What Debt Advisors Should Tell You
There is considerable variation in the standard of service a debtor is likely to get when seeking debt advice from various debt advisors. The Office of Fair Trading (OFT) has published a helpful booklet on its website which summarises the type of debt advice you should expect to get. It is entitled ‘Getting Help with your Debts’ and it is well worth a read.
The first thing to be aware of is that in the UK, debt advisers can be split into two categories: those who provide free services and those who charge for their services. Regardless of which category your debt adviser falls into, the quality of debt advice should be the same.
Debt advisors can do a number of things. Their principal role is to review your finances, explain financial information to you and give you advice on your specific debt situation. For example they might advise you regarding which debts you should consider paying off first such as your mortgage. This is sometimes called the process of prioritizing your debts. They might also advise you on ways of budgeting so as to make your money go further. With your permission, they might also contact the people to whom you owe money, i.e. your creditors, and explain your financial situation to them with a view to agreeing a repayment plan with them on your behalf.
The OFT recommends that you should give careful consideration to the matter of choosing a debt advisor and that you should only deal with debt advisors who have a consumer credit licence which is issued by the OFT itself.
You can check this out yourself on the OFT website by looking up the Consumer Credit Register.
Free advice on debt matters can be obtained from a variety of sources including Citizen’s Advice Bureau (CAB), National Debtline, the Consumer Credit Counselling Service (CCCS) and a variety of other charitable organizations. The OFT booklet referred to above provides contact details for a number of these organizations or you can obtain their contact details yourself by searching on line.
There are also many professional fee charging debt management companies and you can source these quite easily on line or you can identify them from their advertisements in the media. While most of these provide some initial preliminary debt advice, they are commercial operations and are in the business of making a profit. Before agreeing to avail of their services and before you hand any money over, you should ask about the cost of their services and be crystal clear as to when you will have to pay for such services. Ideally you should establish the extent of these costs in writing before you agree to anything, bearing in mind that some of these companies do not charge up-front fees and some of them do. In either case, there is usually a limit to the amount of free advice they will provide, as you would expect from any business which is not funded by the state or by creditors.
Before signing a contract for the provision of debt advice, make sure you understand precisely what is going to be done for you. Summarize your questions regarding costs in writing and make sure you get answers to your satisfaction before proceeding. In particular the contract for a debt repayment plan should tell you the total cost of the service, what fees are payable at the start of the contract and what fees are payable during the life of the contract, whether you can get any of your money back and when, how much money will be paid to each of your creditors and when they will be paid, if and how your debt repayment plan will or is likely to affect your credit rating and what you have to do if you want to stop the service at any time in the future. Even if you use a non fee charging organization, you should ask all these questions if anything is unclear. If cold callers come to your home without your invitation, do not give them any personal details and if you want to avoid being cold called by telephone, register your contact details with the Telephone Preference Service (TPS).
Finally, before you sign the contract, ask your debt advisor who you should contact in the event that something goes wrong in the future or if you have a complaint about the service. Remember that in the event of something going wrong and the company does not deal with your complaint or the issue to your satisfaction, you should contact the Financial Ombudsman Service.
Regardless of the type of solution you attempt to address your debt issues there are a number of things you should do to manage your finances. You need to prepare a budget to determine how much money you have coming in and going out so that you can calculate how much is left over to enable you to pay your bills. You need to keep paying your bills, particularly your priority debts such as your mortgage (or rent) and your utility bills. Continue to communicate with the people to whom you owe money and keep your debt advisor fully informed of their letters and calls and of your replies. It may be that your debt advisor takes over this role and if so make sure that you pass over any communications from your creditors and report any telephone calls you are getting to your advisor. Keep in regular touch with your debt advisor and check to ensure that he or she is passing on the monies you have paid to your creditors in accordance with your repayment plan.
There are many debt repayment options available and if you want to get information about them you should get your hands on The Insolvency Service’s publication ‘In Debt? Dealing with your Creditors’. It explains each of the repayment options in detail and is particularly suited to residents of England and Wales. It is also useful for residents of Northern Ireland where the insolvency laws and associated procedures differ slightly from those applicable to England and Wales. Residents of Scotland should read ‘Debt Advice and Information Package’ which is also available from The Insolvency Service. These publications can also be accessed on line at The Insolvency Service website.