Money Advice Service - Indebtedness, Breaking Down The Barriers. Caroline Siarkiewicz Head Of Debt Advice

Size: px

Start display at page:

Download "Money Advice Service - Indebtedness, Breaking Down The Barriers. Caroline Siarkiewicz Head Of Debt Advice"

Willis Day
7 years ago
Views:

1 Money Advice Service - Indebtedness, Breaking Down The Barriers Caroline Siarkiewicz Head Of Debt Advice

2 The Challenge To use the surveys undertaken by Money Advice Service to model over-indebtedness at a local level To combine a robust methodology and detailed local data To ensure that both the methodology and the data would be straightforward to explain and understand

3 There Are a Number of Key Predictors of Indebtedness There are four key predictors of overindebtedness Age Income Family Renting Each of these increases a person s risk of financial difficulty

4 Age Age Income Family Renting Young people are more likely to be over indebted Least likely to be financial sophisticated Most likely to miss credit payments and use payday lenders

5 Income Age Income Family Renting As shown in a number of surveys, low household income is related to indebtedness With more affluent groups, other factors come into play, with this group it is a key driver

6 Family Make-Up Age Income Family Renting Having children increases the risk of over indebtedness by half (13% to 20%), more children increase the risk further Being a single parent also increases the risk, with a third of large single parent families being over indebted

7 Renting Age Income Family Renting One in three people rent in the UK, nearly 50% of Londoners rent Social renting is more directly correlated with over-indebtedness Private renting less so, except in London where high rents directly affect indebtedness

8 The National Picture

9 Implications Prevention should focus on groups at greatest risk Partnerships may need strengthening Forecasting is the next priority

10 Barriers to Accessing Advice

Barriers to seeking debt advice are many and varied Awareness/ understandi ng Bandwidth/ Capacity Paralysis I don t have problem debt, yes I m in debt but I don t think it is a

11 Barriers to seeking debt advice are many and varied Awareness/ understandi ng Bandwidth/ Capacity Paralysis I don t have problem debt, yes I m in debt but I don t think it is a problem yet I didn t even know to look for advice I don t have the headspace to deal with this right now I m scared about the future after getting advice, it s a bit like a trap

Barriers to seeking debt advice are many and varied Judgement and Stigma Trust Previous negative experience(s) There is definitely a stigma about getting help for debt It s the fear of being judged

12 Barriers to seeking debt advice are many and varied Judgement and Stigma Trust Previous negative experience(s) There is definitely a stigma about getting help for debt It s the fear of being judged by anyone! How do I know they have my best interests [at heart]? It could just be a free scam I got rejected from advice because they said I should just pay a debt management firm to handle it and move on

13 Upcoming interventions Child maintenance Mortgage lenders GPs

What s working Divorced/separated parents: Child Maintenance Service A logical place for a trustworthy and truly helpful referral These agencies are trusted organisations (especially among women)

14 What s working Divorced/separated parents: Child Maintenance Service A logical place for a trustworthy and truly helpful referral These agencies are trusted organisations (especially among women) Parents expect recommendations to be reliable, and their assistance would be gratefully received It feels very appropriate as at that point parents would be thinking about the effect of finances on their children The fact that it is optional means control is retained Trusted sign poster Reliable source Intuitive / logical Control Watch outs Emotions around this period and this issue need to be carefully navigated Not feeling you can provide for your children is emotionally fraught; impact of debt on kids even more so Needs careful positioning; timing could be critical There is a perception that these agencies are more on the side of mothers

15 What Works Funding Up to 7m to fund and evaluate programmes and pilots across the UK to deepen our understanding of what types of interventions can make a real difference to people's financial capability. We are interested in: The evaluation of existing interventions designed to help people to improve their financial capability The funding of analysis into existing interventions that could be proved to be scaleable The piloting of new, innovative approaches to engage and help people improve their financial capability

16 Caroline Siarkiewicz Head Of Debt Advice Institute of Money Advisers Annual Conference and AGM 2016

Consumer Debt in the UK. Utility Week Consumer Debt Conference on March 16 2016 Caroline Siarkiewicz Head of The UK Debt Advice Programme

Consumer Debt in the UK. Utility Week Consumer Debt Conference on March 16 2016 Caroline Siarkiewicz Head of The UK Debt Advice Programme Consumer Debt in the UK Utility Week Consumer Debt Conference on March 16 2016 Caroline Siarkiewicz Head of The UK Debt Advice Programme 1 Consumer debt in the UK economic landscape Examining customers