Thread: OH has store card...any advice pls.

Some answers in red

Originally Posted by trevor33

My OH has had a store card for years (still current). She paid the monthly payment but nearly all was taken in interest and some late payment fees. For a number of years she was paying PPI until she tried to make a claim. It was made clear to us that, since she had not worked for many years, she could not claim for me as I had to give up work. Silly us!!
She cancelled the PPI. Now I think it is time to bring them to book. We sent a Subject access request and got the following reply.
Account opened July 1998
Due to elapse of time, unable to supply copy of agreement.
Unable to supply copy statements prior to Feb 2005.
PPi was in effect since account opened.
PPi cancelled Nov 2003
Premiums paid in that time £407.

Is the PPi reclaimable? some of it, the problem it was cancelled in 2003. Anything before December 2002 is not reclaimable (S5 Limitations Act 1980) You will need to get a move on as anythihng before 6 years before your claim will be statute barred.
Can we claim the penalty charges? Yes. In principle the same 6 year rule applies as for PPI. However, there is a difference. Whereas you know the PPI was useless 6 years ago, you didn't know the charges were unlawful. Therefore you can argue s32 of the Limitations Act 1980 which says that the 6 years starts when you discovered the mistake.
Can we claim interest on both? yes
How is best to proceed? Send them a prelim letter (see bank templates library) suitably modified ASAP. After 2 weeks send lba

Any thoughts anyone?

Due to elapse of time, unable to supply copy of agreement.

If they are saying that due to the lapse of time they no longer have an agreement then you are pretty much home and dry.

without an agreement they cannot enforce the debt.



I would write to them something along the lines of.

ACCOUNT IN DISPUTE,

Dear Sirs,

Account Number: XXX

Re; your recent reply to my request under section 77-79 of the Consumer Credit Act 1974

I notice that you have replied to the above request without enclosing the true copy of the original CCA agreement

I must inform you that this is not sufficient to comply with the request and that your company is still in default under the act.

To clarify, thie is a breach of the Act and Regulations as, apart from the information that the Regulations provide that you may exclude, the copy must be a “true copy” of the original executed agreement.

Sections 77/78 states that:

(1) The creditor under a regulated agreement for fixed-sum credit, within the prescribed period after receiving a request in writing to that effect from the debtor and payment of a fee of £1, shall give the debtor a copy of the executed agreement (if any) and of any other document referred to in it, together with a statement signed by or on behalf of the creditor showing, according to the information to which it is practicable for him to refer,—

This breach of the agreement can be demonstrated as follows;

As you will know section 180(1) (b) authorises, “the omission from a copy of certain material from the original, or the inclusion of certain material in condensed form.”

This refers to statutory instruments made under the heading Copies of document regulations and in this case in particular to the Consumer Credit (Cancellation Notices and copies of Documents) regulations 1983 (SI 1983/1557) and the Consumer Credit (Agreements) Regulations 1983 (SI 1983/1553).

Before leaving section 180 there are two other sections that should be remembered these are:

Section 2(2) (a) A duty imposed by any provision of this Act (except section 35) to supply a copy of any document is not satisfied unless the copy supplied is in the prescribed form and conforms to the prescribed requirements;

And more importantly

Section 2(b) A duty imposed by any provision of this Act (except section 35) to supply a copy of any document is not infringed by the omission of any material, or its inclusion in condensed form, if that is authorised by regulations.

You will see that this quite clearly states that whilst certain items may be left out of the copy document, the rest of the document must be in the form and contain all items as prescribed by the regulations.

Turning to the regulations regarding what may be omitted from these copies these are contained with SI 1983/1557.

The regulations state:

(2) There may be omitted from any such copy-
(a) any information included in an executed agreement, security instrument or other document relating to the debtor, hirer or surety or included for the use of the creditor or owner only which is not required to be included therein by the Act or any Regulations thereunder as to the form and content of the document of which it is a copy;
(b) any signature box, signature or date of signature (other than, in the case of a copy of a cancelable executed agreement delivered to the debtor under section 63(1) of the Act, the date of signature by the debtor of an agreement to which section 68(b) of the Act applies);

It is quite clear what can be omitted from the copy document, this again asserts that all other details of the agreement should presented in form and content as required by the regulations.

The requirements of the Agreement regulations 1983/1553 are very explicit in describing the form and content of an agreement and this as I have demonstrated also applies to the copy of any such agreement with the above mentioned proviso.

I hope this explains why your reply was unacceptable.

I await a True copy of my agreement and would remind you again that whilst the request has not been complied with the default continues.

As you are no doubt aware section 78(6) states:

If the creditor fails to comply with Subsection (1)

(a) He is not entitled , while the default continues, to enforce the agreement.


Therefore this account has become unenforceable at law.

You have failed to comply with a lawful request for a true copy of the said agreement.

Consequentially any legal action you pursue will be averred as both UNLAWFUL and VEXATIOUS and with be VIGOROUSLY defended, putting you to a STRICT PROOF of your claim and COMPLIANCE with the law.

Please also not that under section 127(3), the court is precluded from enforcing any agreement unless an agreement exists that is signed by the debtor and contains the prescribed terms listed under the Consumer Credit (Agreements) Regulations 1983 (SI 1983/1553).

The documents you provided DO NOT contain these prescribed terms.

Please note you may also consider this letter as a statutory notice under section 10 of the Data Protection Act to cease processing any data in relation to this account with immediate effect.

This means you must remove all information regarding this account from your own internal records and from my records with any credit reference agencies.

Should you refuse to comply, you must within 21 days provide me with a detailed Breakdown of your reasoning behind continuing to process my data.

It is not sufficient to simply state that you have a ‘legal right’; You must outline your reasoning in this matter and state upon which legislation this reasoning depends.
Should you not respond within 14 days I expect that this means you agree to remove all such data.

Furthermore you should be aware that a creditor is not permitted to take ANY Action against an account whilst it remains in dispute.


The lack of a credit agreement is a very clear dispute and as such the following applies.

• You may not demand any payment on the account, nor am I obliged to offer any payment to you.
• You may not add further interest or any charges to the account.
• You may not pass the account to a third party.
• You may not register any information in respect of the account with any credit reference agency.
• You may not issue a default notice related to the account.

I reserve the right to report your actions to any such regulatory authorities as I see fit.

You have 14 days from receiving this letter to contact me with your intentions to resolve this matter which is now a formal complaint.

I look forward to your reply.

Yours faithfully



I personally would then withold payment until they provide you with a properly executed CCA document

(The letter was shamelessly stolen from another post - not sure who should get the credit but It certainly isnt me )

Looks like a pt2537 'special' to me

Yes, but make sure you understand the basis on which you are claiming it

They are sort of right - under the 1983 regs they can send a copy of T&Cs in reply to a request under s78(1). They can't enforce it though.

No, they are complying with a request under s78 of the CCA 1974 by just sending T&Cs

YOu could write and say that they may very well view this debt as fully enforceable but without an original agreement the law takes a different view. Quote some relevant bits and tell them you do not expect to hear from them again.

I think your only option is to try a county court case under s142 of the CCA 1974

142.--(1) Where under any provision of this Act a thing can be done by a creditor or owner on an enforcement order only, and either--
(a) the court dismisses (except on technical grounds only) an application for an enforcement order, or
(b) where no such application has been made or such an application has been dismissed on technical grounds only, an interested party applies to the court for a declaration under this subsection,

the court may if it thinks just make a declaration that the creditor or owner is not entitled to do that thing, and thereafter no application for an enforcement order in respect of it shall be entertained.

what does anyone else think?