Wednesday saw a press release by the Consumer Credit Counselling Service regarding fee charging debt management companies. The press release extolled the virtues of free debt management, and cited price comparison website moneysupermarket.com as supporting their views.
Moneysupermarket.com's article in question is an unbiased and highly educational one, and one that MRA Debt Help support fully. The CCCS press release touched on a couple of comments by the price comparison site, without acknowledging the entire story.
The original article provided a structured and informed breakdown of the pros and cons of free debt management vs fee charging debt management. The article highlights the obvious benefits of dealing with a free debt management company, whilst also reminding consumers of the different benefits of using a fee charging debt management company.
Moneysupermarket say -
"Unfortunately, many of the free advice agencies are facing significant backlogs as debt problems mount, with CAB claiming to deal with an average of 7,241 new debt problems every working day and people in some areas having to wait up to three weeks for an interview.
By contrast, fee-charging debt management companies can often deal with problems quickly and the advantage they offer is that they administer payments for you - you pay your money over to them and they pass it on to your creditors. You will be charged a fee for this service - typically in the region of 15% of your regular payment. However, some debt management companies may be able to negotiate better terms with your creditors which could mean the fee is worth it."
MRA Debt Help do charge a fee for administering your debt management payments, and maintain that our services are a worthwhile investment. Our negotiation rates are an indicator of our worth to our debt management clients. It is not uncommon for us to achieve a discount of over 50% to make a full and final settlement towards our clients debts.
MRA Debt Help would NEVER recommend a debt management plan to a client who would not benefit fully from our services, and as such have referred many clients to the CCCS, National Debtline and local CAB offices when their services would be better suited.
There are fee charging debt management companies in the industry that sadly take huge sums as upfront fees. MRA Debt Help take one initial monthly payment to cover our costs in setting up your debt management plan, and 1.765% of your debt per year, spread over your future monthly payments. MRA Debt Help fully support moneysupermarkets warnings to steer clear of debt management companies that wish to charge more than this.
Other unscrupolous debt management companies may try to charge you for debt advice. MRA Debt Help will NEVER charge for debt advice. All of our debt help and advice is FREE, we only make administration charges for our debt management plans.
You can be assured that if MRA Debt Help are prepared to help you, then we firmly believe we can offer you the fastest, most effective way to become debt free.
Great blog about the CCCS. I recommend an impartial company called Debtline-Direct.com. They really helped me get my finances back under control. :D
Luce.