Thread: connaught collections/1st credit

Blinky
I would say that the SD has not been correctly served on you and is therefore unenforceable even though you have signed for it. It has to be served on you in person by a process server who then has to make an affadavit to accompany it with the Court documents should they wish to issue a bankruptcy petition. Obviously they will not be able to do this with a van driver from Interlink!

I cannot see anything that confirms toddles post though you could ring your
local Court for confirmation.
Until then it is probably safer to work along the lines that you are going to have to respond to the demand-and within the 18 day time limit.
[You don't say how much the debt is for, nor who it is too.]
Thee is some excellent advice on this website-
Statutory demands - What they are and how creditors use them

it gives you the choice of agreeing to pay by instalments [to avoid bankruptcy] or having the demand set aside for a variety of reasons. Have
a read of it and come back and let us know if you fit into any of those
categories or you feel there may be another one that may apply to you.
Once you have read that page, take a look at the next page to see if your
overall unsecured debts total less than £20,000 and read about asking
for a Certificate of Summary Execution.

I am not an expert on bankruptcy, but I imagine that those who have gone through it would probably admit that they would rather have avoided it if possible.

Have you already looked at reclaiming your unlawful charges from LTSB? If
not, do you have any of your statements that would give you an idea of
how much the total of those charges might be? Do you think they might be
a substantial part of the debt?
One chance I can see that you can contest is if you can show that
the bank hasn't stuck to the rules. And you could invoke them overcharging
as a reason for your financial problems. It would be a help perhaps if you also
banked with Lloyds and could show that the bank charges prevented you
from making payments on your credit card, and so you collected charges on your credit card that mounted faster than you could pay them off. In
additon because the bank chose not to pay a cheque say, of £10, not only
did you have to pay £25 for the return, plus a futher £20 overdraft charge,
you still had to pay the £10 to the company on whom the cheque was returned unpaid. Had they paid the cheque, it would have saved you £25.
And those cumulative charges on both your credit card and bank account
helped to put you where you are.

So I suggest you send an S.A.R - (Subject access request) to LTSB, there is a template letter in the FAQS-
Step bt Step guide on the first page of the forum. Do not include the phrase where it says that the statements will suffice. This will give you a chance to
argue that it is hard to defend your case as the bank have not delivered
your data in time to properly argue your case.
Send 1st credit a CCA request with a £1 postal order. They should have
delivered that to you before the Court case since they have twelve days to do it. Might help your case if they are in default themselves whilst in Court.

How about 1st Credit Blinky.Have they behaved in the short time they have dealt with you? Also, as they are taking you to Court, that usually means they own the debt. You need to find that out [asking Lloyds or getting your
credit report] since if that is the case, LLoyds should have informed you that
they have assigned the debt. And I understand that though !st Crediit do
inherit most of the terms of the original contract from LTSB, they should
have asked your permission to process your data. [You gave Lloyds permission
to tell debt collectors and Credit reFerence agencies if you missed payments
etc. But you did not give the collectors permission to pass on that info.]
I might be clutching at straws a bit for you, but perhaps some of the more
knowledgeable among the forum could confirm that. If it is right, you can
apply for a set aside because they have failed to comply with the rules.

If I am wrong,then still go to Court and argue your case. Point out your
situation to the Judge, and offer the £10 a month-IF you are sure that you can maintain that figure. It is better to quote a figure you know you can
stick to, rather than missing a payment or delaying one or two.

Another suggestion is to go to the "Genaral Debt" section, then the bottom
thread by Barracad in the "Sticky" thread subsection. Look at all the template
letters there and see if there are some you could use to send to your
creditors to reduce your outgoings and thus a bit of the pressure off you.

Blinky-sorry missed your last question. I read it that if you qualify under all four
categories, then you shouldn't be declared bankrupt.

Connaught it seems are doing this an awful lot lately, I suggest that you send them a CCA Request from the templates.
You will find they don't have the info and they will have to request the statements from the creditor.
This will put the account into dispute and when you get the statements you can make your claim for refund of charges.

As for statutory demand:

Rule 6 - 3

(2) The creditor is under an obligation to do all that is reasonable to bring the Statutory Demand to the debtors attention and, if practicable, to cause personal service to be effected.

The court may decline to file the petition if not satisfied that the creditor has discharged the obligation imposed on him by Rule 6.3 (2)

Service in bankruptcy proceedings can also be by way of post, through the letterbox, advertisement in the local press.......depending on the difficulty in contacting the debtor.
Although the rules in place mean that they have to take certain procedures before going to the more extreme service.

