Thank for the quick reply. I was 90% sure they hadn't made a mistake with this but wanted to run it past you guys before contacting them. The only reason I ask is because Experian themselves have an example on their website of a "settled account" which shows a couple of late payments which have been remedied by a third transaction which clears the balance. This third payment is "green" because the balance is zero. I was just curious as to why my zero is orange/delinquent and the example's zero is green/satisfactory. Anyway, here's the link if anybody is interested: http://www.experian.co.uk/assets/consumer/credit-score/files/credit-expert-YCRE.pdf (it's about halfway down the page)

Hi all. I'd really appreciate it if somebody could clear this up for me. I checked my Experian credit report a couple of months ago and realised an incorrect entry had been made by a "credit card" company (one of those pre-pay ones with a credit building facility) around 11 months earlier. I'm embarrassed to say I made a stupid miscalculation which meant I missed the final three payments without realising. I presumed I'd allocated the correct amount of money several months in advance but it seems I had a shortfall of three payments. As soon as I realised my mistake I made the payments and presumed the matter was resolved. I rang them and they confirmed that the payment had arrived but would be recorded as being "3 payments late". Obviously I couldn't dispute that because it was my own stupid fault. The account was closed (I think) in January 2012 but when I checked with Experian in November 2012, I discovered that Cashplus had recorded an inexplicable outstanding balance of £9.00 in January which meant it was regarded as "delinquent" by Experian (but not defaulted). It remained that way with no further activity until I checked in November. I wrote to APS Cashplus to point out their mistake and they have accepted that they'd made an error over the £9.00 and they've corrected it with the credit reference agencies. However, the account appearing on Experian has a status of "3 payments late" with a balance stating "settled". Of course I accept that the 3 late payments must be recorded but I'm not entirely sure they've done this correctly. In a nutshell, what I'm asking is if it's correct that I am being penalised by a "delinquent account" even though the balance has been paid (albeit slightly late) and is now £0.00 and the account is settled? I accept that it was three payments late but I find it difficult to believe that this should still be regarded as a delinquent account on my file for the next 5 years or so. The last two payments on this account have been recorded on Experian as "late" even though the balance was zero on both. I've copied the info below as it appears on Experian. The ones in orange were classed as late payments even though the last two were zero (is it possible to be late paying off a balance of zero?). Balance: £0 £0 £14 £14 £14 £14 £19 £24 £29 £34 £39 £44 Any thoughts and opinions would be very much appreciated

Thank you Ida. Most helpful and much appreciated.

Yes. Hundreds of people have. All complaints appear to be simply added to the pile. What I'm after is a breakdown of the law which applies to online agreements made in this way. It surely can't be correct that they can acquire a person's details from a separate company then activate a subscription when someone does no more than enter their email address and click on an "I Agree" button. Particularly when they refuse point blank to provide any relevant evidence whatsoever.

Thanks for that. They don't actually owe me money but I am intent on making sure they can't get away with what they are doing. It appears that banks aren't refunding money when this company is invloved. By all accounts, they are doing things legally and it's therefore not a "[problem]". No box is ticked during the signing up process. The customer is confronted with a web page offering a "free £10 Adsa voucher" then simply asked to "re-enter" their email address (which they used whilst signing up with the original company) then click on the "I Accept" button. There is a link to the terms and conditions but they are not visible on the signing up screen in their entirety. Rewardsnow do not at any time ask you to enter your name, address, bank details but already have access to them from the signing up process from the first company. This suggests to me that they could potentially sign you up to their membership regardless of whether or not you actually clicked "I accept". Hence my annoyance at their repeated refusal to provide any evidence whatsoever. They also bizarrely claim that their right to take your money is further substantiated by their sending of a "welcome email" but they then go on to say it probably went to your spam/junk folder where it was auto deleted. In their opinion, it is the customer's fault for not checking his/her junk folder. Simply unbelievable. Does anybody know which laws are relevant to this type of thing?

The company is RewardsNow. It's one of Adaptive Affinity's brands and they're really not popular. In short, they are tagged onto the end of the signing up process of another company (usually another of Adaptive Affinity's brands) and customers often don't realise they are signing up to rewardsnow and instead believe that clicking "I Accept" is part of the signing up process of the original company. The first you know about rewardsnow is when a monthly payment leaves your bank account and you have to google them to find out who they are. Of course tagging on of rewardsnow is all done within the parameters of the law (company name/terms and conditions subtly displayed) but my point is that they should not be in a position to tell disgruntled customers that they signed up whilst still refusing to provide any evidence whatsoever. They simply expect people to take their word for it. They've have made a serious amount of money out of this way of doing business over the years and I believe it's time they were made accountable for their methods. There must be some legislation somewhere which governs online signatures such as this? Surely?

