DMP Mutual Support Thread (Part 4)

rayday2

You read horror stories about harrassment from creditors mainly where people are refusing to pay, you are not refusing to pay you are offering what you can afford.

I got interested refunded back on my worst creditor, the others I felt had applied fair ones and stopped interest fairly quickly so I never tried on those. But you need to do one step at a time, so ignore history for now but file your letters away for later.

Any questions, worries, concerns, even funnys (promise you will get some of those!) these lovely people will be here to share them!

Ex-spendaholic - mine is a aniseed rock

WhoopieDoodle

very scared and silly, hello. I would reiterate what everyone else has said and in particular, just deal with each day one at a time. I worried about everything and anything when we first begain the DMP but 6 months later things have settled down and I am now taking over the DMP myself. I had read horror stories about MBNA but they have been okay with us (we get the odd letter from them, last week they asked if we could borrow the money off a family member to pay their debt. I wrote a very stern letter back to them, basically telling them to bog off, but in a polite way of course)

The early days are the worse but I promise it will get easier and the day will come when the debt is not foremost in your mind as you realise life has to be lived.

very_silly_and_scared

I am almost in tears reading these posts. I am so grateful for the support.

One practical question. Given that the DMP will not start til september, am I ok to cancel my DDs to my creditors and offer them token amounts before that happens? What will happen if I do that?

Should also let you all know that I just found out yesterday that I have £1000 in 18 months council tax arrears (I thought I was exempt but have just been informed that i wasn't). First time I heard from council was yesterday. I know I should make paying these off a priority and if I cancel my non priority creditors, I can pay a chunk off this. Is that wise? Or what i should do?

I am so confused....

WhoopieDoodle

I would love to write a letter to some of them, in the biggest font possible and just stating ....

GO BOIL YOUR HEAD!

Oh the satisfation of that

WhoopieDoodle

We cancelled the DDs about 2 months before payments were due to start so yes, this is fine as long as you send a token payment and explain the situation.

Not sure about the council tax, but this is a priority debt and needs to be dealt with. Someone should come along shortly and let you know about this.

right, back to work, see you laters

rayday2

I would speak to the council tax people and see if you can come to a monthly payment arrangement with them as CCCS will need to know what they want you to pay as this will reduce what you pay to your creditors as council tax is a priority one.

andytwonames

rayday2 wrote: »

First important thing about a DMP is to get a bank account not related to any creditors you owe money to. Use this link if you have not done it yet but remember that Abbey are probably buying A&L and GE Money http://www.payplan.com/debt-library/miscellaneous.php

Rayday, this list isn't what's needed. It shows which solicitors and collection agencies are used by which banks and does NOT show any relationships between banks and their groups!

Silly and scared..... I would suggest that before you do anything else, get a 'safe' bank account and get your salary/benefits/whatever amended so that they hit this new account.

Call CCCS now and ask them which bank is completely un-connected from all of your creditors and then go and get a basic account there.

As an example, I banked with Virgin oneaccount(royal bank of scotland) and I had a virgin Credit card (MBNA). The virgin cc has in its terms and conditions that if I owe them money on that card and fail to pay, they can take funds from any other account I have with the virgin group of companies.

So, you need to pick very carefully where to place your new account.

None of this is as bad as it seems now. Give it a few weeks and you'll wonder what all the fuss was about.

rayday2

Sorry I thought it showed the companies in groups as well as that - apologies let me dig around again!

very_silly_and_scared

If I make token payments to my non priority creditors while my DMP is being set up I should be able to take a big chunk off that council tax payment.

The woman was horrible on the phone yesterday. Accused me of never informing the council I had moved into that property and then of deliberately not paying my council tax. They had no record of me even living there and have been there 18 months which is why the arrears are so massive.

newlywed

rayday2 wrote: »

Sorry I thought it showed the companies in groups as well as that - apologies let me dig around again!

It does - took me a while to work it out when I first saw it...
Everywhere there is a heading "Creditor" the ones grouped under that heading are linked - eg HSBC and First Direct and Co-op and Smile.

So where there is a new "Creditor" heading, that is a new group of linked creditors