37000 over 9 cards. I have decided to start a dmp.
I am so worried though as I’ve never missed payments intentionally and debt has spiralled. I worry that they won’t freeze interest. It’s going to take forever to pay off 😫
Due to an overpayment of wages, I’m not getting my full pay again until April 2019. Once April comes I will be able to pay £260 more each month and I will be getting a pay rise every year. But I worry that only paying £84 in the meantime will just annoy them. I am paying my husband for my lease car which I need for work and also for a debt I owe him (credit card). If I don’t pay him, we will struggle to pay bills, mortgage etc. But I worry the creditors will think I’m favouring my husband over them. If I don’t pay though I fear we could lose our home as money is so tight. My husband has had to fund a court battle for his children so I can’t justify not paying him back the full amount i owe him.

Will this all work out? I’m so scared and feel like I’m dying inside.
Thanks

[Deleted User]

reflex1234 wrote: »

I am finally facing up to my debt problem. I owe £37000 over 9 cards. I have decided to start a dmp.
I am so worried though as I’ve never missed payments intentionally and debt has spiralled. I worry that they won’t freeze interest. It’s going to take forever to pay off 😫
Due to an overpayment of wages, I’m not getting my full pay again until April 2019. Once April comes I will be able to pay £260 more each month and I will be getting a pay rise every year. But I worry that only paying £84 in the meantime will just annoy them. I am paying my husband for my lease car which I need for work and also for a debt I owe him (credit card). If I don’t pay him, we will struggle to pay bills, mortgage etc. But I worry the creditors will think I’m favouring my husband over them. If I don’t pay though I fear we could lose our home as money is so tight. My husband has had to fund a court battle for his children so I can’t justify not paying him back the full amount i owe him.

Will this all work out? I’m so scared and feel like I’m dying inside.
Thanks

:wave:reflex1234. Welcome to our group. I hope you'll find all the answers you need to problems you have now or that may arise along the way. If there's anything you need to know please just ask. You may not get an immediate response but it's more than likely that someone who has been in the same boat will come along and advise you. Also, please let us know of all the little successes you have along the way. Trust me, there will be some although at the moment you probably can't imagine that day ever coming.


Well done on facing up to your debt situation and taking control to do something about it:T:beer:. I can still recall how scary that was, it's a major wake-up call and a huge step. Onwards and upwards from now on:j


Could I ask you if you are using a free DMC like Stepchange to manage your DMP? You say you've decided to start a DMP but you didn't say how far along with it you are. My advice would be to give Stepchange a call and have a chat with one of their advisors. They will be able to clarify the situation and set your mind at rest about the repayment situation concerning your creditors and your husband and the reason you need to pay him first. They are non-judgemental and often just pouring it all out to a stranger can be very therapeutic. I know I found it so as I had never told a living soul about my unbearable debt situation before I called SC.

Good luck:beer:

Loobylou07

reflex1234 wrote: »

I am finally facing up to my debt problem. I owe £37000 over 9 cards. I have decided to start a dmp.
I am so worried though as I’ve never missed payments intentionally and debt has spiralled. I worry that they won’t freeze interest. It’s going to take forever to pay off 😫
Due to an overpayment of wages, I’m not getting my full pay again until April 2019. Once April comes I will be able to pay £260 more each month and I will be getting a pay rise every year. But I worry that only paying £84 in the meantime will just annoy them. I am paying my husband for my lease car which I need for work and also for a debt I owe him (credit card). If I don’t pay him, we will struggle to pay bills, mortgage etc. But I worry the creditors will think I’m favouring my husband over them. If I don’t pay though I fear we could lose our home as money is so tight. My husband has had to fund a court battle for his children so I can’t justify not paying him back the full amount i owe him.

Will this all work out? I’m so scared and feel like I’m dying inside.
Thanks

Hi Reflex,

Well done on taking this step....it's scary isn't it? But you've done the right thing in facing your situation and posting on here.

