Mackenzie Hall- some one help me!!!

[rubynicola]

I recieved a letter yesterday from Mackenzie Hall. It had my name and address on the letter, it says that BT Cellnet V Me, for the sum of £12420.87.

It says it is a reduced settlement offer. And that despite repeated requests for payment the sum of £12420.87 remains outstanding.

I HAVE NEVER HAD A BT CELLENT ACCOUNT, THEY HAVE NEVER CONTACTED ME BEFORE.

As you read on they say as a gesture of goodwill, they are willing to accept a Reduced Settlement Paymeny of £9936.70. This is a once only offer!!!

I rang today three times, the first two times they are answer and put on hold. Then the third time I said unless you tell me what this is about I am passing this letter onto the Police, she said ' Do not speak to me like that, you need to get a F**king better attitude, im not telling you nothing'- then she puts the phone down!!!!!!

WHAT IS THIS ALL ABOUT?? WHAT SHALL I DO??

IT MUST BE SCAM???

[sea-sidelady]

I also got one, i have read all the posts on here about it, and the whole place advises ignore it. They are fishing. If u contact them, they will pursue u. If u ignore i think they eventualy give up and go away.

[Loulie]

Hi,

I have posted on here a couple of times re Mackenzie Hall as my boyfriend is currently receiving various letters from them. After reading all of the advice about them on this site I think the general consensus is DO NOT RING THEM!!! If you really feel the need to contact them I would do it in writing but after the advice I have had from here, and reading all of the other threads about Mackenzie Hall, we are just ignoring everything that comes through from them.

Also, maybe I am being naive but surely it is not possible to run up a bill of £12,000 with a mobile phone??????

[Black Rat]

I think that these letters are a way of getting you to call them.
Not sure about the legalities of them doing this but look at this hypothetical situation :-
Say you owe money to say Barclaycard Mc H know that if they write to you about this chances are you will ignore it, so they write to you with a really outrageous claim from a company that no longer exists then when you call them confirming your details etc they then say oops sorry its been a mistake. But now they have got your details, name address telephone number and confirmation that its you!
DO NOT RESPOND TO THIS PHISHING LETTER
And any way what mobile phone company are going to let you run anything like that sort of bill up before they cut you off?

Providing you are sure you dont owe this money you could also send the letters to the Office of Fair Trading.

Hope this helps
Jon

[rubynicola]

Thanks Guys.

My initial reaction to the letter was that you could not owe that amount to a phone company, as if you donot pay the bill they cut you off. Thats why I knew it was dodgy!

The second thing is that I have never had a mobile phone or any account with BT!!

I am going to send the letter to the OFT scams team as they are apparently recieving a lot of complaints about Mc H.

It does initially worry you, as you think what is this- did I have an account and you start questioning yourself. Especially when they say they are going to seize your assets!!! But I know I never had an account with them!

If they are using it a phising exercise, I do not know what else it could be. As alot have people had said it is probably for something which is statute barred and they are trying to recover some money!!

I know there would be people, who worry when they see any red letter and would probably PAY!! thats why they do it!!!

[Black Rat]

Here are a couple of relevant pieces of information for letters like these:-


(1) A person commits an offence if, with the object of coercing another person to pay money claimed from the other as a debt due under a contract,

• (a) harasses the other with demands for payment which, in respect of their frequency or the manner or occasion of making any such demand, or of any threat of publicity by which any demand is accompanied, are calculated to subject him or members of his family or household to alarm, distress or humiliation;
  (b) falsely represents, in relation to the money claimed, that criminal proceedings lie for failure to pay it;
  (c) falsely represents himself to be authorised in some official capacity to claim or enforce payment; or (d) utters a document falsely represented by him to have some official character or purporting to have some official character which he knows it has not.

and:-

Malicious Communications Act 1988

An Act to make provision for the punishment of persons who send or deliver letters or other articles for the purpose of causing distress or anxiety.

[29th July 1988]

Be it enacted by the Queen's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:—

1.—(1) Any person who sends to another person—
(a) a letter or other article which conveys—
(i) a message which is indecent or grossly offensive;
(ii) a threat; or
(iii) information which is false and known or believed to be false by the sender; or
(b) any other article which is, in whole or part, of an indecent or grossly offensive nature,
is guilty of an offence if his purpose, or one of his purposes, in sending it is that it should, so far as falling within paragraph (a) or (b) above, cause distress or anxiety to the recipient or to any other person to whom he intends that it or its contents or nature should be communicated.


Maybe you may want to remind the OFT about this when you report them

[rubynicola]

Thanks BlackRat that is very helpful information.

I will state this in my letter to the OFT. I urge anyone who has also been sent letters by Mackenzie Hall to send letters to the OFT and hopefully these people will be stopped.

It is outragous that they can send letters to people which are totally false and to be rude and threatening on the phone for no reason. They need to be stopped!!!

[lookinforinfo]

Ruby, from what I can make out, your initial complaint should be to your local
Trading Standards office, who will pass it on to the OFT.

