Help needed please...

[UhOhImInTrouble]

Hi all,

Not a new member to the site, but for anonymity I've signed up again.

 

I'm desperate for help.

 

I'm 27 years old, married with 2 kids. I've been more than a bit frivolous with cash over the years, and my situation I'll admit is pretty much of my own making, I'm probably less deserving of your help than a lot of others, but please don't write me off!

 

First off, I'm a former compulsive gambler. I'm over it now, though currently really fighting the urge to go back to it. I know deep down it will only make my situation worse, but when I walk past a bookies, it's a real struggle. I gambled probably for 2 years, it culminated last summer when I blew all our rent money playing roulette, and we were almost evicted.

 

Since then I've worked 2 jobs to try and clear up the mess I created, and to try and make our future a bit brighter. It doesn't seem to be making much difference though.

 

I've got unsecured debts of probably somewhere between £15 - £20k. These are from old credit cards, finance, a logbook loan, council tax arrears, utility arrears, and a housing benefit overpayment.

 

We rent our house, I own a car probably worth around £500, and this is vital for my part time job as a delivery driver, but also for me to get to my full time place of work 20 miles away.

 

Believe it or not, tomorrow was going to be the day I started to sort things out. I'd made a list of my priority debts, and tomorrow (payday) I'd planned to call each of them and make an initial token payment, and arrange to start clearing my arrears.

 

I got my payslip today, and discovered a court order has been made for one of my creditors to take £150 out of my salary. At the moment, I don't even know who this creditor is, and how long they'll be taking the money for. I plan to call my payroll department tomorrow and find out if they have any further information.

 

I'll admit, I've had my head buried for a long time, and have been in the habit of ignoring post & phone calls for a long time.

 

If one of the resident experts could get in touch I'd be most grateful. I'm happy to disclose all my info to someone if they believe they can help me out.

 

My situation is now quite serious - my utilities are close to being cut off, I'm absolutely terrified of calling my creditors and saying "I can't pay", I know the consequences could be pretty severe.

 

I'm at the point now where I'm considering bankruptcy, but I really don't know what I should do.

 

 

Many thanks,

 

M.

[diamondgirl]

You really must find out who the attachment of earnings was from.

Did you never see any court papers?

You must write a list of all your creditors down.

Your main priorities are your utilities, council tax and your rent. These people need to be paid before anyone else is.

Once you have the details of who and what court allowed the attachment of earnings you should be able to get in touch the courts.

Someone with more knowledge than I have hopefully will be along soon.

DG:)

[UhOhImInTrouble]

I didn't see any court papers, no. I moved house last summer, didn't inform any of my creditors really, except the necessary ones - council, utilities etc, so I guess they could've gone to my old address? Nothing's been served at my new address as far as I know. I've gone through some of the post this evening but can't see anything.

 

I'm guessing my payroll dept will have this info though? It's gonna be quite embarrassing to call them tomorrow.

[diamondgirl]

I'm sure you will be a bit embarrassed but you need to know the information so that you can sort this out. Without the info you'll get nowhere. Hang in there, once you've got the info you can let us all know then we can help you more.

DG

[UhOhImInTrouble]

Cheers, all help is appreciated. Was quite a shock this evening when I saw 'court order' on my payslip! Will keep you posted.

[Dinkjames]

First of all, congratulations on getting your head out of the sand. You will find it quite liberating when you start dealing with your creditors head on. Taking back control of your finances is a great feeling. Just a few thoughts from me.

 

Golden rule: NEVER talk to creditors on the phone. Always communicate in writing.

Get yourself organised. Get a file (best be a large one as you will receive a forest of paper), sort out all the letters you have by creditor and file them. When you get letters, keep the envelopes and staple them to the letters. File these.

 

Get a copy of your credit report from all three CRA's. They offer a free month trial. This will give you a good idea of what creditors you have and at what stage the debt is. You should also be able to see who obtained the CCJ and Attachment order. If you don't qualify for free credit reports, sign up to mycreditfile. You get all three reports for a lot less money.

 

You made a list of priority debts already. Good. Use the budget templates of the front of this site, or alternatively, use the service on CCCS' website to calculate your budget. Your budget needs to include all your essentials e.g. council tax, rent, essential utilities, tv licence, etc. Then your non-essential things, such as food, clothing, transport etc. Once you have this figure, you can work out what is surplus income for creditors. The arrears on essentials take preference over unsecured creditors.

 

Get your essential creditors in order i.e. pay them what they are due every month, on time, as if there were no arrears. Then deal with the arrears on a prorata basis. Individual debt times your surplus income divided by your total arrears on essentials. This should give you a figure that you can pay to each essential creditor to start reducing the arrears. You need to then send them a letter stating what you are paying them and how you got to the figures. There are template letters around on the forums.

 

After this exercise, there may not be any money left to pay unsecured creditors, but I would suggest making token payments of £1 to each of them. Use one of the template letters on here to make the offer. Once you have paid off the arrears on essentials, you can start paying the creditors what you were paying on essentials using the same calculation.

 

Once you have all your creditors on written notice, you can start addressing the Attachment of Earning order. As you now have a clear picture of your financial situation, you can apply to the court for a variation of the Attachment order. The court would have granted the order without your input as to your finances. If you can prove to the court that you cannot pay £150 towards one creditor, the court may order that the order is changed to a lower amount. One of the legal eagles on here should be able to help and give an expert opinion on this.

 

Once you have all of that under control, I would suggest that you start looking at all the credit cards and bank accounts to see whether there are any reclaimable charges added to the account. Getting these back may help relieve some of the pressure.

 

Good luck.

 

Please note that the above is just my opinion and what I would do in this situation. You follow any advise at your own risk

[UhOhImInTrouble]

Cheers dinkjames, looks like I've got a busy weekend. So much for enjoying the sunshine!

 

Payroll are getting back to me re court order!

[Dinkjames]

UhOh, how are you getting on?