How an Individual Voluntary Arrangement Works

If you have debts you cannot afford to repay you might still like to reach a binding agreement with your creditors based on what you can afford. Provided you have a regular income, an IVA may help you to reach such an agreement and to repay some of your debts in a reasonable, finite and fixed period of time. Continue reading

IVA Case Study

Like fingerprints or snowflakes or DNA, every IVA is different to another even if the differences can often be hard to detect or notice. This IVA case study is not a real IVA, it is for demonstration purposes only. It has been written in such a way that it could well be a viable IVA. The circumstances described could be similar to yours or those of anybody who has encountered financial difficulties and finds themselves insolvent. This first IVA case study is a fairly simple one. Continue reading

Suspension of Automatic Discharge from Bankruptcy

Where a bankrupt person is not complying with the requirements of the bankruptcy laws the Official Receiver or the trustee may apply to the court for the suspension of the running period of his or her automatic discharge from bankruptcy. Should the court grant the application, it means that the bankrupt will not be automatically discharged from bankruptcy after twelve months, but will continue to be an undischarged bankrupt for a longer period of time.

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Bankruptcy Restrictions

Some people when in Bankruptcy will try and abuse the insolvency system or engage in dishonest, reckless or otherwise culpable conduct. To protect against that the Enterprise Act 2002 introduced Bankruptcy Restrictions Orders and Bankruptcy Restrictions Undertakings. The effect of either a Bankruptcy Restrictions Order or a Bankruptcy Restrictions Undertaking is that the restrictions imposed on the bankrupt individual continue to apply, even after the (usual) twelve months discharge period has expired. Continue reading

Can my IVA payments increase?

Most Individual Voluntary Arrangements (IVAs) last for sixty months and consist of making monthly payments during this time. Your IVA proposal would have set out your initial offer of monthly repayments into your IVA. Those payments may have been increased by your creditors at your Meeting of Creditors (MOC) before your IVA was accepted. You would have had to agree to them for your IVA to be accepted by creditors.  Continue reading

Who will find out about my IVA?

Insolvent persons who are considering entering into an Individual Voluntary Arrangement (IVA) with their creditors are often concerned as to whether the world generally and certain other people in particular will find out about them and learn that they are in financial trouble. This is a very understandable worry. Continue reading