Urgent advice needed

[73061]

Hi,



I have just joined the forum.
I was 65 yrs old 2 days ago.I have been in hospital for 3 weeks just got out but i have been worried about all my debts (plenty of time to think in a hospital bed)

Summary

1) I have been with Payplan for 12 years and i have never ever missed apayment.

2) I have paid back £17,266 and my remaining debt is £54,198

3) My estimated DMP completion date is 27/03/2055 in which i will be 103 years old.

4) Owing to bad health i will not be around that long.

5) Payplan keep pushing me to start an IVA which is bad advice as it is not guaranteed i could keep up with the payments.

6) All debts are from 2005 and are not reported on my credit file also interest was frozen years ago.

7) I have 13 creditors Wescot Credit Services, Cabot, PRA Group Ltd, NCO Europe Ltd, Hoist Finance, Lowell Financial Ltd etc

8) Most of these debts have been resold many times.

Hoist Finance have sent me a letter offering a 69% discount on a debt which my son has offered to pay on my behalf.

I am thinking about offering full and final payments over the next 5 years if i live that long and if i can gather any money together.

I have ZERO assets and live in rented property.

I will not declare bankruptcy under any circumstances.

Can you offer me any advice which would be very much appreciated

I am very worried about this and somewhere along the line i need to try and put money away for my funeral.

I am very grateful for your help and thank you for your time.

[Kati]

Re: Urgent advice needed

to LB ... I'll tag [MENTION=48934]Debt Camel[/MENTION] for you (she should be able to help) xx

[Debt Camel]

Re: Urgent advice needed

Sorry I have to ask the obvious - why will you not consider bankruptcy? It doesn't sound as though you have any assets to protect?

Why would you want your son to waste his money on trying to pay these debts? You have done your best over the years, it's time to give up. The current creditors will probably have paid less than a penny in the pound for these debts.

Bankruptcy is not published in the papers any more. No one will know unless you tell them.

If a debt is accidentally missed of the bankruptcy application it is still written off.

7 out of 8 people don't have to make any payments in bankruptcy at all.

Payplan will be able to help with your bankruptcy application. You don't have to go to court anymore, it is a simple but long online form to complete.

The only ways to deal with such a mass of debt is to not pay it in one form or another. Asking for very low partial settlement is one way. Asking the creditors to produce the original account documentation and then refusing to pay any more if they can't is another way. But with such a mass of debt bankruptcy is by far the simplest and less stressful.

[73061]

Re: Urgent advice needed

I was thinking of snowballing full and final settlements over a period of time while continuing with DMP.
My sister has offered me 5k to help.

[Debt Camel]

Re: Urgent advice needed

Snowballing is a term used to overpay the debt charging the highest interest - all your debts have interest frozen. You can't snowball.

Why waste your sister's money?

As I said, the people who own your debts have probably paid about 1% of the value for them. But most of them will still be very reluctant to settle for less than 10%.

Especially as you are not in the best of health, why would you go through what will be a protracted exchange of correspondence with a lot of your creditors? After a few months you may have got half of them to settle. But you still can't afford to repay the others, so what is the point?

Bankruptcy is your answer.

[73061]

Re: Urgent advice needed

Bankruptcy is not an option as my landlord will terminate my rental agreement and i will be homeless.
He does not accept bankrupts and it is clearly stated in a legal document.

[ostell]

Re: Urgent advice needed

Why not talk to your landlord and explain the situation. You never know, he may be sympathetic, especially as you have been a good tenant.

[73061]

Re: Urgent advice needed

I cannot take the chance as he is not really a very nice man.

[Diana M]

Re: Urgent advice needed

6) All debts are from 2005 and are not reported on my credit file also interest was frozen years ago.

7) I have 13 creditors Wescot Credit Services, Cabot, PRA Group Ltd, NCO Europe Ltd, Hoist Finance, Lowell Financial Ltd etc

8) Most of these debts have been resold many times

Hoist Finance have sent me a letter offering a 69% discount on a debt which my son has offered to pay on my behalf.

If your accounts were opened before April 2007 there's the potential for them to be unenforceable in court. If that can be established one way or another then any F&F settlements will be easier to negotiate because you'll be in a strong position to haggle. Either they take the money you offer or they take their chances in court.

I can see that the original creditors have already thrown in the towel and sold these accounts to debt purchasers. I can also see names on that list which may have difficulty in court due to assignment issues and being unlicensed even if the credit agreements are perfect in every aspect.

Nobody likes going to court except lawyers. If you're health is not great then you need to avoid that stress.

Since you say your family are aware, involved and willing to step in then why not ask them to help you to send a "s 77-79 CCA Request" letter to each of those thirteen creditors. If they can't comply with the request then the debt becomes unenforceable unless or until they do. Some will acknowledge the fact and even close the account.

This forum has a link to the template letter you need. You simply add a £1 postal order to each request, keep proof of posting and wait to see what comes back. It will be £13 wisely invested (plus postage!).

Here's the link > http://legalbeagles.info/library/gui...etter-example/

Any questions please feel free to post on the forum.