If an SD cannot be effected by personal servcie by a process server the process server can post a letter through the debtors letterbox stating that he will attend the premises on such and such a date to serve the documents. If the debtor is not avaialable that day he should contact the process server with a view to arranging a suitable aletrnative date or time. If the debtor does not contact the process server to say he can't make the appointment the process server can post the SD through the debtors letterbox and the SD is deemed served. Hence my earlier post sating that the SD has been incorrectly served.

Blinky-I wouldn't rely on arguing about the method of serving you with the
notice. In the CPR 6.2 delivery by first class post is one of the options.

6.2 - (1) A document may be served by any of the following methods -
(a) personal service, in accordance with rule 6.4;

(b) first class post;

(c) leaving the document at a place specified in rule 6.5;

(d) through a document exchange in accordance with the relevant practice direction; or

(e) by fax or other means of electronic communication in accordance with the relevant practice direction.


There is a great deal of difference between an S.A.R - (Subject access request) and a CCA request. you can compare them by getting the CCA template letter in the Genaral Debt
section-then goint to the last thread in the "sticky" subsection-the letter you want is number N.
You will find the S.A.R - (Subject access request) in the FAQS on the first page of the forum-then look in
the step by step guide. It will be an advantage to you should you read the
articles in that section so that you can put up a cohesive argument in your
defence, by claiming your debt is artificially inflated by the unlawful charges
levied by the c/card company when you missed payments etc, and you
should definitely push to have them removed at the very least.

PS Sherlock is perfectly correct in suggesting you send !st Credit a CCA
request-the quicker the better-don't forget to include a £1 postal order
and send it recorded delivery.

Lookingfor inf - You are incorrect in your statements as the info you have provided relates to service on a business and not an individual. There are different means of service for both

Bankruptcy Proceedings - Statutory Demand

1) Where it is not possible to effect personal service, service may be effected by other means such as first class post or insertion through a letterbox.

This is known as Substituted Service.
The defendant would have to place in court an affidavit in 'support of order for service by an alternative method'.

This would detail previous methods of trying to contact you with regard the debt owing (THIS COULD BE CALLING AT YOUR WORK, HOME, BANK AND LEAVING WITH THEM AN APPOINTMENT LETTER )

If you fail to contact them, or avoid them then the courts can make an order for service of said claim form by first class post to your last known address or only known address.

We cannot say if the SD is incorrectly served as you didn't point out any previous contact with the creditor (and its fully understood if you do not want to).

If you have been avoiding them, deal with the SD, ring the court etc and get clarification for your own peace of mind. (I would say it is scare tactics, but better safe than sorry!).


BUT DO THIS FIRST

CCA to Connaught, 1st credit, AND A Subject access request to the original creditor (TEMPLATES IN LIBRARY)
I would place an additional letter to the original creditor stating that you require clarification of information passed to Connaught and you will seek redress should your data protection rights be in violation. (let them worry about this, everything helps)

The courts do not take too kindly to creditors taking debtors to court for insolvency when the real reason is to force the debtor to pay up and as such until you receive ALL data requested you require the pursuing of the alleged debt amount to cease immediately.

SHERLOCK

Sherlock - you are 100% correct and have explained far better what I was saying

I think blinky needs to take some advice on whether bankruptcy might be the best option for her anyway given the circumstances that she has outlined. National Debtline or the CAB might be the best places to advise.

Bankruptcy no longer has the stigma that it used to and it allows someone with no assets to make a relatively clean start without constantly being hassled for debts they have no real prospect of repaying.

If Blinky's situation is as outlined, Connaught are unlikely to proceed with the bankruptcy petition anyway as there are no assets or income to attack but she shouldn't ignore the demand.

Lookingforinfo - what difference does it make that they are several hours drive away. Process servers are all over the country and the affidavit is made after the service of the documents. It is basically at statement of truth from the process server stating how and whent the document was served. Sherlocks post with regards to service is 100% correct and is exactly what I had been saying.
You also state that he cannot send a CCA request as Court action is already under way. It is not - the Courts do not get involved with SD's until there is an application to set aside.

That was an informative post Sherlock.

Blinky, on my first post to you, I included a link to company giving advice on debt. Don;t know if you looked at the rest of the site at the time, but there are also articles on IVAs and bankruptcy if you are considering them as a way forward. I am not recommending you use that company, if you do decide, it
is just a suggestion to read what they have to say as they give you the pros and cons involved with both options. Then it is up to you.


If you decide not to go down the insolvency/bankruptcy route, then you
will need to make the offer of £2.50 per week-providing you can maintain it
at that rate. And if that is the figure the Court agrees on, then that should
be sufficient to avoid bankruptcy.