Full and final settlement help thread

Hello, Am looking for some advice for F&F settlements.
I got into horrendous debt 12 years ago and battled the minimum payments for a couple of years before 10 years I finally accepted I couldn't cope and contacted Stepchange.

My debt at the time was £108,000 and after 10 years of a DMP it is just under £51k. I rent a council flat, ditched the car, holidays, etc and budget shop and haven't had credit since.

I earn £1350 a month and after everything is paid I have £475 to pay in my DMP. This means my expected debt free date is 2024.
I have no assets and could have taken the easy way out and went bankrupt but it was my mistake to get into debt so I do want to pay back what I owe.

I eventually came clean to a family member a few years ago and they have been surprisingly good about it all. They encouraged me to see if I could reduce my debts or claim PPI.
I spent most of 2014 claiming PPI and now with added money from family i have £25,000 to offer as F&F settlements

In April I will be updating my budget statement. Circumstances the same so payment will probably be the same. However 2 months dmp payment will reduce my overall debt to 50k meaning I can offer a maximum of 50%

My debts are listed below.
I have rounded up the Debt to nearest Hundred
and rounded up DMP payment to nearest £1
Also I have listed the amount of months it would take to pay that creditor off. Obviously those time scales would change over the years as amount increased due to other creditors being paid off but below is how it stands today.

I have coloured red the creditors that were not the original so whether they have bought the debt or are maybe a collections dept under a different name I have highlighted this.


Creditor.................Debt.............DMP.............Months

Lloyds Bank.............13.8 k........£104............133
Barclays Bank............9.7 k..........£83............118
Marlin........................8.5 k..........£84............101
Idem.........................7.5 k...........£43...........177
Barclaycard................5.3 k...........£59.............91
Link...........................2.9 k...........£34.............86
Blair Oliver & Scott.....2.4 k...........£25.............96
Beneficial..................£688............£44.............16

Total Debt.................£51k..........£475............107



What I would like to know is the following please...

a) Has anyone (especially on a long term DMP) had experience of F&F settlements ?

b) Would people advise me to go through the process with Stepchange or go it alone to try and start lower ?

c) What sort of % would you offer first and do people have experience of the above creditors accepting reduced amounts ?

d) If they refused would I be able to keep the money and retry in a couple of years time when debt had reduced and lump sum equalled a greater % ?

e) how would I go about making payments. Would it better coming from family member as a 3rd party. Would it be allowed for me to transfer my share of offer to family to allow them to write the final cheques or is that illegal / unethical ?

f) how long would the whole process take. Am i talking months or years ?

g) is there anything else I have missed or need to know ?


All comments and advice appreciated.
This time last year I was looking at another 10 years of a 20 year DMP. Now even if everyone says NO i will only have a maximum of 5 years to go. Hopefully I can get some offers accepted and reduce my debt but if I have to wait and see the DMP out then so be it.

Thank you for reading.

Will start the ball rolling in March after I have updated budget statement with Stepchange. Have to wait until then as don't know how much yet council will increase rent and poll tax yet.
Or whether I get a 0.5 % payrise or told not this year !!

If I offer 25% to each of my 8 creditors and I get a a few refusals but someone comes back and says they will accept 40% am I allowed to do that or do I have first go back to the refusals and wait until they mull over 30% and 35% and then 40% subsequently as I have to try and treat all creditors fairly ?

Hi All,

I want some clarity on full and final settlements. I had a lot of financial issues in the past and Payplan look after my creditors. I had several defaulted accounts that have now fallen off my files. However 2 of these accounts never had defaults registered against them annoyingly so remain open. I am desperately trying to tidy my file up. I have offered full and final settlements and had a reply from Cabot (who purchased one of my non defaulted debts) I have been sending emails back and forth but cannot get them to agree to mark my account as satisfied or settled in full as below.


Where your account is reported to theCredit Reference Agencies and a discount has been applied, we will update yourrecord as ‘Partially Settled’ with a ‘nil’ balance outstanding. This willindicate the account has been cleared but with a lesser amount

than the balance owed. Where the fullbalance is paid, the record will be updated as ‘Satisfied’, indicating that thefull balance has been cleared.



We are unable to update your credit fileas settled in full unless the account is settled in full or delete our entryfrom your credit file.

Now I have a couple of questions, will they come around? Has anybody had any success in getting them to take adverse data off after a full and final settlement? And also can you get a backdated default, as this account should have been defaulted years ago by the original creditor Barclaycard?

Any help appreciated

Thanks Tixy

Yes it is a pain! I also Have one with Marlin, that was NRAM. Same story no default despite being in arrears since 2007 and on an arrangement to pay.

Yes it appears it is a flat refusal all round.

Does a partially settled account impact your account greatly, I have read mixed opinions? I basically have £8k of bad debt that they are offering to settle at £3k and I do have access to the cash.

So annoying as if the accounts had been defaulted when they should have been they would just about be off by now. I don't wish to run away from the debt, I pay Payplan £300 a month and have done since 2007 but I would like it off my file so I have at least a chance of a mortgage in the nearish future.

852318 wrote: »

Does a partially settled account impact your account greatly, I have read mixed opinions?

Depends on what you want to do (credit wise) in the next 6years.

Its a pain because usually when people are looking to do F&Fs they have defaults from 4+ years ago and so the partial settlement only shows on file for a couple of years.

Obviously without defaults they are going to be on file for 6years from when you settle, and may well still have an impact on future borrowing in a few years, especially things like a mortgage.