Growing numbers of British adults are turning to debt consolidation to deal with their debt problems. In 2009, more than 130000 adults in the UK were declared insolvent. This was a record high for the British – and not a good record either. Add to that the 9300 people each day who contact the Citizens Advice Bureau for debt solutions advice and what we have is a severe personal debt crisis.

But why?

Unfortunately, it seems that the major contributor is poorly managed personal finances by the British. Credit cards, overdrafts, store cards, loans… they are all made available easily to consumers. But of course, they come at a cost. Plastic purchases often incur fees and interest. This means that the ‘buy now, pay later,’ generation are paying more for their purchases than ever before. Lenders have been criticised for lending too easily, for raising credit limits without notification and simply for lending more to individuals than they could ever realistically afford to pay back. But we can’t just blame the lenders. Of course they have to accept a certain level of responsibility for irresponsible lending, but at what point so we take responsibility for our own poor money management? Nobody forces a consumer to take a credit card. Consumers buy on credit because they want everything now. And when the old generation tell us that it wasn’t like that in their day, they’re not lying. The credit card explosion is relatively recent and with the massive popularity surge of hire purchase has come higher personal debt. Yes, the debt mountain has grown in direct proportion to the number of store and credit cards we hold. So how could be possibly not consider this the single biggest cause of the problem?

The solution might be simple in theory: stop using credit. But we have come to rely on it now and simply stopping isn’t feasible. Perhaps educating the nation on managing credit sensibly would be a better idea!