Hi. I'm hoping somebody could offer their advice on a surprisingly complicated issue that I've recently encountered. Does anybody know which legislation applies to online retail companies who charge monthly membership fees and activate accounts solely when the customer clicks on an "I accept" button on their website? The reason I ask is because I've encountered a particularly slippery company who activate accounts on the sly and refuse to provide any evidence whatsoever when challenged. Their standard response is to say "you must have clicked on the Accept button otherwise the account could not have been opened". According to an extensive thread on another forum, many people have encountered this company and every single one of them has been denied this proof and told to just take the word of the company as the gospel truth. They even challenge their "customers" to tell them what they would describe as evidence because they know it's extremely difficult to research the laws governing their way of doing business. I believe that the legislation which applies to this is either the Electronic Communications Act 2000 or the Electronic Signatures Regulations 2002 but I'm completely out of my depth when it comes to understanding if any of this does indeed apply to the way this company do business. Any assistance would be much appreciated.

Does anybody know what the correct procedure an employer should follow regarding the provision of a P45 to an employee? In this particular case the employer sent the employer her P45 (part 1A) but it transpired yesterday that the employer didn't send the other parts of the P45 to the tax office. The staff at the tax office confirmed this. Does this mean the employer hasn't technically been dismissed and is therefore still employed by the employer?

It seems that way to me too. Unfortunately I think this may come down to another "my word against her's" situation. I hope not because it all got quite childish last time.

Ha ha. Hi mate. Yeah it's me again. And unfortunately it's the same employer again. I didn't want to complicate my last thread by mentioning this one but I thought I'd throw it open to you smashing folk. I'm not representing or anything (mainly because her mother is bigger and more scary than me) but I'd like to give her some handy info if I can source any here.

Acording to the employer's response this chat (which should surely be deemed a grievance meeting) consisted my friend being told that her old job "really no longer existed as I had taken on the role of full time chef in order to keep the business afloat" They employer goes on to claim that she offered my friend a bar job consisting of the same hours and days as her job as a chef which would be 12 hours. My friend maintains that she was offered 6 hours of bar work but with a shallow promise that the employer might be able to give her a few extra hours here and there. The offer was declined by my friend at this meeting and this forms the basis of the employer's response. In short, the employer claims that because she offered a bar job consisting of the same hours, my friend's decision to decline is effectively handing in her notice which means she is not entitled to any redundancy pay. My friend was accompanied by her boyfriend at this meeting and both assure me that she was offered only 6 hours. Of course the employer has changed her story by the time of writing her response to the claim but I suppose that's to be expected.

Hi, I'll try to keep this as brief as possible but I'd really appreciate some advice on this if anybody would be so kind. A friend of mine had a baby last year and had some trouble towards the end of her maternity leave. Basically she was employed as a chef in a pub but her employer informed her that this position was no longer available for her return to. The reason given was that the recession had meant that the employer felt she had no option but to step into the role of chef "in order to keep the business afloat". (shortly before going on holiday for two weeks and employing a 17 year old as a part time waitress). My friend heard nothing more and was advised by ACAS to write to the employer for further details. The employer responded by telephoning my friend and inviting her down for "a chat". During this "chat" the employer offered my friend a 6 hour shift as a barmaid (she previously worked 12 hours as a chef). My friend declined as she felt this was a demotion and the times of the bar job weren't helpful to her and her partner who needed to juggle time with their new son between working various shifts (paying for childcare really wasn't an option as both parents work part time on relatively low wages). Two days later a letter arrived from the employer stating that as she had declined the job offer, she had "effectively ended your contract with us". Despite the fact there was no contract in the first place. The employer also included my friend's P45 which was dated four days BEFORE this "chat" (the employer has effectively stated this in her response). My friend subsequently had her claim for unfair dismissal accepted by the Employment Tribunal and the employer has since done her research and is now desperately trying to wriggle out of this with bizarre claims of an entirely different version of events. Anyway, there's a lot more to this story but I won't go too deeply into it just yet. I have a basic understanding of employment law but I'd appreciate somebody else's opinions on this because the maternity aspect isn't something I know much about really. Thanks in advance for any replies.

