I will be concise as this is not a confessional, if helpers need more information I will respond promptly.

I am 67 years old and have seven creditors, one with CCJ. I followed the advice of CAG and offered what I could, a token £5 a month to each. These payments were set up and have run without apparent fault for about seven years.

Since doing this I was evicted from my home of sixteen years (the reluctant CCJ with a very patient landlord) and had no valid postal address for some time. In 2013 I had to move to Germany for family reasons. My only income is my state pension and a very, very small private pension. In short, absolutely no spare cash as the pension has to cover room rent and everything else. My assets fit into two suitcases and have no value

My sister who is in the UK received a letter from Robinson Way addressed to me. She has told them to remove her address from my file as I do not and never have lived at that address. They have agreed to do this.

They are talking as if this were a recent matter, insisting on the establishment of a repayment plan. Obviously I have nothing to offer them and their threats of legal action are not particularly concerning.

When the CCJ was issued the judge noted that the matter would not be pursued unless there were substantial assets, which is oddly reassuring now.

I intend to contact RW by email so that everything is recorded but before I do I wanted to gather any advice from you good folks.

Incidental to this, I do not know what my credit record looks like now. I have lost my CRA access details and it seems not to be possible to open a new subscription from Germany.

Finally, (because it is stupidly embarrassing) I have noticed an error in Robinson Way's payments. When I agreed to the monthly payment I established a standing order which is still running.

I periodically check that all payments are going out as they should. What I did not notice was that RW established a direct debit, with the same reference number in addition to the standing order. So they have been receiving and taking twice the payment I agreed and this seems to have been going on for the whole period.

Hi

So the Judgment is being collected RW which you have been double paying since 2013 ?

who was the claimant that holds the CCJ ?

Does this letter state a current balance ?

Regards

Andy

The CCJ is unconnected with RW and is more recent it was from the action by former landlord for arrears. They receive the same payment as all other creditors.

The balance stated in RW letter appears to be a similar amount to the initial balance of the credit card but I do not have access to the original files from here. I have no idea how the double payment to RW affects things, if at all.

Just to be clear, the CCJ is from early 2013. The arrangement with RW and other unsecured creditors are older.

Ah yes just re read your post.....you refer to RW then start referring to a CCJ...slightly confusing

So they have removed your sisters address...you reside in Germany...RW do not issue court claims and you are currently paying them or not?...ignore them.

Feels like a bold move, or non-move, but then I simply cannot offer anything, much as I would like to get rid of the whole issue. Thanks Andy

stuff and all anyone could have done to you...

not sure why you didn't stop paying these pointless token payments years ago when told so in your other thread.

Did i see that right.. You were Doing a Standing Order to them and then they set up a Direct Debit ontop of that as well? ...

fkofilee - it appears so.

I was only checking that each of the agency names appeared in the statements, I failed to notice that RW's name appeared too often, the only visible difference between the two monthly transactions was that one was the S/O and the other a D/D. I would never have agreed to a double payment being determined to only do the same thing for all.

One point for clarification, if I may.

In their letter RW states that if we do not manage to agree a repayment schedule (I have no idea what the last seven years are supposed to be) they will have to put the matter to their lawyers on behalf of their client.

It is this last phrase that has me intrigued. I do not believe for a moment that the credit card company has let a collection agency accept the token payments this long.

The phrase is obviously meant to imply a bigger stronger client, might I be right to assume that RW has bought the discounted debt and is the client they refer to in the third person?

robbers way are part of the hoist [HPH2 group] whom are debt buyers and their clients

I would suggest that they have more than one of these debts you've been blindly paying for the last 7yrs on their books now.

So you have paid in over 7 years £840.00...to RW...you state the balance is roughly the same amount as initial balance of the credit card.

There letter implies that no arrangement is in place and could be construed as they are receiving no payments as they wish to agree a repayment schedule ?

I would be wanting to know where my payments have gone...what is a true balance ?

How did they manage to set up a DD with your bank ? ( you set up the standing order)

Have you ever sent a section 78 request for a copy of this agreement ?

Andy

dx100, Andy, thank you both.

I am beginning to realize how little I have understood.

I have maintained these payments largely to remove any excuse for these people to notify further defaults to CRAs.

This and a simple matter of maintaining some sort of sense of integrity myself.

The liabilities are real, or were real.

The advice all those years ago was to continue the payments for this sort of reason.

Perhaps something has changed.

Dx100, I do not understand your point about them having more than one of the debts into which I have been 'blindly' paying.

To some extent I have just been glad to have shut them up for a few years.

Andy, you raise some good questions and I will follow up on them with RW.

