Our BR Diary, from start to finish......

Scarlett.1974

fermi wrote: »

That's one of those "How long is a piece of string?" questions.

Definitely :rolleyes:

He did say to H it would take 8-10 weeks for him to hear about a BRO/U, but I don't know if setting up IPA timescales are the same. We shall just have to wait (patiently!) and see.

wherediditallgo

Scarlett, a point to remember is that the person you speak to on the phone may well not make all the decisions about your case. Also, the assessment isn't done on the 'phone, it's done when they get back to their desk, have verified certain allowances & have re-done your assessment taking into account what's been said on the 'phone. I suspect that, once your assessment has been done properly, the actual IPA figure being talked about will be considerably less, & there may not be one at all. Mine halved between the telephone interview & me getting the IPA agreement, & I'm sure I'm not the only one to get an IPA for less than they'd been led to expect.

I know it's hard, but you might as well put it to the back of your mind for the time being until the agreement arrives. As others have said, if you don't agree with it, contest it & ask for a breakdown of the figures if one hasn't been sent. You get 14 days to sign it or say why you're not prepared to sign it, so please post the details here as soon as you get it, so that we can see exactly what's been allowed & what hasn't. You know we'll do our best to find supporting evidence/points of law that you can quote to put the OR on the right road.

Scarlett.1974

wherediditallgo wrote: »

Scarlett, a point to remember is that the person you speak to on the phone may well not make all the decisions about your case. Also, the assessment isn't done on the 'phone, it's done when they get back to their desk, have verified certain allowances & have re-done your assessment taking into account what's been said on the 'phone. I suspect that, once your assessment has been done properly, the actual IPA figure being talked about will be considerably less, & there may not be one at all. Mine halved between the telephone interview & me getting the IPA agreement, & I'm sure I'm not the only one to get an IPA for less than they'd been led to expect.

I know it's hard, but you might as well put it to the back of your mind for the time being until the agreement arrives. As others have said, if you don't agree with it, contest it & ask for a breakdown of the figures if one hasn't been sent. You get 14 days to sign it or say why you're not prepared to sign it, so please post the details here as soon as you get it, so that we can see exactly what's been allowed & what hasn't. You know we'll do our best to find supporting evidence/points of law that you can quote to put the OR on the right road.

Thanks WDIAG, I know you're right. I need to try and forget about it now and stop worrying until I know I've actually got something to worry about

I'll post as soon as I hear anything, that's definite

gambit_2

Scarlett

As you know my situation is somewhat similar to yours as regards DLA. The day of your OR interview really freaked me out as ALL of my daughters DLA is used for her (I give £200 a month of it to my sister who takes my daughter for respite/time out as believe me she isn't the only one who suffers from her ADHD, I also suffer from her ADHD, she can be so much hard work).

When I first thought about going BR an accountant friend pointed me in the direction of The Bankruptcy Advisory Service (they have a website). They have helped me a couple of times now. Today I e mailed the lady there to clarify the DLA question as my BR is on Thursday (poopying myself!!!!). She said it is definitely NOT included for IPA decision. We are going to speak on the phone tomorrow and I would like to let you know what she says but I don't know how to PM you (duhh). If you can let me know how to do it I will let you know what she said.

Gambit

Scarlett.1974

gambit wrote: »

Scarlett

As you know my situation is somewhat similar to yours as regards DLA. The day of your OR interview really freaked me out as ALL of my daughters DLA is used for her (I give £200 a month of it to my sister who takes my daughter for respite/time out as believe me she isn't the only one who suffers from her ADHD, I also suffer from her ADHD, she can be so much hard work).

When I first thought about going BR an accountant friend pointed me in the direction of The Bankruptcy Advisory Service (they have a website). They have helped me a couple of times now. Today I e mailed the lady there to clarify the DLA question as my BR is on Thursday (poopying myself!!!!). She said it is definitely NOT included for IPA decision. We are going to speak on the phone tomorrow and I would like to let you know what she says but I don't know how to PM you (duhh). If you can let me know how to do it I will let you know what she said.

Gambit

Hi Gambit,

Thank you, I would really appreciate that and sorry for freaking you out

It came as a HUGE shock to me too

To PM me, just click on my name on the left hand side in any of my posts and you'll see an option "send private message", click on that and away you go

gambit_2

Thanks Scarlett, I will write everything down to relay it back to you.

I'm busy filling in the part 'how did you get into so much !!!!' on the SOA and my mind has gone blank, I remember someone posting a reply on here once about spiral of debt etc but can't find it. I don't suppose that jogs any memories for you does it?

Gambit

Scarlett.1974

Don't know if it will help at all but this is what I put down there (I take it you mean the last page, the reasons for you going BR?):

I have used credit almost all of my adult life. I never spent more than I was confident I could repay and never had a problem meeting my minimum repayments every month.
I know there were times such as Christmas and birthdays when I spent more than I should have on my children and family, but I always thought that because I had no problems meeting the minimum repayments that my debt was not a problem.

I consolidated my various debts (credit cards, overdraft and store cards) with my husband in November 2006 with a large secured loan. This was a terrible mistake - he lost his job soon after that due to ill health and although he was able to make a living from playing on-line poker we struggled with that loan from day 1. Initially the online poker playing went rather well and I guess I was lulled into a false sense of security and was soon spending on the credit cards and overdraft again.

With the cost of living rising, especially utility bills and several interest rises on both the mortgage and secured loan (both on variable rates) I found myself relying more and more on credit to fund my essential living expenditure. When interest was added to the monthly balance it made it even harder to pay significant amounts off the balance, and this situation deteriorated to the point where I was using almost all of my incomings to service the debts.
The situation came to a head in September 2007 when the online poker my husband was playing all went badly wrong, he had no more funds to play with and was unable to contribute anything to the household expenses. I was left having to pay for all the household bills myself, as well as my debt repayments and this left a massive deficit of almost £700. We did attempt a DMP through Payplan but this still wasn't enough to cover the gap between our incomings and outgoings.

The situation just got worse and worse, the strain on my family and the distress this was causing was horrific. The shame that things had got to this stage where we would have to lose our home and worry of our situation was with me every minute of every day until we finally realised that we had to do something. Upon taking advice from CCCS we realised that our only chance to break this circle was to declare ourselves bankrupt.

Feel free to borrow/change/snaffle anything from my ramblings that might help you

gambit_2

Wow, how literate are you? That was really helpful. Going to scribble away now. I will pm you tomorrow

Scarlett.1974

gambit wrote: »

Wow, how literate are you? That was really helpful. Going to scribble away now. I will pm you tomorrow

No problem

tigerfeet2006

gambit wrote: »

Thanks Scarlett, I will write everything down to relay it back to you.

I'm busy filling in the part 'how did you get into so much !!!!' on the SOA and my mind has gone blank, I remember someone posting a reply on here once about spiral of debt etc but can't find it. I don't suppose that jogs any memories for you does it?

Gambit

Gambit it would also be useful if you post a thread on here for others that may find themselves in a similar situaton, thanks.