I've recently been through a tribunal and I was also not sure about the order saying the bundle has to be agreed. Personally I wrote to the ex employer and included a copy of the bundle with a cover note saying something along the lines of "please find enclosed my proposed bundle for the pending hearing. I would appreciate confirmation of your acceptance that all relevant documentation is included". In my case the ex employer ignored this letter but I felt it was important to at least be seen to be trying to get a bundle agreed between both parties because we were ordered to do so in advance by an Employment Tribunal Judge. Covering my own backside basically. If your ex employer refuses to cooperate then the reality is that at the Hearing both yours and your ex employer's bundles will be used. I think it's just wishful thinking that a bundle will be agreed by both parties in advance really.

Thanks for the congratualting messages by the way. They all mean a lot to me.

I must admit that this has been an obsession for me for the last 6 months. 50% was due to my absolute belief that my friend was innocent and 50% was due to the employer's horrible arrogance. The end result is that I know a lot more than I did when I started this. I spent months researching and I was pretty sure I had it all sussed. But in the end I (thankfully) decided to ask you guys what you thought. The end result was that I dealt with the hearing on a completely different angle than I intended to. I was well aware of this site because I personally had an unrelatred court case a while ago (which I won with the help of these forums) but I felt it was important to gain an understanding of how a case like this works before I threw it open to you splendid people. I haven't got the confidence of elpulpo and bigredbus when it comes to handing out advice but if anybody wants my opinion-I'm more than willing to help. Cross examination and preparation are my strengths I think. Obviously hindsight is a wonderful thing and I've spent the last two days thinking "I wish I'd said.........this that and the other".

Well I'm told it can take up to 6 weeks before the judgement is sent out and they then have 42 days to cough up after that. I didn't post yesterday because I quite frankly needed a few pints at the end of this. Cheers again though. I would've gone in there with the completely wrong questions in mind if you hadn't opened my eyes to the fact it's not really about "did he or didn't he commit the theft". It's a lot more complicated than that and I firmly believe we won because you alerted me to what the judge actually wants to hear.

I appreciated the offer but I thought I should spend the entire weekend familiarising myself with everything.There was a lot to go through and preparing the bundle was time consuming in itself. I had taken on board the things yourself and Madari had said and in the end I think I did a reasonable job at the hearing on Tuesday. I was certainly more prepared than the other side anyway. Basically we won our case but it really was by the skin of our teeth and it came down to 3 factors. 1) The judge agreed that the employer had shown that they had the belief (beyond reasonable doubt) that gross misconduct had occurred. Although the judge did stress that this doesn't necessarily mean my friend was guilty of the accusations. 2) The judge agreed that the employer did not follow their own procedures at all. He actually seemed very cross with the employer when he interrupted my cross examination when I highlighted this. 3) Now this is the area I really don't understand. You could say that at this point the score was 1-1 and this was extra time. The judge mentioned a couple of things but it seemed to me he had made his decision based upon the conduct of both parties. I had highlighted their refusal to cooperate etc but I don't know if this was what the judge was talking about. Anyway, we won- to a certain extent. The judge decided that as my friend hadn't himself strictly behaved in accordance with grievance procedures shortly after the dismissal so he effectively reduced the award to zero. However, as we'd established that the employer hadn't provided my friend with a written contract, the judge awarded 2 weeks wages to my friend. Also, during cross examination i had also shown that the employer hadn't obtained any witness statements until 5 weeks later. The Judge said that only when these witness statements were obtained was the employer in a position which could be described a beyond reasonable doubt. So the judge awarded 5 weeks wages to my friend as well. Overall the employer now owes my friend around £800. Our schedule of loss was just over two thousand but the money was never an issue for my friend and I was just pleased to get out of there with the unfair dismissal ruling. I can't thank elpulpo enough. Your insight into how the whole thing works was incredibly helpful. I was able to prepare questions specifically designed to tackle certain points which I absolutely never would have even considered without this advice. For example, whilst the employer turned up simply trying to prove the theft, I was able to concentrate on trying to disprove they were beyond reasonable doubt. Granted, the Judge agreed with them but I visibly unsettled the employer and her boyfriend who expected to just show documents to prove my friend's guilt. The whole thing lasted 4 and a half hours and I can honestly say that because of elpulpo's comments, nothing took me by surprise during proceedings. I think the Judge was well aware that I had done my homework and he knew what I was trying to achieve with my cross examination. The look on the employer's face was incredible when I asked "I notice you haven't included a copy of your disciplinary procedure in your bundle. Can I ask you to turn to it on page 11 of our bundle. So Mrs xxxxxxx, do you believe you have complied with your own company's disciplinary procedure?" And it was also very enjoyable when the guy who chaired the appeal read out his report then awaited my first question. I asked "in paragraph two of your report you state blah blah blah blah blah. He interrupted before I had finished reading the third line and said "I didn't say that". I said "ummmm, Mr xxxxxxxxxx, you just said it 3 minutes ago and it's written in your report which we all have copies of". Anyway, we won- just. Thanks again for the help. Please feel free to ask anything if you're awaiting your own hearing. I think I have been able to learn a lot and I am more than willing to offer some hints and tips based on my own experiences.

