In need of major help, what do i do next?

[kennyparkroad]

Hi guys

Great site, helped me a lot so far.

Basically heres the story

i have written to my debt companies (2 of them) and sent them the subject access request, after 28 stat days they never responded so i send them the following letter

DATE OF LETTER

Dear Sir/Madam


Before I continue I wish to establish that I am not seeking to avoid responsibility for any alleged debt or breach of any alleged agreement that I may have or have had.

I wrote to you on the 18th December 2006 requesting a copy of the executed agreement under the Consumer Credit Act (1974). I also asked for a statement of account. A copy of that letter is attached for ease of reference.
I also requested an executed deed of assignment documenting your involvement; this too has not been supplied.

Accordingly, it is my consideration that you have been unable to supply an agreement because no such agreement exists.

Consequently I am unable to acknowledge any debt to your company

Your non-compliance with my request means that your company has committed an offence under Section 77 (4) of the Consumer Credit Act 1974, summarily punishable by a Level 4 fine on the standard scale.

A credit agreement that is not properly documented and signed by the customer is totally unenforceable under the Consumer Credit Act 1974 and is therefore a complete defence to any court claim that is issued.
Please take note that any legal action you may contemplate will be vigorously defended and contested.
Furthermore your actions arguably do not comply with the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) Debt Collection Guidelines of July 2003, in that you have ‘communicated with [me] in an inaccurate or misleading manner (section 2.1) by ‘presenting information in that it creates a false or misleading impression’ and ‘failing to provide [me] with information on the status of debts’.

Notwithstanding the above I believe that your operatives have sought to contact me on a number of occasions, I would imagine regarding your Company’s viewpoint on the above now disputed agreement.
I now consider that considering your failures as mentioned above, any telephone calls from you constitute harassment and so from this date any further calls to me will be reported to the Police.
In addition you are in breach of the OFT’s July 2003 guidelines in that you are wrongly pursing [me] contrary to Section 2.8(i).

Another worrying facet of this whole case is the unlawful dissemination of my data by your company to a third party. Under the Data Protection Act (198 I have principled rights in that:


(Schedule I)
1. Personal data shall be processed fairly and lawfully.
2. Personal data shall be obtained only for one or more specified and lawful purposes, and shall not be further processed in any manner incompatible with that purpose or those purposes.
(Schedule II)
1. The subject has given his consent.
2. The processing is necessary “for the performance of a contract to which the data subject is a party.”



I have recently conducted an audit of my personal credit reports supplied by Experian and Equifax. Within both files, an entry referenced to the alleged debt is lodged.

This is recorded as “In Default”.

However, I note that files have been updated continually since then and I can only deduce that it is your firm updating my credit file without my consent or that your company is disseminating my information to a third party without my consent.

The fact that you have not provided me with a copy of the agreement negates any Notice of Default being served on me, as required by the conditions of the Consumer Credit Act 1974.

Incidentally, if the documentation were to be produced, you will be aware the default notice serves to cancel any original terms and conditions and as such cancels any right you or my creditor might have, implied or otherwise, to share my information without my consent.

I would then be looking to receive substantial compensation from your firm for this breach of my rights.



What I require

I require you with immediate effect to ensure that all data held by you regarding the alleged agreement/debt is removed from any and all Credit Reference Agency database.

Ensure that all data held by you regarding me is fully destroyed.

Ensure that no further telephone calls are made to me, or my place of work.

Ensure that all correspondence is made in writing.

I require written confirmation of the above together with a quarterly statement that no data has been processed by you regarding me.



Failure to comply

• Failure to comply with my request under the Data Protection Act 1998 will result in the matter being referred to the Information Commissioner.
• Failure to comply with the requirements of the Consumer Credit Act 1974 will cause me to refer the matter to the Office of Fair Trading, and Trading Standards.
• Failure to comply with the requirements Office of Fair Trading guidelines will lead to a report being submitted.
• Continued telephone contact will generate a complaint for harassment to the police.
• If you fail to comply with any or all of the above I reserve the right to take action against you without further contact.

