Both VERY useful. Thank you so much. Will pass these on and if she has any other issues I'll get her to register with the site and give more details. x

I am trying to help a friend of mine find out when she can have a debt removed from her credit file. Because the original debt was so long ago (card taken out early 2013) she's a bit vague on the details but is pretty sure it was an Aqua card and that she defaulted pretty quickly on the payments, moved soon after and never paid another payment. She would get occasional emails but nothing aggressive or threatening with court etc so didn't engage with them. In 2018 she noticed a default for the debt (£6k) was registered by Cabot and came up on her credit file. My question is - should her 6 years start from when she actually defaulted on payments (2013) or when the debt management company registered it? If it's the former then is it worth her getting details of debt (which means engaging) and having it wiped from her record? She has none of the original paperwork now and her credit report just shows the amount with absolutely no detail whatsoever. Thanks in advance for any assistance you can give.

Thanks for clarifying Andy, I'm not too hot on the terminology. Should that have made any difference at the SJA hearing? Am I right in thinking the judge should have asked to see proof from the defendant which he specifically mentioned he had on the form? We are both worried about the fairness of the full hearing if the same judge hears it. I was with daughter as a Mackenzie friend and although I have appeared in court in this capacity before, this time I felt out of my depth when we (and the facts!) were ignored.

Thanks for your reply ericsbrother but judges are meant to deal with fact first of all The burden of proof was on the defendant. He said he had proof. He didn't produce it. We produced proof that showed he was being less than truthful. It should have been a very straight forward decision in our favour. Apologies plodderton, only just noticed your post. He already filed his defence back in April I believe. He didnt fill in the DQs in time so daughter got default judgement. He didn't apply to have it set aside until over two months after the judgement. Because of the judge's behaviour at the set aside hearing though, I really think daughter needs proper advice now either on how to reverse the set aside or how to proceed with the full hearing.

There was a hearing last week Andy. Defendant claimed he'd been in hospital for most of the seven weeks he had to file his DQ. We had social media posts that proved otherwise but the judge didnt look at them and set it aside anyway. Defendant had said on N244 that he had proof that he'd been in hospital but didn't bring anything to court. He said the judge could 'ring the hospital' if he wanted but the judge said that wasn't necessary as he believed him! My jaw nearly hit the floor a couple of times.

Update: Dealer got it set aside. I have no idea how as his excuses were ridiculous and the fact he waited over two months after judgement to apply wasn't even dealt with. Still in shock. Date now set for a trial but I've told daughter she really needs proper legal advice now because of what happened in the last hearing. She got a written reply from bailiff manager but just giving a sort of (inaccurate) timeliine, no real response to her complaints.

So the fact the log books are not in his name shouldn't stop them seizing them because the dealer still owns them? The sales receipts will surely still show he's the owner? He seems very well prepared.

Update: I don't know whether to laugh hysterically or cry. Daughter's letter got passed to bailiff manager who is based at a different court so she was misinformed by the local court about who was in charge. She rang the manager today and it seems no goods have been taken control of. She was on speaker phone when she spoke to the bailiff originally and I specifically heard him say he had taken control of 'everything on the forecourt'. The dealer apparently buys these cars at auction but doesn't change the ownership before selling them on and so claimed none belong to him. The manager is taking that side of it further. Apparently the dealer has now applied for SJA but I'm fairly confident he won't get very far with it. It's all a horrible mess.

My daughter wrote to the manager on 22nd so he should have got that on Monday but no response as yet. Car dealer seems to be selling cars through a third party but as she didn't get a list of the goods taken into control she doesn't know if he's doing anything wrong yet. In the letter she asked for a list of the goods as it wasn't on the update sheet the bailiff sent her. The update said “The goods taken into control are: DEFENDANT TO APPLY TO SJA” (their caps).

Thank you so much for your reply. Daughter is now waiting for a time when she feels calm enough to try and contact the manager. After a bit of googling I found this: "An application to set aside a default judgment does not stop the enforcement.The judgment remains in force until it is set aside. It can therefore be enforced and there’s nothing to prevent the claimant from continuing enforcement action to recover their money. Even if you have already begun the application process, the bailiffs are still allowed to seize and sell your goods." Our bailiff was claiming he couldn't proceed even if the defendant was only saying he was ABOUT to apply. The information above says that even if the defendant starts the application the enforcement can still go ahead. So which is right? I can't see it being correct that a defendant can keep claiming he's about to do something but not do it and use that as a tool to prevent a claimant getting their money.

Daughter spoke to bailiff today as the seven days should have started from 12th September. He said that he can't physically take the goods while the defendant is saying he is going to put an application in to set aside. He said this could go on for the rest of the life of the warrant (a year). When I've seen tv programmes with HCEOs they always state that they can take the goods unless they see the actual application. Surely it can't be different for CCB? Surely they have to see an application before they stop action?

Thank you so much for your replies. We're both feeling a lot more hopeful than we were when we saw the letter. Will keep you updated.

Thanks for all the replies. Judgement was for just under £3k The car place did file a defence and at that point both sides were asked to fill in some sort of form. They both had to have the form in by a certain date but the car place didn't do this. They were informed they had so many days to apply to have this possibly looked at again but they didnt respond. At that point she got a judgement. She heard today that the bailiff has taken control of goods but only on paper. The car place wants to apply to have the judgement set aside. Apparently they have seven days now to do this. Why is this only happening now? They've had all these months to apply so why is the bailiff giving them even more time??

Thanks alreadyexists, While that is probably the only way to go now it annoys me so much on her behalf. He hasn't provided her with the service she's paid for so why the County Court should keep her money I don't know. It wasn't made very clear when she issued the warrant who she was doing that through and that she had a choice. Like I say, she'd assumed it was High Court. Incidentally, does anyone know whether it's an easy matter to add additional costs on after the fact? She's been paying for tax and insurance all this time (about eight months in total since she first sent LBA) and had no idea it was going to take this long so hadn't factored them in.

Apologies if this is in the wrong category as I can see almost all advice re: bailiffs is for debtors but I need advice on how to get a County Court Bailiff to actually enforce a warrant against a company. My daughter won a claim online for a faulty car that was sold to her. Dealer didn’t pay up and she thought she had then instructed HCEOs but it turns out she instructed the County Court Bailiff. This was in July. There was a mix up with the paperwork which took a couple of weeks to sort out but since then the Bailiff has only been out to the dealer once, at 8am. Not surprisingly it wasn’t open. The Bailiff hasn’t been back out since. I rang up and asked generally how long it takes to enforce a warrant and they said ten days. This should be a very simple thing to sort out with so many cars on the forecourt. As it’s now been almost two months can my daughter ask for her fee back and go with HCE instead? Surely there is an obligation on the Bailiff to enforce warrants in the order they receive them (where possible of course). What are her options now? Any help at all would be appreciated.