Written by John Kruse, one of the leading experts on Bailiff Law, this consumer friendly guide is essential reading for anyone who comes into contact with a bailiff.
The book is easy to understand and clearly explains the rights
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Let me begin by explaining my choice of username. I joined this forum quite a while ago but used my own name. Until now I have merely used the site as a valuable resource and have never posted. However, now that I am making a post I feel that there is a need to retain some anonymity and so I have chosen the name Coactum. Coactum is a Latin word which most often has the meaning is to force or coerce although other meanings might be used depending upon the structure of the sentence. Anyway I feel that as the other side probably also read this forum that there is a need to become covert in these postings and so I thought this an appropriate name to use because I feel forced into taking action that I’d rather not have to do.
My story is probably not too uncommon. I find myself seeking help on this forum because of a lack of understanding from my creditors. Despite numerous letters to them spanning many years I was simply being overwhelmed by phone calls and the same old standard letters demanding payment.
I am self employed and my problems began about 3 years ago when two customers went into receivership and a third died all within a relatively short time span. In the lead up to my first client calling in the receiver I ran up bills on my cards believing that funds would soon be forthcoming and I’d soon manage to settle. These were not extravagant purchases but merely outlays to meet typical business and living expenses. Prior to 2006 I had almost £100K available to me between overdraft and credit card facilities and although this had rarely been used it is amazing how quick you can run up bills when there is little to no income coming in. Before I realised that the expected income would never be forthcoming I owed almost £80K and realising that my ability to service this debt would be a challenge I approached all my creditors to see if I could reach an agreement with them.
Most of my work involves longer term contracts and so in the main I can predict with reasonable accuracy how much is likely to come in and when I’ll most probably be in a position to make a payment. From June 2006 through to June 2008 I regularly communicated with all creditors and proposed repayments for the months ahead based upon this anticipated income. During this time I successfully reduced my debts to circa £67K but was being constantly pressurised to pay more. I had at times taken a mortgage holiday (with my lenders permission) so that I could fulfil my obligations to my unsecured creditors. I now know that this was unnecessary but at the time the daily deluge of phone calls was preventing me from getting any work done and this in turn was severely aggravating my predicament.
In June 2008 matter again took a turn for the worse when the contract I was working on was prematurely cancelled. I was working with a property company and as we all know that industry was one of the first to suffer under the current recession. So, once again I tried to negotiate reduced payments and or payment holidays with my creditors but sadly far be it from agreeing a reduction in payment most wanted an increase. This time I ignored their requests, advised all that I would no longer talk to them on the phone and insisted that all communication be in writing. Needless to say this request fell on deaf ears so I resorted to either hanging up the phone whenever they called, declining to go through their stupid “for identity purposes can you tell me...” script on the basis that it is me who needs to verify their identity not the reverse or by sending high pitched feedback down the line (yes I know this is childish and could damage someone’s hearing) whenever they called me. The feedback seems to be working!
From June 2008 until April 2009 I paid whatever I could afford. Sometimes this was as little as £5 per month but I endeavoured to pay whatever I could manage and although this did not stop the demands coming in I felt that I was demonstrating my willingness to meet my obligations in whatever way I could. However, as I had no new contracts and the trickle of maintenance that I do yields insufficient income I looked to this forum for help. Upon reading a quickly learnt that as all of my credit cards had been in place for between 10 and 26 years that they might all fall foul of the law. I elected to make a CCA request and cease further payment. I should add that I had contacted my mortgage provider and moved my mortgage to interest only to reduce outlays and have growing council tax arrears and therefore would have been unable to make any payment to unsecured creditors.
The first CCA request was posted on 2nd April and I sent a follow up letter on the 21st to alert them that the account was now officially in dispute and I communicated further on the 14th May to either question what they had sent (more below) or alert them to their continued failure to comply with section 78(6) of the Consumer Credit Act 1974. In this time the number of phone calls dropped sharply which was either down to my feedback response (BTW if you want to try this couple your hands around earpiece and mouthpiece on the phone to see if this feedback can work for you, it only works on one of my phones not all but it does seem to deter them from phoning. I can honestly say that if I were working in a call centre I’d refuse to make calls where me hearing might be damaged so if more of us did this then perhaps the poor recipients of the feedback would encourage their employers to stop phoning us and write as so many of us request) or the fact that they were not proceeding down the default route.
I will add additional entries for each bank Abbey, Bank of Scotland Halifax, Barclays, Citi Cards, First Direct, MBNA rather than extend this section too far as I’m not sure if there is a size limitation.
