So some guy came knocking on my door today asking for my name and address (yes, he knocked on MY door then asked my what my address was!!!) claiming that if i gave it to him a solicitor from his company would ring me and tell me about this "W*NK" (his term not mine!) legislation that would allow me to claim at least £5,000 back from my mortgate provider. Out of pure interest i gave him a fake name and my mobile number and I have just come off the phone to him. They want me to come meet one of their solicitors who will tell me if im eligible to this "compensation". If i am i have to pay them £40 and they will get me this money and they get their costs from my mortgage provider. I'm guessing that they are one of those companies that tries to get back PPI, mis-sold endowments, early pay-off charges etc and no doubt try to convinve you that you need a debt management plan with them. Just wondered if anyone has heard of Devon Management Services and has any experience of them. They show as being a sub-company of "Your Debt Decisions Limited" If no-one has any info this post will hopefully show up in google so that anyone else who gets approached by them will see this post - I'm NOT going to be taking up their kind offer - there is nothing they can do that i cant!

My god man - ask more questions already!! Your asking really simple stuff here that you could find answers too yourself if you had the initiative to put some time and effort into it. I can't help feeling that you are slightly abusing the kind nature of those who constantly reply to you and they in turn and not helping you by holding your hand so much. sorry - had to say it - this was the most annoying thread I have ever read!

I hate to go agaist the grian of this site but my advice is to go see your bank manager. I was in a similar situation to yourself (default improperly)and spent a long time on the road to court but in the end it was my bank manager who sorted it out. If you go in and see them and explain the problem they will ring natwest Insolvancy and client support team who will in term request that you write to them with details of the issue and they will consider it (and they do). You want to tell your bank manager that you never intended to not pay and that even though you were made redundant you always sought to pay off your debts and so the default is an unneccessarily harsh outcome they will be on your side. Then if this doesnt work go down the court route. Honestly, this is what i did and i got a default removed within 14 days with no problems what so ever - well worth a try at least

So, I've only gone and gotten that default removed haven't I!!! I met a guy whilst out on the razz who was a natwest bank manager in a nearby branch. Told him how much I hated Natwest, he asked why, I explained and he gave me some great advice. Go into your local branch, tell them you have been a victuim of credit card fraud (which I had) and they HAVE to speak to me about it - blanket policy. So I did, went in, cried fraud got an hour meeting with the main branch manager. Explained my situation, said i'd been endlessly ignored and that i felt the default was unfair and unrepresentative and that my only recourse now was legal action. She rang client support and insolvancy who told her to get me to write to them with all the details and my evidence which i did (even got it sent in Natwests interbranh internal mail). Got a "we are investigating your complaint - will get back to you in 10 days" letters then got another letter this week saying return your account to a nil balance and we'll remove the default and all the adverse data. I paid them, the default is gone. Its like I never had an account with them! As an extra bonus I now have a much much simpler bank charges claim which will be a breeze compared to this one! 2 years of writing long and boring letters that they endlessly ignored and good old face to face chat with my bank manager sorted it all out in less than a month. My case was a bit unusual in that i had clear mitigating circumstances as I was defaulted due to fraudulent transactions however they had not issued a default notice, there were £1200 of bank charges and I could prove i'd changed my address with them get they never changed my address ont heir systems thus i never knew about the debt but if you have a good case against the default like i do definatly go speak to your local bank manager - worked absolute wonders for me

Yes - I left it there. I didnt agree with the judge but my disagreement was based on reasonableness and logic rather than the law. i.e. OE operate in england, i live in england and i we took up an agreement together in england. As such I left it there to see what they did. They have not written to me since and i dont intend to poke the sleeping lion as it were. They came to me looking for £60 and ended up £90 worse off. The last of that money paid off my £15 a month contact lense deal with Spec savers hehe

Its worth a try writing to them, all they can do is say no or ignore you and maybe you will get lucky. In all honesty though its unlikely you will get very far with them, if they even reply to you id probably die of shock. I'd suggest you read the many many threads on default removal here and see if you feel you have any grounds to challenege them. There are lots of people in the same boat as you here so im sure you'll find lots of people who can emphasise with you and offer you what help and advice they can.

By way of an update had 3 letters, nothing exciting really.. From Wescots: - Which obviously i'm pleased with. then from NatWest i got the standard acknowledgement of the S.A.R - (Subject Access Request) shortly follwed by a request for the exact date and time of my phonecalls to them if i want transcripts along with a reminder that not all phonecalls are recorded. Im ignoring this stupid request. It hardly seems reasonable for them to only release transcripts if i can remember the date and exact time of the call!!! Idiots methinks!

nice one, will be interesting to see what they come back with.

