Mark Writes In “I Need to Go Bankrupt in the UK”

Posted by Steve Rhode

September 3, 2008

Mark wrote in about his financial situation.

“Hi Steve,

My wife and I need help. Since 2001 we’ve been living in the U.S. and we’ve just got our green cards. We moved to the U.S. from the UK and for years I’ve been struggling to pay back debt there using dollars to pay back British pounds. The conversion rate has not been in my favor.

I do not have any property or belongings in the U.K.

I’ve used up all my savings now and don’t have any more money to send back to the UK to pay these debts. I’ve only been able to pay about £100 a month on £25,000 worth of debt. What should I do?”

Mark,

If you had lived in the United States, or anywhere outside the UK for less than three years, you could have still gone bankrupt in the UK using a foreign bankruptcy service.

But since you’ve been gone longer, bankruptcy back in the UK is no longer an option.

You have a few of options.

You could make payment arrangements the UK creditors but that makes it hard to pay off £ with $. But as you have learned, a repayment plan without an expectation that it will resolve the situation only drains you of cash and does not eliminate the debt.
You could speak with a US bankruptcy attorney and consider a US bankruptcy and include your UK debts. There are more cross border bankruptcies these days.
You could do nothing, stop paying the UK debt and then deal with any creditor that comes after you in the US.

As silly as it sounds, option 3 might be the best at this time, certainly making more payments isn’t going to help at all. But I would still suggest speaking with a US bankruptcy attorney to learn about how that solution may help you.

Any more payments to creditors, I’m afraid, is just going to be throwing more good money after bad.

Big hug.

Steve

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