Can you save on an iva?

kenny_boy1

Hi my iva has been submitted today And I was just sitting here wondering. Are you allowed to save? 

I was advised to open a new bank account with someone else and chose starling, they have little pots that you can save in. I can’t get a straight answer online as some are saying you can and some saying that it will have to be paid into your iva? 

Can anyone help answer this? 

Thanks 

RauHughes

You're given a budget and you're expected to live within that budget, however you may be given allowances for example car maintenance at £30 per month, when realistically you might not spend anything on your car for six months then it costs you £250 to get it through its MOT.

You're therefore expected in some respects to have an element of savings in an IVA, but if you're amassing thousands of pounds in savings then you're clearly not paying as much to creditors as you can afford so the IP would want you to pay the savings in and increase your payments. 

So yes you can save, but also no you can't. Realistically you can have a modest sum in savings as a rainy day fund but if the IP sees £1000+ in your account they're generally going to want to realise it. 

kenny_boy1

Thanks for replying.
no it won’t be thousands, it will just be what I have left at the end of the month. I’ve set up 4 pots (Xmas, birthdays, car and a rainy day one for if something breaks) if I have £40 left over at the end of the month I will just put £10 into each pot. I have 5 children so need to save for birthdays and Xmas.

sourcrates

As above, you can actually do as you wish with the money from within your budget, there are no limitations, it’s only extra earned money, on top of your budget, that you must declare.
Some people even save enough to end their arrangement early, but most use it for emergencies or car servicing/repairs etc.

mrcactus

sourcrates said:

As above, you can actually do as you wish with the money from within your budget, there are no limitations, it’s only extra earned money, on top of your budget, that you must declare.
Some people even save enough to end their arrangement early, but most use it for emergencies or car servicing/repairs etc.

Sorry to jump on someone elses thread. So, if I decided to go on a diet (not likely but) and have money left over that I would usually spend on food, then I could put that aside? Then when the annual review comes, would I still put the normal amount I usually put, say £150?

sourcrates

Yes you can do as you wish within your budget.

mrcactus

sourcrates said:

Yes you can do as you wish within your budget.

Sorry to be thick here  As long as I don't take out any credit/borrow etc, I can do as I wish?

reliquit

My IVA is completed now, but when it was live I was saving £200 per month. But our situation was unusual. My wife is severely disabled and receives £225 per month Disability Living Allowance. Initially Aperture wanted to treat this as income, but we argued that this is given to us to meet extraordinary costs associated with her disability (wheelchair purchase/repairs, home adaptations, etc). Treating it as income but allowing us to save it seemed like a reasonable compromise.