Hi pammy1969.

Hopefully your trust deed firm can help out quickly by encouraging your bank to release the funds that are there now (and which may be paid in shortly)?

The quickest accounts to set up are the paid-for ones designed for this type of purpose. Google "Think Banking" or "Secure Trust" if you want to have a look at them. Not the best long-term option necessarily as they come with a monthly fee which is money you'd probably rather use for other things.

We tend to suggest the Co-op Cashminder account to people as an option, though other experts and members may well have other suggestions that have worked well for them.

If you are temporarily stuck take some time to speak to the companies that are going to be paid late. That will help to buy you some time without too much hassle hopefully.

i use Think Banking now.
They have a £15 per month fee for the account though.
You tell them exactly what you pay out every month and when your wages go in they take what is left after all your dd's and put it in what they call your 'card account'.
Early days for me, but its working well so far.

Oh I'm so stressed [:(]

I just typed a reply but I wasn't logged in so it disappeared. Well I'm not typing it all over again so I'll keep it brief!

Anyway, thanks Jinty and TDA (do you ever take time off TDA?)

I thought about the Co-Op but will look at Think Banking too.
On the drive home, I started thinking about all the DDs due to come off. I'll make a list tonite and contact them all to explain the situation.

I had visions of us trailing the banks on the high street clutching a bag of cash and begging them to let us open an account.

I think I will have a glass of wine and chill out for half an hour before I do a bank trawl.

thanks for your advice guys. I appreciate it.

I've done that loads of times pammy1969. Really annoying until I figured to copy what I'd written then paste it into the reply box after logging in!

Some people do like the options that come with these paid for accounts. At £15 per month it's coming to £540 over a three year trust deed though, money that many people might figure out a more fun way to spend!

Hope the glass of wine helps you to relax, I'm sure you'll sort this out soon enough.

I had a conversation with my bank and God bless them - they can't do anything about the actual account but they're being so helpful. They could so easily have cut us off completely but they're really going the extra mile. I'm disappointed that I won't be banking with them anymore but rules are rules. I think we're going to go with Co-op Cashminder as there is no monthly charge and we'll get online banking. I'll get cracking tomorrow - I'm obviously not going to get a lot of work done (just as well the bosses are away for the day!)

Hi Pammy
Sorry to hear you're having problems with your bank.

I have a Coop Cashminder account. It's very easy to set up, about 20 minutes on the phone. Then they send out your Visa Debit card and your account details. Unfortunately I opened mine up when all there was a couple of weeks of back to back public holidays, but it still didn't take too long.

Statement comes out every 28 days, rather than monthly and they have internet banking too. My only problem with that is, their system is never up to date, but should be changed by the end of this year I'm told. So if you go on to internet banking it doesn't take in to account things you've spent on your card, but if you stick your card in ATM you can get correct amount available.
They clearly state during the initial call that if you become overdrawn the account will be closed.

All in all, I'd recommend them. I've had no problems whatsoever. Stick to the rules of the account and you'll be fine.

Morning all- I'm about to sign a TD - I already bank with think banking and I have another bank of Scotland basic acct- as both accounts are basic with no facilities attached etc should I let them know about TD or is it unlikely that they would close my accounts as both are accounts for people with poor credit history- I don't think I owe money to either definently not directly anyway but they all have so many offshoots it's hard to know sometimes eh

Hello Bee.

If you are holding basic accounts with no credit facilities your trust deed shouldn't be an issue. You may wish to call them to double check that the account criteria do not prevent persons in trust deeds using the facilities though.

Even so, if you have credit balances there is a slight risk that they'll be temporarily frozen, perhaps if the bank see the advertisement for your trust deed in the Edinburgh Gazette (which some of them monitor). Your trust deed firm could hopefully quickly encourage them to release this freeze if it happens.

In terms of connections between different banking brands, there are places you can go to check. The key point is whether the brands operate using the same banking licence. One useful webpage can be found by Googling "Thisismoney bank licences".

My IP immediatly requested that my bank (BoS) whose credit card was part of my TD pre PTD requested that my account be kept open to allow me to manage my finances and not be recovered by them as my salary was paid in etc - which was quickly agreed by them. It comes back to my repetitive points that sharing info/being honest with the IP/creditors is the only way forward.

Pammy,

I've been through exactly the same thing, except the bank (Natwest) didn't tell me they had frozen the account - I found out by accident on Xmas Eve last year.

