In 2011 whilst awaiting a redundancy payment from my previous employer I received a payment of £3600 into my bank account.

As I had been waiting almost 6 months for my payout,

I assumed this was some sort of interim payment and used it for living expenses as I was unemployed.

After eventually receiving my full redundancy payment,

it became clear that the initial £3600 payment was made in error by my previous employer.

I arranged a payment plan and have dutifully paid this initially at a rate of £40 per month reducing to £20 per month when I submitted a new RFI due to a change in circumstances, ever since,

In January this year, my previous employer changed their bank details without informing me and I was therefore unable to make payments.

I had initially assumed that the problem was with my bank and even spoke to my previous employer regarding the matter in May, but they still didn’t inform me of any change of bank details.

I heard nothing more until I recently received a letter from a debt collection agency for the recovery of the entire debt (£2000).

I have contacted the sundry debts manager for my previous employer who has agreed to put the recovery action on hold until 28/9 and asked me to complete an RFI from.

I have done this and offered to pay the full amount of missed payments and reinstate my £20 per month payments.

They have stated that they now wish me to pay £40 per month and despite lots of emails back and forth are unwilling to accept anything less than this.

I don’t want to incur any debt recovery charges but am incensed that it was their neglect to inform me of a change of bank details that caused this and now they are demanding a higher amount each month.

Do I have any rights?

You won't incur any debt recovery charges, as there is no legal basis.

You don't have any obligation to pay more than you can afford. So you should tell your former employers it will be £20 a month or if they find this inconvenient they can write the amount off.

Your former employers won't take it to court, if you pay them the £20 a month. You can ignore any debt collectors letters or phone calls. Just tell them you are happy with the £20 a month.

debt collectors - no powers just collectors on behalf of owners on commission if they do collect, They cry when ignored by people who get told the facts as their rattle has been thrown out of their prams and the Xmas party off due to no collections, they do not own any debt - end of.

do you have the new bank account details? If not dont pay the dca, they ahve no interest in this and tell the ex-employer that they are failing to mitigate the debt by refusing to keep to an agreement.

Also, going back in time they could have corrected this error of overpayment when they paid out the redundancy and as you thought the origianl payment was part of this you could ahve claimed the payment was estopped but as you have accepted repayment terms the debt could well be wiped out if they try and refuse the payment. In short, you hold the better cards so dont put up with nonsense.