Make an offer to non-priority creditors - letter

This advice applies to Wales. See advice for See advice for England, See advice for Northern Ireland, See advice for Scotland

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You can use this letter when you have some money available to offer your non-priority creditors a monthly payment.

Use a budgeting tool to work out your budget and how much to offer. You should send a copy of your budget with the letter.

You should only use this letter for creditors of non-priority debts. Non-priority debts are things like credit card debts, overdrafts and other unsecured loans. Priority debts are things such as rent, mortgage, council tax, fuel bills or fines. Before you deal with your non-priority debts, you'll need to talk to your priority creditors and make arrangements to pay any arrears. You can find out more about how to deal with priority debts.

Check if this letter is useful for your specific situation. If you need more specific advice and guidance, you can talk to an adviser.

Important

Check the time limit

Your creditor has a time limit on when they can take action against you.

For most debts, the time limit is 6 years since you last wrote to them or made a payment.

Writing to them might reset the time limit, so you should check if the time limit has ended or will end soon.

If you’re not sure, talk to an adviser.

Writing your letter

To write your letter you’ll need:

  • your creditor’s name and address

  • your account number

  • a few sentences explaining your situation

First you’ll fill in a form with some details about your debt. Your answers will go into your letter. 

You must write something in each box on the form, unless it’s marked as ‘optional’. If you don’t fill in a box an error message will appear at the top of the form and you won’t be able to continue until you fill it in.

We don’t store your information. If you go to another webpage before you’ve finished your letter, your answers will be deleted.

Sending your letter

There are different ways you can send your letter to your creditor. You can:

  •  download it and attach it to an email

  •  download it and print it out to send in the post

  •  copy and paste it into an email or web form

You should save a copy of the letter for your records.

Example letter

First, you can see an example of the letter to get an idea of what you are writing. This is a finished letter, with example details in it.

If you need to write to a creditor about a joint debt - where the debt is in your and someone else’s name - use the joint letter to make an offer to non-priority creditors instead.

Choose ‘Write letter’ to start writing your own version of the letter.

Sam Hoolin

8 Park Avenue
Arlton
AL1 4CA

01632 960001

sam123@mail.com

Giltham City Bank

24 Station Road
Giltham
GT16 3LP

21 May 2026

Reference: LL/ANO/Reminder1

Account name: Sam K Hoolin

Account number: 12345678

To whom it may concern,

I am sorry that I am unable to keep up my monthly payments to your company.

I am sick and unable to work. I have claimed benefits and am waiting to hear the outcome of my claim. My situation is unlikely to improve for at least 3 months.

I enclose a copy of my budget. This shows my income and expenses and the offers I can make.

The amount I can pay you is £50 a month. I will be able to make my first payment on 25 February 2023. Please send a direct debit form.

Please agree to freeze interest and other charges on my account as long as I keep to the payments. I will let you know about any changes in my circumstances.

If you are unable to accept my offer and freeze interest and charges, please explain why. Thank you for your help and I look forward to hearing from you.

Yours faithfully,

Sam Hoolin

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Take 5 minutes to tell us if you found what you needed on our website. Your feedback will help us give millions of people the information they need.