Where am I now:
Wescot acquired an Abbey loan account towards the end of 2007. Abbey were unwilling to accept anything other than the full monthly payment whereas Wescot are willing to accept anything you offer. They have by far been the easiest people to deal with albeit my CCA request has been ignored but they have sent a Notice of Payment Default letter
Blair Oliver & Scott representing Bank of Scotland & Halifax. I have been a Bank of Scotland customer for more than 30 years and the credit card currently in dispute was issued on 16/4/1985. They sent me a copy of the application form which has no reference whatsoever to being a Regulated Finance Agreement. The Halifax card began life as Bank One and again they have sent me a photocopy of my application form dated 8/10/1999 which from what I have read elsewhere on this forum is not valid. Both BOS and Halifax ceased sending statements yet my balance to BOS should be circa £7K and Halifax £8K. All has gone suspiciously quite at their end since I contested the validity of what they presented.
Barclays have acquired my Morgan Stanley account. I had an agreement to pay £50 per month with Morgan Stanley but Barclays insisted this needed to be at least £120. I declined their invitation to increase my payments and initially made a CCA request to them on 26/3/2009 as part of a letter in response to an arrogant letter I received from them. Ever since although they have been communicative they have failed to show me anything that resembles a CCA, they have not even sent the application form. What they have provided is similar to many other threads within this forum. A print of current T&C prints of what Barclays terms were when I accepted my Morgan Stanley card without explaining way this is in any way relevant and the standard response letter relating to my dissatisfaction with the documents provided. phone calls began from Mercers and were later passed to Calder Financial Services but they soon gave up when I declined to discuss anything with them over the phone. I now have a final demand for payment from Barclays for nearly £8.5K giving me until 10th June to settle or a debt collector will call etc. I’m sure you all know the letter I refer to.
First Direct withdrew my overdraft facility and cancelled my Gold Card back in 2006 the moment I intimated to them that I was anticipating financial problems. I have reduced the outstanding balance over the years since but I am presently being pursued by DG Solicitors, Midas Legal Services, Metropolitan Collection and Moorcroft debt collection. The overdraft is in Joint names and is the only debt that also involves my wife. The Gold Card is exclusively in my name. Along the way I successfully prevented them from simply grouping these two debts which would effectively have also made my wife jointly and severably liable to the element of the debt exclusively in my name.
There was another problem with First Direct insofar as I had a payment protection plan in place. I was unaware of this until I noticed the charge on my card and upon phoning to enquire I was advised that I had requested this on application. I said I was unaware of this and asked it to be cancelled because as I was self employed it would not pay out. The person I spoke to was very persuasive in convincing me that it did indeed apply to the self employed and so I allowed it to stay in place. When My problems began I asked what the procedure was if I ceased trading and claimed on this policy. I was immediately told that I could not claim under such circumstances and that I’d need to become bankrupt to effect a claim. I told them this was bizarre because if I were bankrupt I could not give a stuff about any debts. I then cancelled and attempted to get a refund of all premiums paid. This amounted to over £6K and the balance on the card at that time was a little over £10K so it would have made a huge difference.
They dug their heels in and refused to do anything, then shortly after called in my overdraft and cancelled my card.
My outstanding Overdraft is a tad over £3k and the Gold card circa £9K
Citi cards have not responded to my CCA request and ceased all communication. This is very strange I think. Their last contact was a phone call in which I referred the caller to my previous letters. He claimed to know nothing about these and so I enlightened him as to the content. He simply said “Oh I see. A number of people are taking that same course of action” and we ended the call.
The last statement showed the Outstanding sum of £8.2K and still shows my Credit limit being over £10K
This brings me to MBNA. What a strange bunch they are. When I had an arrangement in place they would call me several times a day if I were late in making the payment. They constantly strived to get the payment increased and would never consider any reduction. They bombarded me with standard letters, text messages and emails. They refuse to write other than sending letters inviting me to phone them! Yet now after they fail to provide the requested CCA they come in with a drop close. We will accept 30% of your outstanding balance as Full and final settlement. I don’t know about you but if I had that kind of money I’d be meeting my obligations rather than trying to explore the alternatives!.
I have two accounts with them and owe £9.2K an one and £9.6K on the other
OK now you have my story what help do I need. Well I’d like to hear from anyone else who has had similar problems with the aforementioned companies, ideally someone who has trod the path that I am on before and who can perhaps give me some pointers on what to do next. One final note of caution I’m in Scotland and for those who do not know we have a different legal process up here than our counterparts south of the border.
