www.iva.co.uk

I work for a Midlands Police Force, went into work yesterday afternoon and logged onto my emails.

There was one from our welfare department advising staff that with rising mortgages etc., they realised that people would possibly be having difficulty making their payments. They advised people not too leave it until it was too late to do anything about it and gave a long list of companies (CCCS, Payplan etc) who obviously have specific helplines for the police (never knew that).

I was quite surprised that they had sent this round as they are really funny about financial stuff.

They obviously realise that things are going to get worse before they get better, and I think it is good that they are encouraging staff to get help.

They sounded quite sympathetic!

Thats a positive step and encouraging to hear. I'm actually putting this onto an agenda next week to see if our company can offer free advice if any of our employees are interested.

No-one here knows about my circumstances so I will suggest we offer a confidential one to one with an expert which could cover anything from debt advice to pensions etc.

Thanks for the post - a bit more info for me

That's really good news Kallis, maybe all employers should do that. Viki X

Yes, I was surprised. No one at work knows of my situation and hopefully never will, but it's good that they will be sympathetic to people.

Hope your firm do the same Swans_girl

I wouldnt take it to mean they will be sympathetic though. Would be nice to think so but I cant see it.

They're probably just waiting to pounce!

Quite frankly it's about time!

Firms are now being more sympathetic, but far to late in my view.

I am just in the closing stages of my IVA and have had dealings with loads of firms over the years, going from an extremely good one (a university) to a rather bad one (major supermarket).

In both jobs I had no link to handling money (supermarket meant I could have access to it, but not to the level that I could be fraudulant or my IVA was deemed to raise an issue about it).

With firms being litigated against more and more because of this sort of problem you'll find they are upping their game when it comes to debt. They are either becoming far more prescribed in their contracts, actually stating that any financial problems need to be stated or stating openly that help and assistance is at hand.

It still means that there are firms which do love to play hardball about these things, but goverment agencies are actually putting in place ways of helping their staff.

Lets hope all firms adopt this approach in the future.

Good luck everyone and Kallis3, those 58 payments....they'll fly by