Fair enough, I thought that may be the case. My plan was to tell them to come back with the original, signed CCA!

I've never used Provident but I've received a letter from them. I can't scan but I'll give you the gist of it! "on 30th November 2001 Lowell Portfolio Ltd assigned Provident Personal Credit Ltd the legal rights to your outstanding Shop Direct debt of £134.95 ref no .xxx. This means that a local agent will call to your home to discuss weekly repayments with you. We understand there may be many reasons why you have been unable to make repayments with Lowell in the past. With Provident if you sign a new agreement you will actually repay less than you currently owe with repayments collected weekly by an agent" It then gives a load of stuff about payments etc and tells me that an agent will be knocking on my door any day now. I'm not actually sure what this original debt is for and the letter has been addressed to my maiden name which I haven't used in 3 years. I'm not very happy at the thought of some provident agent turning up at my door to demand money when as far as I'm concerned I don't owe them any! Any advice on how to proceed? I've never heard of this before and am totally stumped! Thanks in advance.

Need more help! She filled in the form with her own I & E, took it back to the court and paid the fee. She also spoke to the bailiff (who was very nice apparently!) and was told that she would hear something in about 2 weeks. it's been nearly 5 weeks now and she hasn't heard anything from the court or Southern Water (who the debt was with). What is the next step? Obviously she wants to start getting this paid off ASAP, but who should she contact. Many thanks in advance!

Thanks for the help. I will pass this on to her.

Thanks for the reply. I'm not sure if the fact that the debt is only in her name is relevant. Obviuosly she needs to get this form back to the court ASAP. She has tried phoning the court, but can never get through.

Just to add. She has had a letter from a bailiff saying that he will be coming to seize goods if she hasn't paid the full amount by Friday. Should she call him and let him know when she has submitted the form?

Apologies if I'm not in the right forum! I'm posting on behalf of a friend who owes quite a lot of money to Southern Water. She was totally unwaware of this debt until she received a warrant of execution in the post. She can't pay the whole amount in one go and was given a form by the court titled 'Application for suspension of warrant and/or variation of an order'. She was told to fill it in so that she would be able to pay by instalments. She is married, but this debt is solely in her name. Here is the question - On the form she has to fill in the usual income and expenses, however it says 'Do not include any payments made by other members of the household out of their own income'. So should she fill in the form purely with her own details or include her husbands? Thank you in advance if anyone can help!

Hang in there, many wise people with advice will be along shortly....unfortunately I'm not one of them! What I can say is don't panic about anybody coming round and taking your goods. They cannot do this.

Yes, I thought it was an interesting coincidence! Small good news today - our council tax is being frozen this year, so we know what to expect bill wise come April!

Thank you. I e mailed it and within half an hour, I had a message from my councillor telling me that he's free at the end of the week if i need any help! I've had an acknowledgment from the council so now I just wait and cross my fingers.

I am writing regarding account ref- In November 2009 I sent an income & expenditure for our household with a proposal to pay £200 per month to clear the arrears on our council tax. I fully appreciate that the arrears should never have built up in the first place and it is a priority to get them cleared. However, I have recently received a letter saying that £200 per month is not enough and that the payments must be increased to £250 per month. The letter states that the amount we are paying out in loan repayments is not considered a 'priority' and we must lower these repayments. I do not feel that we can pay an extra £50 per month currently, due to the bulk of our loan repayments going towards an IVA, which defaulting on would cause huge financial problems and could affect our ability to pay the rest of the arrears. As of 1st March 2010 our rent is rising by £25 per month and my concern is that with the new council tax year starting in April, we would fall behind again. I am also concerned by how long it is taking for your letters to arrive to us. A letter dated 21st January was received on 6th Feb. Whilst I understand that this problem is unlikely to be a fault on your part (our post is somewhat haphazard) I would appreciate any communication from yourselves to be sent by both post and e mail to avoid any delays. I would appreciate your attention on this matter. Any advice or is it Ok? I have copied in both my MP and local councillor.

I'm trying to draft the e mail, but as I have flu, I'm a bit fuzzy headed! Can anyone help with the wording? Also just remembered that our rent is going up on 1st March too...

No, it was lumped in with 'credit card and loan repayments' on the I&E. I'm going to e mail my local councillor and cc the council tax dept tomorrow, I can't go down there as I'm not well, hence why I'm awake at this hour!

According to the council we can afford it. They seem to think that everything we are paying for is 'non essential'. We don't have luxuries, we don't smoke or drink and everything we own is very basic, including our car which is 15 years old and we've only kept it because of the issues with my father in law.

Back again.... Finally managed to get rid of the bailiffs and had the account passed back to the council. Many thanks for all the advice and support I received here. Sent council I&E in November with payment plan for £200 per month and have made payments for December and January with no problems. I received a letter yesterday (dated 4th Jan!) from the council saying that the £200 a month is not enough and they will be taking £250 from Febuary's payment onwards. Apparently, the amount that we are paying in loan/credit card repayments are 'non essential' debts and basically we should stop paying these and give more to the council. My issues are - The bulk of our 'non essential' payments are towards an IVA (my husbands) which is a difficult one to stop paying. I have spoken to my bank about reducing my loan repayments, but as it's a managed loan they have refused. We are also aware that in April we will be paying a new year of council tax and do not want to get in to arrears with that one too. On a personal note, my father in law has terminal lung cancer and around 3 months left to live. He lives 100 miles away and so we are spending more in petrol to visit him, and because we have to go at weekends, it is affecting the amount of hours I can work (husband works during the week, I do evenings and weekends) I know the council probably won't care about this but is it something I should bring up? What can we do? Direct debit is due out on 15th Feb and they will be taking more than we had planned. If we don't pay extra they have said that 'action will be taken'. does that mean more bailiffs?