I expect to hear from you within 12 working days from the date of this letter.

Failure to do so will be taken that you failed to comply with my request and I will consider the matter closed.

Any further action on your part or that of my alleged original creditor pursuant to your and/or their breaches of my statutory rights will be taken as a wilful act of harassment and each instance will be reported to the police.

Yours faithfully,





Me!





They have not responded within the 12 working days (today being the 12th) but i am at a loss as what to do now.

Any suggestions?

thanks

Kenny

[whats a mook?]

File complaints with the relevant companies.

[kennyparkroad]

what do you mean by file a complaint?

i thought i was already complaining! lol

do you mean to the office of fair trade and that?

sorry but can you please explain further.

thanks for the reply

Kenny

[whats a mook?]

I mean get on to Info commissioners and OFT.

[kennyparkroad]

hi,

thanks for that

but im not entirely sure what to say to them in the letter. i know i have to send copies of the letters i sent out, but apart from that, how do i address it, is there a template somewhere?

Again thanks for the quick reply, your a credit to the forums.

[whats a mook?]

The way I see it, you're not claiming against these people, you're reporting (illegal) activity to them. As long as you attach as much evidence as possible to a letter containing the facts, then in my opinion, that should be sufficient.

[kennyparkroad]

so if i write to them and basically say.


After contacting the above companies (name them obviously) and sending them the attached documents i have had no correspondance to my requests.

I therefore am supplying you with the evidence to get these 2 companies removed from my credit file and all records of them deleted.




Something along those lines?

Thanks again

kenny

[PriorityOne]

Hi Kenny.... thanks for the PM.

Are both of these companies DCAs (Debt Collection Agencies) ?

If so, they should have received a CCA (Consumer Credit Agreement) request from you and not an Subject Access Request at this stage. SARs usually go the original creditor.

With a CCA request, they have 12 days from receipt of your request to produce a true copy of your consumer credit agreement. If they do not, then they are in default of your request and can only re-enforce the debt by going to court. If you have already been paying them, this means that you are within your rights to withhold payment after this time, cancel Stanidng Orders, etc. One calendar month later, they will have also committed a criminal offence and they commit a further offence by chasing you for payment.

A Subject Access Request on the other hand, is a request for all transactional data held on you by a creditor/DCA, but it does not make a debt unenforceable. That is why the CCA request is so important... it determones whether a DCA has a legal right to pursue you for monies owed. You also get a faster result in that, if the DCAs default, you can then withhold payment after 12 days because they have not produced documentary proof of their right to collect.

A Subject Access Request gives a company 40 days within which to comply. If they do not comply, or only partially comply, then they can be reported to the Information Commissioners Office after this time.

Neither of these procedures involve 28 days however. It could be that a DCA has mentioned 28 days, as some appear to be under the impression that they have 28 days within which to produce a CCA. They are wrong, it is 12 days from receipt.

If you have not already done so, send a CCA request to each of these DCAs on Monday. Make sure you send them by recorded delivery and keep the receipt ! This is your proof.

If you do not receive a CCA within the full 43 days (12 days from receipt + one calendar month), then these companies will have committed an offence under the Data Protection Act, 1988... if they have also entered defaults on your credit files.... They will not have had the legal authority to do so (no CCA).

So, can you just clarify... have you sent CCA requests as well as the Subject Access Request that you mention ?.... or did you assume that a Subject Access Request covered a request for a CCA ?

Were they sent by recorded delivery ?

If you have sent CCAs.... and they have defaulted on these... and you have had defaults entered by these companies, then you should write to the DCAs informing them that they have breached the Consumer Credit Sct, 1974 (no CCA) and have also breached the Data Protections Act, 1988 (entering defaults when there was no CCA). If they ignore your request and refuse/don't remove those defaults, you can then report them to the Information Commissioners Office.

The Information Commissioners Office also covers non-compliance of a Subject Access Request (although I am not sure if you needed to send one of those at this stage anyway). You can report them to Trading Standards for non-compliance with your CCA request.

Although all of this reporting to various places is all well and good and needs to be done to raise awareness of underhand/unlawful tactics, etc... try not to lose sight of your reasons for contacting them with a CCA request in the first place....

