www.iva.co.uk

I had an IVA approved in July 2011 for £450 per month with a dividend of 40.62p in the pound. My husband lost his job in Dec 2011 and our income has dropped by £800 per month. I maintained my IVA payments until May 2012 and then had a two month break. He isn't entitled to benefits because my salary is too high. It will be difficult for him to find another job quickly as I travel with my job and stay away from home a few nights each week, he needs to work flexibly part time (as we have an 11 year old son), is unskilled and is 55 years of age. He has applied for jobs and had interviews but no success to date. I have discussed my situation with my IP and am thinking of proposing a permament variation to amend my payments to £150 per month (this is all we can afford on my salary)as I am not confident my husband will get a job in the next few months and I don't want to keep accumulating arrears or extended months onto the length of my IVA. However this will only offer a dividend of 10.93 in the pound. (I a hopeful that my husband will get work eventualy and then we can increase our payment. My IP won't give me any indication of the liklihood of £150 being accepted and I'm worried that the IVA will fail if creditors don't accept. My creditors are MBNA, Barclays,Capital One, Santander and Halifax Any advise on whether this low dividend is likely to agreed would be greatly appreciated.

Thankyou

I personally would accept the offer and your IP is clearly hopeful the variation will be accepted. It is through no fault of your own that this variation is being drafted and we have closed down cases at pennies in the £ and even fractions of a penny in extreme cases.

While the dividend is a factor in deciding whether to accept, your behaviour and complaince are also important and I am sure creditors will accept the variation. There is always a possibility your husband finds work and the dividend increases but even if he does not your offer still beats bankruptcy.

Very best of luck.

Hi Sasha and welcome to the forum

If 10p in the £ is the best that you can manage, given your changed circumstances then there is no reason why this would not be accepatble to your creditors. Do make sure that you can realisticaly afford this sum, and are there any reasons why bankruptcy proceedings may not be a better solution now?

Thank you Michael and Melanie - your advise is more encouraging than my IP - I think they are just being cautious about giving any indication in case it does get knocked back.

Re Bankruptcy option - I don't want to go down this route as I am a home owner (mute point as I am in negative equity so technically the bank own it....)and don't want to put my home at risk or have the public shame of bankruptcy. I'd prefer to stay with the IVA and pay back what I can.

Good for you, and I wish you the very best of luck with the offer. Let us know how you get on.

is there any public shame in bankruptcy anymore? Isnt it the in thing for many celebrity folks these days??

With negative equity and a large loss of income I'd be seriosuly looking at the impact of BR and whether it is now the right thing to do.

Paul

Just wanted to update to let you know my variation for a reduced payment of £150 was accepted. Thank you so much for the advice.

Congrats. Good luck for the future.

Good result for you, congratulations

Thats great news

Good luck for the remainder of your IVA

Great news Sasha I'm sure you'll find time to celebrate over the weekend!

Great news Sasha. Hope this has put your mind at rest now.

So glad to see that this is now resolved for you Sasha. Hopefully your case can be closed very soon.

Hi Sasha. That's great news - I'm so pleased for you and hubby! I think cases such as these do add a 'human face' to IP's and creditors too. Maybe 'back in the day', such dividends would have been less acceptable, but in these continued times of recession and severe financial hardship, they know they have to deal with the reality that some people just cannot pay as much as originally agreed. It gives hope for many who come onto this forum and/or exploring viable options for dealing with their debt problems. Thanks for sharing Sasha!! x

It certainly is a sign of the times GilliB. We are regularly getting divdinds of less than 10p in the £ accepted by creditors, which five years ago would have been largely unheard of.