Expert Savings Advice

I work in a media office in the centre of one of the most thriving and bustling cities in Europe. My job is extremely varied and one day never seems to be repeated as we move from project to project; all of which have different requirements, different venues and they will almost inevitably demand huge amounts of time and long hours. I travel everywhere with my computer. It provides everything I need to make a living, from mobile office to communication device and it’s also my accountant and bank manager. It allows me to do all the things that most other people might do during the day at a time that’s convenient for me. I can log on and pay bills, buy a DVD or even get a life cover comparison. As technology evolves to become more and more user friendly, the opportunities it will open up for us all will mean that all our lives will embrace the computer and the net. Computers were once the preserve of the mathematically brilliant few. Now most people have a smart phone capable of communicating with satellites whilst simultaneously booking a table in a restaurant in Tokyo. With the advent of the next generation of computers, ultra fast broadband and 4G telephones all of which will arrive in our shops in the next few years those trying to anticipate the likely impact on the normal person in the street will be hard placed to comfortably predict where we will all be in just 5 years time.

My wife and I needed to reduce our overall monthly expenditure due to a change in our personal circumstances. We sat down with a list of our monthly outgoings and a clean sheet of paper and tried to come up with ways that we could achieve the savings required to live within our means. Ideally our plan would save us three hundred pounds a month and we would aim to renegotiate all of our policies plans and utilities and any shortfall would be made up by cutting back on our holiday plans and social lives. We started with our direct debits and logged onto the internet to compare life cover prices, mortgage costs and utilities. The savings it’s possible to make were substantial although we weren’t able to save the entire amount. We are virtually there, though and our lifestyle will not suffer tremendously, so we’ll be able to enjoy our lives as much as we did before. With hindsight  it’s clear that those who put off  carrying out such an exercise are being stupid and wasting money unnecessarily. This is money that most people can ill afford to give away. It’s not as if there isn’t enough adverts on the television telling us to log onto our computers to compare the price of our car insurance, home insurance and so on.

The debt management plan is important because many of us become trapped in the vicious cycle of taking on more debt in order to cover the debt repayments we already have.

The reason that the debt management plan is such a popular solution to complicated debt repayments is because it allows us to bring our expenditure and income back into line without any further borrowing. While this is an attractive proposition, it is not actually suitable for everybody. Could a Debt Management Plan be the right plan of action for you?

Take a glance at the main characteristics of a debt management plan and find out.

• The debt management plan is for debtors who are unable to afford all of the full monthly payments on their debts.
• A debt management plan does not write off your debts. Instead it allows the debtor to make a reduced monthly payment at an agreed rate until the debt is cleared.
• Your debts will be listed in full and in order of priority, starting with outstanding debts which could result in the loss of a home, an essential utility or item such as a car for commuting to work, then the maximum amount of expendable monthly finances that you can dedicate to the debt is also calculated.
• This maximum payment is divided among your creditors each month.
• Debtors can cancel their debt management plan at any point because it is not legally binding.
• If you arrange your debt management plan with a third party, you may still be contacted by your creditors but are not obligated to increase your payments to them.
• Once agreed debtors make just one monthly debt repayment which is divided among their creditors which makes your debt easier to manage.