An in-house DCA (one that is owned by the original creditor) will usually pass the debt back to the original creditor and you can then deal with them directly... by issuing a Subject Access Request (as you have done) to re-claim any unlawful charges to reduce the amount owing.

If the DCA has bought the debt however, then after they default on your CCA request, you need do nothing more.... except stop paying, of course. Reporting them for non-compliance will be just a formality.

You may not know which situation applies to you until some time after the 12 day time frame... although the age of the debt and the DCAs involved with the account will usually give some clues.

If you have any more questions, I will do my best to help.

[kennyparkroad]

Hi there, thanks for the reply. i will try to explain as clearly as i can.


I owe Centrica Finance (the aa) £8000 they are the original company but Blair Oliver and Scott have been assigned to reclaim the debt.

Now because i am not working, i am only paying them X amount a month, but they want more.

I sent them the letter i posted above in my previous post.

I also, COPIED Centrica Finance on the letter, so both the original creditor AND the debt collection agency have a copy, now i sent these recorded delivery, and have checked online and they have indeed been signed for the day after i posted them.


I have yet to hear anything back from them, and the 12th working day was on the 23rd February (Friday)

I have however been defaulted on this loan, the default happened in late 2004.


The other company is a catalogue company (littlewoods_, now i sent them the same letters recorded but apparently Royal Mail have lost it (it wasnt delivered) so ill have to send them another letter and change the date of the latest letter sent (they too did not get in touch after my first letter, i gave them 28 days) and give them a further 12 working days, BUT I KNOW i did not sign an agreement with them.

So i really dont know what to do now.

Hope this information has been helpful and hope further information that can be given.

Thanks in advance for all replies, i just feel like im fighting a losing battle!

[PriorityOne]

Originally Posted by kennyparkroad

Hi there, thanks for the reply. i will try to explain as clearly as i can.


I owe Centrica Finance (the aa) £8000 they are the original company but Blair Oliver and Scott have been assigned to reclaim the debt.

Now because i am not working, i am only paying them X amount a month, but they want more.

I sent them the letter i posted above in my previous post.

I also, COPIED Centrica Finance on the letter, so both the original creditor AND the debt collection agency have a copy, now i sent these recorded delivery, and have checked online and they have indeed been signed for the day after i posted them.


I have yet to hear anything back from them, and the 12th working day was on the 23rd February (Friday)

I have however been defaulted on this loan, the default happened in late 2004.


The other company is a catalogue company (littlewoods_, now i sent them the same letters recorded but apparently Royal Mail have lost it (it wasnt delivered) so ill have to send them another letter and change the date of the latest letter sent (they too did not get in touch after my first letter, i gave them 28 days) and give them a further 12 working days, BUT I KNOW i did not sign an agreement with them.

So i really dont know what to do now.

Hope this information has been helpful and hope further information that can be given.

Thanks in advance for all replies, i just feel like im fighting a losing battle!

Hi again,

It doesn't really matter how many dummies that BOS throw out of the pram, if you cannot afford any more, than there is nothing more they can get. If they have received a CCA request (not a Subject Access Request), then after the 12 working days default... you are within your rights to withhold further payments until they can produce it and have it re-enforced in court. I am still unclear if you have sent a CCA request or not. If you have, then do nothing. The onus is on BOS to produce the doc. within the legal timeframe... it is not up to you to remind them of their respoinisbilities under the law. No CCA = no enforceable debt.

If you have not sent a CCA request, then send one tomorrow... by rec. delivery and keep the receipt. The default was probably put on your credit file by the original creditor, which they had a right to do. If BOS have put it there though, it needs to be removed, but wait until the calendar month is up for the CCA request, as well as the 12 working days.

CCAs are not usually applied to catalogue debts, unless it involves a high value item... therefore, theoretically, these debts cannot be enforced through the courts anyway. So once again, if you have already sent a CCA request (not a Subject Access Request), then do nothing. If there is an amount outstanding, I am not sure how it can be enforced.