Forgive my ignorance but what is a section 78 request and how might this help?

all you have done by continuing to pay these historic debts off is to run the statute barred date a further 7yrs from starting.

that's the time limit from your last payment to 'whomever' on a debt can take legal action to try and enforce a debt.

not sure where you got the idea that 'paying ' stops them from further trashing your credit file? I would hope that those that advised years ago did not indicate that.

once a debt has a defaulted date it will vanish from your credit file on the defaults 6th birthday never to return regardless to if you are paying it, not paying it or have already cleared it. ok it doesn't mean the debt is till not owed, but it allows your credit worthiness to improve.

as for my comment about could more than one debt being paid to robbersway hence to SO and the DD, those might not be for the same debt, you need to check the reference numbers on your payments.

robbersway are a debt collection agency, their parent company are hoist portfolio holding 2, they are debt buyers, RW collect debts for them, and I would suspect that in the fullness of time, whom you were blindly paying other token payments too have now sold the debts to HPH2 and that could be why you have 2 payments to RW...

just for your enjoyment. ...debt buyers and DCA's are NOT BAILIFFS

they have ZERO legal powers to demand payments off anyone.

with regard to what is a CCA request

it is a request to WHOMEVER you are currently blindly paying ANY debt to ...to produce signed copies of the agreement you signed with the ORIGINAL CREDITOR that proves they hold the legal paperwork [still] to even demand payment out of you.

it appears that you were advised to do this years ago but the threads dried up without resolution.

would it be possible for you to list your debts?

then we could better advise

?

original creditor

type of credit

when taken out

defaulted date from your credit file

Whom you pay now

robbers way have written to your sister because they cant get ahold of you directly as they want to probably cough up on a few more debts that they've now found as they can see your are a good cash cow and want to try their luck or possible need more free money to fund their xmas party drinks on you.

you are in germany, a UK DCA has ZERO legal powers

they have even less powers in a foreign country...

pers i'd be stopping ALL payments to everyone

there is stuff all anyone can do to you.

as andy says

i'd wanting to know where ALL you payments have been going

because assure as eggs is eggs they've not been going off the original debt and I bet the original creditors have never received one penny of it.

That's the plain talk I was hoping for.

Right, this could be fun.

It will take time for me to get hold of the original information as it is in the UK but I did follow up with demands for evidence of liability,

most just did not respond,

others claimed that their previous letters constituted that information.

One or two of the names have changed, or the agency sold on or something.

These are Wescot,

Cabot,

Capquest and

Moorcroft.

I will check the old papers that I have here to see if I can link these with the original creditors.

From memory these were Barclaycard (now RW)

Egg,

Santander,

Lloyds and

one other that eludes me at present.

I have checked the reference numbers of the RW payments and they are the same so it is two payments on one issue.

This does not touch the CCJ which is owed to an individual of course.

But I assume that such a liability does not enjoy the same sort of limitation.

One last point of clarification,

my personal concern is that the debts still exist and I see no prospect of settlement, but to whom do they exist.

I assume that by selling the original debts the original creditors have also sold their claim to the debt from me.

But in law, assuming the debt passes to the agency,

what is the the liability,

the original amount or the discounted (but undisclosed) amount.

I am guessing that they paid only a small percentage of the original.

ok its a shame that back in the time, myself guided by others ….. whom were thought to be giving informed and correct information did not really tell you the actual truth, more the morality card...ok we don't condone debt avoidance but these debts smell badly to me now...………

Moorcroft and wetcloths don't own debts...like robbersway they only chase for their stated clients.

but that's not to say, what they have coerced you to do gives them any credit.

your easiest way to stop all this doubt is to simply stop every payment.

now where you payments to date on any specific debt has actually gone and if you'll ever see it again or trace it is another matter.

but the bottom line is...there is effectively stuff all they can do to you if you hold no assets in the UK, and the fact that one [RW] out of possible shear desperation wrote to your sister ..p'haps underlines this fact.

I am guessing that they paid only a small percentage of the original.

no this is the point with all fleecing DCA's

they buy the debt for say 10p=£1

but they then chase the whole amount

and sadly 99.9% of the population believe they have some magical powers that make them superhuman and you must pay them.

sad fact is they have no more legal powers than you or I if we believe someone owes us money...that's to start a court claim.

if everyone was to stop paying DCA's tomorrow...the whole industry would collapse.

dx

Well, all I can do is to thank you.

With all that is happening and is likely to happen soon I could certainly use some relief from the relief of debt.

None of the owners of debt have been in touch over the last seven years (per the links through 'statute barred')

the fact that I did not have an address where I could expect to stay for a while won't have helped them but I shall not lose sleep over that.

I will pursue this with RW and test the reaction before cancelling the other collectors and come back to this thread, if I may, if there are any surprises.

