Su Ling* was in her mid thirties, had progressed fairly well up the ranks in a marketing firm in downtown KL and was living modestly. She had big dreams but never let work get in the way of her family. Su Ling is forever indebted to her parents for all that they had taught her in life and as such her main priority was always to look after her aging parents, especially now that she can afford to do so. With her life in order and her parents being looked after well due to her high paycheck, financial difficulty was something Su Ling had not expected.

Tragedy first struck when Su Ling's mother was diagnosed with kidney failure. As her mother's condition worsened, dialysis treatment was a necessity. Desperate for any form of monetary assistance, she looked into different avenues to fund her mother's medical treatment. However all her efforts were met with a dead-end. She was unable to attain subsidies neither from the government nor from any NGO's. Hospital and medical bills became hers to bear as her father was retired and had very little saved up as he approached his golden years. Dialysis and hormone therapy alone amounted to RM6,000 monthly. Due to her mother's surgery expenses the bulk of her salary went to financing medical bills.

Five years into her mom's treatment, Su Ling's father was then diagnosed with lung cancer. She could not believe the situation she was in. It felt as though the world around her had crumbled. She didn't know who to turn to, and for the first time in her life, she felt helpless. She knew that the cost of medical bills would potentially double as chemotherapy was needed to battle the cancer. Within months, medical bills for both her parents soared, resulting in a tough financial strain on Su Ling. She was forced to work odd jobs over the weekends just to earn a little extra income. Even then she was just able to make ends meet and had no extra money for other expenses. Su Ling's life was falling apart, she was aware of her inability to maintain paying for her parent's medical expenses much longer with the pay she was getting. All that however was incomparable to the fact that Su Ling was staring directly at the possibility of losing the two most important people in her life.

Unable to support herself and finance both her parents' medical bills with her current earnings she found herself in dire need of financial assistance. Su Ling took the easy way out and turned to the number one cause of debt - credit cards. She applied for several cards in order to ease the strain, knowing full well the consequences of her actions and the amount of debt she would be in. She had no choice however as she had to find a way to finance both parents' medical bills.
The condition of her parents slowly deteriorated and in a few short years she

lost both parents in the same year. The loss left Su Ling devastated, she could not believe that all her efforts met with such a depressing end. On top of that Su Ling was left with the task of servicing debt she had accumulated. Though help was handed to her by her family member it did not suffice and Su Ling sought the counsel of AKPK.

The AKPK agent negotiated with the Bank for some waivers of interest and penalty interest. The outstanding balance totaling RM500,000 on her 5 credit cards were restructured in such a way that allowed Su Ling a minimal monthly payment of RM300 to service the debt with interest waivered.The AKPK agent's negotiations also resulted in the Bank lowering Su Ling's monthly payments by almost 50%. Su Ling was thankful that finally, after the last 10 years of financial stress, she is able to relax and get on with her life.

**Note: For purposes of confidentiality, the real identity of the people involved in these success stories are not disclosed.