Thread: Step by step...

Hi everyone

I have been up most of the night reading the posts on here, its amazing how quickly time flies when you are having fun!

The only thing my little brain is struggling with is finding the starting point with some of the processes.

I'm trying to help my girlfriend who may have fallen fowl of the banks evil practises. She has a loan (unsecured) with Northern Rock and a credit card with Barclays. Barclays raided her current account yesterday to pay of some of her credit card, which was a bit of a surprise as she had a payment arrangment in place that had been running fine. So that god me reading up on things on here, it turns out they are entitled to take the money but it has opened up a whole load of other questions

Over the last 6 years they have taken up to £120.00pcm from her current account. I'm sure a lot of people know the spiral of charges making you overdrawn which then causes charges etc etc

They have also hammered her with late payment charges and overlimit charges etc on her credit card. If she managed to get all these charges back she would have a healthy bank balance rather than worrying about being in debt.

She has had her credit card and bank account for nearly 15 years so i'm wondering whether there is a copy of her contract still in existence.

Basically, given the way they have treated her, I would like to see her get some payback on this one but although I can follow a lot of whats being said on here I could do with someone giving me the idiots guide to the starting point, which letter should she send first etc etc and a pointer to a good example of this letter. I was going to crack on and send a SAR, but there seems to be a few examples on here, some very short and others that itemise a number of bit of information required...

I'm also a bit confused about CCA's and SAR's. A lot of threads start by saying "I CCA'd the bank etc " and others start by SAR'ing the bank. Some pay £1 and others £10, there is a 10 + 2 days and a 40 days and unfortunately I cant really find a staring point to this

I'm sure the info is there somewhere and apologies if I'm going over much covered ground but your guidance on this would be appreciated

OK - a lot depends on what paperwork you have retained.

If you have all the statements, then you don't really need to do a Subject access request as that is just to get copies of the statements.

The first step is to get a CCA (Consumer Credit Act Agreement) request in for a copy of the original agreement. You will find the letter in the templates section.

Copied this from a post by Steven4064 which might be helpful

Copies of agreements

Sections 77, 78 and 79 of the Consumer Credit Act 1974 give you the right to request a copy of the executed credit agreement for your account from the creditor. The creditor is either the original creditor (for example, the credit card company) or a company to whom the agreement has been assigned.

Section 77 applies to regulated fixed sum loans (e.g. bank loans),
Section 78 applies to regulated running account credit (e.g. credit cards), and
Section 79 applies to regulated consumer hire agreements (e.g. hire purchase agreements)

In all cases, if you request a copy of your agreement and quote the relevant section of the Consumer Credit Act, the creditor must comply within 12 days. If no money is owing (and no money is to become owing) the creditor does not need to comply. They also need not comply if you have made a similar request in the previous month.

If the creditor fails to comply with the prescribed period (12 days), then they may not take any enforcement action until they do comply. For agreements signed before 2006, if they fail to respond within a further calendar month, then they commit an offence (Note - not a criminal offence).

Enforcement actions include:
- Requesting or demanding payment
- Sending you a default notice
- Giving information relating to the account to any third party, particularly credit reference agencies
- Passing the account to a debt collection Agency or assigning it to a Debt Purchaser.

As noted above, the creditor must send a copy of your agreement on request under one of these 3 sections of the Consumer Credit Act.

However, the Consumer Credit (Cancellation Notices and Copies of Documents) Regulations 1983 define what may be sent in response to a request under ss77-79. they have to send a 'true' copy but this is far short of an exact copy. They may just send a copy of current terms and conditions.

Requests for copies of agreements for fixed loans and hire-purchase agreements normally produce a proper copy of the executed agreement.

However, credit card companies usually send a copy of the application form (often without a signature) and a copy of current terms and conditions, which fully complies with the 1983 regulations.

You should be aware that compliance with a request under sections 77, 78 or 79 and an agreement being enforceable have nothing to do with each other.

The CCA request is letter N from here
http://www.consumeractiongroup.c o.uk/forum/general-debt-issues/20758-creditors-dcas-letter-templates.html

You might find it easier following the first time user's guide, the FAQ section and, finally, this
http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk...ease-read.html

Thanks for your response. I'm going to start slowly working through this and see where it leads.

I have just read throug your CPR info. I can see the merit in going down that route, although it seems a bit more complicated...

Thanks or the pointers. Isnt everyone helpful on here? If the banks customer services were half as keen to help it would be a good start!

In terms of timings, am I best trying to help my girlfriend to claim back all her charges etc first, then that done challenge whether or not the debt is enforceable? I would reckon they would owe her a small fortune, and although my main purpose is to stop the disgusting way they have treated her it would be a cherry on top to manage to get her some money back and then challenge the rest of the debt

There seems to be quite a few very intelligent, very legally minded people on here that have had great successes with sorting things out. To be honest with you, I'm not the brightest guy around so I may need some patient guidance and advice with this!!

Out of interest, if you have barclaycard debt which includes charges etc and you successfully claim a refund is there anything you can do to prevent them from just using the refund to reduce the balance on your credit card, bearing in mind the next step is to see if the debt is enforeable at all. I'm just trying to get my head around the right order to do things in: should we go for the charges then challenge the debt or challenge the debt then go for charges??

I'll get the hang of this eventually!!!