Perhaps someone else will come along and clarify this point ?

[Laiste]

Hi Kenny,

Sorry fo the late response, I've been extremely busy. Priority has given you some good advice to follow. I am puzzled however, if I read your letter correctly, why you contacted them after 28 days? If you have read around on the forum, you will know that a CCA request has a specific timescale. 12 working days, after which they are in default and after 1 calender mnth, they commit a criminal offence. Why have you made the comment that you feel you are fighting a losing battle? You are only at the start of this process to establish if your creditors can legally recoup monies from you, that is, if indeed the debt is lawful! These situations can rumble on for months! I have been embroiled in legal action with HFC for what will be 8mnths in March, (the trial is set for April) attempting to prove that there is no debt owed to them! I am not trying to be harsh but if you are going to get totally stressed out because a period of time has elapsed and nothing has happened, then you are not mentally prepared for this fight and for raising the legal arguments that you need to. These are by no means easy battles, Priority can tell you all about the fun and games I have been having with HFC! Which is why I'm saying you need to stop panicking and approach this calmly, otherwise you are really going to struggle and need for the sake of your health to consider whether you really want to be doing this.

Catalogue debts for the most part are entirely legally unenforceable. Chances are if you don't recall signing an agreement, you haven't and you will not receive one from Littlewoods. I am currently suing a catalogue company, as they have no agreement, for all monies ever paid to be refunded and for a variety of offences they have committed.

I want to add a point about the comment in your letter that no agreement renders the default notice invalid. This would only be true if they were never able to produce said agreement. If and when they do, the D.N has the same degree of validity as if the agreement were produced for eg. within the 12 w.days. You need to be absolutely sure of your legal arguments before you send letters.

Regards,

Laiste.

[kennyparkroad]

CCA

is that the TRUE SIGNED AGREEMENT?


this is the original letter i sent both the catalogue (which i owe £2500) and BOS (Blair Oliver and Scott)



Dear Sir/Madam

I am presently striving to organise my personal information and can find no reference to the alleged debt and/or agreement on you appear to have been assigned to collect.

Therefore, please supply me with a true copy of the original agreement.

You will appreciate that this is my right and your legal obligation under the legislation contained within section 77 (1) and section 78 (1) of the Consumer Credit Act 1974.

I also understand that it is your obligation to provide me with a statement of account and I look forward to receiving that as well.

Since you are a Debt Collection Agency, please also supply a signed true copy of the deed of assignment of the above referenced agreement

Again, this is you will appreciate a statutory obligation, whether you are the original creditor or not, under section 189 of the Consumer Credit Act 1974.

I look forward to hearing from you within the statutory time limit.

Yours faithfully,

Me.








in the catalogue one though, i didnt put that they were a DCA, this was the letter i sent in December, i sent them the above letter (in my first post) at the start of Feb, i have heard nothing back from either one.

So what do i do now????

[Laiste]

Do absolutely nothing! There is no need to! Why are you in a rush to do something? Ok, here is an example of how "doing nothing" works so well it defies belief. In July 06, I sent a CCA request to a DCA that LTSB had employed. Heard nothing, let the timescales pass and did nothing, I didn't need to! Debt was passed (not sold) to a further 4 DCA's after my CCA request. So, I'm disputing the debt, which means no collection activity or threats should have taken place once I had sent the CCA request. I now have a huge dossier of phone calls and letters for a debt that hasn't even been proved to exist! LTSB and their agents are in big trouble, but if I had chased them at every turn, I wouldn't have been able to compile a really compelling case of unlawful threats and harassment. It's Feb 07 and there is still no agreement, despite the fact I made a formal complaint in Dec 06 (I was getting bored).They have now breached FSA rules concerning responding to complaints. They are in HUGE trouble. The moral being here, know when to leave things alone! Give them enough rope to hang themselves!

Regards,

Laiste.

[tracyd]

Hi Kenny
i too am going after my CCA with littlewoods and funnily enough Royal Mail lost my 2 letters!!! They didnt get delivered so i am having to re submit to a different address just in case. I shall be resubmiting using a different address to see if they get there.