Trust Deed

(applicable in Scotland only)

If you have an income or you own assets, and you’re being pressured by your creditors to repay your debts, a Trust Deed can help to relieve the stress of this very difficult situation. What’s more you can sign it immediately without it automatically affecting your credit rating and without any court proceedings being involved.

A Trust Deed is a legally binding voluntary agreement that usually lasts around three years and involves the appointment of a Trustee to deal with your financial affairs, including taking over responsibility for dealing with your creditors. We can take on these Trustee duties for the benefit of you and your creditors.

After the Trust Deed is signed, the Trustee will write to all your creditors. The Trust Deed automatically becomes ‘protected’, preventing creditors from taking any further action against you, unless creditors who are owed more than one third of the total debt object, which is very rare.

Any correspondence you receive from your creditors should be passed to your Trustee to deal with. Furthermore, any payments you have been making to creditors will stop - and instead, you’ll pay your Trustee whatever surplus work income you have left after meeting your day-to-day living expenses, including your mortgage. You need only make a single payment to your Trustee each month, although you can make weekly payments if this is more convenient.

If your house is worth more than the mortgage, we will look to find some way of releasing this equity into the Trust Deed. It is extremely unlikely that your home will be sold unless you agree to this happening.

If you move house or your financial circumstances change whilst the Trust Deed is in force, you need to let your Trustee know. There is no need for your employers to know that you have signed a Trust Deed, unless you also owe them money – and after the end of a Trust Deed, your debts are effectively written off.