If you are going to struggle to make the next month or two’s payments due to unforeseen expenditure (eg washing machine repairs) please send us evidence and we may be able to grant you a payment holiday.

Any payments missed will not count as arrears and will be added to the end of your IVA before it completes.

If you will struggle to make your IVA payments and this is likely to be for the long term, such as a permanent reduction in income or increased expenditure, we will need to do a review of your income and expenditure to see what you can afford. We might need to ask your creditors if they will allow you to reduce your payments.

Please contact us to activate your income and expenditure, you will also need to provide evidence of the change.

If you have been made redundant, some of your redundancy payment may be due into your IVA.

Please send confirmation of your redundancy pay.

If you have lost your job, you need to contact us - we can help. We may need to do a review of your income and expenditure depending on your circumstances, as Supervisor we may be able to offer payment breaks or reduced payments.

If you do need to complete a new income and expenditure, please include details of any benefits you will be claiming until you find alternative work, or if you have a new job lined up, details of your new salary.

Congratulations!

We know that having a baby, whether it’s your first, fourth or tenth is an exciting time. We also know there will be additional things you need to buy and changes to your income.

We will need to do a review of your income and expenditure and find out about those essential purchases you’re your baby.

It is possible to get a new car on hire purchase, but the lender will want confirmation from your Supervisor before they lend you the money. Before we provide the confirmation to the lender we will need to make sure the payments for your car won’t impact your IVA payment.

We will need to do a review of your income and expenditure and find out details of your proposed hire purchase – the car you will be getting, the monthly payment and length of agreement. We may need to ask for your creditors’ permission for this to proceed.

Yes, it is possible to attend university or take on a course to further your education or future job prospects. It is likely that you will need to obtain finance to pay for your fees and supplement your income whilst studying.

It’s important that we know how you plan to manage your payments to your IVA during your study time, so we will need to complete a review of your income and expenditure.

Please send these documents.

Depending on your circumstances, we may be able to offer a short term payment break to give you time to regain employment and return to a position of being able to afford your monthly repayments. We will also look at whether we need to adjust the amount of your repayments based on your new income.

It is worth noting that a payment break does not mean that the missed payments will be removed from your plan. You will need to repay these by either extending your plan, increasing your payments temporarily or making a lump sum payment.

We understand the impact losing a job can have on your personal life, and we will always do our best to find a solution that fits your circumstances, which is why you must call us as soon as you anticipate any changes.

You may also be able to ask your creditors if they will vary (change) the terms of your IVA to accommodate your change in circumstances.

It will depend on individual circumstances and your Maternity Pay entitlement. We can look at reducing your monthly payments temporarily to reflect your decrease in salary during your leave.

We may also be able to offer a payment break from your IVA to allow you to adjust before we reintroduce payments. It is worth noting that a payment break does not mean that the missed payments will be removed from your plan. You will need to repay these by either extending your plan, increasing your payments temporarily or making a lump sum payment.

When your maternity leave comes to an end, we may need to assess your circumstances to account for any financial changes to your situation. For example, if you decide to go back to work part-time and your income is reduced, you may have child care costs, or you may be entitled to child benefits which will see your income increased. Any changes will then need to be reflected in your future payments.

You may also be able to ask your creditors if they will vary the terms of your IVA to accommodate your change in circumstances.

If your monthly income increases, you will need to let us know so that we can look at how this affects your IVA. If your monthly income increases, it is expected that your payments will eventually increase with it.

At the end of every 12 months during your plan, we will conduct an Annual Review to look at any changes and make sure that your payments are still affordable and reflective of your monthly surplus.

If there is any change to your circumstances that will affect your ability to manage your payments to the IVA (or any other obligation), you should let us know right away. The sooner we know about a problem, the sooner we can assist you in resolving it. A solution of some sort is achievable in the vast majority of cases. The important thing to remember is that we are here to assist you and so you shouldn’t hesitate to get in touch.

The Supervisor will have some discretions available to them to potentially reduce your payments, grant payment breaks and extend the term of your IVA and so almost every problem has a remedy. If the change in circumstances is likely to have a long-term effect, then you may need us to assist you in trying to renegotiate the terms of your arrangement with your creditors through a formal “Variation” to the terms.

You may be able to change the terms of your IVA with the agreement of your creditors. This agreement is known as a variation. A variation involves preparing a report to your creditors, convening a virtual meeting of creditors — similar to the one at the start of your IVA when it was approved — and your creditors deciding on your proposed changes. Variations are typically called following a change in circumstance and we will need information from you before we can prepare a variation report.

