Average bills

The_Drowner

First post so please be gentle with me.... after struggling with credit card debt, unsecured loans and other debts for some while I finally got my head out of the sand
last month and switched my bank account, cancelled my direct debits and put together a debt management plan which I sent off to all of my creditors. Almost all of them seem happy with it and I have now greatly reduced my outgoings on the back of that plan.

However one of the creditors (one of the largest ones as well) is being more difficult. Despite the fact that the others all have accepted the plan and think it is reasonable, they are refusing to allow me to go into an agreement with them becuase they think that my household expenditure is too high in some areas. I asked them what kind of figure I should aim at to make them happy and all I got back was some vague waffle about bringing my grocery bills in line with the national averages etc. - when I checked just now on a few internet sites I was not altogether surprised to see that my aveage househod spend on groceries etc. was considerably less than the average.... where do I go from here? Help!

onamission_2

1. ignore them as all the other creditors have agreed.
2 Write them another letter with your SOA, this time include copies of any agreement letter from other creditors. Reinterate your offer of payment again and the fact that it is prorata, all your other creditors have accepted your offer.
Ask them to accept your offer and you can include a cheque for the amount if you can to show willing .

this worked for me - i'm doing a DIY DMP.

(by the way your budget is yours - every family is individual so don't worry about it. National averages have jumped with the recent costs of gas, petrol etc so those figures don't reflect reality for many of us.)
let us know how you get on.

The_Drowner

Thanks - they were making noises to the effect that 'if this went to a court judgement yadda yadda yadda' - scare tactics I guess. Are they legally obliged to accept my offer if ALL of the others agree to my plan?

onamission_2

no but its in their interests to accept what you *can* afford rather than writing down more bad debts to their books.

anyway if you did end up in court you'd probably end up paying what you are offering now..

waddy_2

how can they say what you can spend thats ridiculous. at least u are trying and have offered something. dont worry, dont panic i have learnt they use all sorts of scare tactics in just 3 days, good luck.

~Beanie~

What have you included for groceries and how many people is it for?

The_Drowner

We are a family of five and I have estimated a weekly food budget of £80. The problem that they have with tis is not so much with the £80 of groceries but the items I listed separately like the cost of running a computer, repairs to my house, the cost of Christmas, birthdays etc. for which I've added in another £50 a month in total - they say that this is far too high (which just seems madly unresonable to me). The second compaint they have is that I shoudl now include this aditonal household expense in my weekly grcoeries, but not, and here's the wonderful bit, by increading eth weekly houshold bill. In other words I have to lose the £50 a month I put aside for my kid's birthdays, washing machines blowing up and roof being ripped off in the winter winds, buting new ink for the printer or my kids can't do their homework etc. and either forget about those altogether OR knock £13 a week off my weekly food bills i.e. feed a family of five on about £67 a week. I know that's not impossible but when that also needs to absorb all of these other houshold costs as well it'll be damned near it.

LilDevil

As others have said, write to them again and reiterate that you can only afford XXX per month/week (whichever your plan is!).

I did this with Next Directory - they refused my offer of £30 per month, so I wrote back and said sorry I cannot afford what you're asking, I can only do £30 - this went on for a few months with them constantly threatening legal action/debt collectors etc (all this time, I was making my £30 payment each month to show them that I was keeping my side of the bargain, so to speak).

I eventually got so fed up with them threatening debt collectors, I wrote them a snotty letter telling them to stop procrastinating and actually refer me as I knew they would accept my offer. :rotfl:

Low and behold, I got a letter a few days later accepting my offer! :T

I've been making these payments for nearly 2 years :A and it's now down to under £500 (it was for a £1000 sofa - I know, I know).

It's well worth sticking to your guns and as I said, if you make the payments, it shows them that you are being as responsible as possible.