Hi again dx Thanks for the information once again! I have just looked through my credit file and checked the Date of Default on each Account and every account - all of my adverse credit history will cease to exist with regards to my credit report by November this year! My next step is to request a CCA on my two accounts and go from there, thank you for your help it's been invaluable and I hope others can take something from this too! Patrick

Wow dx, thank you for all of that! I can see that you hate the fact people are "cash cows" as you say for DCA's lol! There's a side to it though where people like myself whom never was in the situation prior & had no knowledge, the information provided by Lowell at the time was deemed by myself to be quite helpful by myself! In hindsight I would never let the same thing happen again. Now I know the "Account Opened" date on my credit file is actually he original creditor opening the account I can look through the history to find the original default dates? You'll also like to know that Lowell have always told me the default will not go off my credit file until Account is "Satisfied/Partially Satisfied", I believed this because EVERY month a default appears to be recorded on EACH account because this is how my Accounts are recorded on my credit file; Jan DF - Feb DF - Mar DF - Apr DF - May DF - Jun DF - Jul DF - Aug DF - Sept DF etc etc for every month since the account originally defaulted. I will request a CCA on my two remaining accounts asap! Thank you dx!

Thank you for your response dx100uk for the advice so but I still am not 100% clear of what I should do in my situation. I was under the impression that; - If I pay the outstanding amounts on the defaulted accounts these accounts will be "Satisfied" and no further action can be taken and those accounts will drop off my credit file after some time. - As I have already been paying monthly installments against the two final defaults I am deemed to have acknowledged them and I do indeed have to clear them or I will revert back to step 1 and defaults will continue until legal action is taken against me or 6-7 years when they drop off my file and are stature barred? I was also told (verbally) by Lowell that the fact the amounts on the default lessen, my credit file will become more attractive to lenders. You suggest I send a CCA request, can & should I do this now I have already been paying for these two accounts for years (like 4 years now..) - I know in the past they have provided me information, letters of agreements but I don't know if they were agreements I have accepted with them now. After each of the other accounts were paid I received acknowledgement from Lowell in form of email/letter stating that the account had been cleared and default altered to "satisfied". Please note that I have extremely little knowledge of these types of scenarios, I only ever thought it was unfair that if I had ignored these defaults I could have had them wiped from my file by now if no legal action was taken but by paying them I am almost handicapping myself further until they are paid, I imagine the "Satisfied" default remains for a further 6 years after my final payment on each? Great. I imagine you have answered these types of questions a million times but any information you can give me to help is extremely valuable to me so thank you Patrick

Hi renegadeimp Thanks for your reply What does a lemon debt refer to? The debts Lowell refer to are from accounts I held with various catalogues / credit cards e.g. K&Co when they existed, Littlewoods, Capital One etc. The original amounts were not abnormal to that of the original debts owed. brassnecked: Thanks for your reply This is something I don't have any knowledge about. If Lowell tell me an outstanding amount is owed and I pay that and it is then showing as "Satisfied" on my credit file, how can they engineer a new amount owing and sell that on? I don't understand and thats what scares me, I just want rid of it all! Going back to my previous post; - What is a realistic amount to ask for to settle the accounts I have left? What discount can I ask and realistically expect on the £2700 & £1500 debts? I will communicate with them via email only. - Will the defaults (all previously listed) hold a large negative effect on my credit file to potential mortgage lenders next year? (Accounts will have been satisfied/partially satisfied for a mixture of 1/3 years by that point) or can I expect the file to have begun its recovery by that point? Many thanks again!

Thank you dx100uk & brassnecked for your replies. dx100uk; With regards to everything you said you can see that I was ignorant to the situation, in my head at the time I acknowledged I owed the debt and thought a company would be honest? I know a DCA is not a bailiff but DID think they could take further legal action if I did not pay anything and I was under the impression that if they could contact me that meant my default date reset to the date of contact even if I did not respond (I was being called about 900 times a day) - I now know that as false but that does not help now. With regards to being ripped off, I meant that in the way that if I rang Lowell up today, agreed a settlement figure and paid it over the phone, could they then plead ignorance and still chase me for the remaining amount? What's the most I can realistically expect to get discounted for a settlement? Also Will a "partially satisfied" account vs "satisfied" make a difference next year when I look for a mortgage? Does the default still bear much impact on my file now than it did say 4 years a go? Or does it's effect lessen all the time even if still open? (and especially once Satisfied / Partially Satisfied). Full list of defaults on my file, I have no CCJ's etc - £2700 Opened: 13th March 2010 - Default - £1500 Opened: 2nd July 2010) - Default - PRA Group UK - Opened 31 May 2012 - Satisfied - Lowell - Opened 31 July 2010 - Satisfied - Lowell - Opened 7 December 2011 - Satisfied - Lowell - Opened 13 Aug 2009 - Satisfied - Lowell - Opened 18 July 2011 - Satisfied I take it the "opened" date is the date I opened the original credit account and not the time Lowell had my account? brassnecked: I have been paying these final two debts for years, I have been clearing the other debts as quickly as possible to just get rid of them and now have these two left. Thanks again!

Good Evening All, I have been reading through these forums for a while and decided to make an account after seeing how helpful everyone is in the hopes of extracting some valuable information from yourselves. I'm 27 and got myself into some trouble when I was around 18/19, borrowed too much money until I couldn't afford to keep up repayments and then buried my head in the sand ignored everything for a year or so and then decided I'd sort it out. Lowell had purchased my debts from numerous different companies and I had around 7 different defaulted accounts with them. I now have two left having paid off five of the others, I have paid them all in full and they now show as a Closed Account "Satisfied" on my credit file. The two remaining accounts are now at the following amounts (approx.) - £2700 (Default Opened: 13th March 2010) - £1500 (Default Opened: 2nd July 2010) Every single month the account is marked as "Default" on my file and is in the "Closed" section of Clearscore on the Accounts section. I have just been reading up on settlements with Lowell (just Googled it this evening) and came across a term "statute barred" and am wondering if anyone could give me any advice on whether this would effect my situation or not? Or if anything else does? I'm truly clueless ! I am now in the position where I can probably pull together a settlement figure but again I have absolutely no clue on where to start with this, is there a procedure to follow or do I just ask them what they'd accept? Is it that simple? I'm frightened of being ripped off by them after reading up on them, can I just ring and pay? Should I have email communication of everything first? If someone could point me in the right direction or give any advice I'd be really grateful. Also, do defaults dating back to 2010 as mine do(as closed accounts) hold much weight on my credit file? I have read so many different answers in the past! I'm going to save for a house after this debt is cleared and if anyone has any advice regarding that then that'd be great! Kind Regards Pat