I assume that MCKenxie Hall are chasing after someone with the same name
as you who owes BT. If that is the case, then they have breached the Data
Protection Act [failing to keep accurate records] and [passing on sensitive
information to a third party.]

They are also in breach of the Consumer Credit Act by failing to investigate
when a debt has been queried.
These are serious breaches which would indicate that they are not fit persons to hold a Consumer Credit licence. So tell TS that when you write.
.

[rubynicola]

Thanks lookinforinfo!!

I will write to local TSS but also cc to the OFT as they are investigating them, as I read on another site that they have recieved many complaints.

I do not think that BT are the actual claimants as how could you ever run a phone bill up to £12,000!!!!

[lookinforinfo]

Originally Posted by rubynicola

I do not think that BT are the actual claimants as how could you ever run a phone bill up to £12,000!!!!

You have obviously never met my wife. LOL

It could be a sole trader whose income derives from overseas trade for
example so spends a lot of time on the phone. Now the company has gone bust. Or someone who likes to ring those premium rate chat numbers.

[rubynicola]

Well lets hope its not your wife who ran up the bill and now they are pestering!!LOL

[lauriesmb]

Hi Rubynicola,

I had these people pester me by letter for over 3 years! I only ever opened 4 of them, after that i just binned them. I moved to Spain and came back this year and as soon as i bought my house I receieved a letter from them! It was mis spelled so now i just send it back with addressee unknown on it and dont give it a second thought.

Before i moved to Spain the last letter i opened and read before trashing, stated that baliffs would call, my wages would be tapped, my account frozen, my employer contacted etc etc! but none of the above ever happened and i was hoping it would so i could sue their miserable hides!! I was being chased by them for a supposed debt of 10,000 owed to a bank that i never ever had an account with, so if i were you, i wouldnt worry about it! Just report them as advised and then forget it!

Soon as the letters arrive, either bin them or send them back unopened, cross out the name and address and put "Return to sender" on the envelope. DO NOT PHONE THEM!!!!!!!!!!! as stated in other posts, once you phone them they have confirmation from you that the letter they sent has been acknowledged and more mail will arrive!! BIN THE LOT!!

ABOVE ALL, DONT WORRY OR PANIC!!

[Ares]

Hi I too have recently heard from these guys - I'm afraid I called as wanted to know what it was in relation to. Apparently it was Barclaycard debt the default date is 1997!! I asked whether any action had been taken and they told me BarclayCard have never before tried to claim the money. I said in that case it must be outside the statute of limitations now - and the guy started talking about concealment!? As I banked withy Barclays at the same time they always knew where I was so that doesn't seem to apply. They refused to provide a Deed of Assignment or a Statement of Acct and suggested either paying it (only £700) or getting legal advice. I don't have a recollection of the debt but even if I did how do I go about writing to them to state that as it's after 6 years it is closed in my mind. I shall not be contacting them by phone again. Any advice would be great thanks!

[powelll]

Originally Posted by Ares

Hi I too have recently heard from these guys - I'm afraid I called as wanted to know what it was in relation to. Apparently it was Barclaycard debt the default date is 1997!! I asked whether any action had been taken and they told me BarclayCard have never before tried to claim the money. I said in that case it must be outside the statute of limitations now - and the guy started talking about concealment!? As I banked withy Barclays at the same time they always knew where I was so that doesn't seem to apply. They refused to provide a Deed of Assignment or a Statement of Acct and suggested either paying it (only £700) or getting legal advice. I don't have a recollection of the debt but even if I did how do I go about writing to them to state that as it's after 6 years it is closed in my mind. I shall not be contacting them by phone again. Any advice would be great thanks!

Concealment isn't anything to do with stat. of limitations anyway. Send them this letter - you're completely right not to call them again - best of luck

http://www.nationaldebtline.co.uk/en...3467_25091.pdf

[mrmagooooooo]

Hi Peeps
Ive visited 3 or 4 forums today with literally hundreds of posts regarding this company. I too have recived several letters claiming that i owe them x amount of money (bizzarely this amount always seems to change) anyway i urge you all to contact BBC's Watchdog programe.. if enough of us tell them about it im sure they would investigate them... anyway here are is the link...
BBC - Consumer - TV and radio - TV and radio
Lets all join together and show the whole of the UK what utter Bas£@£$s this company really are :T

[steve_eoh]

Hi,
Mackenzie hall contacted me around a year ago by letter, they said i owed around £65 - i called them to find out what it was all about. The guy on the phone was quite stern with me and i felt quite intimidated. It was only at the point that he said 'if you pay £50 now, we'll call it quits' that alarm bells started ringing. So i told him that i had no recollection of this debt and that i would like to see some proof - i know i moved house around 2 years before and at the time i had pneumonia, so it is possible that i had somehting outstanding that id forgotten about. But i have no record or memory of owing anything.

I received another letter from them around a month later saying they'd be in touch when they have the information. I didnt hear anything else from them until today when i received one of those 'attempting to contact above named regarding a personal matter'. From what has been said, looks like they are phishing. What do you think??

[dolphin939]

Hi my partner got letter from mackenzie all stating that he owes a balance of £255.22 to JD Williams he has never had a cat