£3000 debt over 6 years old chased by dca

[haydn]

My son had a loan in 2001 from Halifax for £5000 and never paid any repayments. He immediatly became unemployed. Eventually in 2004 the Payment Protection Insurance he bought at the time of the loan started to make payments, but only 12 months worth. The balance of £3000 has remained ever since. Various debt collection agencies, Castle, Westcott, Logic, DDR, Mackenzie Hall have sent the odd letter.

Then I found this site. Then a couple years ago, he had a letter saying Hillco had bought the debt from Halifax and they were chasing him. Armed with info from this site, I asked them for copies of agreements, default notices, deed of assignments. Eventually I got a copy credit agreement but nothing else. Everything went quite for 18 months until now.

He has now had a letter from Thames Credit saying that they act for Aktiv Kapital who has bought the debt. They want paying.

My questions:

1. Should I ask them for the various documents and hope they fail to supply.
2. Should I do nothing and ignore all correspondence.

My assumptions are that the debt remains but is unenforceable if they cannot supply the documents. But even if they can supply the documents, the debt is still unenforceable as it is over 6 years old. But, if the debt has had some payments (ie the PPIs) only 4 years ago, does the 6 year period start from the date of the last payment?

[ODC]

I think you may find that the PPI payments made in 2004 would count as payments made by your son.

[babybear39]

Do you still have the copy of the agreement they sent? If so, can you scan it and post it here please?

[42man]

Thames Credit usually chase statute barred debts, so they may be in the dark about the previous payments. As BB asked can you post up the agreement ?....in the meantime it may be worth sending them a request for the CCA....

[haydn]

I will try to scan the agreement shortly. As for the PPI payments, they should have been made monthly from the date of the agreement and if they had, they too would have been over 6 years old. They were in fact only made in one payment after some complaining, on year 3. I believe there is some importance attached to a payment within 6 years as it might mean the debt is accepted by the debtor as due.

[haydn]

I have now sent the CCA letter and £1 fee. I have done this to a few of the debt collection agencies in the past, and asked for the Copy Credit Agreement, Deed of assignment and default notices.

I have only ever received a copy of the agreement which is 7 years old.

I guess we have to write to each and every debt collector as and when new ones start to chase?

I have read on this site, that I should also write template letter M because the debt is over 6 years and statute barred, but the template says that no payments have been made. A payment was made from the insurance protection policy, so I suppose the letter should not be sent. I suppose the debt is not statute barred despite its age.

Can anyone explain the difficulties we cause to our defence of either making a payment within the 6 years, or being in various stages of corresponding over a disputed debt in that period.

[JonCris]

Send the statute barred letter removing any reference to payments & you may find that as they are specialists at chasing after the unenforceable they may assume that to be the case here

[haydn]

Just received letter from Thames dated 22 April. The main points raised are:

They acknowledge they purchased the debt balance and the right to collect the balance plus interest. They did not purchase the Agreement. and therefore have no obligation to provide a copy of the agreement. They will try to get a copy from the Halifax. They are the legal owners and we need to pay them. If we dont respond with an offer to pay within 7 days, the account will be passed back to their collections division. If Halifax cant send the Agreement it doesnt mean that Thames have no right to continue to request payment.

So, they acknowledge they have bought the debt, but no Deed of Assignment has been sent. They might send the copy credit agreement if Halifax an send them one first. Nothing about sending a copy default notice or statement of account.

I guess I just ignore the letter and wait for their time to expire. And yes I suppose they retain the right to ask for payment, they just lose the right to enforce payment until the documents turn up.

[ODC]

As usual THAMES are talking ballhooks.

Under S189 of the CCA they are obliged to supply you with the CCA agreement. Do not worry about the deed of assignment

189 Definitions
“creditor” means the person providing credit under a consumer credit agreement
or the person to whom his rights and duties under the agreement have passed by assignment or operation of law, and in relation to a prospective consumer credit agreement, includes the prospective creditor;

They should also be aware of S 175

175 Duty of persons deemed to be agents
Where under this Act a person is deemed to receive a notice or payment as agent of the creditor or owner under a regulated agreement, he shall be deemed to be under a contractual duty to the creditor or owner to transmit the notice, or remit the payment, to him forthwith.


So reaslly Thames are waffling and the clock is ticking. You have made a LEGAL request and they are obliged to comply

[haydn]

The thing is, the CCA is probably easy for them to get. Dont they still have to supply the Deed of assignment, Default notice and statement of account too?

[JonCris]

I agree ODC...Clearly Thames Credit have yet to discover the existance of the internet & in particular CAG Dummies

[ODC]

Originally Posted by haydn

The thing is, the CCA is probably easy for them to get. Dont they still have to supply the Deed of assignment, Default notice and statement of account too?

The deed of assignment is easy concocted and they will come up with the excuse that they dont have to supply it because it contains sensiitive business information (such as how little they bought your alleged debt for)

They do not have to supply the default notice but should supply a statement of the account. You may be surprised how difficult it actually is to provide a properly executed CCA

[noomill060]

The number of properly executed CCAs which have been posted up here on CAG is, well, I've seen two or three, but no more than that!

(And NONE of them were from the Halifax!)

[noomill060]

hadyn said- "The thing is, the CCA is probably easy for them to get."

Funny thing is, it would be a first if they did!

[GRH]

Referring to the statue of limitations, I was under the impression it was 6 years from the date of the default notice, or subsequent acknowledgment such as a payment, not the date of the original debt

[maggieboo]

as far as I am aware, a debt becomes statue barred 6 years after the date of the last payment.