I agree with it being financial abuse, and I've touched on that in my replies. Whether it's a crime or not is another matter, but if it were, the police are people who deal with crimes. County Court/MCOL is for resolving civil matters is it not? There is no doubt that all parties agree the money was loaned, if the borrower isn't repaying then surely small claims court is an appropriate legal route to try and recover the loaned money? However, I don't believe that the borrowers ever had any intention of repaying, which could be argued as theft (admittedly difficult to prove to a criminal standard). Having now gone through the statements thoroughly, it's become clear that about half of the money transfers were made to his step dad. And whilst his mum has repaid a fair bit of what went to her, step dad hasn't repaid anything himself. He owes over 2k. And now they've split up (but not yet divorced). Not sure if that's of significance or not?

It's not an adult account, it's HSBC's "mysavings" children's account. I believe the account is held in the child's name with an 'authorised adult mandate' that should also allow me to operate the account on their behalf. I did ask the bank for parental access to at least monitor the account, but was told that isn't possible (despite the AAM). https://www.hsbc.co.uk/savings/products/mysavings/ My son lives with me, but his mum does still have parental responsibility. So it sounds like that could prevent any kind of legal action? His mum's 'new' partner has also been a direct recipient of some of these money transfers, and definitely does not have PR for my son. Was hoping to name them as respondents jointly though. I was also hoping to shield the lad from as much of the legal process as possible. If there is no prospect of that, and he'd be called into court as a witness, then it would probably stop me from taking the legal route. The wider picture is that my son apparently understands that this money was a loan to his mother, but has obviously been taken advantage of as it is clear there is no intention to repay it. She has manipulated and conditioned him to think that he is somehow responsible for his mother's welfare (she has mental health conditions, is alcoholic, and now I'm thinking possibly other drug addictions (not sure what else this money might have been spent on). I am looking at trying to get counselling for him because it clearly isn't healthy for an 11 year old to feel responsible for his parent in this way. I guess it's similar to any other victim of coercive control (except between parent and child rather than a couple in a relationship) - that the victim doesn't realise that they are a victim until after they break free of their abuser. Until I can break that toxic bond between mother and son, he isn't going to learn any lesson from this. Part of my thinking behind gaining a judgement is that it establishes officially that what his mother has done is wrong.

We weren't married. And none of us had any savings while we were together because ex managed to spend if faster than I earnt it.

Thanks Andy. Struggling to get my head around that though. Is it saying that a child under 18 has to have a 'litigation friend'? Obviously I would want to take on that role. And I would prefer to shield my son from the legal proceedings as far as possible possible, especially as he doesn't really appreciate that he's been taken advantage of by his own mother.

Ironically we already have social services early intervention assisting us! This is because my ex has convinced our son that he ought to go and live with her (despite social services taking our kids off her a couple of years due to her neglecting them, that's why they live with me now). I've mentioned the money thing to the early intervention lady and she was pretty shocked by it as well. Not sure there's anything they can do about it though.

Not sure if I'm in exactly the right place for this, but I'm looking for advice on making a claim (MCOL) against an individual. I have recently discovered that my ex partner has coerced/bullied our 11 year old son into transferring the entire balance of his savings account to them (about £3k), allegedly on the basis of a loan. The funds were transferred in relatively small amounts (£30 - £80, almost daily, sometimes multiple transfers per day) predominantly over the course of a couple of months last year. I setup the savings account for our son (well after we had separated), and all deposits to the account had come from me. My ex didn't even know about the account. When our son turned 11 the bank automatically gave him a current account as well. I set him up for online banking/app, which also gave him online access to the savings account. I did tell him not to touch the savings account, which he hasn't for his own use at all. Every single withdrawal was immediately transferred to his mother (and her new partner), via his current account. I have no idea where the money went, but in one month alone they took over £1600! Given our son's age, I'm not happy that the bank haven't queried or flagged these transactions in any way, but I expect they'll brush it off if I complain to them. Account is with HSBC, and they are in our son's name, they don't offer children's accounts held in trust. I had asked for the accounts to be linked to my online banking, so that I could monitor them, but HBSC said they don't do that either. The account was completely emptied 9 months ago, and I've only just found out about it (ex had bullied son into keeping it a secret). He's under the impression that it's a loan, but nothing has been repaid (except a few tiny amounts, which ex has then made son transfer back a day or so later), both savings and current account have balance of £0.00. I've confronted ex about it, who was less than apologetic, made it sound like she was entitled to appropriate our sons savings, but did concede it was on a loan basis. Obviously no repayment plan is in place, and the lack of repayments so far make it look like a perpetual loan. Ex is hopeless with money, constantly pleading poverty, refuses to get a job and therefore pays no child maintenance either. In addition to my son's savings, I've also lent my ex money myself as she regularly claims she can't afford to feed our son when he goes to her for occasional contact time. That's added up to another £1k over the last 3 years. Despite it being agreed as a loan, I was willing to write that off as a lost cause, but in light of her also appropriating all my son's savings I'm going to take legal action. Unfortunately, I doubt either of us will ever see the money again, but at the very least I want to try, if nothing else to get the debt (and hopefully a repayment plan) formalised. Can I claim on behalf of myself and my son, is it ok to name our son as a joint claimant even though he's a child? Presume I start by serving a letter before action, outlining the amounts and giving 14 days to repay? As there's no way they'll be able to repay in 14 days, I'm also inclined to offer to discuss a repayment plan before commencing the MCOL. Or is this a bad idea?

