With unemployment currently rising from 2.46 million in the UK, people are increasingly finding that the fact that they found another job shortly after losing the first is not always the end solution. The problem is that when they were going through the period of unemployment, they were set back financially to a point that they cannot recover.

The credit agreements they have fall into arrears and there is little or no chance of earning enough money to catch up, savings have also usually been diminished and this is when the individual starts to seek a personal debt solution such as an IVA or Individual Voluntary Arrangement.

Hard times are ahead for the UK consumer and people need a solution to clear personal debts that they can trust. The IVA or Individual Voluntary Arrangement is a UK government approved scheme that is legally binding between the individual who has the debts and the creditors who have leant the money.

• The IVA usually runs for 5 years (60 months) and has an exact end date.
• Creditors will be expected to stop further interest and charges being applied to the credit accounts whilst the IVA is in place.
• Any money left to pay the creditors at the end of the IVA process will be written off.
• In certain circumstances where the individual is a home owner with equity in their home, they will be expected to release some of this equity in years 3-5 of the IVA agreement. This increases the overall contribution back to the respective creditor.

With the rising cost of living on the horizon, household expenditure in the UK is going to be stretched and only those who plan correctly and take advice when required will survive financial turmoil.

If unemployed, one needs to cut costs and be pro active in finding work, downgrade personal expectations in the current economic climate and accept an income that will provide a living.

People in the UK should now start to gear their lives to living without credit, we have been conditioned as a society to use credit and live by using it. The only people who will succeed in the future financially are those who will reduce their need for credit to a basic level.

If you have been considering a debt solution such as an IVA or Individual Voluntary Arrangement, you will be familiar with an alternative personal debt solution called a debt management plan. It is important to be aware that a debt management plan is NOT legally binding and does NOT have an exact end date.

Some companies will claim they can write off all your debts, you should be very careful of these claims, only certain amounts of debt can be written off under an IVA agreement and a voluntary petition or creditors’ petition for bankruptcy is the only process that would usually write off 100% of any persons’ unsecured debt.

When you enter into an IVA or Individual Voluntary Arrangement, your IVA is managed by an Insolvency Practitioner and this person is legally responsible for proposing the case to your creditors and administering the IVA process on your behalf. An IVA or Individual Voluntary Arrangement should not be entered into without much consideration.

You are at risk of being petitioned for bankruptcy by your creditors should your IVA fail. An IVA can fail for many different reasons and the main one usually is due to the client no longer being able to afford the agreed monthly repayment. In this situation, the Insolvency Practitioner will re assess your income and expenditure and offer advice accordingly of what the best route forward for you would be.

• A great number of people do successfully complete IVAs’ and are then confident that they chose the best solution to clear their debts.
• To qualify for an IVA an individual would have approximately £25000 of unsecured debts and be able to contribute a disposable income repayment of around £250 per calendar month.

Not all situations require an IVA and you should not enter into an IVA or Individual Voluntary Arrangement without much prior consideration. For further advice regarding personal debt issues please call our free debt helpline using 0800 018 6868, lines are open 24 hours a day and your call is free.

The above is exactly the same as when an individual or consumer leaves a personal debt problem to grow out of control without taking action to balance the income and expenditure into the household.

The longer the debt problem is left un-managed, the greater the problem becomes to manage!

Debt Management plans have been around in the UK since the early nineties, they offer consumers in personal debt an informal opportunity to pay off debts without having to borrow any more money to do so.  Debt Management Plans came about due to people finding they could not obtain any further credit to consolidate, or put into one, all the other debts they had accumulated.

If you find you are in need of a debt management plan, the first thing you should do is contact a reputable debt management company.  This way you can obtain advice regarding your personal situation.  You should not be charged any fees up front when being advised and only if you decide to use that particular debt management service should you be asked to part with any money.

Debt Management in the UK is very common place in the personal finance industry and when a debt management plan is operated professionally by a reputable personal debt service, consumers can find that a debt management plan is a very useful solution to clear personal debt problems.

