I am ready to try just about anything. I know I have been told its mostly in my head and I do partially believe this, but the fact is when I stop smoking, I feel unhappy, irritable and very cross. In the pit of my stomach I feel sick and on edge. After a few days this does lessen but the cravings feel strong and I convince myself I dont really want to stop. I know this isnt true and Im telling myself lies, but I also know im doing this because I just want to end the craving and irritable feeling. Its awful, when I do start again I feel normal again instantly but hate myself.

Im back smoking again, after the 2nd session I lasted 3 days. I knew it wasnt working as I was told I couldnt do it on will power alone. I was also told I would not have cravings, but I did and they were bad! I have the book and am considering reading it soon, I really want to stop but its the irritableness and cravings that I fail on.

over

The letter is from Buchananclark + Wells and Aktiv Kapital UK LTD is listed as pursuers. The letter mention court action and advises me to call to arrange a time for a debt investigation officer to call. Thanks for the responses, I will post the letter and see what happens.

Just a quick question please if someone could help me out. I have a debt from 2002 which I have received a letter from a DCA demanding payment. I have checked my credit file and the debt is dated 2002 and although the last payment made on this was in 2002 the default date is 2005. My question is, does the debt become statute barred from 6 years after the last payment or 6 years after the default date? Many thanks in advance.

house

Attention

I personally think ths is only what you deserve, how could you knowingly deprive your own children?

This Wednesday will be my 6th Payment in a row which has been on time and for the full contractual amount including £40 arrears. Halifax has not sent a letter or had made any contact with me since I started making regular payments. I phone them every month to make the payment. As I mentioned earlier I am now looking at reducing the arrears by applying for the unfair bank charges back. I have only lately started looking at my debts and trying to organise my finances, something I have been notoriously stupid about. I've been on MSE to save money and hope to clear most of those arrears over the next 2 -3 years. My income goes up in March making this possble. Once this is done I hope to start overpaying to get the mortgage cleared early. Halifax have mentioned about adding the arrears to the lump sum, but I have not taken them up on this yet as the interest calculated on the arrears is at a lower rate than the capital Iyswim.

Wow, I love looking at that type of art.

Amazingly no! Though this scenario has been going on 4 years

I came to 4 different arrangements over the phone with the arrears dept. Everytime I missed a payment, I had to phone and rearrange a new agreement. They initially wanted more than £40 off the arrears, but accepted this was all I could afford after the contractual payment.

I cant really offer any advice but can let you know a bit about my experience with the Halifax and mortgage arrears. I owe £15,000 in arrears but have made the last 6 months contractual payments plus £40 off arrears. I should also be able to do this in the forseeable future. Payments before that were sketchy over the last 4 years to say the least. As I am on a fixed rate, the interest on the arrears is calculated at SVR which is a lower rate, meaning it would cost more to have the arrears added to the capital. So this may be something to consider. I have had no letter regarding solicitors, courts or repossession, but have had debt councellors call to my home which I was charged £100 for. In my experience the Halifax have been very understanding and as long as payments are being made I think they will be with you also, though I suggest you also get everything in writing as others have said. I also wanted to suggest perhaps you look into reclaiming any unfair charges they may have levied on top of your arrears. I recently sent off an SAR, and have found 2K in charges. I dont know if I will succeed in reclaiming them, but I thought it was worth a shot.

I went to an Alan Carr session in December, lasted 2 weeks off them, did another session last week, lasted 1 day. Today I havent smoked at all, just trying my best with will power

f2f - face to face

I received a letter yesterday from my bank advising a £30 "maintenance charge" would be applied to my acount. Suspecting this charge was because I had gone overdrawn slightly in the last month I phoned my branch to dispute the charge. After being advised to submit an SAR, to which I replied I had already done so. I was told the fee would still be applied and my subsequent complaint after the SAR had been processed would be stayed. I argued the charge was unfair and explained I would be claiming under severe hardship. The bank promised to look into the waivering the fee and come back to me. They have just phoned back to say the fee would not be applied and instead they would credit the account with £120 goodwill. Although I know they owe me more than that, and I will be following up on the SAR for the full amount, it still feels like a small victory for only a phone call.

