informed by text message that they will fail me.

[pod]

Having had debts of £111000 from 16 creditors we were finding it hard to pay the bills. It was a never ending cycle of paying the bills and then once the payments to the credit cards had cleared we were drawing it back out so we could survive. I trolled through the yellow pages and found Debt Free Direct and at the start they made it sound simple.

The original agreement was to pay in the region of 80p in the pound back. Since then we've had a baby and we have both been forced into moves not only by work but also as child care is so damn expensive. I know the government gives you back an amount each month but when you can't afford to pay up front charges that's no help. We have been in discussion with DFD since November last year when our son was born and they are giving an impression of that they don't care. I advised them twice that my wife was getting maternity pay and that the last 2 months of it were going to be so low that the car payments wouldn't be able to be made so I would have to top her account up meaning that after checking my budget I had no money left over for them after the general living expenses. At no time did they acknowledge this and I am now getting sick and tired of speaking to the monkeys employed there (hate saying it like that as I am a call centre worker) I feel like a number. They are now threatening to fail the IVA which i'm tempted to let them do that just to get out of this mess that they advised me to get into.

At the moment I feel like I can only pay them about a quarter of the £1200 per month that I am paying but that would only be once my wife's wage is sorted out which will be June at the earliest. Any idea's? I'm more annoyed with the lack of customer service and also the unprofessionalism of being informed by text message that they will fail me.

[MelanieGiles]

Hi pod and welcome to the forum

If you cannot afford the IVA payments, and £300 is unlikely to be acceptable under variation proceedings, I suggest you consider bankruptcy proceedings. You have tried, and events outside of your control have led to this situation.

I can understand your disappointment at your IP's attitude, and suggest you tell them to carry on with the failure and to commence bankruptcy proceedings against you. If you own no assets, then you are unlikely to be affected duly, and it brings an end to this hassle finally.

If you feel, however, that you can make a sensible offer of variation to the Supervisor, then they are duty bound to consider this and present it to creditors. Work out what you can afford to pay now, and what you can when your wife returns to work, building in the cost of childcare.

Regards, Melanie Giles, Insolvency Practitioner for over 20 years.

For further details contact me at http://www.melaniegiles.com and view my IVA blog at: http://melaniegiles.blogs.iva.co.uk