A debt management plan can help you to clear unsecured personal debts such as, credit cards and store cards, personal loans and overdrafts, catalogues, book clubs and even allow for you to repay car finance, mortgages and other commitments as part of the solution if your disposable expenditure allows for it. All secured debts such as car finance, mortgages and secured home loans have to be kept up and cannot be included within the debt management companies’ dealings with creditors, the debt management company must make an allowance within your expenditure for you to maintain these payments as they constitute your priority debts, this is how they form part of the overall debt solution that a personal debt management plan can offer.

Priority debts are debts that must be paid before others are taken into account, for example your mortgage payments must be taken more seriously than your credit card payments.  It sounds so simple but the pressure that credit card companies can put on people who owe them money is often enough to make them prioritise the credit card repayment over the mortgage repayment.

This is why the press report horror stories daily about people who have lost their home due to failing to keep up with mortgage or rental payments.

If you find yourself in need of help and advice regarding a debt management plan or other form of personal debt solution, please contact our free debt helpline 24 hours a day in the UK using 0800 018 6868, our lines are open and your call is free!

A lender or loan company makes a decision to lend based on the risk that you personally present to them regarding your ability to repay the credit you are applying for.

Examples of factors that lenders take into account when scoring your application for credit could be some of these that follow;

• Are you working or not?
• If employed is this full time or part time?
• Do state benefits make up 100% of your income?
• Do you have a UK bank account?
• Does your employer pay you in cash?
• Has a bad credit rating affected you from obtaining credit or loans recently from other lenders?
• Will you be able to repay the loan if you suffer a change in circumstance, such as loss of job, split from partner or less hours at work?
• Have you ever been declared Bankrupt, subject to an IVA or Debt Relief Order?

There are many factors that lenders will take into account when deciding to lend money to an individual and you should accept that each lender has different requirements that the proposed customer or client should be able to meet.

• A lender does not have to inform you of how they decide on approving or declining your loan or credit application.

Different loans require people to qualify in differing ways.

For example, a debt consolidation loan could be secured against a home, this would require the individual to usually be a home owner because if they were not, there would be no property for the lender to secure the new loan against should the person fail to repay.

An unsecured loan requires no security but rates of interest are usually higher to balance a lenders risk of loss due to none repayment or an unexpected time delay to recover the money leant.

If you have been refused a loan and then made further applications for credit within a short space of time, you may be surprised to learn that multiple declines for credit within a short period can mark your credit score down further.  This is then an alarm bell to other lenders when they search your credit file to see if they are happy to lend to you because they see all the other lenders declines.

You need to realise that more credit is not usually the best route and by obtaining free financial advice from a trained debt advisor, you will be able to clear your personal debts without another loan!

Debt solutions such as an IVA or Debt Management Plan could assist you.

• Some loan companies will charge you fees for an online loan search – be careful!

Can you really afford to part with another £50 or £60 without a guarantee of a loan? Some companies are making large gains from taking advantage of consumers in a vulnerable financial position.

When you have no other income apart from state benefits, it is hard to get a loan.  People on maternity leave can find it particularly difficult as they have a job but the income is reduced, creating extra risk to the lender.

If you think would benefit from a free telephone consultation with a trained loan advisor who can help you identify your best solution, call Lewis Alexander free using 0800 018 6868, our free debt helpline is open 24 hours a day 7 days a week and all calls are confidential.

• This is a mistake that can cost you dearly.

In the long term it can cause a greater indebtedness.  Usually, credit card companies will charge considerably more for the combined credit, applying interest rates that will be far greater than the current average of all your interest being applied to all your individual accounts. The last thing you would want is a higher interest rate leading yourself deeper into the cycle of debt.

The problem of getting into debt may have been primarily caused by the credit cards in the first place. It is already a well known fact that many debtors wanting to consolidate their loans are doing so because of unmanageable credit cards and therefore it makes little sense to use credit cards to consolidate personal debt!

• The whole point of trying to reduce debt is that you should be working to decrease your bills and outgoings.
• The common mistake people make is to take the easiest way out to pay off their debt with credit cards as they still have a line of credit available.
• This can cause a problem in the not too distant future if the individual suffers a further change in personal circumstances.

