At the moment we are all issuing at courts throughout the land so any overall picture is being slow to emerge to the authorities.

Therefore as we all know we are unlikely to have to attend so how about we all issue in the same court. Say for arguments sake Northhampton & if we do have to travel at least it's central

As a more pragamatic apparoach why not say regional approach?

Is there a chance that if someone from say cornwall puts northampton down that the bank or cc company will actualy defend and turn up?

I realsie what you are saying and agree up to a point, but it would be a shame if we did this and it backfried.

Sorry if i have got the wrong end of the stick.

Glenn

I realize there are a lot of us but I don't think there are enough (yet) in any one area to make the impact I had in mind (unless someone knows diifferent)

I banks do turn up it'll be a 1st & don't we want to get the buggers into court anyway. I would do my damdest to attend & I live in the SW. Also bearing in mind that it could happen to a member who's a bit strapped for cash I would be willing to contribute to the costs of that "chosen" member getting there.

I still think in our campaign we should become more proactive as group.

Anyway vote your choice

I realize there are a lot of us but I don't think there are enough (yet) in any one area to make the impact I had in mind (unless someone knows diifferent)

 

I banks do turn up it'll be a 1st & don't we want to get the buggers into court anyway. I would do my damdest to attend & I live in the SW. Also bearing in mind that it could happen to a member who's a bit strapped for cash I would be willing to contribute to the costs of that "chosen" member getting there.

 

I still think in our campaign we should become more proactive as group.

 

Anyway vote your choice

Forgive me if I am wrong but I thought that your address defined your local court and individuals had no say over it, so local court is where any hearing is likely to end up. Northampton is just the bulk MC court

I voted yes, im not rich but could fund my own travel be interested to see how many people vote not many so far.

Forgive me if I am wrong but I thought that your address defined your local court and individuals had no say over it, so local court is where any hearing is likely to end up. Northampton is just the bulk MC court

They don't like it but you can choose to issue in any court you want. Its then upto the judge to transfer. However if you insist it remain in that court then they have little choice

I for one could think of many reasons why I chose a particuler court such as a holiday, staying with friends etc:

I voted no.

The court system is currently struggling with the number of claims being processed. No one court would ever have the capacity to manage such a large number of cases as will be produced by this site on top of their normal workload.

We really do not need to go upsetting the court system as it has served us well so far.

Are you actually suggesting that the courts would be prejudicial against us if we drew attention to our cause by making it highly visible.

I don't think so. To begin with to suggest the courts have been helpful is to misunderstand how the courts work the courts have only been doing their job.

Also it would demonstrate to the powers that be that it's not us clogging the system but the banks who are refusing to settle unless we issue proceedings

At the moment the various courts only see the occasional claim. They don't see the whole picture

The successful reclamation stats on CAG are filled in voluntarily without audit. Far be it from me to suggest they might be overstated, if anything I suspect they would be very much understated.

However neutral observers and hesitant claimants outside of CAG forum may be sceptical. Being without legal training myself, can I ask if it is possible to obtain objective stats from County Courts Small Claims division, to clearly show:

how many claims were lodged against HSBC,

how many against Lloyds etc,

how many claims were withdrawn following out-of-court settlement?

Alone of all the institutions Egg Card appears to be taking on all claimants and defending against claims and intimidating claimants in arrears with open retaliatory threats of CCJ. (Has anyone succeeded with refunds from Egg Card beyond the £4 per item without interest? If yes please say so.)

Stubborn resistance from the money vultures need to be softened up. Egg Card deserves special attention from united, concentrated, focused firepower. If the number of claimants from the general public were to rise exponentially, Egg Card for one cannot hope to cope with answering 10,000 phone calls and letters per day, just the effort of replying and rebuttal will cause the organisation to grind to a halt. The publicity in the national press will maim them.

Egg stands alone, wealthy as it is, but there must be over a million qualified Egg claimants, at least. Egg cannot possibly stand up to a general uprising. Aux armes!

EGG

Egg have the Direct Debit rule, therefore it is very rare that anyone misses a payment. As far as I know Egg have never charged me an over-limit fee. They've only ever sent me a reminder. So I doubt you will get many cases against Egg.

Back to the court thing.

I agree with the same court thing, it can raise awareness, but there are other ways to raise awareness, say by writing a letter to the Office of Fair Trading, as it has been suggested to the users of The Consumer Action Group Forum within the template letters. (So, actually I'm going to say no!)

I think the best way of raising awareness would be by attempting to acquire accurate statistics from the courts, forwarding this information to the OFT and by publicising CAG through the media.

Sorry angeljen

But its obviously gone unnoticed by you that ever man/woman & his dog has written to the chocolate teapot OFT without success. If they ain't aware if it by now the never will be.

