Mr & Mrs J.

Mr and Mrs J are tenants, they both live on disability benefits. They were convinced to go into an IVA by one of the large IVA factories who told them they were in a “joint” IVA.

Even though Mrs J's debt is less than £4,000 Mr J owes £27,000 is disabled and only paying the £290 per month IVA from their disability allowances.
 
This elderly couple were recently given a rent rebate; the I.P. now insists that this small sum is paid into their IVA.

The IVA comapny convinced them to enter the IVA by combining their debts even though Mrs J. could easily have dealt with hers without seriously damaging her credit file.

Peter and Diane T,

Approx 3 yrs ago Peter and Diane applied for a consolidation loan just in Peter’s name, which was declined.
Out of the blue they were contacted by an IVA Company, who said they could help them.

This initial contact was in Peter’s name, the IVA Company took all of the details they required. When the company came back to Peter they said they could only do an IVA if it was in joint names. At this time Diane only owed £4,500 to 3 creditors ,

The reason the IVA company were interested in Diane is because Peters income was insufficient enough to provide a suitably large disposable income.

They were told by the IVA salesman that if they went Bankrupt they would lose everything.

The IVA Company told them they had to pay £965 pcm. Diane’s income net income was £880pcm.

They had no property, no other assets of any description and their car is worth less than £1,000.

Peter and Diane have paid their IVA for nearly 2.5 yrs They were contacted by one of their creditors in month 30 to say they had received no money at all, at that stage they contacted their IVA company to see what was going on.

Anne and Mark

Anne went to an online debt Helpline for debt advice, she is a full-time Mum with two young children.

The online debt Helpline asked her if she had any assets and if she was a home owner, she answered that she had no assets and she rented her home. She was told she should enter an IVA but as she did not personally have an earned an Income could they speak to her husband.

Her husband Mark was told he should enter a "joint" IVA with his wife. Mark told the online debt Helpline that it wasn’t necessary as he only owed £5,000 and had no problem making the repayments.

The online debt Helpline told him he had no choice, because he was married to Anne her debt was his debt and his responsibility!

Mark and Anne were then placed in a 5 year IVA paying £224 per month.

An IVA is really intended for people who have assets to protect, Anne may well have been better off following a quicker less expensive solution.

As for Mark, he is in NO WAY liable for the debts of any person other than himself, whoever they are (even his wife), he should never have been in an IVA in the first place, now BOTH have a credit file which is marked “Insolvent”.

IVA Watchdog

2 Landsdowne Crescent

Bournemouth

Dorset

BH1 1SA

01202 636070