Thread: johanblog v arrow global

am also having problems with Arrow Global they sent me a letter saying i owes them a debt assigned by orange for £1149.45, and if it as not paid they would issue a statutory demand.

i sent them a letter Subject access request letter and saying that i disputed owing this money and enclosed a cheque for £10.00.

They replied to me today saying that the agreement was not covered by the Consumer Credit act1974 so they were not obliged to provide copy documentation and if they did not hear from me in the next seven days they would continue with the action.

Can someone tell me where i go next??

The bill is for a mobile phone bill taken out abount 2003 most of the charges are made up of text messages sent to my phone even though i kept contacting Orange to have thm stopped, i have asked for the full details of what the charges are for and i have still not received a itemised bill.

A SAR is made under the Data Protection legislation and anybody keeping data on you is obliged to supply that data on your request.This has nothing to do with the CCA.

It is true that mobile phone accounts are not regulated under the CCA which regulates money and not services. But they are completely wrong to suggest they do not have to answer a SAR because of this.

Can we have some more details?

When was the contract with Orange taken out?
Did you receive and keep a copy of the contract or any written terms and conditions for the account?
Up to what date is the amount that Orange claim?
Have you or Orange terminated the account?
What were the arrangements eg direct debit for paying this account?
What have you paid?
When did you ask Orange to stop text messages?.
Did your contract include a provision to charge for the receipt of text messages. If so was there a provision in the contract for you to refuse text messages?
Have you received a default notice or any letter saying that you owe them and have not paid?
Have you received a letter fron Orange that the account has been assigned to Arrow?

I believe you have asked for a itemised account from Orange. Have you received it? Do you dispute it?

It seems to me that mobile phone companies are using DCAs as the first method of collecting debt presumably because they get results because people have an unreasoning fear of DCAs. Though DCAs can take you to court they make all sorts of threats which they have no power to enforce. If they try court action this may well be best for you so do not be intimidated by the threat.

If you owe Orange there is no CCA to protect you and you will have to pay. However it is important that you agree with Orange what you owe and you should concentrate on this.

For the moment forget Arrow - if there is a dispute with Orange and you have not resolved this the account should not have been passed to them.

the account was opened in 2006 i received a statement from orange in June 2008 saying that the account balance was £0.00. and that the debt had been written of on the 29th May

i had requested detailed copy of the bill that made up the charges they were asking me for.

i made many phone calls to Orange to have the text stopped and was always given the same information which was, send stop to the text when i received them and also a phone number to ring to complain about the company sending them, but the text just kept on coming all times of the day and night.
i paid the bill by cheque, there was no direct debit, i told orange to canell the phone because i had just paid a large phone bill,

i have not received any itemised bill either from orange or Arrow, just a letter saying there is ample evidence available to prove the existence of a agreement between you and the original creditor, in the circumstances we shall be obliged to receive your proposals for repayment of your debt.

The SAR i sent was copied from this site and a cheque for £10.00 was enclosed.

Get that itemised bill from orange. Do not ask the DCA the paperwork is rarely passed to them. The request must be in writing and recorded delivery.

Did you send the SAR by recorded delivery? Have they cashed your cheque?

You do not deny that there was a contract between you and Orange but you say you cancelled it. All you require is the bill up to the date of cancellation. They must prove the amount if they are to take you to court.

Did you do all your business by phone? They will say you did not phone whenever it suits them- everything in writing in future and recorded delivery. They lose letters as a matter of course even recorded dlivery letters but you have the proof that they were were sent.

i never signed a contract with orange, and yes i did send the SAR recoded deivery to Arrow because it is they who are about to issue the satutory demand, the £10.00 has been cashed,
Please see above the reply they sent about not sending the information i asked for.
All my comunication was done via the phone

To Be Honest The SAR Should Have Been Sent To orange
But Say To Arrow As They Are Now The Creditor, They Have An Obligation To Release That Data

Confused As You Say You Never Signed A Contract

Please Explain

I received another leter from Arrow today, saying they are in the process of requesting the documents relevant to my Data Protect Act 1998 request.

I did not sign a contract i was on pay as you go and when i rang to add funds to my phone they asked me why i did not go on the monthly charging i agreed and that was that, biggest mistake i have made.

They did not put a stamp on the envelope of the latest lettes and i had to pay £1.30 to the post office when i picked the letter up this morning

There is a lot we do not know about this situation. A DCA can act in two capacities

a) as an agent for the original creditor (OC). They will get a commission on what they recover

b) They may own the debt - they buy it for a small amount (perhaps 10%) hoping that you will pay up the whole amount so they make a profit. To do this a proper deed of assignment has to be drawn up and the OC must inform you that the assignment as been made.

At some time you will need to know what the situation is but in the absence of a notice of assignment assume it is a).

First you must get rid of Arrow. They probably have no more information than the account number, your name, address, phone number and the amount of the alleged debt. Their reply to your Subject access request is a nonsense - you are not disputing the contract but the amount of the debt and in particular the charges for premium text messages.

So write to them in the following terms changing things where necessary. Recorded delivery !

Dear xxxx.

I do not acknowledge any debt to you or orange.

