Hello.
I''''ve just completed the first year of my IVA and am puzzled by the review of my income/expenditure.
There doesn''''t seem to be any real method to calculating the allowances. It seems an end figure (what I was paying to start with, plus 50 per cent of extra income (my salary rise)) is the startng point and the allowances are then "tweaked" to fit that figure.
It doesn''''t matter what documented proof I am able to provide, I''''m just told "those are the allowances".
For example, during the first year of my IVA I was allowed £25 a month (£300 a year) to run my car.
From that I had to pay £185 road tax and £53 for an MOT, leaving me £62 for the year to pay for maintenance.
Towards the end of my first year I had to pay nearly £100 for essential repairs and £245 for four new tyres.
This year I have again been allowed £25 a month and, despite me providing proof of what it actually costs to maintain a car, my supervisor refuses to allow more.
I was told the figures were provided by the AA and CCCS and yet when I check with the AA I find their figures to be considerably higher.
My supervisor told me I could use the £30 a month contingency I am allowed towards any maintenance, but to me that is an allowance for emergencies and the allowance to run/maintain a car should be treated separately.
Apologies for going on, but I am curious to see if others have experienced similar "inflexbible" attitudes from their supervisors, no matter what evidence they are able to produce of their expenditure.
First of all your road tax should have been included under a separate heading, as £62 per year is grossly insufficient to maintain your car. CCCS allows for this to be shown separately, so I cannot see why this was lumped together in your case leaving you with a very harsh allowance.
You are correct in your assumption that the general contingency fund is there for general emergencies. I really fail to see what IPs have to gain out of making their clients suffer under harsh budgets for a five year period - and suspect that is one of the reasons why the failure rate of IVAs in some firms is very high. But perhaps I am just a bit cynical!!!
Thanks for the welcome and the advice.
I'm going to have another go at my supervisor because it just doesn't make sense.
When I took the IVA out last year I was so happy just to get the creditors off my back that I, perhaps rather foolishly, agreed to whatever allowances I was given.
Having taken the opportunity to do a full review of my spending and a forecast of my planned expenses this year, I find some of the allowances are woefully inadequate.
I've no problem with paying the £764 a month agreed a year ago, but my three per cent pay rise has hardly kept pace with inflation.
Now it's £791 a month and that will increase in April when I have to hand over half of my salary rise.
I know I messed up and am more than willing to pay back what I can. I'm paying back 68p in the pound (after supervisor fees etc).
It's just so frustrating that proven expenditure can seemingly be ignored by the supervisor.
To my mind my creditors allowed me to have a car so should accept that I have to pay a fair cost in maintaining it.
After costing it out myself I got it to about £39 a month to do the absolute minimum (including road tax and MOT).
If I was allowed that it would still mean I was paying my creditors more than the initial figure agreed.
I'll have another crack at them tomorrow!
Hi there and welcome to the forum from me. I cannot add to what Melanie has said.
I cannot understand the pressure some companies put unecessarily on people, causing struggle, when they know you are doing your best. I wonder could the supervisor of your iva run and maintain his car on this amount, I think not. I would definately ring and fight your case.
All the best and let us know how you get on.
Given that IP's will be paid regardless I cannot see the need to squeeze to the point where the iva will fail. Some common sense is required when dealing with expenses.Better to have fair expenses and the creditors get some money than failed iva's all over the place and people going BR.
Out of interest Mel,do you know anywhere which shows the success rate of IVA firms,not just approvals but actual % of iva's that run the course or are ended by F&F's???
Discharged today the 8th feb 2012. View is much brighter now.
Continuing to rebuild our credit worthiness.
Those statistics are just not held Plasticdaft, but ought to be. I know that some of the creditors do keep these statistics, but they are not publicly available.
Thank you all for you kind words and advice.
I am putting my case together to present to my supervisor, but if he won't budge what options are open to me?
I believe I have a genuine case for complaint, but what can I do?
I made a thorough and honest review of my finances and yet it seems that whatever evidence I produce to support my case is ignored.
Is there an ombudsman or arbitrator I can appeal to?
If you do not agree the level of payments demanded by your Supervisor, you do have the right to challenge his/her decision in Court. I suspect that the Judge would err on your side - as everyone knows the cost of living has risen enormously over the last year.
Sorry for the delay in responding.
I'm with ClearDebt. To be fair, they've been ok up to now, but I can't help but feel if I'd looked at the allowances a little closer last year, I would be in a better position now.
At the time I took the IVA out I was just so glad to have a way forward that I assumed everything would be ok without fully realising the true cost.
Despite spending close to £240 on road tax and an MOT - out of my £300 a year allowance - I still had to spend nearly £350 on tyres, electric leads and rust repair. It was only by doing the majority of work myself that the bill wasn't a lot higher.
To manage I had to rob Peter to pay Paul and not spend my other allowances.
I've been told this year by my supervisor that if I do need to spend more than the £60 I've been allowed then there may be the possibility of a break in payments. That simply means my IVA term will be lengthened or my payments increased to pay back whatever extra I've been allowed.
It's just so frustrating that they do not seem to understand the true running costs of a vehicle.
In my review letter it states the AA guidelines show maintenance costs of 6.5p a mile which they calculate on 12,200 miles a year to be about £66 a month but "pursuant of the CCS current inclusion rates this did not justify such a significant increase therefore they have kept the minimum guideline at £10 and a maxium of £20 a month".
I did point out to my supervisor that the maximum of £20 a month (£240 a year) would leave me £2 a year to maintain my vehicle once I'd paid road tax and MOT and how on earth was I supposed to manage?
My plea fell on deaf ears.
To me it seems they are insistent on me paying what I initially agreed (£764) plus 50 per cent of extra income (£27 - representing half of my salary increase).
As I previously stated, they are just tweaking my allowances to fit that figure, regardless of what my actual expenditure is.
Sorry to keep going on about it, but their inflexibilty and just plain stubborness in the face of irrefutable evidence is just bewildering.
I may only be talking about £15 to £20 a month, but it's money I would definitely need to spend and I don't see why I should have to find that money from other allowances.
I'm going to talk to them again tomorrow and see if they can at least include road tax under a separate heading.
Based on past experience, I don't expect a positive response, but I have to try.
Size 5 who is a regular forum posters works for an associated compaby of Cleardebt, and may be able to intervene for you on these specific points. I usually allow £35 per month as a general provision for car maintanence, and do not recall this ever being challenged by creditors, and if you need a higher allowance, so long as that is backed up by receipts of actual expenditure incurred, I cannot see why your IP would be making you stick to a £10 - £20 per month budget.
Well, I made the call. Take head, take wall and bash one against the other several times....
All around the houses, refusal to budge and finally a concession that he'll talk to the big supervisor and let me know. I await his response tomorrow.
