www.iva.co.uk

this was a question i was asked when putting my income/expenditure together. Luckily I said yes. I'm not against smoking as my partner smokes and i have the occasional one. my advisor told me she could allow for 1 pack a day. Thats a fiver per day, which is £1850.00 per year. Now my habit is probably five pound a week, but think what that money will add to my disposable income. I can have a b***** good holiday for that. So my advice if asked that question and you don't smoke is

Answer YES I b***** DO

Hi
A difficult area this one.
If you smoke then the answer is yes,if you don't and say that you do is that really in the spirit of the IVA ??
Remember your creditors may be writing off many thousands of pounds and taking a holiday at their expense is not the right thing to do.
If you can save for a holiday from your allowable expenditure,or from earned overtime, then all well and good
Regards

Sorry, I can't condone lying about something to get extra allowances that you don't need.

Also, as a non smoker I don't agree with smoking being an allowance - I love chocolate, but I doubt I'd get a chocolate allowance!

CCCS guidelines DO allow for a token amount to be offset against tobacco, but it is nowhere near £35 per week as has been suggested.

I am not sure I know of any IP's who would go into bat for a client with that particular expenditure at that level.

Regards.

Agreed with Size5. When i was putting my proposal together with his company, both me and my partner smoked and the allowance would never have nearly covered it. BUT Why should there be a large allowance for it? Like skippy says, you wouldnt get an allowance for chocolate.

I have given up smoking now and i will not lie about it when im sorted with work to get an extra few quid. I cant remember how much it was but im sure our allowance was £60 a month.[for both of us] Size5 may correct me on that.

No need to correct you Steve, you are bob on, as you usually are!!

Regards.

I would be interested to know if an IVA gets approved with an allowance of £140 on a 4 week month. Especially seen as alot of other allowances are so low.

I think it is safe to say that a lot of others would be interested to see that as well Steve!!

Regards.

Hi

I just wanted to say, while I would think it very wrong to lie to 'gain' from expenses. I am a smoker and I do not want to stop. It's my choice and I dont want to live forever either. There are other things that may be a damage to health, live and let live. I smoke outside, I wouldnt ever impose on anyone. My job was really stressful, so is my home life at times. My IP allowed me £40 per month for ciggies and I felt that was very fair. Its not that I would prefer to smoke than to pay my creditors back, I am a smoker and thats is all.

i use to smoke, but i have given up now, but my IP told me that creditors will not allow you to claim more than £20 towards smoking, just as well i gave up and at my review i took the £20 as i no longer smoke. Always be honest then no one can catch you out.

As one who enjoys an occasional ciggie with a glass of wine - I have a theory that if they put cigarettes up to £20 per packet we would still buy them - but in my case a pack of 20 lasts about 3 months!!

Most of my smoking clients seem to manage on approx £50 per month, and in many instances this gives them some incentive to cut down or give up entirely.

MelanieGiles wrote:

As one who enjoys an occasional ciggie with a glass of wine - I have a theory that if they put cigarettes up to £20 per packet we would still buy them - but in my case a pack of 20 lasts about 3 months!!

Most of my smoking clients seem to manage on approx £50 per month, and in many instances this gives them some incentive to cut down or give up entirely.

Question for you Mel.If someone had an allowance of say £50 a month on ciggies but managed to give up,would you allow them to keep the £50 a month??

No - but the reality is (based on human nature) that clients would probably not tell me and I certainly do not ask each one if they still smoke at the annual review.

Wouldnt you consider stopping smoking as one way to pay some of the debt back?, I think it is wrong to allow a value for smoking in an IVA.

Im a smoker - but didnt say so on my expendature allowance as i thought it would be unreasonable for my creditors to lose even more money through me smoking - as skippy said about chocolate. - i look at smoking as a luxury item.