It is so easy to use more credit to pay for existing bills by paying one bill off and adding a new balance to a new or exisiting credit card or loan that will need to be paid off in the future.

The way to reduce your debt would be to get cheaper or less expensive rates of credit and pay off the more expensive credit first, which is usually credit cards.

You will find that credit and loan companies have large resources at their disposal in terms of the best lenders rates available and will have a better negotiating stance than you for the best debt consolidation loan rates. That action would achieve the desired results by reducing the debt in the long and the short term.

• Your only problem could be the fact that your personal credit rating does not allow for your lenders acceptance for providing this new loan.

Let us imagine for a moment that you owe money on your mortgage, car payments, insurance and some household bills such as electricity and gas.

Your first stop should always be to approach your mortgage company to let them know of your situation, they are a priority creditor.

• Burying your head in the sand will not make your debt go away!

It is quite amazing that people would take the easy way out and pay their mortgage using their credit cards instead of approaching the mortgage company and informing them of the personal debt problems. You will find that mortgage lenders are usually understanding of your problem if approached early on.

If the hardship is caused by a temporary situation from being out of work for a short while then this contact between you and your creditors can become a financial lifesaver.

You will still need a professional debt advisor if your situation persists and it is important that you find a way to reduce your outgoings in the long run to ensure you do not get deeper into debt.

There are a number of ways that an amount of personal debt outstanding can be consolidated and rolled into one new monthly repayment. Some of the most chosen options follow;

• Debt Consolidation Loan
• Debt Management Plan
• IVA or Individual Voluntary Arrangement

Each case is different and that is where a debt management company usually excels itself in providing the best advice for your own individual needs.

Lewis Alexander Financial Management offers a first class personal Debt Management Service, nationwide throughout the UK. We are based in Manchester, England and we have helped thousands of consumers suffering with personal debt problems in our history.

We have in house specialists who concentrate on debt management plans and personal debt consolidation and we have been looking after a great number of our clients for many years now.

Call Lewis Alexander on their free debt helpline using 0800 018 6868, our lines are open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and your call is FREE.

• Need Debt Management Help?
• Find Debt Management Questions and Answers!

During the course of our business day, we receive a lot of questions from prospective clients about debt management, how we can help them, how much it costs and the best debt soltuin for them to follow. 

As you can imagine, all situations are slightly different and we specialise in helping people from all walks of life, you could be a single parent with a low paying job or even a footballer.  Yes, even they get into these kinds of financial situations and need help with their debt problems. They are fully aware of the quality help a debt management plan can give them should it be needed.

• We have listed a few of the questions below, 

One of those often asked questions is – How can a Debt Management Plan help me?

Debt Management Plans can help you if you are struggling and unable to repay consumer debts such as personal loans, credit cards, store cards, bank overdrafts and catalogues etc.  If your income is lower than your outgoings, this will cause you to get further into debt each month.

A Debt Management Company will gather all the information from you regarding all your unsecured debts, your income from wages and any other means including state benefits and then decide with you, how much you are able to repay as one monthly sum to start the pathway to reducing the total indebtedness over time.  One, new and affordable simple monthly payment is arrived at with the client to ensure they are comfortable with meeting that payment.

• The Debt Management Company will then negotiate with the various creditors as to the amount they will each receive monthly. 

As you can imagine this involves a fair amount of work and negotiation with the various creditors.

One of the most common types of feedback we receive is that clients are so thankful that we make this process as pain free as possible and we manage to arrange a new debt repayment plan without the clients having to even write one letter.

It is possible to arrange all this yourself, but imagine just for a moment how much time energy and cost would be involved in the process if you were trying to deal directly with your creditors.

• A client who is already in financial trouble is less likely to be able to cope with such situations as well as trying to negotiate the best terms possible.

Yes, it’s true that a debt management plan will cost you a small amount each month, payable as part of the payment plan and usually included within your monthly payment but the cost is negligible when you consider the many aspects involved in arranging a structured repayment plan yourself.

