The Money and Pensions Service (MaPS) has announced an increase in its budget for debt support in England in 2020/21 by £38million. And an additional £5.9 million is being allocated to Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. This new money is in addition to the existing MaPS budget for debt advice of £64 million. It will come from a combination of government funds, reallocated MaPS budget and … [Read more...]
Articles for debt advisers
Coronavirus & the reform of Personal Insolvency in England
This article builds on the arguments I put forward in Coronavirus – how the debt advice sector should be planning, looking at one area that needs to be tackled urgently - personal insolvency. Coronavirus will cause a large increase in the numbers of people who should choose insolvency over the next couple of years. I am not trying to predict how many, but it is likely to be large enough to … [Read more...]
Coronavirus – how the debt advice sector should be planning
As lockdown is gradually phased out and furlough payments eventually stop, many people will not be able to return to their pre-Coronavirus situation of being able to manage their debts and bills. Now is the time the debt advice sector should be considering how to prepare for the large demand it may face and what may need to change. We don't know how many people will have problems We don't … [Read more...]
Debt Advice – 2019 did not go well – what will happen in 2020?
Many annual reviews say the year has gone by so fast. But it seems like a very long while since I wrote my review of Debt Advice in 2018. 2019 has been very difficult for debt advice. There have been few bright spots (apart from affordability complaints), a lot of delays to policy decisions being taken and an ever-worsening benefits environment for our clients. 2019 - what happened & … [Read more...]
More payday lenders go under – was anything learned from Wonga?
In the last two months of 2019, Britain's largest payday lender, QuickQuid, went into administration followed by three smaller lenders: 247 Moneybox, PiggyBank and Swift Sterling. Have the lessons from Wonga's collapse last year been leaned? And how can regulators and debt advisers do better in future to protect borrowers, not just of payday loans but other sorts of high cost credit as … [Read more...]
Holding Money & Debt up to the Light: Transparency and the Standard Financial Statement
This is a guest post by Dr Joseph Spooner, Assistant Professor of Insolvency Law at the LSE and the author of Bankruptcy – the Case for Relief in an Economy of Debt. He had previously worked at the Law Reform Commission of Ireland, where his papers influenced the enactment of the Irish Personal Insolvency Act 2012. Systems for addressing difficulties of over-indebted households in England … [Read more...]
Guarantor loans – why guarantors & borrowers need extra protection
Guarantor loans are coming into the regulatory spotlight. The FCA wrote to CEOs in March 2019 saying it will be looking at affordability and whether potential guarantors have enough information to understand how likely it is that they may have to make the loan payments. In a speech, Jonathan Davis said: Recent work we have done in this area showed that many guarantors are making at least 1 … [Read more...]
Debt advice in 2018 – my round up of the year
At the end of 2017 I wrote: Persistent credit card debt and overdraft charges tackled, bailiffs brought under control, SFS being used by all creditors, and a breathing space that will actually work in practice – that would be a good 2018. That would have been an amazing 2018 - I would have been happy with just a couple of those. But it is disappointing that none of them were achieved this … [Read more...]
2018 – Ombudsman decides it can look at payday loans over 6 years old
The Financial Ombudsman (FOS) has published in September 2018 two Decisions involving payday loans over six years old: Mr H has complained about fifty-four payday loans Lender C lent to him between March 2010 and September 2014. Mrs W’s complaint is about nine short-term loans from Lender D between November 2009 and July 2012. In both cases FOS has decided that its rules do allow it to … [Read more...]
2017 – a bad year for debt advisers and our clients
Very little has happened in 2017 that is good for the free debt advice sector: for the agencies, the advisors or - most importantly - our clients. This article is for front-line debt advisers across the country, because someone needs to say just how bad things are out there at the moment. I hope it will also be read by all the regulators, quasi-regulators, government departments and creditors … [Read more...]