I managed to open a basic bank account with Barclays - it took less than an hour. The important thing is you need to mention you have a trust deed - many banks don't actually specify trust deeds in their terms as being unacceptable but will freeze accounts if you are on the insolvency register. Also contact all of those who are due to be paid by direct debit to inform them of what has happened as soon as you can and preferably before they are due to be paid.

I had a small battle with Natwest to get the funds released and eventually got compensation from them in the way they handled the situation.

Thankfully my wife and I have separate bank accounts, so we had funds to pay the important bills. It also confirmed by belief never to have all my eggs in one basket where banks are concerned.

My journey with trying to resolve my debt problem over the past five years has led to me believe the financial sector needs a complete overhaul. Despite having no debt with the Natwest and the account always in credit during the four years I was with them (opened an account when I entered a debt management plan in 2006) - they showed no mercy when I entered a trust deed.

To top it off, when the day came that my funds were released, I was chastised by the Natwest bank operative for having too much money in my account.....

I had a very productive and much better day today. I phoned KPMG first thing and they promised to contact my bank to progress release of funds. They also advised that they would defer my first contribution until 1st january which is fantastic news! We were very worried as we would have to pay back my £500 overdraft which would have left us with virtually nothing for Xmas which was a real worry.

I then spent my lunch break (honest Boss!) phoning all my payees to explain my situation. Everyone was very understanding although none of them are included in the TD! I did get the odd "can't you just make a card payment over the phone?" "Um, no." "How about a cheque then?" "I'm sorry, what part of 'frozen account' do you not understand?". But overall, they were all very good.

I then contacted Co-op to open a Cashminder account. They are fully aware of our situation and we were approved. Like Saabrina said, it was really quick and we should be up and running in a week or so.

I've not heard when our funds are going to be released - hopefully in a day or two. We can either go into any HSBC bank and withdraw cash or get the money transferred into another account. Do you think getting a transfer into my son's account sounds reasonable? This way, we can make card payments over the phone until our new account and DDs are set up. He's fine with this and is happy to speak to the various people and verify this. He's 19 btw - so old enough to understand what he's agreeing to!

I was speaking to a friend about my situation and was telling her that we were ignoring all the phonecalls we've been getting - they're all automated calls, repeated five or six times a day, landline and mobiles. She used to manage a call centre and explained that these call centre workers are, in the main, unaware of banking law and will tell you anything to get you to cough up some money. I asked her if she thought we should take the calls and just explain our situation. Her advice is to continue to ignore them as I will just get frustrated and upset having to continually repeat the same story. I know my poor MIM is up to high-doe with phonecalls from her creditors harrassing her for payment. I've told her just to hang up if it's one of her creditors (she's in some sort of debt repayment agreement) but she's old-fashioned and thinks she's doing the "right thing" by explaining her situation.

So, progress made and only 26 days to wait to see if we're protected!

Hi pammy1969.

That does sound like a productive day. It also sounds like your trust deed firm are being very reasonable. Hopefully they'll promptly contact HSBC who, in turn, will promptly unfreeze your account. We've heard of this happening very quickly before.

well, we still haven't had ay funds released which isn't good. My salary and CHB were rejected by the bank which also isn't good. I've spoken to my employer and just said that I was having problems with my bank account - once they get the payment back, they'll sort something out. Which brings me to my latest question. Should I tell my employer about my TD? Part of me says "yes" as I'm so honest and would rather tell the truth but I'm just too ashamed to tell them. What if they think badly of me? My sister worries that I could ruin my chances of promotion etc. But I don't work in the financial sector - I do have a corporate credit card which is used for booking flights, purchasing items for the office etc. but I dont get the pin number.

I would be mortified if they took my card off me - I'd feel like a criminal. [:(]

Re my bank account though - I've chased my IP and stated the obvious, i.e. we're skint, so hopefully they will write to the bank tonight. Piece of advice to all forumites thinking about a TD - for the love of God, open a new bank account right from the start. All of this could easily have been avoided. And read the T&Cs - if we had, we'd have known the bank would withdraw services in these circumstances. Oh well, you live and learn!

Oh my goodness what a rough time of it you've had, glad you have an account sorted out now and hopefully the funds will be released asap!

Fot all my husbands trustee is rubbish at everyhting else the one thing they did do was tell him to open a new bank account urgently and transfer all cash, money in and dd's ect to the new account so we got that done before the trust deed went protected.