Well things get stranger - haven't had a chance to call British Gas since I last posted as had a family member ill in hospital and have spent most of my time there. Got home yesterday at 21.00 (after a day at work and then the hospital) to find a lovely letter from Wescot regarding the British Gas account. Now the letter arrived with me yesterday (13th December) and the post mark was second class, but according to the letter itself it was generated on 26th November (3 weeks ago) and had in big bold letters Failure to action by 10th December could result in blah blah etc. How are they allowed to get away with this??? Firstly it is with three DCAs?? Mackenzie Hall, Meritforce and Wescot? And crucially for me, how can they generate a letter on 26th November with a specific timeframe for responding and then not send it out til after that timeframe has passed??? I am so so angry with them, especially as had I not found this forum I would be in a complete state of panic right now.

thank you will try ringing british gas this evening and let you know how i get on tomorrow.

but if British Gas have sold on the original debt which i presume they did - then I would have to contact Meritforce?

Hi I am new! I have already posted a thread on here today regarding one of my other creditors - so apologies if I should have put this in that thread. I am just so grateful I have found this site where I don't feel embarrassed to talk about the problems I have and can actually see people who have been in my position and have got through it. Some years ago I had a loan with Barclays bank, who I also banked with. I then got made redundant and had to take a lower paid job in 2003 and I struggled with the debt. I spoke to the Consumer Credit Counselling Service, who made an appointment with an adviser who rang me back about 3 weeks after my initial phonecall. They went through my incoming money and outgoings (which included luxuries such as haircuts etc!). They then decided that I could not afford to pay anything and sent me some forms to send to my creditors to ask to pay £1 per month until I could afford anything else. I did this - and most accepted. Barclays passed me to their collection department as they intially did not accept this - but their collection department agreed - however Barclays closed my bank account and made my overdraft a debt and sent that to their collections department also. However - I have been dealing with the collections department for about 2.5 years now and no problems, now paying £50.00 per month off of the loan account and £50.00 per month off of the overdraft account. I have missed one payment - when I was late and they decided to pass my account straight to RMA for the loan account. I did not receive any letters from either Barclays or RMA, just a phonecall from a guy at RMA and when I rang them back they said that Barclays had passed the account to them and they wanted to collect full amount £6600. I told them i could not pay whole amount and would be able to make payments at £50 per month as I am currently doing until one of my other small creditors is paid off - and then can increase. To cut a long story short - they have said I can pay £50 per month for 3 months - Dec, Jan and Feb, in March I need to increase to £100 for March, April and May and then in May after the last payment they want the entire amount - no arrangements or anything the entire amount or they will send bailiffs. I am really scared - I have paid this month's £50 and have now received a letter from them which pre-dates the phonecall (funny how I receive the phonecall but no letter for another 9 days and when letter does arrive it is dated 5 days before the phonecall) but am so worried what I do in May when they will come after me for £6000 what can I do????

Oh my god - I cannot believe this thread!! I only came across this website this morning when doing some research but you guys have been so helpful. I have been dealing with Bryan Carter for the past year. They now have control of my Egg Card debt. Unfortunately I have not received any letters from them since Nov 2006(which was when they received the debt) - and I pay them £50.00 a month on a card that they sent me for use with Paypoint machines. The only correspondence I have had from them is if I am a day late paying the £50.00 they send me a SMS text saying this is Bryan Carter please call us immediately etc etc. This prompts me to remember to pay - so I have not received a letter from them in ages. I am now concerned having read this thread - and the whole forum, as to the fact I have been scared into paying money etc to various creditors and have not really taken notice of my rights. I have a CCj from this account as the first month I was late and Bryan Carter sent me to court - which I did not know about until I received the letter saying I had a CCJ for £158.00!! The actual amount I owe is about £1300. So I paid off the £158 and have been paying off the £1300 at £50.00 per month. But now I do not know whether the CCJ is legal if they are not Bryan Carter anymore and whether they should be sending me texts from Bryan Carter. Should I even be paying this £50.00 per month to a company that doesn't exist anymore???

Hi everyone Firstly can I say what a great website this is - and I feel very empowered by reading your messages. I am concerned over a SMS text I have received and wonder whether I could get some advice. Sometime ago I started to receive text messages from Mackenzie Hall asking me to contact them immediately. I did not respond to these as I thought whoever they were they would write to me if they wanted to speak to me - which they never did. All I have received for the past 7 or so months are SMS text messages every couple of weeks asking me to call, which I have never done. I should say at this point that I have suffered from debt in the past but am now trying to claw my way back up into the daylight, so decided to go through all my old paperwork to see if there was something I had missed. I found a letter I had forgotten about for a British Gas payment just as I moved for about £50.00 which had been passed to a credit company but not Mackenzie Hall they were CDC or something. I rang CDC and they advised me that they had passed the debt to Mackenzie Hall. This was about a month ago. So I have been receiving the texts from MH but never had any postal correspondance. Now, last night I received a text from Meritforce asking me to contact them urgently with a reference number. I have not contacted them, but looked them up on the net this morning and discovered from these forums that they are part of Mackenzie Hall?? Can anyone suggest what I can do? I really do not want to pay before I have received any kind of corrsepondance from them - out of principle really - but I would like to get this matter cleared up. But I am worried they will add on loads of charges if I just ring them up and arrange to pay and I will be ripped off - particularly after what I have read about them on here. The amount I owe was £47 so it can't have risen that much? Any advice would be gratefully received.