Self Help

What Is Self Help?

 

What Is Self Help?

‘Self-Help’ is an option available to anyone with debt. This involves you trying to resolve your financial difficulties yourself, without taking out further credit or using a debt solution product or service. This may include you contacting your creditors directly yourself to explain that you are struggling to meet payments or experiencing financial difficulty, to see if it is possible for them to reduce payments to a more affordable level, to have a ‘repayment holiday’ or for them to reduce or freeze interest and charges while you get back on track. ‘Self Help’ may also involve you assessing your household budget to cut costs or identify areas of spending where you can save money in order to put that money towards your debt repayments.

Criteria

There is no criteria for helping yourself to deal with your debts.
 

Advantages and Benefits

  • You do not need to pay any fees to a debt solution company
  • You remain in control of your debts and assets
  • Budgeting, keeping a spending diary and keeping track of debt payment dates can be enough to keep debts on track if your debt difficulties are due to spending habits and lifestyle
  • Self-help for your debts is unlikely to affect employment as other solutions may, as long as you keep up with your repayments
  • Self-help for your debts is not a matter of public record, as with other solutions which appear in newspapers/on specific websites

Disadvantages and Potential Consequences

  • If you wish to negotiate lower monthly debt repayments, you will need to deal with your creditors yourself, which some people may find difficult
  • You may not be able to renegotiate your payments/reduce or stop interest and charges as a debt solutions company with more creditor experience may
  • You will still need to pay all of your debts separately; most debt solutions combine these into one single monthly payment
  • Managing your own debts can prove complicated and time consuming
  • Failure to maintain contractual payment levels may affect your credit rating/score