• One needs to peek into the management side of a plan to see what is involved and appreciate the complex negotiations a reputable debt management company undertakes on behalf of a client.

Once a sensible monthly payment is agreed, the debt help provider will normally distribute your payments monthly on your behalf to your creditors on a pro-rata basis, minus the costs of the plan.

• A second question we receive is;

Do I need to pay any legal fees and Do I need to put my property up as security?

The answer to that question is NO in both cases! 

A Debt Management Plan is not a legally binding agreement and therefore no legal fees are involved.  If you have a property, this will not be needed for security when entering into an informal debt management plan.

What you will also find is that once a fair payment plan is arrived at, most creditors are very flexible in their attitude towards a debtor.  This is very probably due to the fact that many lenders or loan companies look at it with the attitude that the person involved has taken the positive steps to approach a Debt Management Company and made efforts to re negotiate their debts.

• This is a very positive move!

They can also be very flexible depending on your track record of repayments.

You must bear in mind that under normal circumstances, debt management plans usually do not deal with but do take into account any secured loans such as mortgages or court fines and any tax arrears. These debts are normally budgeted for within your expenditure part of debt management plans financial statement.

For impartial advice on how a Debt Management Plan can help you right now, contact Lewis Alexander and ask to speak to a personal debt counsellor for free advice.

Professional debt companies like Lewis Alexander understand what people are going through and are willing to offer assistance that allows you to cope in these difficult circumstances.  We will help you review all your finances in private and make a suggestion for a positive solution.

Lewis Alexander Financial Management, offer a first class personal Debt Management Servicenationwide throughout the UK. We are based in Trafford Park, Manchester and we have helped thousands of people in our history.

We have in house specialists who concentrate on debt management and personal debt and loan consolidation and we have been looking after a great number of our clients for many years now. 

Call Lewis Alexander on their free debt helpline using 0800 018 6868, our lines are open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and your call is free.

The above are comments from within client testimonial letters, received by Lewis Alexander Financial Management.

We have been reading through some of the many letters and emails we receive from clients that have been using the services of a Lewis Alexander debt management plan.  The identity of the person has been changed to maintain their privacy of course and permission has been received from them to list the letter on our blog.

“I just wanted to write and let you know that since contacting your company I have been making progress with my life and my personal debt.  Before I contacted your team, I was going through a very difficult time, since I had never before been in any kind of financial arrears or personal debt but I found myself exasperated at circumstances with my work and the debt that I had built up due to compounding problems in my personal life.  I had done my research on quite a few companies and your company came up in my online searches, so I took the plunge and gave you a call on your free debt helpline.  That was a very difficult decision to make but I had realised that once I accepted my situation and that I had to accept my own part in the process, I had to take action and do something about it.  I wanted to let you know that it was probably the best decision I made.  You personally answered my call and put me at ease straight away and were very sympathetic to my predicament.  The mere fact that you listened to my debt problems and came up with solutions with regard to the debt management plan and the various paths that I could go down lifted a huge burden that I had been carrying around with me.  I know that it was affecting me and everyone around me.  Once you outlined what I needed to do and the details I needed to send to you so that you could work out what I could reasonably afford to pay and manage my debt, I felt like I could go out and get on with my life again.  The fact that you were also able to negotiate with my creditors with the repayment plan we came up with was a leap in helping me along and coping with the mountain of worry I had built up.  I had worries of the bailiffs and debt collectors turning up from the credit companies who I had not been able to pay and realised that had I not buried my head in the sand so to speak earlier, I would have been in a much better situation.  Once the debt management plan was in place, I was almost a different person. Knowing that I would be sending all the nasty letters received from my creditors directly to you to deal with every week and not worrying about it made a huge difference to my daily life.  May I thank you for at first helping me come to terms with my mounting personal debt problem, helping me to deal with the situation by talking to me when I needed someone to talk to about my concerns and finally, negotiating with my creditors for a reduction of interest and charges being applied to my accounts.  I would not have been able to do that on my own, regardless of my past business successes and knowledge!” 