Because I was not receiving information from you that could enable me to assess whether a debt ( and particularly its amount) is owed by me I sent you an Subject access request on xxxx. An Subject Access Request entitles me to all information that you hold on me including documents, computer records and recordings of telephone conversations. You appear to be treating this Subject Access Request as a request for a copy agreement under the CCA(1974). A Subject Access Request is made under the Data Protection Acts and you are bound to answer it.

Please therefore send the required information. Ignoring my rights in this matter will inevitably result in a complaint to the Information Commissioner.

It must be clear to you that this alleged debt is disputed with Orange. I would remind you that The OFT considers it Unfair practice for a lender to pass on (in whatever capacity) a debt to a DCA which is in dispute. In addition the OFT holds that it is unfair for a DCA to pursue a debt that is in dispute.

I would therefore advise you, to avoid a complaint to OFT, to return the debt to Orange.

I will not communicate with further on this matter.

Yours xxx.

How annoying that Arrow are requesting information from orange, I would still send the letter in my post iognoring their letter. I bet they are agents for Orange.

Text Messaging.

I only use mobile phones for emergencies and I have never seen the sense of the text messaging culture so I do not know a great deal about this.

It came as a great surprise to me that yu can be charged for receiving a text. This is too easily used by [problem]mers and the phone operaters are not exactly going to police this adequately as it would reduce their profits. Its a bit like BT's initial attitude to rogue diallers.

It seems that in some way you have to request these messages but it could easily be arranged by a [problem]mer to start sending messages without request. Did you request them?


However it seems that you can stop receiving requested but unwanted texts by texting back 'STOP' or 'STOP ALL' Did you send such messages?

Obviously this 'STOP' techniique is very likely to be ignored by these [problem]mers

If after sending the stop texts you still receive messages Orange require you to report this and they will sort it. You say you did report it but the nessages continued. Why should Orange stop an income stream?

It would seem to me that you have been [problem]med and you should not have to pay for these texts because Orange have ignored the situation.

How on earth can the telecom regulators allow this!

I received the records that Arrow have kept on me but no statments of account and no credit agreement, last week a guy came to the gate and asked for me i was not in, on Friday i received a letter saying they would be coming on Thursday to hand me a SD, i rang them and said the account is in dispute and you still have not provided me with the information requested without they guy on the phone sounded quite young and he said orange did not send them the statements just an amount of £1100 as being unpaid, and i should write to them again and tell them the account is in dispute.
What should i do now wait for the SD or send a letter recorded delivery so they get it before thursday.

I doubt the visit will still go ahead regardless. Of course, you don't have to be there. As noted earlier in the thread, Arrow cannot provide statements and it is unreasonable to expect them to. They are there to collect a debt and make a profit. Similarly, there is no credit agreement so there is no requirement on them to show you one.

From what you said earlier, you do not dispute the debt was owed to orange. The network advised you it has been 'written off' this is true, but it doesn't mean your responsibility to repay has ended, this will continue regardless. After 6 years it may become uncollectable, but it still remains as a debt owed.

How much was owed originally? Have you checked your credit file to see what it says was the amount in default? Global will be adding their fees and charges, but assuming you haven;t agreed to this you could agree to pay what the original debt was they can go whistle for the rest.

When i could not get orange to stop the unwanted text being sent to me i told them i was closing the account and to send me a statement of all the outstanding, i then destroyed the sim card and went back on a different network, i then received a letter telling me i owed them £1100 i aske for statement so that i could check just what i had been charged for, i never received these statements so i could never contest the charges for the text that were being sent almost every hour of the day and night.

In the above what you are saying is that even if a Subject access request is sent Arrow do not have to comply with it!!!

Arrow have told me they are the inhouse collections for Orange

A SAR is not a magic pill that reveals information about a data subject you may be unaware of. All it does is require the firm who receives the request to provide all relevant data THEY HOLD about you.

You are not Arrow's customer - simply the subject of their attention. Therefore, all the information they may hold about you may be limited to simply your name and address, the name of their client (orange) and the amount they have been asked to collect. There will then be a list of their interactions with you regarding the type and times of contact and your responses. Nothing relevant in letting you find out what or how these charges were calculated. Paying £10 just for this is a bit of an extravagance yes they so have to comply, but the information they hold will probably be inconsequential. If Arrow are Orange's in-house collection service, then your SAR should be to Orange themselves.

Now, Orange will hold all this information - but the longer you wait, the detailed information will be lost, and perhaps only summary data and totals with dates. Making it difficult to challenge if you've already disposed of the detailed information they sent to you at the time.

Because you effectively stopped communicating, the situation simmply rolled on and then returns to bite you.

As i keep saying i never recieved a final statement and what about the fact that Arrow never bothered to inform me that they did not have some of the documents requested in the SAR.

There's no such thing as a 'final statement' this is not a CCA regulated account, and as a service contract there will have been invoices and or statements, not a 'final' one - unless you wish one to prove the owed balance is zero.

Your expectation of what Arrow have or have not is not their concern. YOU called the shots, and if you send them a SAR they have to comply. They're not going to provide you with a shopping list of items they have to let you decide whether it is worthwhile making the request.