URGENT HELP PLEASE - Bankruptcy and Amigo Conplaint

sparklababe

thank you thank you for the help. I haven’t been back to post as nothing was actually helping. 

I no longer own the mortgaged property. It was sold at lower than value and by the time we sold it, we were 7 months behind in payments so there was no lump sum left. I had to move for work and for the first 12months after we moved, we had to pay for the mortgaged house and a rental house. This has contributed to the problem.

My husband Has been out of work since March who has escalated the problem. I had been doing overtime at work to make up the funds but then got Covid myself and had to take 5 weeks off so although I’ve had basic pay there is no extra. Once the rent is paid I have £600 for everything else. 

I Have spoken to many of the creditors - they have already given me 3 months and some have given 6months breathing space for Covid and further 8 weeks for the complaint. And then no action taken due to lockdown but now it’s a case of go into insolvency on my own terms as the council have said that they will look at asking the courts to make me bankrupt.

the debts are all priority debts (utilities, tv licence and council tax mainly). I do know I should not have prioritised the Amigo loan but was trying to protect my mother in law.
DMP isn’t suitable for me as the debts I owe are not covered by a DMP - the big heat debt is Amigo and in a DMP, I would still have to try and find the £400 to pay them each month or mother in law has to. 

 DRO isn’t suitable as I am just over the £20,000. Which leaves either IVA or bankruptcy.
The FOS haven’t been that brilliant so far either. They’ve had the case for almost 7 weeks, I keep checking with them but they have no updates for me. Amigo had a deadline of 27th November to respond to FOS. I have checked  but FOS have not received anything. All FOS has said is that I have to be patient as Amigo have a backlog of complaints.
Not quite sure where to go next! 

Any constructive advice welcome!

katsu

Can you get any benefits or find a way to start paying the council tax? Even if not the arrears? 

What other costs do you have that you can cancel? 

If you can't afford a TV licencet, stop using it then there's no more TV license debt. Its not the law that you have to have a T V license.  If you don't use BBC iplayer nor watch any live TV, then you'll not need a license.

Sounds like you need to try and get more time if you think Amigo can be resolved in your favour. 

sourcrates

I note the time of your last post was 4.19 am, i can understand if this is causing you sleepless nights.

However, the problem you will still have, is that although Bankrupcy will protect you from the Amigo loan, it will not protect your Guarentor.

Amigo can still chase your MIL for the money, and take her to court to get her to pay, so going bankrupt will not solve that problem for you i`m afraid.

What is your MIL`s financial situation ?

Because if she hasen`t got the cash to pay them, then Amigo have nowhere to go with this, its an unsecured debt, so even if she owns a house, they cannot force a sale to pay the debt.

You need the wheels and cogs to keep turning here, default on the debt, let Amigo go through the collections process, I would try and brief your MIL on this as much as possible, just keep saying you cannot afford to pay, make sure the MIL is singing from the same songsheet, they can go to court, and obtain judgement, but if neither of you have the money, not even a court can force you to pay what you haven`t got.

Thats the stratagy i would employ until my position becomes clearer.

One other thing on Bankrupcy, in order for you both to benefit, in the case of the Amigo loan, both you and the MIL would need to declare bankrupcy.

fatbelly

sparklababe said:

... the council have said that they will look at asking the courts to make me bankrupt.

the debts are all priority debts (utilities, tv licence and council tax mainly). 

DMP isn’t suitable for me as the debts I owe are not covered by a DMP - 

That will save you £680 - let them do it.

TV licence arrears are not a qualifying debt in bankruptcy.

A dmp is just a payment plan. You could still get payment plans on your debts

sparklababe

Just an update - Amigo are upholding my complaint! I don’t know if or how much I will get back and Amigo are typically not being forthcoming. If anyone knows of any way of persuading Amigo to act swiftly - I’d love to hear your thoughts! 

Or if anyone knows what I can say to other creditors to delay action, I’d be most grateful. One company I have spoken to said ‘we don’t work with ifs, buts and maybes so we will continue with action.”

It’s very frustrating.

Thank you for all those who have offered advice.

sourcrates

Utility and TV licence debts can wait for the time being, however there`s nothing to stop you making arrangements with them, council tax arrears are far more serious, i hope by now you have come to an arrangement with the council ?, you should be speaking to them to avoid any further action.

Making you bankrupt would not get them anywhere if you have no assets, whats the point of that ? it would simply be £680 wasted, they usually obtain a liability order to recover unpaid CT anyway, i think whoever told you that was trying to big themselves up and make an idol threat, without engaging their brain to the facts of the matter.

When companies mention "recovery action", all that means is writing to you and calling you, this is a long process and can go on for many months, even years. Under the civil procedure rules, any legal action is preceeded by whats known as a "letter before action" this is a questionaire type document that gives you the opportunity to agree terms without progression to court, should you recieve one, just offer what you can afford, the usual progression of these things see`s the debts passed to debt collectors, not the courts, who will accept whatever you can afford, so i don`t really see your problem here, as all of this can be sorted out quite easily by having agreements put in place.

However you should stop paying Amigo now too.

You don`t need insolvency here, your CT debt is your priority, that should already have been addressed by yourself.

Unfortunatly theres no way to predict how long Amigo will take to offer you your redress, just give it time to play out.

Smashingitnow

That's good news. Try and be patient...good luck.