Please contact us for more details.

It can take a few months after your IVA has been approved for creditors to update their records, so if your IVA has only recently been approved this is perfectly normal.

Creditors still need to send you annual statements, so you will still get these whilst you are in your IVA, but these are not demand for payments, so there is nothing to worry about, but if you are concerned you can send them on to us – please send a picture.

Please send us any paperwork you have about this debt we will need to speak to this creditor and have them included in the IVA.

Depending on the amount of debt missed out, we might need to speak to all of your creditors to make sure they are happy with it being included, but we will take care of that for you.

Your creditors can take several months to update their records. If you receive any correspondence that you are concerned about, such as threatening court proceedings or bailiff action please send this in to us and we will double check the creditor is listed on your IVA and make contact with them directly.


Although your creditor is bound by the IVA they are still required by law to issue you with annual statements. If you receive an annual statement from creditors for debts included in your IVA you don’t need to notify us of this and no action from you is required.

To work out how much equity you have, you will need to deduct your mortgage redemption figure and any secured loans from the valuation of your property. If you have more than £5,000 equity in your property, based on an 85% loan to value you will need to try and re-mortgage.

Example property valuation £100,000
Valuation at 85% loan to value £85,000
Less mortgage of £70,000
Equity = £15,000

As the equity is more than £5,000 you will need to try and re-mortgage. We can help you this this.

Please send your most recent mortgage statement.

No, you don’t need to sell your house.

Your IVA protects your property. The Supervisor will place a restriction on the Land Registry but that doesn’t give them the power to sell, it means that if your property is sold, they will be notified first.

Once your IVA is finished the restriction will be removed.

An IVA will typically allow you to keep your home on the basis that – instead of selling it – you attempt to release equity (the difference between the value of your home and the amount you have left to pay on your mortgage) for the benefit of the creditors. Your IVA proposal document will detail the specifics of this requirement. However, in most cases, you are obliged to attempt to release equity six months before the anticipated end date of your IVA.

The first step in that process is to assess the value of your equitable interest. To do that, the Supervisor of your IVA will need you to provide them with:

• A current property valuation (this will advise the Supervisor of the current value of your property and can be obtained from an estate agent or online);
• A current mortgage redemption statement (this will advise the Supervisor of the amount that you still have to pay in respect of your mortgage and is available on request from your mortgage provider); and
• If you have any other loans or charges secured against your property, you will also need to provide a redemption statement for those (this will advise the Supervisor of the amount you still have to pay in respect of those loans and is available from the lenders)

Once the Supervisor receives that information, they will calculate the value of your equitable interest and – depending on how much is available – will then advise you as to what action (if any) you need to take. In general, there are two possible outcomes:

If your equitable interest is determined to be £5,000 or greater, you will need to take some independent financial advice and try to remortgage. If the financial advisor can secure a suitable loan product for you, you will need to provide Debt Movement with details of the loan and obtain our consent to receive the loan. The loan can then be progressed, and the full value of your share of the loan should be paid directly to us by the lender; or

Suppose your equitable interest is determined to be less than £5,000. In that case, you will not be required to do anything – your equitable interest will be excluded as an asset of your IVA because it has a minimal value.

If your equitable interest is determined to be £5,000 or greater, but you are unable to secure a remortgage or secured loan product, you will be obliged to either:

• offer a third-party lump sum equivalent to 85% of the value of your interest in the property; or
• make 12 additional monthly contributions (with the aggregate sum due to be to the IVA paid being limited to 85% of the value of your interest in the property).

This obligation is a significant and important one so if you have any queries or concerns about it, please get in touch with us and we will be happy to help.

A letter of undertaking is a promise (normally from a solicitors or bank) promising to pay a sum of money usually from a property sale up to a certain amount. The document should be on letter-headed paper and signed by an authorised person from the organisation.


The main reason letter of undertakings are required in IVAs are when a client is in the process of selling their property and requires the restriction on the land registry to be removed. Your IVA supervisor will ask your solicitors to provide a letter of undertaking promising to pay funds from the sale (after paying the costs of sale and secured borrowings) to them for the benefit of your creditors. The maximum amount requested will be the amount required to pay your creditors 100 pence in the pound plus the fees and costs of the IVA.

The first thing you should do is contact us as soon as possible so that we can review the position and confirm if proceeds from the sale are due into the IVA.


