Ah, someone else whose secured loan has been sold by Welcome to MKDP. With the one I know about the last payment was made over 4 years ago.

Hello Janet, I would agree that for there to be £6,000 out of £10,000 outstanding with around a year to run on a 10 year loan seems very odd. I would suspect there must have been a lot of charges added, and then interest on those charges, for it to end up like that. Either that or something far worse by someone in the Blackburn office. Hopefully when Welcome do write to you again it will be far better news as regards the balance outstanding.

WP, I have flagged up your first post with the attachment since the CCBC claim form is showing both the claim number and the online password for you to use. This means someone with malicious intent could, for instance, go and admit to the debt on your behalf, leaving you stitched up with a CCJ. I have to say that as a Particulars of Claim it is very terse to say the least. It merely talks about "an account", with no mention of "an agreement". As far as I know this means you wouldn't be able to use a CPR Part 31.14 request to the Solicitors to see the documents, since none have been specified in the PoC. I guess this means you would have to use a CPR Part 18 request. However I will leave that to Andy as I know he is far more clued up on that sort of thing than me.

Hello Janet, and welcome to CAG! Personally I would just sit tight for now, and continue making your regular payments, while waiting for them to write to you again. If you have not heard anything by 8 weeks from the first letter I would write to them chasing for an update. When they do write to you I would be looking for a fully itemised statement of account from inception to the current time so you can see the full transaction history and how the revised outstanding balance has been calculated. However, if they decide you owe then not much more at all you may not want to push this point, but just get it paid off as quickly as you can! You haven't said what the original loan term was, or how much was showing as still owing on the last statement you received?

Caro, that is very good news to hear. I am conscious of the fact that March next year represents the sixth anniversary of when I first wrote to my banks concerning bank charges, and feeling that if I am going to start a county court claim it probably needs to be done before then to avoid any possibility of the bank entering a statute barred defence.

Cleo, for your own peace of mind you really should search for the Santander v Mayhew judgement referred to above, as it too relates to an unsolicited storecard changed to credit card situation. If needs be I have a PDF copy I could attach.

Hello Cleo, For Sigma Red/HL Legal to start the County Court Claim against you there ought to have been an assignment of the debt from M&S to Sigma Red. That is a proper Deed of Assignment, with you having been sent a proper notice of assignment (normally you get two letters, one from both M&S and one Sigma Red). Is that what you received "a while back"? Your first step as you say is the send the Acknowledgement of Service, this at least gives you 28 days to get your response back to court. I pesume we are talking the Bulk Centre since you say it is Northampton? The form should have a claim reference number, perhaps it might be an idea to phone Northampton CCBC and verify it is a genuine claim. I note you don't mention being able to complete the AoS online, which would be the case for CCBC, and I have read of companies "trying things on" by sending what look to be claim forms direct to the debtor. Then next, if it is a genuine claim, and since they are speifically mentioned in the Particulars of Claim, is a CPR 31.14 request to HL Legal asking them to send you copies of the agreement, the default notice and the termination notice. They should also have mentioned the assignment in the PoC, but I don't believe you can ask for it under CPR 31.14 if they haven't mentioned it. I would suggest you then do a detailed post summarising the whole of your thread, and flag that up for the attention of the site team to get someone like andyorch or Brigadier2CJS to look in and advise. Oh, and finally, I did read once about the small claims limit being increased to £10k or £15k, but I'm not sure if that has happened yet or not. I'm sure someone will be able to confirm if this is so.

That's good to hear NN1. I must chase Welcome again for my own report. Currently they've had more than the 8 weeks that I know I must leave before going to FOS, but the reporting issue was wrapped up in one complaint that included other matters. Interesting to note that you went to ICO rather than FOS. I suppose that makes sense since you were quoting the ICO Technical Guidance at them!

Actually if it is a car hire purchase agreement wouldn't it be a section 79 request?

Hello Lois, A couple of quick comments off the top of my head. I will try to find the time in the next few days for a more detailed reply. On no account give them your card details. Tell them you will be making the payment by online bank transfer (I do have their bank account details for secured loan repayments somewhere). You may wish to send the telephone harassment letter (from the library), and say you will only deal with this matter in writing. Unfortunately this doesn't tend to stop the worst of their branch staff, but at least they will have been told, and you can terminate any future call by reference to your letter. It's a pity you are still at local branch level, I didn't realise they still had any of those left! The staff at the centralised teams seem to be a bit better trained. As for registering the charge, theoretically Welcome could add it at any point, since you will (presumably!) have signed the legal charge. However, firstly Welcome would need to realise that they had forgotten to do this. Then there would be the fly in the ointment that the address they had on the charge isn't in your name any more, and I presume would be rejected by the Land Registry if they tried to register a charge. Obviously don't mention any of this to Welcome! As an aside you can check the charges on any property online at the Land Registry website on payment of the (small) fee. Far cheaper than getting your solicitor to do it! Since you have moved during the life of the loan I guess you must have notified Welcome at the time of a change of address? It seems that whoever actioned that at Welcome missed the point that you had a secured loan. Mind you, at the point you were notifying them, after the event, I don't suppose there was much they could do.

It looks like judgement will be formally handed down tomorrow. Understandably WBDFS can't tell us anything about the draft she has received by email. All the best for tomorrow WBDFS.

Or maybe a last minute out of court agreement with a gagging order?

