Debt news and policy Archives

Debt news and policy

Debt Camel articles on what's changing and what ought to change in the world of personal debt in Britain.

If you are interested in a specific area, look at: High cost credit news & policy and Insolvency news & policy.

And for my weekly round-ups of debt and poverty news items, see Weekly News Summaries.

Amigo – many customers may do better in Administration than a Scheme!

When Amigo announced it was proposing a Scheme of Arrangement in December, it said: Amigo continues to explore alternative options but it is likely the alternative options would result in those with Redress Claims receiving considerably lower amounts (if any at all) than they would under the Scheme. But that isn't correct for one large group of borrowers who would be significantly better off if … [Read more...]

Is Amigo allowed to delay paying refunds? Does it have a DISP waiver?

When Amigo announced in December 2020 that it was seeking a Scheme of Arrangement to cap the amount it has to pay to customers owed refunds for unaffordable lending, it said: To ensure equal treatment of customers with Redress Claims, Amigo will stop the ongoing payment of all Redress Claims, except for those cases where the Redress Claims result from: (i) reviewed and upheld complaints where a … [Read more...]

Lessons from Amigo – FOS complaint handling needs to be faster

If Amigo’s proposed Scheme of Arrangement goes forward, customers with complaints at the Financial Ombudsman (FOS) will have them returned to Amigo to resolve in the Scheme. My guess is that there may be 10,000 Amigo cases at FOS, possibly a lot more. UPDATE: FOS says it has about 13,000 open Amigo cases and about 500 new cases are arriving each week. If these customers would have had a … [Read more...]

Amigo’s Scheme – who’s next? Implications for the bad credit market

If Amigo's proposed Scheme of Arrangement is allowed to go forward by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), what would be the impact on the guarantor market and the wider bad credit market? This article looks at whether other lenders would also seek the protection of a Scheme and the implications for competition in the market. This is one of a series of articles looking at Amigo's proposed … [Read more...]

Will an Amigo Scheme of Arrangement abandon vulnerable customers?

A whole book could be written about the different ways vulnerable customers can have problems with guarantor loans - I wrote about some of them in Guarantor loans – why guarantors & borrowers need extra protection. But here are a couple of very recent cases for illustration. Case 1 - mental health problems The borrower informed Amigo when he made an affordability complaint in September 2020 … [Read more...]

Covid-19 – what help with debts & bills can you get?

Now we are all back in lockdown, this article looks at what support you can get with essential bills and debts. There are contact details at the bottom of this page for where it is suggested you should get help. More than four million payment breaks have been provided by lenders, but these lifelines are coming to an end. If you have had six months of breaks already for a debt you won't be able … [Read more...]

Amigo Scheme – my estimated numbers don’t look good

When Amigo announced it was seeking a Scheme of Arrangement on 21 December 2020, I said there were very few details and asked some questions. UPDATE: Amigo gave some more information about the Scheme on 25 January, see my article Amigo’s Scheme - timetable for approval & how it may work. But there weren't any of the useful numbers I had been hoping for, so I have not made any changes to the … [Read more...]

Amigo seeks refuge from complaints in a Scheme of Arrangement

UPDATE - on 25 January 2021 Amigo published more details about the Scheme. See Amigo’s Scheme - timetable for approval & how it may work for my summary of what has happened. Amigo announced on 21 December 2020 that it is seeking approval for a Scheme of Arrangement in order to cap the amount it has to pay to customers who were mis-sold unaffordable loans. The announcement says: Whilst … [Read more...]

Barclaycard to hike minimum payments in January – are you affected?

Barclaycard emailed customers in November 2020 about changes to their credit cards. With the title "Dear [customer name], we're updating your T&Cs ", you may have ignored it. But many people will find their minimum payments are going to be increasing from 26 January 2021. And some of the increases will be very large. This affects Barclaycard holders with Cashback, Freedom, Forward, … [Read more...]

3 month car finance payment breaks because of Coronavirus

In April 2020, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA ) set out new rules for car finance lenders on how they should respond to customers who are affected by coronavirus. It followed the general "three-month payment breaks" approach used for other credit from mortgages to credit cards. In July, the FCA these rules were extended to allow for a first or second payment break to be taken up until … [Read more...]