I have setup this blog to hopefully record our progress through our Debt Management Plan (DMP) and our journey from debt to debt-free.

If you have any questions then please let me know however if they are financial questions then can I suggest you speak directly with a free debt management company.

I am recommending the Consumer Credit Counselling Service (CCCS) as I have found numerous forum posts and success stories from people who have been where we are - all the information I could find about the CCCS was excellent and they come highly recommended.

I shall be updating this blog regularly with any information/letters/phone calls I receive from both the CCCS and/or my creditors to hopefully give you some idea of the process involved in a DMP.

I hope this site proves helpful.

Thursday, December 17, 2009

The calls have started!

So far only had calls from 2 of our creditors.

First was from Barclaycard who have changed me £12 late payment fee (I sent them a £1 token payment).  They basically employed an automated dialling service which kept ringing all day with a message of "We have an important message for Mr [insert name].  If you are [insert name] press 1".  I eventually was at home at a time when they rang and I got through to someone to speak to.  I told them I was having financial difficulties and that I had spoken with the CCCS.  The lady asked for a reference number and said she would put a note on my file so that the ring-backs stopped for 30 days.

I've now had a few calls from Lloyds TSB but haven't been able to talk to them yet.  They left me a voicemail with a number to call back but it was obviously from an Indian call centre and the ladies accent was so strong that I couldn't understand the last 4 digits of the number to call back!

They rang again today at my home and luckily my wife was home so she wrote the number down.  They are open until 9pm so I shall ring them when I get home and explain the situation to them.

...and there I was hoping for a quite Christmas!