Negotiating with Creditors for my Elderly Mother

liselle

Hi, I'm sorry to hear about your mother's credit card debts and the theft.
Have you spoken to Stepchange? I am retired aged 70 and am in a DMP with them.
They're very helpful.

With very best wishes

sourcrates

vka1 wrote: »

Re the CCA, my mother won't let me do anything that means an account is frozen. I think she's scared of not be able to access funds in an emergency. What might my next step be?

Thanks all.

You mis-understand, the accounts are not frozen, if they are still live accounts, nothing will happen, it’s only if debt collectors are involved, they would cease collection activity until complied with.

Get some advice from one of the free debt charities.

vka1

Thanks. There aren't debt collectors involved.

So far I've managed to get RBS to recognise that their systems failed and should have flagged the card theft and they have refunded all the cash withdrawal amounts, transaction fees and interest as well as reducing her minimum payment on her own small balance. It's been a bit of a battle but it's a big help in freeing up her weekly budget.

I'm now off to tackle her next highest % card to see if we can balance transfer or make them an offer...It's going to take some time to untangle everything but sorting out the stolen money feels like a huge step forward and has eased things considerably!

Everyone's advice is appreciated.

knightstyle

Hi, glad you are helping her sort this mess out.
To me the first thing is to transfer some of the debts to some of the 0% deals there are, I have just had one from Barclaycard for over £10k even though we have only our small pensions now we are retired.
Next get rid of the cards except one which will be for emergencies, just cut them up.
If you now contact the credit card companies you will not get the best repayment deal, you need to get a charity to do it, they are used to doing it and will usually get the interest frozen. Look at CAP https://capuk.org/i-want-help who will give free help or someone similar.