We will ask your solicitors to provide a letter of undertaking promising to pay funds from the sale (after paying the costs of sale and secured borrowings) to us for the benefit of your creditors. The maximum amount requested will be the amount required to pay your creditors 100 pence in the pound plus the fees and costs of the IVA. This figure can be provided upon request.


We will also request an estimated completion statement.


Upon receipt of the letter of undertaking from your solicitors we will make an application to the land registry to remove our restriction from the property.


Once funds from the sale are received, if the amount is sufficient to repay all of your creditors 100 pence in the pound plus the fees and costs of the IVA, your case will be referred to our closures team to issue your certificate of completion.


If funds from the sale are not enough to pay creditors 100 pence in the pound plus the fees and costs of the IVA, you will be expected to continue making your monthly contributions for the duration of the IVA, based on your affordability.

The case of Green v Wright confirmed that where a “Trust” is created when your IVA started or at a subsequent meeting of creditors, this is still in place after your IVA finishes so you do need to pay into your IVA estate any asset that was an asset at the time your IVA started, even if you didn’t know it was an asset (such as PPI redress) or didn’t receive any funds from the asset until after the IVA has closed.

Unless your creditors have been paid in full (100p/£) then you will need to pay in any PPI redress received, even after your IVA has finished.

Depending on the terms of your IVA, you may be entitled to an element, known as statutory interest, of the redress awarded.

Given the high volume of PPI payments that claims management companies are dealing with and the corresponding volume that is then forwarded to Debt Movement for allocation to the correct account, the reconciliation process can take up to 90 days to complete, which may delay the processing of any refund due to you.

Your PPI money will be used to discharge any outstanding fees and costs, any costs of administering your IVA Trust (if your IVA has closed) and claims management company fees before being paid out to your creditors.

You may be entitled to an element, known as statutory interest, which will be paid to you once we have completed our reconciliation process.

First Dispute Management Ltd are a firm of solicitors who specialise in recovering compensation for an insolvent estate.

They have been instructed by your Supervisor to review any potential mis-selling claims

The agreed terms of your IVA may state that PPI or similar claims are assets of your arrangement. In broad terms, most IVAs approved since 2012 will include such a clause which will explicitly refer to PPI. In older cases, the standard terms and conditions of the IVA will typically include what is called an “All Assets Clause”, a common term that essentially states that all assets – including PPI – will be an asset of the IVA unless creditors agreed to their exclusion from the arrangement.

By paying in any redress concerning mis-sold PPI, this will improve the return to your creditors. You will still need to make your monthly payments in line with the terms of your IVA proposal unless the compensation is enough to pay your creditors and the IVA fees and costs in full.

Yes, the case of Green v Wright confirmed that the PPI is due to the IVA even after completion or termination.

Depending on the terms of your IVA, you may be entitled to an element, known as statutory interest, of the redress awarded.

Given the high volume of PPI payments that claims management companies are dealing with and the corresponding volume that is then forwarded to Debt Movement for allocation to the correct account, the reconciliation process can take up to 60 days to complete, which may delay the processing of any refund due to you.

If you are unsure as to the status of the investigation of your claim, please be advised that your claims management company is in the best position to advise you. Please contact them directly for an update.

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Please call us on 0333 987 0000 to set up your direct debit.

If your refund is in relation to PPI, given the high volume of PPI payments that claims management companies are dealing with and the corresponding volume that is then forwarded to Debt Movement for allocation to the correct account, the reconciliation process can take up to 90 days to complete, which may delay the processing of any refund due to you.

If your refund is in relation to a contribution or other payment, please call us on 0333 987 0000 for an update.

If you will struggle to make your IVA payments and this is likely to be for the long term, such as a permanent reduction in income or increased expenditure, we will need to do a review of your income and expenditure to see what you can afford.

We might need to ask your creditors if they will allow you to reduce your payments. Please send your income and expenditure together with evidence of the change.

If you will struggle to make the next month or two due to an unforeseen expenditure item (eg washing machine repair) please send us evidence and we can give you a payment holiday.

Any payments missed will not count as arrears and will be added to the end of your IVA before it can complete.

It’s really important that you don’t ignore missed payments as we do have discretion available to assist our clients during difficult periods. There are several options available to address the arrears and we will work with you to find the right solution.

If you believe that you will be unable to make either the full payment or part of the payment then we would ask that you contact us on 0333 987 0000 to discuss the circumstances with one of our advisors who will outline the options available to keep the IVA on track.