I might be wrong here but if Wescot have defaulted you they must have been assigned the debt (rather than acting as agent to the origional creditor). It also rather interesting that Wescots immediatly replied saying no further contact from them. I myself have noticed a significant change in Wescots behaviour recently and Im wondering if they are starting to see the light. None the less. You want to get the default removed and to do this you need to know the facts. Therefore my suggestion is to ignore Wescot's letter and CCA and SAR both wescots and the origional creditor. You need to know exactly what info they both have on you before you decide what to do next. Ask both of them in your SAR whether the debt has been assigned to Wescot's and if so what the status of that assignment is (equitable etc). Once you have the info come back here and let us know the outcome on the juicy bits (i.e let us see the agreement/application form or whatever they provide and was there a default notice etc) and decide where to go fromt here. I would also, very casually suggest, that its looking promising if Wescot's have backed down so easily. Took me 4 letters and threats of harrassment to get them to that stage and im curious as to why it only took you 1 letter. I wonder if they have asked for a copy agreement and been told there is none and they know they are scuppered. anyway, thats fanciful thoery only, get the info and go from there. Good luck

This is really helpful info. Ill be looking into this. They really would be mad to run the risk if this superseeds the previous default compo cases thanks bud

I'll admit that based on my experiences I'd have to agree with this. I'd liketo think that banks would listen to people who had valid and genuine complaints but they dont, qite simple they couldn't give a stuff. If i was going down this road again knowing what i know know i wouldn't waste my time trying to place nice with then. Get your info together, get your facts straight and get the ball rolling. Write and ask then to remove it nicely, they'll say no so LBA then court. Its sadly the only way they listen. Its a terrible state of affairs

I think that perhaps I had the slightest glimmer of hope that they would care about their customers. Very nieve of me i guess I'll wait for the sar and cca. I want to see the agreement and if there is any record of a default notice then i'll send them my LBA and draw up my PoC. I know i'm wasting my time with them. I just have to make sure they really don't give a flop. Plus all this stuff helps when it gets to court. That i endlessly tried to play nice with them and that they ignored me and forced the matter to court and only try to talk to me at that stage isnt going to hurt my cause.

Right, well they totally ignored that letter and instead passed the account back to Wescots. Wescots made the mistake of ringing me at work. In a way i felt a bit sorry for the poor woman as she ran through her pre-written script of terror: - Her: Hello there, could I speak to Mr jysmystry please? Me: Speaking Her: This is Wescot Credit Services Ltd, we are acting on the behalf of our clients the royal Bank of Scotland regarding an outstand debt of £XXXX. when can we expect payment? Me: Never Her: err, this relates to a NatWest credit card account number 4187.... Me: I'll thank you to stop there. You were about to hand out personal information regarding my private financial details on a publically accessible telepohone without having any assurances what so ever that you were in fact talking to Mr jystmysty. This would only add to your continued unlawful activities. Her: errr, ok, what do you mean unlawful activites? Me: Look, ill be honest with you. I'm surprised you have started rining me again, the last time i heard from Wescots you promised me in writing i would never hear from you again on accoutn of the fact that i believed you to be harrassing me, that you failed to provide a credit agreement, that the debt was in despute with your client and that the account is currently subject to legal action. Her: ah, err ok, so i'll need to look at the file. Me: yup, and to be honest once you have read the file i dont expect you to ring me again, if you do I'll refuse to speak to you and request you only contact me in writing. Her: ok, well i'll read the file then, im sorry about this, we have an automated call pick up system and this is showing as a new account for collection, i didnt realise we had already been in touch previously. Me; ah, so they have sent it back to you for collelction again? Her: yes, like i said this is a new accoutn we recieved 2 weeks ago, its showing as make first contact on the calling system, they must have sent this in the last batch for collection. Me: ok, cool, thats interesting Her: so ill read up on the file blah blah Me: Great stuff, thanks bye. She was nice enough like, she was fair and wasnt trying to bully me like they sometimes do. None the less i was felt feeling rather annoyed at Natwest because this means they totally and utterly ignored my last letters. I have now sent them this. I'll get the info and go from there. I really dont want to have to go to court but if they are going to keep on ignoring me like this i see no alternative What i did find interesting though was that they have started ringing me at work instead of at home. Previously they were always contacting me at home but this time they are chasign me at work. Whilst this conversation caused my office to fall dead as they all listened in i really dont want to be talkign about this stuff in my office, Its private and i dont want my colleauges knowing i have debt collectors chasing me and these calls always leave me shaking a bit. Not sure if this is natwest giving wescot different contact details for me so they wouldnt realise its the same account or what. Not good though.

Well this is a REAL pain! I put in my draft Order and the judge has now written back basically saying Optical Express are a company registered in Scotland. You need to either restart your claim in a scottish court or provide me with a justification as to why you think an english court does have jurisdiction. Obviously i don't want to restart the claim in a scottish court but equally I have no idea about how i can alter their view on jurisdiction. I spoke to a local solicitors and they say the same, its a scottish company, you'll have to restart your claim there. Does anybody here have any views on this? Is there are point in me trying to change their minds or is this a clear point against which i have no argument? If the latter i'll have to knock any hope of getting a court order on the head and i'll be forced to go to the ICO for complience. Such a shame though and such a waste of mine, the courts and optical express' time. If you think about it they should have entered a defence, they would have won...

Ok, I have thought about it and i want to be reasonable with them ("don't be, they arn't reasonable with you" I hear you cry) so i'm thinkign about sending them the attached. I want to send them this because they have so far refused to talk to me at all so i have never really had the chance to make them any kind of offer. I'm also happy to give up the bank charges if they accept my first offer as it works out at about the same as if i claimed them back. If they reply negativly then i'll go down the normal route and issue the request for charges back, lba then claim and include default removal as part of my PoC. I'm posting this draft here for a) any comments if anyone is interested and b) just so anyone else going down this same road can see what im doing and how it works out. Enjoy