Debt Management and Short-term Loans
Debt management advice introduction
If you’re having difficulty managing your debt, that can be stressful and exhausting. But you may be able to turn things around through a mixture of communication and perseverance.
Please note that the following does not constitute financial advice. Always do your own research into financial matters to find the right solution for your personal circumstances. While we are linking to some websites that you might find useful or interesting, we are not responsible for what they publish on their own websites.
Prioritising debts
Sites like the Moneyhelper recommend prioritising your debts into three different types.
- Priority debts (those with further consequences, such as court appearances, bankruptcy, bailiff action or removal of vital services like electricity)
- Non-priority debts (where you may not have immediate consequences, but missing payments could become more expensive or lead to court appearances etc later)
- Debt emergencies (where you’re in immediate danger of a court appearance or bailiff action, etc).
For debt emergencies, you should immediately look for free independent debt advice.
If you’re not at an emergency stage, you should list out all your outgoings and try to pay priority debts first, as these carry the most severe consequences. After this, if you want to reduce debt, it usually makes sense to overpay the most expensive debt first, paying the minimum amount elsewhere, so you don’t keep spiralling. Although it’s always worth checking if you are likely to receive a penalty for overpaying. It’s worth noting that the ‘most expensive debt’ may not actually be the biggest amount you owe, but the one that would work out most expensive if not repaid.
Once this debt is repaid, you move onto the next most expensive debt and so on. If you have used high-cost short term credit, then this may be one of the more expensive debts, as they’re designed for short term use only.
Repayment plans
If you’re having difficulty repaying a debt, it’s often worth contacting the lender. They may not be able to do anything, but they may be in a position to put you onto a repayment plan.
These obviously vary from lender to lender, but some will be able to freeze the amount of interest you owe and arrange a repayment plan to allow you to pay off the debt over a period of time with lower payments.
If you do start a repayment plan, it’s important to stick to it. If you don’t, then the lender may go back to the original payment schedule. If you can now afford this, that’s hopefully fine – if not, it could just put you back at square one.
Lending Stream and debt management
If you’ve taken out a loan with Lending Stream and are struggling with the repayments, please do call us. We understand that this can happen and we’ll try and help you find a solution and set up an affordable alternative payment plan. If we don’t know about your financial issues, we’ll continue collecting your next payment automatically, which could make your immediate situation worse.
You can contact us via chat by logging in to your account section.
Links
You may find some of the following links useful. They’re not-for-profit organisations recommended by the Financial Conduct Authority and provide free, confidential and impartial debt advice.
The Financial Conduct Authority recommends contacting the following not-for-profit organisations for free, confidential and impartial debt advice, or for details of where to get such advice in your area.
Moneyhelper
Money Advice Scotland
Citizens Advice Northern Ireland
AdviceUK
Christians Against Poverty (CAP)
Citizens Advice
National Debtline
StepChange Debt Charity
You can find out more about alternative approaches to short term financial issues by visiting the Moneyhelper.
Related Loans
We don't offer loans under 60 days. We offer 6 or 12 month loans. The maximum repayment period is 12 months. Maximum APR 1721%.
Representative Example: Given a Representative APR of 1333%, if you borrow £300 over 6 months at 292.0% p.a. (fixed), you would owe 6 equal repayments of £96.66. You will repay £579.96 in total.
Warning: Late repayment can cause you serious money problems. For help go to moneyhelper.org.uk