We understand that you may be facing difficulties at this time and are here to support you on your journey to becoming debt free.

If you are struggling to make your IVA payments, please call us with details of your income and expenditure to hand so that we can review your situation and discuss your available options.

The case of Green v Wright confirmed that where a “Trust” is created when your IVA started or at a subsequent meeting of creditors, this is still in place after your IVA finishes so you do need to pay into your IVA estate any asset that was an asset at the time your IVA started, even if you didn’t know it was an asset (such as PPI redress) or didn’t receive any funds from the asset until after the IVA has closed.

Unless your creditors have been paid in full (100p/£) then you will need to pay in any PPI redress received, even after your IVA has finished.

Most IVAs anticipate that contributions will be payable for 60 months with a possible additional 12 months’ payments being required if you are a homeowner and have more than £5,000 equity. As such, your final payment will usually fall due 5 or 6 years after the approval of your proposal. However, it is not uncommon for unforeseen changes in an individual’s circumstances to arise during an IVA and – to deal with those changes – you may need to seek alterations to your payment schedule, extending the terms of your IVA. Similarly, if you miss payments to your arrangement or need more time to fulfil other obligations under your IVA, then the term of the arrangement might also change.

In broad terms, our ability to close an arrangement will be impacted by an outstanding obligation that needs to be addressed. The most common obligations that arise will typically relate to the following:

An outstanding Income and Expenditure review;

• An outstanding requirement concerning any obligation to release equity;
• An outstanding amount due to the IVA in respect of additional income;
• Unresolved arrears that accrued in respect of missed payments during the IVA; and
• An outstanding matter concerning investigations into mis-sold Payment Protection Insurance (PPI).

If you don’t think that there are any outstanding obligations and your IVA should be completed and it has not, please just get in touch and we will review your case and provide you with an update.

When the Supervisor of your IVA is satisfied that all obligations have been fulfilled, we will issue a final report together with a Completion Certificate. A copy of that report will be sent to you, each of your creditors and the Insolvency Service advising that the IVA is now closed.

The final report will include information regarding all of the funds received into the IVA and what has been done with those monies. It will also show how much of your debt has been repaid (the dividend) and how much has been written off by your creditors.

Debt Movement does not have any remit to update your credit file – that responsibility rests with your creditors. They will typically take steps to update your credit file data around eight weeks after we issue your final report. Please visit the Equifax, Experian and Call Credit websites for more information on your credit file and actions that you can take to ensure that the information held is accurate and up to date. Please also ensure that you keep a copy of your IVA final report and Completion Certificate safe as you may need it to evidence that the IVA has come to a successful conclusion.

Yes. We will file the necessary statutory form at Land Registry within two weeks of the issuing of the final report.

The Personal Insolvency Register is administered by the Insolvency Service or the Northern Ireland Insolvency Service. We will send them a copy of our final report confirming the completion of the IVA and they endeavour to update the register within three months of being notified. However, it is often updated much sooner than that.

If you come into some money, or a third party has offered to make a lump sum payment in settlement of your IVA, the first thing to do is contact us to let us know where the funds are coming from and on what basis you would like to make the settlement offer to creditors.


We may need to review your income and expenditure as before accepting a lump sum, creditors may want us to confirm your affordability. If so, this will be discussed with you at the time.


If funds are being paid from a third party, the following documents will be required:


• ID of the third party


• Proof that funds are available (such as a bank statement showing the account balance and third party name)


• A letter from the third party confirming the amount they wish to offer in full and final settlement of your IVA


Once the details of the proposals have been agreed with you and the relevant supporting information received, the proposals to creditors will be drafted for you to review. Once you have confirmed you are happy with the draft proposals these will be circulated to creditors.


We must allow creditors a clear 28 days notice (plus time for delivery and excluding the day of the meeting) of the virtual meeting of creditors to allow them sufficient time to submit their votes. Creditors can either accept, reject, or accept with modifications to the proposed terms.


We ask that you are available on the day of the meeting of creditors by telephone so that we may discuss the outcome of creditor votes including any modifications to the proposals they may request.

Normally payment of the agreed amount is required within 30 days of the meeting of creditors to approve the lump sum settlement. If for any reason you may be unable to make the payment within this time-frame please do let us know to ensure the IVA can proceed as agreed and to prevent being contacted for arrears

Once your IVA has completed, you can contact the credit reference agencies to update your credit file, it is likely they will want a copy of your completion certificate.