Allan - (Real Identity hidden due to data protection)

That was an extract of part of a letter we received after we accepted Allan as a client and we were able to help him deal with his debt worries and work out a solution for an affordable debt management plan. 

Please be aware that we try to help people in these situations and no two people will have the same circumstances, we will advise the best way forward depending on the individuals current circumstance.

A debt management plan may be one of the options that we suggest for you. You must make the first move and contact our team, so that we can discuss your personal financial problems.

Lewis Alexander offer a first class national debt management service throughout the UK.  We are based in Manchester and have helped thousands of people in our history.  We have in house specialists who concentrate on debt management plans and personal loan consolidation and we have been looking after a great number of our clients for many years now.

Call Lewis Alexander using their free debt helpline 0800 018 6868, lines are open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and your call is free.

For most people that live in Scotland, the differences between debt solutions that are available in England compared to those in Scotland can be some what confusing to say the least.  If you have previously taken advice from debt agencies and are still struggling to understand the various options available to clear your debts as a Scottish resident, please read this blog post further as we believe this will help you.

• Trust Deed

Most people are now familiar with the term IVA (Individual Voluntary Arrangement), for those that are not, it is a legal agreement between you and your creditors in England ONLY, and is a form of Insolvency that allows you to pay back an amount of the money you owe within a set or fixed period of time, usually 60 months or 5 years.  The remainder of what you owe that has not been repaid is then written off by your creditors leaving you debt free.

• The Trust Deed, is very simply the Scottish alternative to the IVA in England.  The difference is that in Scotland, the Trust Deed lasts for 36 months, not 60 months like an IVA in England.

Creditors are not duty bound to agree to Trust Deeds as they do need to make sure that they are obtaining a satisfactory percentage of the total debt to be repaid.  This is not always possible when the clients circumstances are investigated as the client sometimes does not have enough disposable income (the money left over after essential bills and living costs) each month to meet the financial repayments, in this case the client can then consider a debt management plan or Bankruptcy.

• YOU SHOULD NOT APPLY FOR ANY FURTHER CREDIT ONCE ACCEPTED ONTO A TRUST DEED!

A Trustee will manage your Protected Trust Deed for you and Trust Deeds can only become protected if certain requirements are met by the individual, if the Trust Deed becomes protected, your creditors cannot take legal action against you and the interest or charges on your personal debt will become frozen.

You will NOT be charged to enter a Trust Deed arrangement, your creditors are responsible for paying your Trustee out of the contributions you make whilst the agreement is in place.

• Bankruptcy in Scotland is sometimes referred to by some as Sequestration

Sequestration involves removing or seizing a persons belongings or assets, to a value of the debt owed with a view to being of financial benefit to the creditor owed the money or in some cases this can be for monies owed to the Scottish state.

Laws in Scotland that appertain to personal debt and finance agreements can vary based on what type of agreement you have signed and with which company or lender.  For an exact definition of different legal agreements, you should without question consider speaking with a Scottish Insolvency Practitioner or solicitor.

The above is a very basic explanation designed to give you a brief outline of the differences between, debt help in Scotland and that to the rest of the UK.  For a more detailed explanation you can contact our free debt helpline which is open 24 hours a day.

Your creditors are possibly on the large list of banks and credit companies that contribute funds to free debt management charities, these funds are paid to the charities from the banks and credit companies for the work undertaken on clients files.

• How can a free debt management service be helping you personally when they are being paid by the people you owe the money to!

We are proud at Lewis Alexander that we do charge the client directly and transparently for our debt management service, these charges are all agreed upon with you first and you are not tied into any formal agreement of any type whilst utilising our informal debt service.

• You are free to leave at any time!
• We only ask for your personal commitment to our plan for your financial recovery.

Most people find that when employing the services of a free debt charity they can often become just another number, no real personal service can be offered as the number of enquiries that these services receive is quite amazing, this is basically because they are free.

Not all debt charities are the same, some are totally free services such as the governments CAB or Citizens Advice Bureau.