Tried to make purchase through their website using a gift card last week. It said there was an error processing payment (no further explanation). So I tried a different gift card, and it did the same with that one. Now I've checked the balances on the gift cards, and argos have debited both of them by the value of the item I was trying to buy (one of). Nor order confirmation text or email, not showing on my account anywhere, so by their records it appears the order never went through despite them taking the money twice. And now it seems there is no way to contact Argos to try and resolve the matter - their online chat is just a bot that ends the converastion without being any use at all. And their customer services phone number hangs up if you don't have an order number to give it. Where the hell do you address complaints to this catastrophe of a company??

I was registered as self employed between 2011 and 2017. This was a small sideline along side my main PAYE income (so my NI contributions are already made up for the years in question), and me SE profit was generally about £1500 per year (highest was about £2500). Now I've just had a letter from HMRC demanding Class 2 NIC for 2011 to 2015. Don't know why they've only just written to me about it, first I've heard from them on this subject since 2011. I was always under the impression that as my income was below the small earnings exception, I was exempt from having to pay class 2 NIC? I seem to recall dealing with this matter back in 2011, and I'm pretty sure I sent them a CF10 form back then (although I didn't keep a copy of that myself). Should I just write to them stating that I believe I was exempt due to earnings below the threshold? Obviously this is reflected in my SA tax returns. Are they likely to just accept that? It seems odd that if they think I should have been paying class 2 NICS for all these years, why haven't they chased it before now?

I thought this was all sorted out months ago - in Feb I had a letter from Spark acknowledging the error, and saying that GB had accepted my account. Spoke to GB who agreed, and said it would show up on my account within a week. And it did, was all there showing as normal when I logged in. Then it disappeared again, and I was only getting bills from GB for the gas. Spoke to GB again and they said, 'no it isn't resolved yet (it bloody well was!), and it will take 12 weeks. Today I get a 'sorry you're leaving' letter from Spark, and them reminding me to provide a meter reading to my new supplier, apparently my switch took place 11 days ago! My GB account also shows an 'opening reading' for that date. I'm guessing I'll be getting a bill from Spark for the interim period. Spoke to GB again today, who said they are still sorting it out internally. To be fair to Spark, they appear to have done everything right to resolve the situation, it seems like GB have got themselves in a real mess over reversing the erroneous switch.

I have 3 children (3,5, and 7 y/o) with my ex partner, and we share care for them (they stay with me about 3 days/nights per week). Until now, we'd agreed to split the child tax credit, so I claim for one child (the youngest), and she claims for the other two. Now she's saying that doesn't work for her any more, and she needs to claim the tax credits for all three. Does the new legislation allow her to add our third child onto her existing claim, or will she come up against the 2 child limit? From what I've read, it applies to children born after 6th April this year, or to any new claims for tax credits. But it isn't a completely new claim in her case, so not sure if that makes it ok?

And now I have a council tax rebate, since they too think that I vacated on the 14th January. All this is happening two months after we completed and thus when my tenancy terminated.

According to a couple of websites I've looked at, the switching process has been speeded up to now take 17 days (14 days cooling off period, and 3 days to actually perform the switch). I'm not sure of the mechanics of the process, but it's possible that the new supplier (Spark in this case), doesn't have to contact the old supplier to inform them of the switch until the 14 cooling off period has passed. with Countrywide requesting the switch on a vacated property, rather than an actual consumer, it could be that Spark just cut to the chase and the skip the cooling off period. I've spoken to GB by telephone several times in the last few weeks for other reasons regarding my account (fallout from them collapsing and being taken over by Co op), at no point did they mention an impending switch away showing on my account. During our conversations they were well aware that I wanted to stay with them, I should think they'd have mentioned it if the switch request was visible on their systems at that time? Even when I phoned up after receiving the Spark letter, their advisor was a bit miffed by what I was telling him, at first it appeared to him that my supplies were still live through them, he was quite shocked when he dug a little deeper into their system and found that my electricity supply had already gone. Maybe it's the normal way their internal computer systems work, or maybe the switch really did go through in 3 days, and it threw their systems somewhat? The other consideration is that I obviously didn't go through Countrywide's standard check out process (end of tenancy inspections etc), I certainly didn't provide any meter readings to them, which I believe is normally what happens with this Countrywide/Spark tie up. they have absolutely no excuse for what they've done. I wonder what's next - a council tax rebate, my telephone & broadband cut off? Anything else they could do?