I notice this thread has been read a huge amount of times. Can I just ask for a vote on what people think we should do based on everything you've read? The choice we have is to withdraw the claim for unfair dismissal on monday or take them on in what seems to be a 50/50 shot. I don't mind who you are or how many times you've posted before but i'd be really grateful for your opinions. So do we quit on monday (the day before the hearing) ? Deal or no deal?

As this is my friend's case I think i should check with him first. To be honest, 4 of the 5 statements are brief and there are only minor errors in them. For example, one says he arrived at the pub at a certain time even though the till records show he arrived at least half an hour earlier. He says he witnessed the incident happen a few minutes after arriving even though the employer's boyfriend states that the incident happened half an hour later. I suspect the witness had been prompted into stating the incorrect time in order that it tallys with the employer's boyfriend's version of events. However, i would imagine that a judge would not expect a witness to be 100% accurate on times of incidents. Particularly because this witness had no idea he had seen anything suspicious until the following day.

Sorry to hear you've had a hard time of it. At the end of the day all I can hope for is that my friend is lucky enough to get a fair hearing. He is a realist and he understands that a case such as his has a large grey area which could be interpretated differently from one judge to the next. It's a gamble but one he feels is necessary because the employers misinterpretation of events has left him with the stigma of a thief in the small village where he lives.

So what is the point of companies having disciplinary procedures if they don't have to follow them? And more significantly, why do ACAS bother to set out guidelines if nobody cares if they are ignored?

Surely the ET would want to base their own decison based solely upon the evidence which the employer took into consideration before dismissing the employee though? By failing to disclose these documents the employer has given herself the flexibility to do as she pleases regarding evidence. Particulary as she has been in possession of my friend's evidence in it's entirety for eight months and has now provided witness statements which are specifically designed to shoot down all claims made within his evidence. The question must surely be "was the dismissal fair at the time of the dismissal?". I'm not doubting you elpulpo (your info has been very helpful) but I'm struggling to comprehend a situation where an employer can unfairly dismiss an employee but is then given 8 months to potentially fabricate evidence which will then be taken into consideration at the Tribunal Hearing. If that's the case then I may have to put my head in the oven until the pain goes away

The fact that the employer failed to follow their own disciplinary procedure or the ACAS guidelines is absolutely watertight and the evidence appears several times within their documents and correspondence. However, their massively delayed and backdated witness statements have been cleverly written and makes their case for the dismissal being beyond reasonable doubt a strong one (although i've found a couple of minor contradictions in their statements). Hopefully the tribunal will be gunning for the employer after she flatly refused to provide copies of the witness statements despite receiving two letters from the ET telling her to hand them over. Each time the employer replied by telling the ET that she had taken legal advice and been assured that she didn't have to hand the statements over until 7 days before the tribunal hearing. This hearing is next tuesday. I was trying to not give that away at the start of this thread but it's close enough to drop the cloak and dagger act now.

Here's an interesting quote I've just found on the Directgov website: What is unfair dismissal There are several ways your dismissal could be unfair: your employer does not have a fair reason for dismissing you (eg if there was nothing wrong with your job performance) your employer did not follow the correct process when dismissing you (eg if they have not followed their company dismissal processes) As you may have already read, I've been hoping to clarify whether a dismissal can be ruled as unfair even when an employer makes a strong case for being "beyond all reasonable doubt". Although it only says "could", this quote suggests to me that an employer's failure to follow any disciplinary process does indeed play a major part in the scenario. If the government are saying it then who am I to argue. I just hope the ET people will think the same way. I'd imagine that somehow subtly mentioning it during cross examination would work better than attempting to tell the ET people how to do their jobs.

Their evidence is purely that the employer's boyfriend witnessed a drink not being paid for. The following day the employer had decided that she also saw this happen. Finally, one of their witnesses says he saw my friend receive a drink. Unfortunately this witness is an employee of theirs and has signed a statement prepared for him by the employer's boyfriend in which he adds a few incriminating remarks. The employer believes thay have backed this up with till records etc but how can you pinpoint something which was never tilled in? We wrote to the employer requesting the exact time of this incident as part of the previously mentioned letter but this request was again deemed by the employer as being "baffling". Presumably they don't know what time this was. The till records actually show that they employer and boyfriend has consumed several drinks that day. (They have a tab which they claim to settle at the end of the evening)