Some very interesting comments here which I will pass on to the British Bankers Association representative when I see her next week. Keep comments coming please.
Regards, David Mond, Insolvency Practitioner for over 46 years. Personal Insolvency Practitioner of the year 2012, Personal Insolvency Practitioner of the year finalist 2013 & 2014 awarded by Insolvency & Rescue Magazine and 2015 finalist for Personal Insolvency Firm of the Year.
I have just started off the whole process of going down the IVA route and I am just beginning to miss payments and cancel DD's to creditors
So far whilst the calls have been pretty well ongoing - none I could say have been aggressive or rude in anyway
MBNA main thrust is to try and talk me into a DMP with them - but as long as you are firm and polite and tell them what is happening then at present they are just asking me to keep them informed though they are under pressure to try and get you on board with them . MBNA told me for instance that an IVA would stay on my record for 16 years . I also find that if you dont answer the call it will keep going till you do - the discussion usually puts the call off for about a week
I have no doubt that things will get more heated as time moves on and another payment gets missed - I think once you miss 3 then things ramp up a bit . and at present I am not dealing with any 3rd parties .
I have a Halifax CC and a personal loan- they call me around 3 times an hour/7 days a week. I do not answer, either reject call, or answer it and put it next to a loud radio- funnily enough, that tends to stop them for quite a few hours!
Barclaycard- write nearly every day, call me every hour. Sent me a letter acknowledging I was going into an IVA, still call and write every day though!
First Direct/HSBC - nothing!
MBNA- call every hour.
Egg, emails and calls every day.
Lloyds TSB- Overseas call centre call twice an hour, put next to the radio! Wrote asking us to send them our I&E's,we didn't.
Yorkshire Bank- Nothing!
MINT- Nothing.
Hope this helps,
Sharon
Last edited by Breakdown on Thu Jan 15, 2009 12:26 pm, edited 1 time in total.
When I first realised that my financial situation was worse then I thought I had a list of all my creditors and sat down ready to ring them to advise I was in financial difficulties as most statements say you should advise and they will try to help. The first creditor I rang was Lloyds TSB Credit Card. I had never missed a payment up until this point and they were so rude and kept saying that it was unacceptable that I was offering a lower payment for the month and they wanted payment now in a raised voice. It really scared me and so I did not contact any of my other creditors and unplugged my phone for 3 months.
I have been in an IVA since August and once all my creditors realised I have had no problems since. Prior to the IVA, whilst sorting out what I was going todo, I had a lot of problems.
My creditors are: Barclays Bank, Barclaycard (the worst), Next, MBNA, Tesco, Mint, M & S. My husband and I are both ill, my husband more seriously than me,so I wrote to them all quoting all the medical history, I work full time to try to pay but had to reduce my hours temporarily (I though) and I could pay token payments for approx 3 months whilst things got back to normal and then would review. M & S were the only ones that were helpful and accepted with interest frozen immediately, all the others were extremely unhelpful which made the stress and the medical situation worse. I then went into an IVA.
My husband is doing an informal DMP via ourselves. His creditors are Capital One - supportive, Barclaycard very supportive (which is odd because they weren't with me but his debt was less) and HFC loan who have been dreadful and harassing us until I complained about them and have involved the FSO. They are now being surprisingly helpful.
Lloyds were constantly ringing my work. The receptionist was always advising that we were not allowed to take personal calls but they kept ignoring this and ringing 5-6 times a day. (Very embarrasing) Luckly I know the receptionist and she knew about my money worries. In the end she had to tell them that I no longer worked there. It stopped the calls.