Debt Movement don’t contact credit reference agencies, it is your creditors who communicate with and update them. If there are any discrepancies we suggest that you contact your creditor(s) or the credit reference agencies directly.  Creditors will have registered a default on your credit file at the start of your IVA which will automatically drop off after 6 years.

It is likely that the funds will be due to your IVA in full or to repay 100% of your debt plus costs of the arrangement.

We would be required to complete a calculation to determine how much of the funds may be due and require you to send us confirmation of the windfall/inheritance. Once received, we will work out the amount due and confirm to you.

If the windfall/inheritance is less than £500 then the funds would not be due to your arrangement. If over £500, it is possible that all the funds may not be due to the arrangement depending on the amount that would be required to repay 100 pence in the pound.

However, if all of the funds are due, it is possible to ask your creditors if you can retain a portion of the funds. This is done through a process called variation.

In order to proceed with a variation, we will require an updated income and expenditure review and details of why you wish to retain funds so that we can prepare a new proposal for your creditors.

Windfalls (or “After-acquired Property” as it may be known within an IVA) typically arise where you receive or become entitled to an asset during your IVA. After acquired property relates to a wide range of potential assets which include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Lottery wins
• Gambling wins
• Inheritance
• Personal injury claims

In some cases, if the value of the asset is less than £500, you can retain it in full, but in others, any windfalls would be due to the IVA (it depends on the terms and conditions of your specific IVA). The key thing to remember as regards to windfalls is that you must contact us and make us aware of them, if you don’t it may bring about the failure of your IVA so you must make us aware of any such assets as soon as possible.

You should also be aware that the payment of a windfall into an IVA will not bring about a reduction in the IVA’s duration or alter your payments unless the windfall sum is sufficient to repay your debts in full (and discharge the fees and costs associated with the IVA). Or unless we can assist you in negotiating an early settlement of the IVA through a renegotiation of the terms (known as a “variation”).

If you do receive or become entitled to a windfall during your IVA, please contact our team who will ensure that you are given the correct advice having regard to the specifics of your case.

The term of an IVA is a long time and we all know that a lot can change so it is important that we ensure the IVA remains affordable during that time.

It is also a requirement for the supervisor to increase contributions to the IVA if your circumstances improve (for example because you have changed jobs or received a promotion).

An IVA also contains a clause that means that if you earn additional income such as overtime, bonus or commission then a portion of these funds may be due to the arrangement to improve the return to your creditors.

The terms of the IVA state if additional income is earned then a portion of it may be due. The clause allows you to earn up to 10% of your basic net salary before there would be a requirement to pay these funds to your IVA and of the amount that is due to the arrangement, this is only 50% of the funds over and above the 10% you can earn.

For example, if your monthly take home pay is £2,000, you can earn up to £2,200 in a month. If, however, in a month you earned £2,500 then £150 would be due to your arrangement however you would also retain £150 as well as the 10%.

Any increase to your contributions will be based on all of the information you provided at your annual review.

It is important that you set aside time to review your income and outgoings to ensure the figures are accurate and provide documentary evidence of any changes that have occurred in the last 12 months such as an increase in utilities.

If your payments have increased and you believe you cannot afford to make them at this level, we will be required to re-review your income and expenditure details. Please contact us to have the Income and Expenditure review opened on your Docslink portal.

If you are unable to submit the income and expenditure review online, we would ask that you prepare your income and expenditure and give us a call on 0333 987 0000 where an advisor will take the figures from you and load the review with the appropriate team.

Any supporting documents can be send or posted to us to enable the review to be completed.

There are a number of different documents you can provide to allow your review to be completed:

1. Payslips – these can be obtained from your employer directly and in the current climate most companies make these available electronically so you can simply download a copy and upload to your Docslink portal.
2. Bank statements – with online banking, accessing your statements have never been easier. Simply download a copy of the appropriate statement and upload to your Docslink portal. Most banks hold 12 months statements or 200 transactions which will be readily available online and we only require your latest 3 months statements.
3. Utiliy bills – if one of your household bills have changed they will be required to notify you in writing. You can simply take a photo of that bill and upload to your docslink portal.
4. Benefits – HMRC and DWP have moved a lot of their information online so it makes it easier to get details on your entitlement if you do not have a copy of the letter handy. Simply take a screenprint and upload to your Docslink portal.
5. Self employed – a copy of your latest accounts or projections for the year ahead will be sufficient.

In the absence of proof that an expense has changed, we may be unable to accept the change so it is important that you keep a record of this information however your bank statements should largely cover this requirement.