Towards the end of 2020, after deliberations with various related stakeholders, the NCR issued a circular developed by the CIF with proposed operational solutions to standardize debt review court orders. It further addresses the inability of debt counsellors to comply with the 2012 Regulations due to delays by the courts to make the granted court orders available within 5 working days.

The following must be included in a debt review court order:

• General inclusions:
  • The jurisdiction
  • Case Number
  • Name, surname and NCRDC number of the debt counsellor
  • Name, surname and ID number of the consumer/s
  • Name and NCRCP number of the credit providers
  • Credit agreement details (type and account number)
  • Clauses in the Order should align with the prayers in the notice of motion
  • A clause confirming the consumer/s to be over-indebted
  • When the Order refers to annexures, all annexures to be clearly marked and attached to the order.
• Payment related inclusions in the court order:
  • A copy of the debt re-arrangement proposal
  • Estimated starting date of payment
  • A clause confirming that the distribution is subject to the principle of cascading repayments.
  • The final debt re-arrangement proposal acceptance letters of the credit providers.

The circular goes further to address general exclusions from court orders. The Circular refers to 2 clauses that should be excluded and not be referred to in the court order. They are:

• A clause referring to a PDA because a PDA is not a party to the court order
• A clause referring to the appointment of the debt counselor because a debt counsellor is subject to change. This is simply to avoid variation applications when a consumer is transferred or a debt counsellor is deregistered, dies or their registration has since lapsed

The final part of the circular remedies the inability of debt counsellor to comply with the 2012 Regulations due to courts not providing the court order within 5 working days.

The following working days have been extended:

• Regulation 2(3) and Regulation 3(3)
• The debt counsellor must collect a copy of the court order from the clerk of the court and deliver it within 15 working days from the date of issue to the affected consumer and each credit provider.

Should you require a copy of the Regulations, please don’t hesitate to let us know.

Industry Ready to Commence After Festive Season

Whilst most of the bigger debt counsellors remained open with skeleton staff during the festive season, all debt counsellors are due to return to work between the 1st and 2nd week of January 2021.

The courts are due to open the 2nd week of January 2021.

UPDATE: 08 January 2021

Towards the end of January 2021, the NCR issued a circular wherein they authorised the transfer of several consumers from debt counsellors who have been deregistered or whose registration has lapsed.

They provided the details of the debt counsellors to whom the consumer will be transferred. Whilst the circular stated that we will be contacted by the new debt counsellors to facilitate the transfer, we have proceeded to get in touch with the new debt counsellors to obtain a list of the affected consumers.

Once we have these details, we will proceed with the transfer on our system.