It gets better - today I've received a letter from the water board telling me that I've got a £50 credit. Looks like Countrywide have told them I've moved out as well. But curiously, they have my vacating date as 15th January (two months after my tenancy has ended). I wonder if they told Spark to take over my gas and electric on the 15th January as well? Would explain why the first letter I received from them was dated 16th Jan, but not sure how they could have commenced my electricity supply from that date - I thought the switching process was supposed to take weeks? I'm going to make Countrywide sort out the water, I'm guessing that's less critical, as there's no change of supplier or tariff involved.

I received a letter from Spark Energy yesterday, addressed to 'The Occupier', welcoming me to them as my new supplier. Goes on to say that "As instructed by your letting agent on your behalf, we've been appointed as the gas and electricity supplier to your property". But I don't have a letting agent/landlord, I own the property! I was the tenant, but I bought it from the landlord two months ago. My landlord used a local letting agency, and during our tenancy they've been taken over by Countrywide. It's obvious what has happened - Countrywide have an agreement with Spark to refer as many tenanted properties to them as possible, they are clearly getting kickbacks/commission from doing so. When they processed my tenancy agreement they have done the (allegedy automated) process of requesting Spark to take over the gas and electricity supplies. But they should never have done this, they had no right to. My tenancy ended on the day my purchase of the property completed. They were no longer acting for the landlord, since there was no longer a landlord. This is the first I've heard about any change to my supplier, and the electricity changed over to them 4 days ago, gas due to next week! If they'd contacted my (or 'the occupier') beforehand, I could have told them to do one and stopped this from happening. Obviously it's Countrywide that's initiated this mess, but I find it shocking that Spark are just blindly taking instructions from Countrywide to acquire supplies without bothering to attempt to make contact with the occupier until after the switch has been completed. Is this allowed, seems like sharp practise to me? I phoned Spark first of all, who confirmed that it was Countrywide behind it. I told them they had no right to perform a switch without my consent, and Countrywide had no authority to request it. I asked them to reverse the switch immediately and put me back with my previous supplier. Initially I was told they couldn't do that, and I should go through the normal switching process again to change back! Told them that wasn't good enough - I've not entered contract with Spark, it'll take weeks to switch back, I'll be on an uncompetitive tariff with Spark in the meantime. And the (exceptionally good) tariff I was on with my previous supplier is no longer available to new customers. After a bit or denial and erring, they finally accepted that they could attempt to reverse the switch under the erroneous transfer correction procedure, which I instructed them to do asap. Although they said that it was conditional on my previous supplier agreeing to reinstate my contract with them. I then spoke to my existing supplier (GB Energy), who were very helpful. They immediately understood the problem and said that they could also initiate the erroneous switch reversal from their side, and it would probably be quicker. So hopefully it will get resolved and I'll be put back to where I was with GB Energy before this fiasco. But it sounds like it could take a while to resolve. I then called my old letting agent to bring the problem to their attention and get them to escalate it within Countrywide (in the hope of them improving their procedures if nothing else). Letting agent was very blase about it, "just standard practice, nothing we can do, no point in me even raising it". They used to be a really good local letting agent, always had a good relationship with them in the past. Then Countrywide took them over, the staff are the same, but the service has turned to rubbish. So, who has done this, is it just Countrywide, or are Spark partly to blame accepting an unauthorised switch? I guess the regulator can't touch Countrywide? Even if I get put back to where I was, I'm not happy that this mess has ever been allowed to occur, and I intend to kick up as much stink as possible.

Not heard a thing about this, I chased Spark today. The have the final meter readings that were provided electronically from my new supplier. But the gas reading is wrong. Not a bit wrong, but by about 5 years worth of gas usage! Spark are adamant that is the reading that came across through the system from GB Energy. I've also spoken to GB Energy and they are insistent that the reading I provided is the one they sent to Spark (it's also the one they've used on my first bill as the initial reading). Spark agree that the reading they've got can't possibly be right (it's a 3 digit number, so it doesn't even look like a proper reading, and would mean my meter would have had to have rolled all the way over). But they both say the only way to resolve it is through the dispute process, where I give one reading now, and another in a weeks time, then the two of them get together and decide whether to agree on it. But that takes up to 30 days from getting the second reading. Meanwhile, Spark are sitting on hundreds of pounds of overpayments.