OK, scrap that idea... Just publicise the balls off CAG... I'm prepared to go down to my local banks and hand out flyers, no probs. I just doubt that everyone going to the same court is going to help as much as just general publicity would. It's going to be a hugh ball-ache for a lot of people to make the effort to travel to, say, Northampton. But if you really think that it will help, ten I would be prepared to give it a try as I don't live too far away from Northampton (it's only a county away). I'll keep an eye on this thread and see what everyone else thinks. (I'm off down the bank with mi DIY flyers methinks!)

Angel, your reasons articulated with smooth moderation are as eloquent as your photo is fetching.

Re your first point on Egg, evidently cardholders who became hard-up can no longer meet D/Ds when they fall due, hence big late payment charges repeated month after month. Such penalties are no longer wake-up calls, as persons in distress cannot do otherwise even if they wanted to.

On the second point of over-limit charges, there is a circumstance who have not thought of, I shan't go into details here as I would not like the Egg lawyers to make the link between my postings.

In another scenario, interest compounding monthly, plus late-payment charges at £20 a month would soon put an account over the credit limit. Once again the cardholder is on the floor, with Egg's jackboot on her/his throat and no way of escape. Egg knows the punitive charges have no effect in encouraging payment -- not from persons unable to pay. For them the charges are golden eggs laid once a month.

No one said scrap the idea in fact I try & encourage everyone to send them copies of the banks "get stuffed" letters just so that the OFT can see what high regard they hold them in....not.

I was only pointing out that it had already been done so far without success

My suggestion isn't meant to overide any other action but an added attempt to bring it to the attention of the judiciary who seem to be oblivious to whats going on.

Mistermind I'm interested in your comments about there being circumstances not thought of & your not wanting to give anything away because of eggs lawyers.

Not being an egg lawyer perhaps you would be kind enough to PM me to discuss

The only objection that I can see is that Nothampton is th "home" of MCOL which is not a good vehicle for our purpoese.

MCOL transfer claims to the local court as soon as a defence is lodged, so I am not sure that the courts will allow everyone to use a non local court by choice unless everyone uses MCOL which I would oppose

Since someone made an error in setting up the poll, I have done that which is usually only possible in Parliament: I have voted for both "Yes" and "No".

I have voted "yes", since if one court does find hundreds of these cases on their list, and stays are consistently appealed, someone will catch on to the abuse.

I have voted "no", since there are practical concerns, not only with actually getting to the court should you need to attend, but also there is a risk that cases may be prejudiced if the court decides we're taking the mickey.

I have little doubt that after issue the court will transfer the matter to the local CC & the whole idea is to let the courts see who IS taking the mickey

Not only that, but it does leave us open to accusations by the banks of barratry (as empty and unfounded as those accusations would actually be).

I've been reading around the website and have noticed a couple of posts about Courts applying 'stays' to cases while they awaited the outcome of a similar case in a higher court. Surely this means that a fair few of the courts are quite aware of the issue?!

The problem is that while this tactic works for most cases (i.e. those where the defendants aren't taking the **** and are refusing to pay up in full - remember, this isn't receivables that are overdue, this is our own money being taken from us), in this instance, they won't get their test case, because every one they nominate will be settled out of court. We really need to find some good excuses for refusing settlement and forcing these cases to a hearing with disclosure, or for some high-ranking member of the judiciary to weigh in.

Surely we have enough evidence to demonstrate that the banks are aware that they are acting unlawfully. One of the most damning pieces of evidence is their attitude towards the cases. If 100 people sued you on one principle, and you knew you could win all of those cases, you'd force one to a hearing in a court of precedent, get the result you want, and have it applied to the other 99. You would not be trying frantically to settle each case before it reached the courtroom - after all, you're right, you have no reason to give your opponents anything. Since they aren't forcing cases to court in the belief they'll win, and only an idiot when faced with this situation would not do so, they must know that what they have done is wrong.

Someone with experience needs to write to a senior judge (High Court perhaps?) stating this. It's all very well that the judiciary may be aware of this point, but it may also be that they have not had exposure to the cases (due to the banks' frantic settlement efforts keeping them in the dark) to know the finer points.

I wish.

As they are staying cases they are clearly not aware of what's going on. If they were what's the point of staying cases that will never ever see the light of day.

I thought the point of a 'stay' was to await the outcome of a similar case in a higher court, therefore indicating that someone has linked the two similar cases together. Obviously I was wrong.

You are correct

The only problem is the banks will never let the matter come to trial & the courts are without realizing it wasting their & more importantly our time by staying cases. We are being denied our money because the court thinks there is a case to answer. There is but it's only a matter of fact not law, as the law is already well established.

In other words the matter boils down too "did the banks take penalty charges which have no bearing on their actual loss/costs"

Yes they did, a fact & thats unlawful & we want it back + %

So get writing to someone in a senior position in the judiciary and let them know. Given the banks' reluctance for anything to come anywhere near a courtroom, that's the only way they'll find out.

Already have & awaiting reply

But a few more letters or emails to HMCS wouldn't go amiss