I completely respect your decision not to go bankrupt. The roof over your head is paramount. It's common for tenancy agreements to disallow bankrupts and you don't want to risk the chance that your Landlord might take advantage of that clause to get rid of you.

If you're not well you don't want to feel any more vulnerable than you already do. Depending on your health issues you may be able to approach your creditors on the basis of vulnerability.

You've had a spell in hospital so you're understandably feeling low. Let's see what can be done to make you feel better by exploring all your options instead of prescribing just one.

Di

PS belated Happy Birthday for last week

[Guest]

Re: Urgent advice needed

Sorry I have to ask the obvious - why will you not consider bankruptcy? It doesn't sound as though you have any assets to protect?

Why would you want your son to waste his money on trying to pay these debts? You have done your best over the years, it's time to give up. The current creditors will probably have paid less than a penny in the pound for these debts.

Bankruptcy is not published in the papers any more. No one will know unless you tell them.

If a debt is accidentally missed of the bankruptcy application it is still written off.

7 out of 8 people don't have to make any payments in bankruptcy at all.

Payplan will be able to help with your bankruptcy application. You don't have to go to court anymore, it is a simple but long online form to complete.

The only ways to deal with such a mass of debt is to not pay it in one form or another. Asking for very low partial settlement is one way. Asking the creditors to produce the original account documentation and then refusing to pay any more if they can't is another way. But with such a mass of debt bankruptcy is by far the simplest and less stressful.

As someone looking in, seems very sensible, very sensible advice.

[73061]

Re: Urgent advice needed

Hi,
One of my creditors has offered a discount on my debt 69% payment required £350 which my son has offered to pay.
The offer expires in 5 days.

If i accept and make payment how can i be 100% certain that the remainder of the debt will not be sold on to another debt collector.
I need a letter/template that is 100% legally binding so that i know the debt is settled in full and will have peace of mind.

Many thanks to everyone especially to Diana.

[Debt Camel]

Re: Urgent advice needed

!One of my creditors has offered a discount on my debt 69% payment required £350 which my son has offered to pay.
The offer expires in 5 days."

This is a dreadful offer. Unless your relatives can come up with £21,000 (that is a 69% discount on all your debts £55,000) you should not be accepting this offer. Tell them you can offer 10%.

If you want to try to fight the debts one by one, rather than go bankrupt, then you should write to each of them and ask them to supply the Consumer Credit Act agreement for the debt. Because if they can't, then you can just stop paying. That will probably get rid of a few of them! Possibly including this Hoist debt.

Template letter for asking for a CCA agreement is here: https://www.nationaldebtline.org/EW/factsheets/Pages/getting-information/credit-agreement-advice.aspx.

Don't worry about this offer "expiring" - the creditors will bite your hand off for a generous offer at any point. This 5 day deadline is just to try to put pressure on you.

If your relatives can come up with say £10,000 then one possible option would be a "single payment IVA".

Sara

[73061]

Re: Urgent advice needed

Sara Thanks for your reply.
Do you think i should write to all creditors and offer 10p in the pound first or should i request CCA agreements first.

Many thanks.

[Guest]

Re: Urgent advice needed

Hi,



I have just joined the forum.
I was 65 yrs old 2 days ago.I have been in hospital for 3 weeks just got out but i have been worried about all my debts (plenty of time to think in a hospital bed)

Summary

1) I have been with Payplan for 12 years and i have never ever missed apayment.

2) I have paid back £17,266 and my remaining debt is £54,198

3) My estimated DMP completion date is 27/03/2055 in which i will be 103 years old.

4) Owing to bad health i will not be around that long.

5) Payplan keep pushing me to start an IVA which is bad advice as it is not guaranteed i could keep up with the payments.

6) All debts are from 2005 and are not reported on my credit file also interest was frozen years ago.

7) I have 13 creditors Wescot Credit Services, Cabot, PRA Group Ltd, NCO Europe Ltd, Hoist Finance, Lowell Financial Ltd etc

8) Most of these debts have been resold many times.

Hoist Finance have sent me a letter offering a 69% discount on a debt which my son has offered to pay on my behalf.

I am thinking about offering full and final payments over the next 5 years if i live that long and if i can gather any money together.

I have ZERO assets and live in rented property.

I will not declare bankruptcy under any circumstances.

Can you offer me any advice which would be very much appreciated

I am very worried about this and somewhere along the line i need to try and put money away for my funeral.

I am very grateful for your help and thank you for your time.

There are several organisations ofering funeral payment plans, I use Legal & General but there are others. You make monthy payments, when you die the payout should cover your funeral. The payout is ringfenced to cover your funeral so even if your finances get worse this money can only be used for your funeral unlike savings.
Hope helpful

[MIKE770]

Re: Urgent advice needed

wow you are being cash cowed, when some of the collectors are only Debt collectors not owners of any alledged debt, this is a good case for the peeps on here to invest time with you and sort out the cash cows (paying when not needed to or possibly non enforceable- I will ask for assistance for you