www.iva.co.uk

hi there i have just found out im pregnant. im 2 years into my iva and pay currently pay £363pm,i wandering what will happen to the payments when ileave to go on maternity leave and whilst goin from full time to part time if i need to. im intending to return full time however want to know my option?? also my partner is a mature studant and only works part time will i need to advise my ip of my partner as i dont want my partner knowin im in a iva as ashamed?? im sick with worry please help...

Hi

Firstly, many congratulations on your happy event. Secondly, don't be ashamed at being in an IVA. It's a totally responsible way of attempting to repay your debts.

You'll need to talk to the Supervisor. The more notice he/she has of this the better.

It's not necessarily fatal to your IVA although whether it's worth continuing with it will depend on the following:

1 How long you will be off work
2 How much that will impact upon your income
3 The extent to which your new arrival will affect your ability to contribute to the IVA.
4 What you do for a living.

Depending on the answers to the above you could ask the Supervisor to call a meeting of creditors to vary the IVA. If the above make the IVA unworkable then the right answer might be bankruptcy.

Ian

Other things to consider are the type of maternity package offered by your employers - usually 90% for six weeks and then SMP for nine months, together with the benefits you will receive once the baby is born - child benefit, working families tax credit, child tax credit, and additional costs of childcare.

Your IP will expect you to have checked this out firstly, so that he/she can consider what impact any income/expenditure fluctuations will have on your ability to make your payments. Hopefully a variation may not be necessary, with careful planning and budgeting, but it does really then depend upon whether you intend to return to work or not.

Children bring different priorities to our lives, and it may be that having a family becomes far more of a priority for you than paying off your creditors. So if money is going to be very tight, also consider bankruptcy proceedings as Ian has already advised.

Congratulations Johnsons on your good news, don't know if this helps but we found childminders much more affordable than nurserys - we pay about double now our little one is at nursery. If you do go with a childminder make sure you see lots, you tend to get a gut feeling about if one is going to be good and look after your child as if it were there own.

Hope everything works out for you