Sorry I can't help you there. I have never got to the stage of having to argue in detail about non-compliance of a Default Notice where an actual date was specified. I can see their point, it is probably technically correct, though it is a little unusual. More recent examples I have seen are electing to allow about 21 days or more from the date on the notice to allow plenty of time for service

Hello Stugoz. This gets complicated! The agreement states that the interest rate is the variable rate plus a fixed margin of 7.50%. It also states that they may change the variable rate at their absolute discretion whenever they want as long as the variable rate is never more than 2% more than the LIBOR rate. It defines LIBOR rate as the variable rate of interest equal to LIBOR fixed not less often than quarterly. LIBOR is itself defined as the rate at which sterling deposits are offered for a 3 month period. The notes to the quarterly mortgage statement from February 2008 infer that (being a Money Partners arranged loan) that the interest is LIBOR plus the margin. The actual rate she was paying was 10.20% up till 29/02/2012 and 10.25% from 01/03/2012. Are you able to point me to somewhere where I can see the historic LIBOR rates please? What you say about them using a 1 year rate rather than 3 months is very interesting.

It worries me that the court is stating they have no intention of sending you anything in writing about the Strike Out. I know HMCTS is having to make cutbacks, but that does seem a little extreme. As a judge would have to have made the order to Strike Out, I would expect you to receive a "General Form of Judgement or Order" (form N? anyone) in the post.

Hello Stugoz, My partner has a secured loan/second mortgage with Kensington. The interest on her loan is set as LIBOR plus so many percent (I cannot remember exactly how many and don't have the paperwork with me to check), and this is reviewed quarterly. Thus her loan repayment did increase earlier this year because LIBOR had gone up. I presume your assertion that "there was no increase in the interest rate" is based on the BoE Base Rate? We did claim back all their unfair fees/charges a couple of years ago (£25 returned direct debit, the £50 ones you are talking about for just being in arrears, and a counsellor visit fee for a visit that never took place). We cited the FSA ruling in our letters to them and they responded with how this only applied to first mortgages and not secured loans. However we persisted, and eventually issued a court claim. And at that point I'll stop saying anything further, imply what you will from that!

ieuanMr, Just a quick response, from memory, without re-reading the whole (merged) thread. Personally I would start with a claim to enforce their compliance with the DSAR, possibly including damages to your son's reputation by their reporting to the CRAs if the agreement is not forthcoming. From there I would then consider what other claims to bring against the bank. Remind me please, have you actually ever had a written admission from NatWest that they cannot locate the agreement? It seems to me that your son's case is so complex you need the assistance of a far better legal mind than I possess to advise you. Possibly even so far as a consumer champion solicitor (though I do seem to recall you might have tried to find one of those before without any success). As for your local court, they are correct, as of sometime earlier this year new claims of a certain type must all originate with the processing centre in Salford before being transferred out to your local court (if appropriate). For what it's worth, I do agree the bank have been very naughty in continuing to service the loan from the overdrawn current account, despite your explicit instruction to the contrary. What was the date of your letter to them instructing them not to do so, and attempting to cancel the direct debit for the loan repayment? Have you ever managed to get the bank to cancel the overdraft on the current account, or reduce it all?

Well, for what it's worth, my suggestion would be to give them another week (21 days ought to be enough for an initial reply). If you have not heard anything by then send them a copy of the letter, with a covering letter stating that you have not had a response, that you know it was received by them (give the Royal Mail Tracking number), and that you wish them to consider it as a "FORMAL COMPLAINT". Send it to: Compliance Department Welcome Financial Services Limited Mere Way Ruddington Fields Business Park Ruddington Nottingham NG11 6NZ (How sad am I, I've just done that address from memory? Someone please correct me if I've got it wrong!)

Did you head the letter FORMAL COMPLAINT? Did you send it to the Compliance Department in Nottingham? Two weeks would be about the timeframe I would expect of them to respond to a Formal Complaint acknowledging receipt and enclosing a copy of their complaints procedure. This would have an anticipation of providing you with a final response up to 8 weeks from receipt. You really do need to give them a little more time.

Hello H_A_K, This is my understanding of the situation, and stand to be corrected if anyone can provide proof of a different view. The rules of service apply as per Practice Directions and the ruling made by a senior judge. I can't quote you the citation, but could go and find it if you needed it. So presuming it is collected on the same day it is dated, it would be deemed delivered on the second working day afterwards for first class post and the fourth for second class post. So from your example above if it was dated Monday 1st, it would be deemed delivered on Wednesday 3rd (1st class), or Friday 5th (2nd class). Therefore if the date (and note it has to be an acual date and not just "within 14 days") for remedy is given as 14th the Default Notice is deficient. It was Brandon v Amex that determined that the invalid default notice was not "de minimus". You can find the judgement on Bailii with citation [2011] EWCA Civ 1187 (http://www.bailii.org/cgi-bin/markup.cgi?doc=/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2011/1187.html). I think there may be another judgement that is relevant, but again I can't remember it at the moment, though could find it again if needed.

For reference the ICO Data Protection Technical Guidance on Filing defaults with credit reference agencies is here: http://www.ico.gov.uk/upload/documents/library/data_protection/detailed_specialist_guides/default_tgn_version_v3%20%20doc.pdf In that document it is stated "A record showing a series of payments as six months in arrears when this does not reflect the real payment history should not be used as an equivalent of a default." I have successfully used the Guidance to get one of my creditors to record a default with the CRAs properly, and am in the process of going through the complaint process with two others.

WannaBeDebtFreeSoon, There is an interesting phrase used in that judgement at paragraph 11 - "and the rate is fixed by Statutory Instrument and at all relevant times was £9.25 per hour". That would suggest to me that you are far less likely to find your costs being disputed if you use a rate of £9.25 per hour up to October last year, and £18.00 an hour since.

Just noticed this: http://govanlc.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/sharp-v-bank-of-scotland-plc.html

Thanks Tex, I did!

Hello Tex, As someone who has been watching from the sidelines (having had my own reasons to see how NatWest might behave), can I just say how pleased I am for you and Mr Tex, and a very big "well done" to you both for sticking it out to the end.