Once again, thank you.

your debts cannot be statute barred...you have been blindly paying them...

but if anyone can do anything to you now...IMHO is NO.

i'm really sorry to bring you this news and really sorry that p'haps CAG might have in thr day misled you.

but ofcourse due to your situation ...you didn't comeback here in the years since indicating what you were doing ...so...

its just areal shame that these dca's for want of another word 'con' or what we call 'cash-cow' people out of money by what is perceived to be some magical powers they do not have.....

think of it this way...the original creditors which I bet were all worldwide banking org's could have taken you to court and crushed you...they didn't...they chose to sell the debt on for peanuts...I wonder why...…….

dx

This is timely if disappointing but it answers the big question that arose when I read more widely across the forum. There seemed to be a contradiction between the conditions that trigger the statute barring and the continued payments. So, it seems that the six year limit has not started, let alone ended.

I have also been through the partial files I have with me and have discovered another problem. The two payments to RW that have the same reference number are for a different creditor, Lloyds. There have been no payments to RW for Barclaycard (and I have had nothing that tells me they act for or own that debt). The amount they are claiming is within five pounds of the balance from Barclaycard from Feb 2014, several years after the plan was agreed.

While I cannot, with the information available, link any of the other payments to other DRAs to Barclaycard I cannot from bank records say that they have not been. I have no correspondence from some of the agencies at all and short of contacting all of them for information no way of finding out.

My confusion about the Lloyds issue (which has the greatest amount of correspondence for the smallest of the debts) is that they went through three different agencies so rapidly I was unsure about who was doing what for whom.

The options seem relatively simple, though. I could cancel all payments, wait for something to hit the fan and then try to sort out the remains. My reluctance to do this is that the other agencies will get contact info in the same way that RW did and my sister will be fighting off the connection between her address and my debt for months. Or I could contact those who are receiving payments and ask for confirmation of details. This too could trigger unwanted attention but it might be preferable to the current mess. Any advice on which direction to take, given who is involved (RW, Wescot, Cabot, Capquest, Moorcroft) and quite what questions would be best to ask, will be gratefully received.

you always seem to go about things the long long way rather than a simple step that would resolve things quickly, effectively and forever.

i'd write to each company you are blindly paying. [using your correct address]

simply state you have been resident in germany since date

you have been paying the debt since date

you are now ceasing payment.

that way they have your correct address

they wont pester your sister s they cant they know where you are.

end of the problems

end of being cash cowed

Just one point for understanding before I send letters to all the DCAs.

You said that Moorcroft and Wescot do not buy debts but collect for clients.

you did not mention anything about Cabot or Capquest.

I think Cabot has simply taken over the arrangement made with another DCA as I do not remember their name.

You also said that if any of the original creditors (you are right, they were all major CC companies or banks) could have taken action and 'crushed' me.

This might well be true but would have been fruitless for them.

But it does leave me with the impression that while the DCAs might not be worth worrying about their clients, if they are still the big companies, might be.

Unfortunately I have lost the records that linked the original creditors with the acting DCAs so I cannot tell who owns the debts.

My question is this.

Would your advice be different if a DCA, after all this time, were still acting for the original creditor?

If "after all this time" is longer than 6 years ...then no the advice still stands as the debts would be statute barred....assuming you have not acknowledged or made any payments in that period.

Cabot buy debts out the names you list

Just one point for understanding before I send letters to all the DCAs.

You said that Moorcroft and Wescot do not buy debts but collect for clients. - correct

you did not mention anything about Cabot or Capquest. - cabot buy debts...capquest are arrows dca under a diff name

 

I think Cabot has simply taken over the arrangement made with another DCA as I do not remember their name - arrows

You also said that if any of the original creditors (you are right, they were all major CC companies or banks) could have taken action and 'crushed' me.

 

This might well be true but would have been fruitless for them.

 

But it does leave me with the impression that while the DCAs might not be worth worrying about their clients, if they are still the big companies, might be.

 

Unfortunately I have lost the records that linked the original creditors with the acting DCAs so I cannot tell who owns the debts. - bit of a stupid situation to get in...a pitfall of blindly paying? all these years...

My question is this.

Would your advice be different if a DCA, after all this time, were still acting for the original creditor?

no just stop paying everthing after sending the letters

you'll soon get deforestation if anyone wants your free money for their xmas drinks fund.

Andyorch, thank you. We seem to have established that the debts are not statute barred because I have been making token payments for the whole period. So this does not give clarity. It is possible that Moorcroft and Wescot could be acting for the original bank or CC companies.

DX100uk, thank you. Deforestation sounds bad for my environment but I don't really understand what it means.

threatening letters...= deforestation.

then..

you would need to look at their letters to see whom their stated client is.