Your rights - Citizens Advice Bureau

If you've completed our Debt Analyser, then you might now be considering getting some specific, individual debt advice. If the Debt Analyser's recommendation was an IVA, then completing the more detailed questionnaire to which you were directed when you completed the analyser will get you the advice you need. If our recommendation was anything else - or if you just feel you need some independent advice - you could do no worse than contact your local citizens advice bureau for some debt advice (CAB).

There are more than 21,000 advisors working at various citizens advice bureaus in the UK - and they deal with many thousands of debt advice enquiries every year.

Citizens Advice Bureau also provides a range of fact sheets on debt topics, including bankruptcy advice and letters you can use to approach your creditors yourself (DIY debt management may seem daunting - but for many it can be the best route to becoming debt free).

CAB provides a searchable directory of local citizens advice bureaux.

One slight word of warning - citizens advice bureau is not a single national organisation with common standards of advice. Each Citizens Advice Bureau is different and develops according to the resources it has (some get local authority support, some don't, etc). So - whilst it is difficult to think of a better source of general, free face-to-face debt advice in the UK, you should check that the advisor you are seeing has debt experience - Wikipedia has a good explanation of how the Citizens Advice Bureau movement works.