cccs or not??

RenB21

Hi, I'm with CCCS, and the calls stopped from creditors after only a month or two.

Going to CCCS was the best plan for us, and I think helped over doing it ourselves as creditors will see you are serious as you've involved CCCS - who are well known.

We did end up receiving a CCJ, but this was for a £25k loan, where we were paying half their required monthly payment, so seemed fair enough. This also doesn't cause any issues as long as you keep up your payments.

Like already said here, your credit won't be great after this, but who really wants to get the credit again anyway, once we're out of it I plan on staying out of it!

homer_simpson_2

thanks for all the replys, much apperciated!!

i know my credit will be shot to bits, but to be honest i dont really care!
two things, being a noob, could someone point me in the right direction of a full soa for refrence, so i can see how its supposed to be:doh:

also, dont suppose anybody knows the address for hsbc loans dept, to send debt management form to, i have been all over website and phoned them but all i got was transferred to debt management dept, i took it out in my local branch, so i suppose i write to my local branch??

again thanks for all the replys and advice :beer: ,

Deep_In_Debt

After struggling for 6 months on my own, it was a God send for me to go on a DMP with CCCS.

Sorry can't help wit HSBC - one of the few finance institutions that I didn't have debts with!

I don't care about my credit rating...I got myself in a real pickle with money so a happy to live my life with a basic bank account and cash.

CCCS and Payplan were both recommended by my creditors when I got into difficulty. I went with CCCS because they seemed more friendly and helpful at the time.

kazd

You can pretty much do everything yourself with a creditor that the CCCS or Payplan can do. Under no circumstances approach a fee paying dmc.

Your creditor will want you to fill out a som (statement of means), they will then look at what disposable income you have left and work out how long you would take to clear your balance. At the end of the day they want to get there money back and its far better for them to come to an arrangement with you that you can stick to than end up with failed plans.

You will start of in arrs in a collections dept, once you miss a couple of payments without an arrangement set in place you will then be passed to another dept who will issue the default notice, once the default notice runs out you then get passed to a debt collection company.

Either way you will affect your credit file because you will show as a late payer but if you can come to an arrangement and stick to it, its better than a default.

Have to say the only time I have heard of interest being frozen is when its gone to CCJ and you don't want to do that.

RedDino308

Hi Homer and Welcome,

First of all well done for posting up on here. My situation was very similar when I had my light-bulb-moment and you do have a number of positive options open to you.

You say that you have been able to meet all your payments. This indicates that your credit rating may be surprisingly good and we may be able to use it to your advantage.

Your SOA shows some areas that could be improved on dramatically. For instance...
£48 for sky is high - can you cut this back to the lowest tariff of £16 inc b/band

£38 for income insurance is very high. Do you really need this at the moment. If so then get a cheaper deal - ant insurance should cut this down to about £18.

£60 pension - can you stop paying this whilst you get yourself back on track.

£120 food - if it is just you then this is quite high. Take a look on the thrift boards and you could cut this fairly easily by at least £30.

Now with just those small changes you would be recouping £142.

Obviously you can finesse this when you put up a more complete SOA but you get the idea.

Now coming back to the cards. There are a number of articles detailing how to shuffle the debts around to minimise the interest so that your payments are reducing the debt. The fact that your credit rating may be quite good could really make this easier. For instance if you can pay off a couple of those small CCard Balances then you could phone up the card companies to close down the cards and when they try and talk you out of it you ask for a %0 balance transfer.

Obviously this approach will be very hardwork and require you to continue with the overtime - especially whilst you get things on track - but it is an alternative to a dmp and the problems that could cause.

I hope this helps a little.

RD308

Merlot

homer_simpson wrote: »

ok, my soa,

income (before any o/t) £1800

outgoings
mortgage £590 - Is this interest only or repayment?
gas/elec £65
c tax £65
water £11
phone £21
sky £48 <- inc broadband - too high
petrol £100
income ins £38 - why?
morg ins £15 - why do you have both mortgage insurance and life insurance, are you married? Do you have children? Did you have an IFA give you advice on these products, I'm betting you did, my advice is insurance is great if you can afford it, you are spending £74 per month on the what "if", you need to look into this.
life ins £6
home ins £15 - essential - do not cancel
pension £60 - pause the payments for a wee while
food £120
cap1 cc £241 13.6% (maxxed)
mint cc £109 0% till november (£1100 remaining)
secured loan £259 6.5%
hsbc p loan £217 8% i think?
marbles £8 22.9%:eek: ( to transfer to mint)
egg £5 19.9% ( to transfer to mint too)

total £1993

(not including annual stuff, car insurance, car tax, ect ect:eek: )

hence the 10+ hours overtime:mad:

Ive added a few comments in above.

Merlot.x.

homer_simpson_2

Hi again, and thanks again for the comments,
@ reddino & merlot,
yes your probably right about the pension, i should stop it for a while, i will contact them and see if would be a problem

the life insurance on the mortgage is compulsary, but i am going to cancel the mortgage insurance, i can cover this with my income protection,

income protection, i took this out after i did my back in a while ago and was off work for a month, and seriously screwed my finances (and thats partly why im in this mess now!) it is with ant insurance, and its high cos it includes redundancy insurance, i work for a very small company, so it may happen, but he pays very well, bit reluctant to end this tbh, im a engineer, with a history of back probs!

sky bill, well i confess to having movies on there, but in my defence before i was spending £40 -50 p/m on dvd's, as im a big film buff, and got movie package to "save money:idea: "but yea, i will go to freebie broadband.

as for the food bill, i thought £30 a week is pretty good! i take a lunch to work and feed 2 cats on this, but yea i probably could cut back some more.

cccs is starting to look like the best option for me at the mo, only thing concerning me is the fact i will be stuck with my mortgage and secured loan, unable to swap them when they decide to hike the intrest rate after my fixed rate ends, has anybody managed this with a poor credit rating?

Ta

soo

I would like to say I had a light bulb moment in Jan 08, I contacted cccs, worked out my DMP - I never really got any calls but I did have a home visit from Welcome Finance (really upsetting) . Its the best thing I ever did.

tyllwyd

One thing if you do decide to go to CCCS - check with them before you transfer any debt around - mint might not be happy if you increase your debt to them by paying off marbles & egg and then immediately expect them to agree to a dmp.

HHH_2

In your first post you metioned a management fee with CCCS. make sure the CCCS you are with is the Consumer Credit Counselling Service which is a charity and charges no fees. there is a company called C-C-C-S which is not the same and will keep part of your money. I have a DMP with the real CCCS best thing ever all interest stopped and debts going down not up. the calls and letters lasted about a month.