Good afternoon everyone

My son has received a letter from Pastdue chasing an alleged BT debt,

as he is away in the army at the moment,

he has asked me to help deal with this.

This is a bit of a story so please bear with me and I will try to explain the best I can.

In 2011 my son left home and headed off to Minehead,

he followed his (then) girlfriend who lived there with her parents.

some 12 months or so later the relationship broke down and he turned to a housing association for help to house himself

(he was working at a powerplant) so able to pay his way.

Things then took a turn for the worse in 2012 as my dad passed away,

my son took this very very hard as his passing was sudden and hit the family very hard.

In 2013 my son signed a contract with BT to have broadband and a phone line turned on (service was already in the property but disconnected).

He recalls agreeing to a contract with BT in Feb 2013,

however, in March 2013 my son decided to come back home, and in May 2013 he did just that.

This is where things get a bit fuzzy,

today he has called Pastdue, who claim that he owes BT the best part of £800 for services provided during the period covering Feb 2013 - May 2013!!!

He has asked Pastdue to provide:* Proof of Debt* Copy of the contract* Statement of account* Itemised statements clearly showing the breakdown of money owed

The response from Pastdue was that they didn't have any of that information,

that he would need to contact BT

they were only collecting the money (oh and threatening 'further action' if monies remain unpaid).

Any advice on this would be gratefully received,

I presume that Pastdue are a 'usual' DCA and should be treated in the same ways as the others?

I want to be able to sort this properly,

he admits that he owes something but need to get to the bottom of 'what' he actually owes

and potentially extortionate charges!

Thanks in advance!

Past Due will do NOTHING. They are a low rent DCA who do nothing so you have nothing to fear. Just ignore.!

credit file time me thinks

certainly never pay a no powers DCA

least of all these bottom feeders

and he need to stay off the phone too!!

dx

Thanks DX, I think he is worried, being in the Army etc he wants to have and keep a clean financial slate, which I understand.Am I able to look at his credit file or is that something that only he can do?

depends if he has ever used any

say noddle

might work if you know his details

dx

I've had a similar thing occur with my daughter.

Although in my case, I agreed the contract online and paid line rental for the first year upfront.

BT said I had to do it this way and then once the services were up and running I could go online and change the name and bank details to my daughter.

I did this, and after six months my daughter moved to another address so we transferred the service and no further payment was requested.

She stayed at her next place for six months and then we informed BT that she was leaving and the service no longer required.

As far as we knew there were no outstanding charges.

..then I receive a phone call from CD UK (Collect Direct) asking for payment close to £300 - for what exactly I have no idea.

.upon checking Collect Direct on the FCA website,

their license to practice Debt Collecting is INACTIVE and has been since Dec 2014.

Therefore I will be ignoring all said texts, emails and calls as they aren't even allowed to be doing this.

Which means they can't enforce anything - no matter how much they threaten!

and they cant do anything anyway

they are not bailiffs

no DCA ever can be ...totally powerless

dx

Thank you for that reassurance dx

Tell him not to worry about having a clean financial slate, I don't know of anyone in the forces who doesn't have some sort of

financial problems.

Unless he goes on to do a specialist role such as intelligence then the Army will never need to know of his finances.

Deal direct with BT, ignore the powerless DCA.

A SAR to BT regarding this will flag up just how they came to this figure!

Thanks BBI will do just that