Free Debt Advice

If you can’t afford your payments and need a debt solution to help you reduce them, your credit file will be affected. However, if you’ve fallen behind with your repayments, this could already be happening. The impact to your credit file will depend on the solution you choose. Some solutions, like a trust deed, bankruptcy or the Debt Arrangement Scheme will show on your credit file for at least 6 years and will prevent you from getting credit during this time; however, once successfully completed, you will be able to rebuild your credit file from a clean slate.

Unfortunately, some of the firms who advertise using this type of language don’t provide access to all available debt solutions. You shouldn’t consider entering a debt solution until you’ve had advice from an FCA regulated firm which can tell you about all the solutions available to you.

In Scotland, debt write off can be achieved by successfully completing a protected trust deed or a bankruptcy. You should be aware that the level of debt write off in a solution, if any, will be based on the solution you choose and your individual situation. In a protected trust deed, for example, it would be extremely unlikely for 90% of debt to be written off; 50% would be far more realistic.

Before choosing a debt advisor, check that they are regulated by the financial conduct authority to offer ‘debt counselling’ and ‘debt adjusting’. This means that they can give debt advice and offer debt solutions. If they aren’t regulated, they will only tell you about what they can offer which may not be the best option for you and may cause you further problems further down the line.

If you choose a Scottish solution that Cleanslate® can offer, subject to you being able to provide them with the information they need, they can contact your creditors straight away. They can let your creditors know that you’re getting help with your debts and ask for them to stop contacting you.

A trust deed, bankruptcy or Debt Arrangement Scheme administered by Cleanslate could be set up in a matter of days. Once you’ve completed your online advice you will be able to speak to Cleanslate the same day if you’d like to take this forward straight away.

There may be things that you can do yourself to help with your debt problems, like budgeting for example. But if you’re going to need support in reducing payments and dealing with your creditors, how you do this will depend on a variety of factors such, the amount and type of debt you have, your assets, what you do for work and what you can genuinely afford to pay towards your debts.

The most common solutions in Scotland are Trust Deeds, bankruptcies and the Debt Arrangement Scheme. Our Scottish partner, Cleanslate® offers all of these solutions in-house.