The coronavirus may have a serious impact on your income. If this means you can’t pay your IVA don’t panic. Here are your options.
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Ask for a payment break
The effects of the coronavirus (Covid-19) could result in your income being significantly reduced or stopping altogether. If this is the case the first thing you should do is implement a payment break with your IVA company.
Most agreements will allow you to have a payment break for up to 9 months. This means you can put your payments on hold until things get back to normal.
There is no need to make any knee jerk decisions regarding your IVA. A payment break will give you a breathing space from your payments until the coronavirus crisis has passed. You can then start paying it again as normal or take different steps if your income changes longer term.
Most IVA companies will be receiving a high number of calls. If you cant get through before your payment is due cancel it anyway. You can agree the payment break later when you speak to them.
Reduce your payments
If your income has reduced you may be wondering whether you should ask your IVA company about lowering your payments. To be honest it is probably too early to be thinking about this at the moment.
No one knows how long the coronavirus problems will last or when incomes will return to normal. Therefore it is probably the wrong time to try and work out what you will be able to pay going forward.
The best thing to do now is take a payment break. Once you know what your future income will be you can discuss reducing your payments with your IVA company at that time if necessary.
If your income has reduced and you are confident that it will remain steady from now on you could discuss reducing your payments with your IVA company straight away.
Stop your IVA and go bankrupt
I know this may sound radical. But what if you believe your income will not return to normal even after the coronavirus passes? Alternatively you might already have been struggling and this is just the final straw.
If you think you will will never be able to restart your IVA payments then now is the time to consider a different option. If you are not a home owner (or you are but have little or no equity in your property), stopping your IVA altogether and going bankrupt might be a really sensible option.
Don’t be frightened of bankruptcy. Its just a word. Once you are bankrupt if you can’t afford to continue paying your debts you don’t have to. They will be written off. You may find you have absolutely nothing to lose.
Want to talk about the options for your IVA? Give us a call (0800 011 4712) or complete the form below and we’ll call you.