Out of all my creditors, and there are a few [:I] Barclaycard and MBNA are the worst for ringing (both of them ring at least twice a day). MBNA continually send default notices and have also written to inform me that they are, and I quote, "most disappointed" that I have not responded to their requests for money. I did try to explain to them that I couldnt give them any money without giving all my creditors money, and that I was applying for an IVA, to which they replied "so how much can you afford to pay today then?" Man alive. For the others, Egg send me texts asking me to ring them, Natwest send texts and letters, but dont ring, Halifax ring every now and again, Inchcape finance just send letters asking me to bring the account up to date, Black Horse send snotty letters, the occasional voicemail, and then bizarrely a week ago a letter saying I had been specially chosen to be reserved a £5000 loan! Barclaycard after telling me my account had been stopped promptly sent me new cards because the old ones had expired. I have now stopped answering calls as I am fed up telling them the same thing over and over again without getting anywhere. Last week my girlfriends 4 year old comes toddling down the stairs holding the phone while I was making dinner saying a "man" wanted to talk to me. Turned out to be the man from Barlcaycard again! Lol. I wish I had heard the first part of the conversation as the little lad can talk the hind leg off the donkey to absolutely ANYONE! Maybe I should get him to answer the phone to all my creditors they might stop ringing if they know a 4 year old is going to keep them nattering about Ben Ten for hours on end!! [:D]
I know it is a pain and not always practical - or even wanted - but in my limited experience if I dont answer the call and at least try and talk to them the calls will just keep coming - all depends if you can just mute the phone and get on with your life - with Mobile it is easier as they have to now show a number and they are all roughly the same - office is hard if they get hold of that .
On another matter I have noticed lately that MBNA dont even do security any more they just go straight into the call . I can imagine that they probably get more calls unanswered than answered - so when you do say hello they get a bit flustered
Ok I'll have a go... (please note that all the creditors had been written to prior to the calls)
Northern Rock. Called once a week, I told them each time I was applying for an IVA and will not make a minimum payment. They accepted this but said that they would have to call once a week to meet proceedure.
Mint. Superb. Acknowledged all my letters and called once, I told them the same thing and they left me alone.
LTSB Bank account (overdraft). Superb... same as mint.
LTSB Personal loan. Superb... same as mint.
I think I was lucky with the people I dealt with. However sorting our my wife's DMP with LTSB Credit card was a nightmare. They never responded to our letters and kept ringing from a foreign call center. It took about 2 months to sort things out with them.
I think you just have to be firm with them. Politely, but firmly tell them that you are NOT going to make ANY payments as advised by your IP until the IVA is either accepted or rejected.
Been in an IVA since Oct last year and they keep phoning, 6 times yesterday whilst at work, which I didn't answer. Have told them numerous times, together with my IP who must have faxed through quite a few chairmans reports to them but they keep phoning. Not on their system they say. Grrr.
I had no problem with Barclays once my IVA was approved. I don't know what it is with them and refusing to believe that you are in an IVA.
Sharing from experiences of dealing with debt
The greatness of a man is not in how much wealth he acquires, but in his integrity and his ability to affect those around him positively.
Bob Marley. http://kallis3.blogs.iva.co.uk
The majority of my creditors were really helpful & understanding..Natwest,American Express,Capital one & Marbles were all very polite & sympathetic,and after the initial phonecall to inform them that i was proposing an iva,they didn't ring me again.
I didn't hear anything from Littlewoods,Grattan or Argos.
Goldfish were phoning me on a regular basis asking for token payments & an 'iva reference number',even though i kept telling them that i was proposing an iva & that i didn't have an 'iva reference number'!
But Barclaycard were an absolute nightmare,they rang me constantly on my mobile & at work..i asked them numerous times to remove my work number from their file,explaining that we weren't allowed to recieve personal calls at work,and each time they would assure me that it had been removed,but it hadn't because they continued to ring me at work..One day,2 months after my iva had been approved i went into work to be told by a colleague that Barclaycard had been phoning up for me and there was a contact number left for me to ring..i was so embarrassed,yet when i rang them up they denied ever phoning my work,or even having the number in their records!!
They also rang my parents house where i haven't lived for 5 years,and they were asking my dad questions about my current address & any other numbers that they could contact me on!!..obviously my dad didn't give them any information whatsoever,but at that time i hadn't told my parents about my debt situation,and had to make up a tale that they were just pestering me about applying for a loan!..it really was awful..i also had the early morning weekend calls,and on one occasion was asked if there was anyone else in the house who could make a payment for me with their debit card!!..i wouldn't have minded but i'd never missed one single payment until the iva was being set up..so i would say that whilst the other creditors were very fair indeed,Barclaycard made my life a misery!..hope this helps[:)]
Hi Tori
You story regarding Barclaycard shows creditors ar their worst.
I have a journalist from a national paper interested in writing an article on the subject.
If you are interested in becoming a case study please contact me directly
Many Thanks
I too had issues with Barclaycard- they had an old work number before I moved depts, and kept asking to be transferred as a matter of urgency...even when I said I was at work and couldnt discuss there and then I was told to have a tea break and call them back!!