If you wish to discuss how Lewis Alexander could help you better understand free debt management, please contact our free debt helpline today using 0800 018 6868 our lines are open 24 hours a day / 7 days a week!

IVA or Debt Management

The most difficult decision when trying to clear personal debts can be which debt solution to choose after doing all your homework on the options available.

• Debt Management Plans or
• IVA – Individual Voluntary Arrangements
• are usually the two solutions that people have to decide between. When faced with the two options, there are many factors that influence the choice of informal debt management over an IVA and likewise, an IVA over a debt management plan.

It is very important that you understand the differences between these debt solutions, as if you do not, you could easily have the wool pulled over your eyes by a clever and unscrupulous debt advisor that wants to earn extra commission for placing you onto an IVA as opposed to an informal Debt Management Plan.

A professional debt management company such as Lewis Alexander will offer you advice tailored to your personal situation and if you are better suited to a debt management plan rather than personal Insolvency or an IVA, we will tell you, however, you make the final decision based on the debt advice given to you.

It is your choice no one Else’s!

When you are in debt it can feel like everyone else does not understand your particular situation and that you feel that your debt problems are some how different to all others.  This is not true, it is actually a mental stigma associated with being in personal debt, you are not alone and your financial problem is usually pretty much the same as others around you, it is your personal change in circumstance that will differ to other peoples, this is what creates the problem of being in debt in the first place.

Some people split from partners or others suffer a death in the family, others may have hours at work reduce resulting in less income, the list is endless but what is the same is the debt problem that people find themselves with due to being set back financially by the change in circumstance they may have suffered.

The main difference between an IVA and Debt Management Plan (DMP) is that

• An IVA is a legally binding agreement
• A debt management plan is not.

With a debt management plan you can expect to repay much of what you owe.  With an IVA, the debt that is not repaid within a 60 month period is then written off by your creditors, this is agreed at a creditors meeting prior to the IVA commencing.

The IVA will guarantee to freeze any interest or charges being applied to your accounts, a debt management plan will not and it is down to the hard work and efforts put in by your chosen debt management company as to how quickly your debt is reduced, make your selection regarding your chosen debt company or debt service carefully!

• The cost of choosing or selecting the wrong debt company or agency to solve your debt problems can be as high as the interest being applied by your creditors to your accounts.
• The wrong debt company will have no concern on actually getting the job done, they are more concerned with extracting funds from you and fobbing you off with none truths.

For honest, genuine, debt advice and help in the UK, call our free debt helpline today using 0800 018 6868, your personal details are dealt with in absolute confidence and your call is free!

Clear debt without a loan

• Debt Management Plan
• IVA or Trust Deed in Scotland
• Bankruptcy

Lewis Alexander is a specialist debt management company, we help people clear debts without loans, we also offer a free debt helpline to UK residents struggling with personal financial problems.  The advice we give is based on individual personal circumstances and is often not what the person (possibly you) wants to hear.

This is where debt counselling comes in, we have a proven method of helping those that wish to be helped.  Often in life, the truth is the hardest to accept, usually with any personal financial problem, there is an element of truth that needs accepting before the individual can move ahead.  That is the hard part to get over and after what we call the acceptance period, the individual feels so much relief from the stress of the debt problem that they really can continue with a normal daily life just like they experienced before being in debt.

If you are suffering with financial problems such as mortgage arrears, missed or late payments on credit agreements etc, you must deal with the situation as soon as possible, in the time it has taken to read this article so far, you could have dialed our free debt helpline using 0800 018 6868.

Our advisors will help you to make a fresh start financially and offer you tested and proven methods that you can employ to combat the pressure from debt collection agents or lenders that may be chasing you.  Letters and phone calls are the most worrying to people along with the threats of court action.  There are laws that appertain directly to debt collectors and the procedures of collection that they undertake, more importantly, the Office of Fair Trading sets out debt collection guidance that the collection industry is expected to adhere to, just the same as the debt management guidance set out for debt agencies and not for profit debt charities.

For further advice and help on how to clear debts without loans, contact our free debt helpline today, lines are open 24 hours a day/ 7 days a week and your call is FREE.