CAB just heard on radio... is this right?

[MelanieGiles]

There is nothing that annoys me more than anything at the moment than the continual referral to "free" providers in the IVA marketplace. Those companies who purport to be free providers certainly do not do IVAs for free, and it is entirely wrong to portray them as any different to the many other companies that provide very secure and reputable IVAs for their clients. It is about time the media stopped indicating that there is a two tier system when it comes to formal personal insolvency.

There are no government run agencies who provide IVA services - apart from the Insolvency Service themselves who do have a system of putting forward post-bankruptcy IVAs, but these are very rare.

[kallis3]

Well said Melanie.

[Michael Peoples]

Even the so called 'free' DMPs have their price. The 'charities' receive a commission for collecting the debt and few know where the profits go. There is a suspicion that many of these charities give advice that is often unsound as they cannot bite the hand that feeds them.

[kallis3]

To defend Payplan who are one of these 'charities' when we phoned up to change our DMP to them (we were with a fee paying company), they were the ones who suggested we went for the IVA.

[Michael Peoples]

I am not saying that all their advice is dubious but I have seen some pretty awful advice from these 'charities'. People are advised to go to the CCCS without being told that the CCCS do not do IVAs for the self employed so immediately anyone self employed is in trouble as not all options are available to them immediately. They do refer the self employed to Grant Thornton so why not say this and cut out the middle man?

There is a whole thread about various modifications proposed by Payplan when equity cannot be realised and I a still unclear if these conditions were imposed by the banks or by Payplan. The idea of threatening someone with bankruptcy after paying for five years just because the market collapsed is frankly appalling and certainly no way for a charity to behave.

We need a proper open disclosure about who these charities are, who receives their excess income[or profits], who makes the decisions concerning advice and whether their staff provide as professional and independent service as the non charity firms.

[Adam Davies]

Hi

Quote "We need a proper open disclosure about who these charities are, who receives their excess income[or profits], who makes the decisions concerning advice and whether their staff provide as professional and independent service as the non charity firms"

Well said Michael

Regards

[Declan at DebtFreeDirect]

Absolutely agree with what Michael has just said and I think it would be really useful to have a very open and frank discussion on this topic.

Thanks

[size5]

Couldn't agree more, but I also get fed up with the general public persona of the fee paying sector as somehow being inferior to the free sector. Any reputable fee payer, for a DMP certainly, will point out that there is a free sector and we do not denigrate them in any way. The opposite absolutely does not apply and we get crucified from all angles and downright bad mouthed. Slightly different with IVA's of course due to the charities being fee payers themselves. Strange how that is not trumpeted as much but I digress.

I will be just as interested to see, going forward, what the charities will do should the very real prospect in the medium term of creditors pulling the plug on their funding becoming a reality. Will we all be fee payers then? Will creditors continue to refer to what may well be fee payers? If they do, why would they do so? Interesting times ahead certainly.

Regards.

[kallis3]

Interesting point Mike.

[Nick Pearson]

Interesting thread. Not one you would see on say MSE or CAG Forums.

[Imhotep]

We went to CAB prior to taking the IVA route. They recommended a DMP over something like 17 years! Why? We didn't have enough disposable income to have an IVA "You need at least 450.00 a month 'spare' to be in an IVA" we were told. We were also told that bankruptcy was our best option as 17 years was a long time!

We went to CCCS and they recommended an IVA.

[MelanieGiles]

What strange advice - the CAB really should be making sure that their advisors are properly trained in the provision of advice, and well done for finding an alternative solution.

[Adam Davies]

Hi

Good to have you posting Nick

I will contact you shortly and upgrade you to expert status

Regards

[North East Derbyshire CAB]

Hi everybody

We hope you all are well

We have not been on for a while, but do look in every now and then.

We have noticed a couple of interesting threads including this and the Payplan one.

The CAB seem to be coming under scrutiny a little on here again (which is fair enough) so we thought we would chip in on the debate when and where we can.

Just ot of interest can anyone tell us which radio programme this article was originally broadcast and if possible any evidence of what was actually said and by who?

We would also like to second what Andy has said - glad to have you posting Nick.

Also for anyone that is interested we have recently launched a new free debt resource tool that includes an online debt management plan facility (link below)

http://mymoney.nedcab.org.uk/moneyadvice/

We would welcome any feedback by experts and forum users alike (positive or negative)

It is still early days with development of our new resource ongoing. However our new system is now successfully being used by our advisers and clients with other agencies also coming on board and we are sure that in the name of free independent impartial advice that you will all wish us and other bureaus well in the difficult and interesting times that lay ahead.

NED-CAB

[kallis3]

Nice to see you back. I've no idea what programme this was unfortunately, hopefully the OP will be able to let us know.

I'd also like to welcome Nick to the forum.