First off just want to say I'm no expert and I'm sure others with more experience/knowledge will offer you more advice shortly (this board has helped me massively). Just by reading through and lots of lurking gave me lots of confidence to face our debt, so I would suggest you try that too.
We are in the early stages of our DMP and my focus at the moment is to build up an EF. I won't start making DMP payments until Feb. The general advice on here is to do this, you'll have no access to credit for a good while.
We pay £370 a month to family - they gave us a good chunk of money to enable us to buy our house, and the agreement is that we pay them back. So I've listed this as 'family loan' on our budget sheet (we're using nedcab). I've also spoken to stepchange about this payment and there's no question of it being queried. Plus, it's my DMP (well and Hubbys!) but my point is we control the budget and come February we will pay what we can afford and the creditors will get what we can afford.
The biggest confidence boost to me was control. I set up a spreadsheet, I budget every penny, and that feeling of living within our budget whilst saving towards the EF has really really helped.

It is scary and I've had a good few wobbles over the last few weeks. You should feel proud of yourself for facing this and now plough on with taking that control.

Good luck and keep reading and posting on here, it really does help!

Loobylou.

reflex1234

Thank you carbootcrazy and loubylou07

I am going through SC, they have been great but have advised that the creditors may think I’m favouring the loan to my husband, as he will be getting much more than them currently.
They said creditors may not freeze interest, default etc. It worry I will just get in more and more debt. What will happen then.

My form and details have been sent off to SC, I just need to pay the creditors a token payment when I get paid tomorrow, until SC set up the direct debit. I hope to put money aside for emergencies.
I have a new bank account also. I feel in control in that way as I have read so much that I feel I know what I am doing in some ways. But I just worry they won’t stop interest and the debit will rocket.
X

Suseka97

reflex1234 wrote: »

.............
They said creditors may not freeze interest, default etc. It worry I will just get in more and more debt. What will happen then.
I have a new bank account also. I feel in control in that way as I have read so much that I feel I know what I am doing in some ways. But I just worry they won’t stop interest and the debit will rocket. X

Firstly welcome - you're in a good place coming here.

Okay, maybe your creditors will get a bit peed off if they think you are favouring your husband - but whether they do or don't, you just stick with your plan. If they don't stop interest and charges quickly, you'll be in no worse position that you are now - surely. The debt may increase in the beginning -yes, but eventually once you've paid off your husband and your income returns to its normal amount you'll be able to up your payments and thus reduce the term.

Another option might be for you to self-manage (which I know sound scary, but really isn't) - you can use the NEDCAB site for assistance with this, with advice from this forum. That way you are in full control and you could drop all creditors to token payment - or write telling them you in financial difficulty, that you are working with NEDCAB to come up with a workable solution but in the meantime you won't be paying them anything. You can back that up with an I&E if needs be. You can add that you'll start making DMP payments from x date (your choice) and that'll give you time to build up an EF - or maybe you could completely pay off the debt to your husband in that time.

There are lots of choices for you - you just need to consider the best way forward for your situation (and your mental health).

booksandbacon

Sorry to ask again, I'm just not sure what to do...


I have just started my DMP, and have been paying token payments of £1 to all creditors for two months except one - payday lender Sunny Loans. I've had so much round-robin communication with them (including sending them my I&E three times), I have written and emailed them but they only ever email me.


They have recently offered an 80% reduction on the balance I owe if I can pay it by mid-November. At first I thought YES RESULT but I want to check the wording to make sure everything is kosher...


If you pay £166.93 today or by November 16, 2018 we will accept this as full and final settlement of your loan and your account with us will be closed.

If you accept this settlement offer and pay the agreed amount by the date stipulated , we will mark the debt as 'partially settled' on your credit file. This shows future creditors that the debt was cleared for less than the full amount. Please be advised that this may impact your ability to obtain credit. The account will be removed from your credit file six years after it was partially settled, or six years after the date it defaulted if this was earlier.

1. Does this seem above board?
2. They haven't mentioned anything about other companies chasing me for the debt, is that bad?
3. Is partially settled okay?
4. They emailed me the offer, is that satisfactory for 'written confirmation'? That seems to be their only method of communication!


TIA