UK CC & personal loan debt after Brexit

[mysterygirl04]

Hello Everyone!

 

This forum is really helpful, and I am hoping to get a bit of advice.

 

Me and my husband sadly have to move away from the UK, as we feel we cannot cope here anymore as a result of covid (being laid off) and Brexit.

 

Due to this and other sudden changes in our circumstances, we have to move quickly, and there is no way we can settle our outstanding debts, and will likely wont be able to in the near future. We are moving to mainland Europe (EU) and do not intend to return.

 

My husband has roughly £5000 debt on HSBC credit card, on which he has never missed a payment so far. I have a £2500 HSBC cc and £25.000 HSBC personal loan debt also on which I have never missed a payment up until now.

 

I am very anxious as to how to proceed.

We never had any issues paying our bills and credit cards, but I see no hope of settling these debts. We both work very hard, over 60 hours a week and we feel awful about being in this situation but we feel like we cannot cope anymore.

 

How likely is it that HSBC will come after us and try to recover the money?

We will have no assets in the UK but have a house in the EU country we are moving to.

Can they come after us?

Will Brexit make it harder for them to do so?

I imagine they will at least try to recover my £27.500 debt as that is quiet a large sum.

 

Any info would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks! 

Edited December 3, 2021 by dx100uk
spacing

[dx100uk]

the short answer is no, stuff and all they nor anyone can ever do to you, though we don't condone debt avoidance.

 

HSBC won't ever do anything, they'll never want the bad publicity and there are no examples of HSBC ever entering into a court claim themselves even if you were here in the UK or had assets in the UK.

 

they will eventually sell the debts onto powerless DCA's whom are not bailiffs and can to all intent and purpose can be totally ignored.

 

i would however recommend writing to HSBC once you are settled abroad simply informing them of you new address.

 

[unclebulgaria67]

You would have to be very unlucky to have this debt enforced in the EU country where you are going to live.  Yes there are international cross border debt collection laws which would allow a foreign Court to consider a claim to enforce the debt, but in most cases any owners of the debt won't bother.

 

HSBC will write to you (do provide your foreign address) to see if you want to make repayments. After a few years of non payment, they will sell the debt to a debt buyer and they will chase you for the debt, threatening to take you to Court.  It is very important that you read all letters sent to you, to make sure you don't miss any Court claim. If you failed to respond to a Court claim, the debt owning claimant would gain judgement by default. You need to avoid this happening. You could defend claim at the time, by for example asking for evidence or accept the claim, agreeing to make affordable repayments.

[mysterygirl04]

Thank you for the quick reply dx100uk. I will definitely let them know about my new address then. 
unclebulgaria67 - thank you for the reply as well. I was thinking to try and negotiate an affordable payment with them, after reading so many topics on this forum. But my only concern is that we would not be able to afford much, hence we will probably end up paying the interest only for a very long time, which seems pointless money out of the window. So I am not sure whether to try that or just leave it all for now, and see how things play out.

[dx100uk]

why not try our pro-rata letter in the debt collection section of our library.

 

but always use LETTERs only not email/phone/etc.

 

[mysterygirl04]

Thank you. I will have a look and see if we could arrange something like this.