Financial worries and mounting personal debts are not limited to people in the United Kingdom as the current economic downturn has spread on a global scale, but folks in the UK do have an outlet they can access to get help with their money problems and best of all, it’s free.
Since 1991 Money Advice Trust (MAT), a non-profit organization, has gone out of their way to provide British residents with information and assistance on how to get their burgeoning debts under control. The mission statement of Money Advice Trust seems to revolve around the bringing together those who need debt assistance and those who provide it, as their website seems more focused on adding links to news about current debt issues, but if you dig a little deeper on the Money Advice Trust website, there are some helpful tips within their pages.
- Also see: National debt UK
Perhaps the best little tidbit hidden in the menu is a link to a very nice looking online debt advice service called My Money Facts, which was the brainchild of MAT and Barclaycard. The basic premise of the tool is that users input their financial data, a task that takes around 15 minutes according to the site, at which point a course of action is given that will help the user set a clear path to a debt free future. The goal of My Money Facts is to let people try and get themselves out of debt without having to resort to high interest loans or bankruptcy as a bail out method. The tool allows users to see exactly where their money is going and what steps can be taken to make smarter money choices, but if an individual’s problems seem too dire, Money Advice Trust will put them in touch with a debt professional who will offer one on one advice. The biggest problem with the My Money Facts site is that there is no feedback yet as at time of writing, the tool was yet to go live.
Simple and easy forms
One of the biggest issues that people face when it comes to repaying debts is trying to reach an agreeable repayment schedule with the company they owe money too. It seems that each individual company has a different method of applying for debt relief which can leave the head spinning if there are several different companies that are part of your debt issue. Money Advice Trust has a link to a document called the Common Financial Statement (CFS) which can be “used by advice agencies and third party organizations to make debt repayment offers to creditors on behalf of clients.” This is done by having a simple, easy to use form that can be filled out by users, which outlines income and expenditures in a clear, detailed fashion that is easy to read for creditors. This looks to be a great toll which could really help to take a lot of stress out of the debt situation, especially if a financial agreement can be reached with creditors that is beneficial to both sides which, at the end of the day, should be the final goal for everyone involved.
- Also see: The national debt history of USA
The impetus behind setting up the CFS may very well have come from another of Money Advice Trust’s debt assistance programs called CASHflow which was set up after it was discovered that there were major discrepancies in the ways in which creditors went about reclaiming the money they were owed. This led to mass confusion on both sides, which in turn led Money Advice Trust, in conjunction with other advice groups, debt collectors and a number of different creditors to come up with CASHflow, a standardized method of debt collection that revolved around the CFS.
Depression on the rise
Earlier in the piece we mentioned the stress that is associated with personal debt problems, and that is something that can lead to severe health issues, with recent studies indicating that mental health problems such as depression were on the rise, especially among individuals who were buried under a mountain of financial problems. Money Advice Trust has recognized this problem and has links to help those who feel their health is being affected by their debt. While not doing anything to lower the debt of anyone, allowing them to focus on getting healthy can have a positive effect on how that person approaches their debt. Being able to focus and concentrate on a real plan of action without being weighed down by stress and depression can lead to the problem being tackled head on.
There does seem to be some excellent, real world help and advice available on the Money Advice Trust website, but the problem seems to be that no-one really knows about it. Upon doing a little research, it was discovered that Money Advice Trust does not even rank in the top 2 million most popular sites in the world, and with the economy in the state it’s in, that’s a problem. As a non-profit organization perhaps they don’t have the financial means to effectively promote themselves, but that is simply not good enough if their true mission statement is to make a difference in the lives of people who are in critical financial need. Given that there are great tools and advice given on the Money Advice Trust site, we can only hope that people will find out about them and touch the helping hand that is being offered, but if they still remain fairly anonymous after 20 years in existence, I fear that may never happen.
