So the New Year is here and we are absolutley determined this will be a better one than last year. Its almost a year since hubby went BR after his IVA failed and on the money side, things have been fairly smooth. It still amazes me how huge the differences are in BR compared to IVA’s.

There has been talk on the forum that BR allowances are going to be tightened up – now I don’t know if I agree with that. As someone who has seen both sides of the coin, I think the BR allowances are realistic, its the IVA allowances that need to be brought in line with BR. All to often we are reading of posters struggling in their IVA because the allowances are too tight and unrealistic, surely this tells its own story?

Even though going BR was a relief to us, I would still not recommend it over an IVA..why? Quite simply, I believe you should pay back what you owe/or at least as much as possible. In my mind, Hubby knowingly borrowed the money, so he should pay it back -to the best of his means. In addition, I don’t think people fully realise what going BR means..okay so the stigma may have reduced over the years, but if asked you still have to declare the BR on formal forms. It can affect your current job and any future career, so believe me its not an easy option.

On saying that, I am still annoyed with creditors who push people into BR through pure greed. Its unbelievable that we were prepared to pay over £500 a month into the IVA, yet it was rejected, hence the BR.

I really hope more people read the forum before making any decision….its a huge step whether its IVA/BR and not one to be taken lightly.

On the positive side, a few posters will be coming to the end of their journeys this year. What a fantastic achievement! I hope they’ll stick around(I’m sure they will) as their stories will give hope to those starting out.

So another year,/decade is upon us. I know I’m now in the “older” generation…being 41! How do I know? Well I call this year two thousand and ten….if you were young, you’d call it twenty ten! So which group do you belong in lol

Happy New Year All! xx

This entry was posted on Saturday, January 2nd, 2010 at 10:12 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.