Making an offer

johnpeter_3

Hi all,

my first post on here. I've spent a little while looking around but can't find a post which covers my position, but if there is would somebody kindly direct me to it.

My situation is this: I gave up work almost 3 years ago to look after my very ill wife and my beautiful little daughter. I started working self employed so I could be around or near to home as much as possible. We always had a small amount of debt, but I did have a well paid job and they didn't seem to matter too much. But, the debts started to mount up, though being the optimistic sort I felt it was only a matter of time before my earnings would start to take care of things again. Looking back, we were robbing Peter to pay Paul. Using one card to pay off another. It finally dawned on us in the middle of last year that we would need to take drastic action as we really could no longer pay everybody that was demanding money from us. So, I contacted the CCCS and started the ball rolling. Sadly, my wife passed away during this time suddenly, at the age of 33, leaving me to try and sort out the debts and look after my, then, 4 year old daughter.

Anyway, the CCCS were a great help and set me up on a very low start up payment plan and took all the hassle from my creditors away from me. Forgot to say, at that time my debts totalled £55k. My business is now starting to grow and I'll be able to increase my payments through the CCCS at the next 6 monthly review.

Now, to the point of my post!! One of the credit card companies has repeatedly contacted me with better and better offers on my debt to them. I owe them just over £10k, but they have now put on the table an offer to rewrite that to £3k if I pay them an extra £20 per month. Very tempting. In addition to this I have met a very special lady this year and she will be moving in with me and my daughter next year once she sells her house. She wants to help me out and we have discussed her coming onto my mortgage and paying me half of the equity on the house. This won't give me enough to cover the full amount of my debts, but has got me wondering whether I'll be able to make offers to my other creditors and get all my debts written off in one go.

Has anybody any experience of this or any sound advice to offer on the best way forward?

Many thanks in advance.

AGB863

Any creditor will always give you a settlement figure, this is usually between 25 -35% off what you owe them as they would prefer to have a lump some quicker than small amounts over a long time.
Some may ask how much money you have suddenly come in to, but you do not have to inform them of that.
Don't accept the first offer they give you, they sometimes come back with a better offer.

johnpeter_3

Thanks for that.

The offer I have on the table from one of my creditors is for 70% off. They started at a much lower discount, but I kept saying 'No', chiefly because I couldn't afford the extra monthly payments they were asking me to commit to.

So, I suppose my next question is how do I approach the other creditors? Do I make them an offer of, say, settling at 30% and take it from there? Or ask them to make me an offer, telling them I will have access to some funds and then get into a bit of negotiation? I've certainly learnt by now never to take up a first offer on a settlement figure.

Apple_2

Hi johnpeter

Do you mind me asking ? who are the credit card company and how long has the reduced payments through the CCCS been going on ? I'm not being nosy, it's just my O/H has debts and his c/c's currently won't look at anything under 75% - I'm wondering how long before they get to the point your c/c company is at.

Thanks

jordylass

Hi johnpeter, your situation sounds similar to mine, it wouldn't be MBNA by any chance?
They too offered me a very low settlement figure, (only good till the end of the month!) I spoke to my counsellor at CCCS about it and she said they are the one creditor who will continually come up with these 'offers' but that any crditor will accept a settlement figure.
There other 'offer' was to wipe all of the charges and fees if I could pay £60 per month for 3 months, cccs said if I did that for 3 months, MBNA would then come back to me saying if you've done it for 3 months, you can carry on.
Until you have the finances I would carry on as you are. When you have the money contact all your creditors for a settlement figure.

Dammam

Firstly, my condolences on yours & your daughters sad loss and congratulations on what will hopefully be a happy future.
I agree with the above posters - know how much money you will have available for the debts and then speak to the companies concerned. Some will accept more, some less. There's no harm in letting them know that the money is coming from a friend who has a finite amount available. If you have a maximum of £20,000 available, then aim your total settlement figures at £10-12000 and then work your way upwards a small amount at a time. It can be slow going, but worth it in the end. Always explain that you have other creditors and you have to make a fair settlement to each of them. Also worth telling them that unless you can clear ALL your debts, it's not worth taking your friends money as you will still be paying out more than you can afford.

I lost my wife at 32 - although we weren't blessed with children I gave up my job and spiralled into debt. Went off the rails a bit I suppose. My thoughts are with you; good luck.

johnpeter_3

Hi,

Jordylass- it was a Marbles credit card, so it's the HFC bank I'm dealing with. I have in writing from them the offer to make additional payments for 3 consecutive months (sound familiar?) and that then they will re-write my debt with a reduced balance into a new non-interest bearing loan, closing down the existing account. I had this letter in August and told them I would not be in a position to make extra payments for another couple of months and they were ok about that.

Apple - CCCS payments only started in May of this year, at the very minimum level that they would accept. It took me the first part of the year to even work up to that. Before then I was making £1 per month payments to all my creditors and couldn't even afford to make mortgage payments for a couple of months.

I'd still be interested to hear from anybody about a strategy for apporaching my creditors and 'making a deal' on a reduced settlement figures. Has anybody been through this?

johnpeter_3

Hi Dammam,

thanks for your kind words. It's only when you go through something so bad that you find out there a lot of very kind and helpful people in this world. Even the creditors left off hassling me for a few weeks!!

But I'm very blessed to have a wonderful daughter and a new very special lady in my life and right now the future is looking much brighter.

Very good advice about dealing with the creditors, by the way. Certainly, about starting from a low point and working up from there towards my limit and ensuring I clear all my debts or none at all. I don't mind it being a long drawn out affair. I've seen already how much one bank has been willing to move to get a settlement, so I know there is a lot of scope for negotiation.