Well you seem to have everything in hand and organized.
As you hare aware if they fail to supply anyhting that's not a valid ccaor nothing at all the account in dispute letter can be sent.
Re PPI, have a read around the forum to reclaim it:
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First things first, it will make navigation and communication a lot easier if you split this into a separate thread for each CCA subject.
These were my first posts and I'm still going through a learning curve, so, if you think these should be seperated then perhaps you can advise how best to go about doing that.
Simply start separate threads in the relevant sections for each account.
I wasn't having a dig - merely trying to preempt the inevitable problem of people talking at cross purposes.
I have to say, from what you've posted so far you seem to have handled thing remarkably well! I can relate to your self-employment grief - I'm in a similar boat myself after an accident last year stopped me trading properly for five months. You soon find out that your loyalty has counted for diddly-squat!
I previously entered an extended dialogue with First Direct regarding the PPI which culminated in a letter from them in April 2008 in which they copied an online message which their system claims I read on 4/9/2002.
In this message they highlighted the words "We notice the you have chosen to protect your repayments" and later "read the terms and conditions sent"
In the covering letter they reiterated their stance that the plan offered worked for the Self Employed and to some extent this was true. Their get out was in the wording "Involuntary". Had I simply thrown in the towel claiming that my business was unviable they would not have paid out because this action was of my doing and being voluntary excluded me from making a claim.
Simply start separate threads in the relevant sections for each account.
I wasn't having a dig - merely trying to preempt the inevitable problem of people talking at cross purposes.
Thanks Smouk I'll look into doing that. Do you suggest that I simply start a new thread for each topic and reference the existing one from each of those?
I hope that you are now recovered and back to work.
Thanks Smouk I'll look into doing that. Do you suggest that I simply start a new thread for each topic and reference the existing one from each of those?
No need to cross ref - Just start a thread for issues with Barclays, another for First Direct and so forth. When two or three accounts get discussed in a single thread it can get confusing when talking about CCAs etc. As you have experienced the track of dispute with Bank A inevitably differs from that of Bank B.
Originally Posted by Coactum
I hope that you are now recovered and back to work.
Yes, but no thanks to certain institutions who seem a tad disappointed that I survived.
I do sometimes wonder if the van had Amex written on the side.
I should also express that I am not one to shirk my responsibilities just because i can exploit a legal loophole. I have endeavoured to meet my obligations and work with my creditors but some just make unreasonable demands.
I have regularly been supplied with an Office of Fair Trading Information sheet which makes sensible suggestions on how to manage debt. One of these suggestions tells you to list all your essential outgoings excluding unsecured creditors, deduct this from your net income, then apportion what remains among your unsecured creditors on a pro rata basis. This is more or less what I’ve been doing for the past few years. However, being self employed my income is subject to fluctuation and as such what I can afford to pay will vary. This regrettably is something that most companies systems cannot manage especially if you are proposing to reduce what you have been paying them. i.e. for the last quarter you paid £100 per month now you want to reduce that to £80 per month. In such a case they throw a wobbly and start making all kinds of unreasonable requests.
I've had various agreements with my creditors in the past. When I’ve had long term contracts I have updated them every quarter with a prediction on what I expected to be able to pay in the months ahead. More recently I’ve been doing minor work which typically pays an hourly rate. This is not guaranteed and in the main has proven inadequate but these are difficult times. Each time I have contacted most of my creditors to amend the payment they would only accept an increase. I have therefore ignored them and simply write each month stating that in accordance with the aforementioned OFT Guidelines on dealing with arrears I looked at what was left over and apportioned among my unsecured creditors. At this point in time my outlays exceed my income and so there is nothing left to give!
A few months back I made token gestures of £5 or £10 but this merely resulted in a deluge of calls demanding more. Strangely enough since adopting the stance that these debts may be unenforceable and writing to them in that regard the calls have almost stopped. As I write I just had a silent call from 0161 457 2875 which I guess was something to do with one of my card debts as I don’t know anyone in Manchester with that number.
I have assets, in particular my home has considerable equity despite the current property slump. However, many of these assets are jointly owned and so I’d guess that in the worst case scenario I could be pursued for up to 50% of the net assets which is probably just about what I owe. It would be very difficult to sell my home in the current market not to mention that I’d need to spend a few grand getting it market ready and then there is the cost of advertising etc. As such bankruptcy is not an option, nor is an IVA. Therefore, as I see it I have no other course of action than taking the path I am currently on.
Introduction & background to my debts
and the same old standard letters demanding payment.
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Originally Posted by smouk