Thanks have repped!

Thanks very much, can you please point me in the direction of the hardship rules, as I imagine I may be able to claim under this. Thanks so much

Can anyone advise with this please

I have found myself in a very similar situation. I used the benefit calculator below to see how much I would be entitled to live on. Start Calculation Depending on the ages of children you should be able to claim Income support and chld tax credits. Your claim will only be backdated to the day you first make contact regarding it, so get on the phone asap. You can also apply for help with paying the interest on your mortgage although there is a 13 week wait. Also have a look at the link below if your children were born between 1986 and 2003 as you may be entitled to a payment of £520 or £1040. Can you claim Children's Tax Credit from 2002/3? - MoneySavingExpert.com Forums I got that link from MSE which has loads of money saving tips to help make what little you have stretch. Hope all this helps.

After stumbling across the fantastc site and having spent some time reading case stories and stickies I have decided to pursue the unfair bank charges levied against my mortgage account with the Halifax. I have also advised my Mum to do the same ( seperate mortgage ). My own mortgage account is badly in arrears due to the fact in the beginning I was never informed the mortage was completed. The solicitor dealing with the conveyancing emigrated to Austraila and I was 6 months into the mortgage before I was even aware I had bought my first house, and was also 6 months in arrears. I sent off my SAR on 08/01/09 and today received a response along with statements. I have tallied up the penalties/charges and they amount to £2K. The statement was accompaned with a 2 page letter advising me the charges are fair and lawful. It states, that they assume my request was to enable me to reconcile bank charges and should I decide to register a complaint, they will be unable to respond to it in full. They also say should I refer the case to the FOS it shall not proceed until the Test Case is resolved and if I issue a claim in the courts the bank will apply for a stay until the resolution of the banks proceedings with the OFT. Should I ignore this and send my letter requesting the £2k they owe me? My Mum also send an SAR on the same date and the letter she received was quite short and stated they would send her statements as soon as possible. Her unfair charges would only amount to a few hundred. Any advice with this would be much appreciated.

I booked flights with American Holidays in Mar 08 by telephone. The holiday was due to start mid April. At the end of March we had a death in the family and no travel insurance booked yet. After a lot of conversations with AH, who said the flights were non refundable, and I couldnt change the names (In the hope of selling the flights on) nor could I get the dates changed on the flights. Due to this information I cancelled the holiday and was refunded the tax. During this time, I had been phoning Delta (who the flights were with ) to see if it would be possible to get the flights changed to another time as I didnt see why AH could not do this. Delta returned my call the same day as AH processed the refund on the Tax. Delta said they dates could be changed. I phoned AH and explained this and they agreed to change the dates on the flights at £75 per traveller. There were 6 travellers in total. This cost was also to be added to the tax which had been refunded. I paid this, thinking the orignal sum paid was then protected. I got an invoice with the extra amout paid but not detailing what it was agreed for. Unfortunately I have had to cancel again due to personal illness and have travel insurance. AH are now saying, the are not laible for any tax costs, that they did not charge me for flight changes. (Total lies) That they cancelled the first holiday outright. That the second amount charged was for a new holiday, which has a shortfall of almost £800 from the original amount. The second invoice shows only £6 tax. I cant believe the blatant lies. Any advice would be appreciated please.

Thanks will start doing that now.

Thanks very much will get my letter posted off today. Could you tell me where I find the addresses of other banks to send SAR's too which are based only in Northern Ireland, such as Bank of Ireland and Ulster Bank. Should I just phone and ask for the addresses? PS Think this site is amazing!!

Hoping someone can help me please. I have decided to try to pursue bank charges on my mortgage account with the Halifax. Can someone please tell me where I can find out which address I should post the SAR letter too. Thanks in advance.