DMP advice

Hello2023

Hello,
I’ve been within a DMP for around 8 months which is for 6,8000. I’m paying what I can each month and some of the accounts have now defaulted and been passed on to other collection agencies. I feel like I’m constantly worrying what letters will I receive or will any further taken action be taken from the creditors. I just wanted to see if anyone had any experience of this and if things do get better after a while, I really just want to carry on paying what I can and work towards getting myself out of the debt but feel like it’s a constant worry,

thanks 

Keep_pedalling

There is a typo in your opening post £6,800 or £68,000?

RAS

Who is managing your DMP? Hopefully you are not paying fees?

fatbelly

If you're with stepchange, and the monthly payment is affordable, you have nothing to worry about. Let them get on with what they do, and you get on with your life

Rob5342

Remember that these companies buy debts at a fraction of their value as an investment, expecting to get a return over a number of years. Even if you are making greatly reduced.payments they could still be doubling their money over a few years for no effort whatsoever so they are laughing. If they are making easy money like that they have little motivation to spend time and money on any legal action. Even if they did take legal then the court would set payments the same as the DMP, so again there is little motivation for them to try.

If you are able to save some money then at some point you might want to consider making a full and final offer to settle some of the debts for a reduced amount. At the beginning that might not be possible but if you could save a bit of money over a few years then you might be able to try they with one of the smaller ones. You might also consider making CCA requests, if they can't produce the CCA for a debt then they can't enforce it so you can simply stop paying it.

Hello2023

Yes sorry was a typo above meant to say 6,800. I am currently managing this though step change and all accounts apart from 2 have now been passed to other collection companies to me managed, 

RAS

Thank heavens it is Stepchange and even better that it is £6,800.

However, you might be able to repair your credit record faster if you stop paying the creditors who haven't defaulted. You see, what you've got with the other creditors is an arrangement to pay and AP markers damage your credit record longer than defaults.

If you don't mind, OK, let it roll and apart from the odd letter and phone call, ignore everything, except a written Letter before Action.

You could be proactive, take back your DMP from Stepchange, keep paying the debts that have defaulted, and any tiny ones you can pay off in the next 6 months. Stop paying those who haven't defaulted until they do so.

Meantime, put any money you would have paid into an emergency fund, so you have cash when you need in to replace or repair something not in your budget.
 

Rob5342

The other thing with defaults is that it makes the debt more likely to be sold to a debt collector who in turn is much more likely to accept a reduced settlement offer (as they buy debts at a fraction of their value).

It seems absolutely crazy and goes against all intuition, but you get treated better in terms.of your credit report if you stop paying untill you get a default than if you engage.with the creditot and get a payment arrangement.

sourcrates

Relax, nothing happens, and as long as your making your payments, nothing will.

Your debt is fairly low anyway, its quite normal for accounts to be assigned to debt collectors or sold.

Stepchange will plod on distributing your payments, you get on with your thing, it`s all good.