Yes I do realise they are powerless, but I warned them twice not to call to my door and they did, so I want to Sue them for trespass, does anyone have any advice along those lines?

We recently had a couple of nasty financial hits involving losing our best customer and Universal Credit shafting us,

I contacted all our credit cards and explained the problem,

all but Aqua where very understanding,

Aqua sent the problem immediately to Resolvecall,

who threatened a home visit,

so I sent them an email with the standard letter as below,

but despite using THEIR ref number they insisted that I told them who I was..

I told them politely to bog off and that any calls to the door and I would prosecute for trespass (see email details below).

They emailed me back asking me to confirm my details and I again politely told them to bog off and I don't have to confirm anything to them and NOT to attend as per previous emails.

Today they dropped a card into my downstairs neighbours door, so not even using the correct address, so I called them and I must admit did not let the guy speak very much and warned him that any other visits would be repulsed using necessary force.

I do now wish to prosecute them for trespass, I do know a solicitor, I fix her computer but she is a employment specialist.

Does anyone have any suggestions as to where to go, because I do not want this bully company to just start visiting people DAYS after asking for the creditor for help.

I DO intend to sue this company and also make it as public as possible, so that these people cannot think they can walk over us.

Gary

The First Email (C&P / slightly modified from CAG)

Dear Resolvecall

Your Ref xxx

I do not acknowledge any debt to your company.

Please be advised that I will only communicate with you in writing.

Should it be your intention to arrange any “doorstep calls”, please be advised that under Office of Fair Trading (OFT) rules, you can only visit me at my home if you make an appointment . I have no wish to make an appointment with you.

There is only an implied license under English Common Law for people to be able to visit me on my property without express permission; the postman and people asking for directions etc (Armstrong v. Sheppard and Short Ltd [1959] 2 Q.B. per Lord Evershed M.R.). Therefore take note that I revoke license under Common Law for you, or your representatives to visit me at my property and if you do so, then you will be liable to damages for a tort of trespass and action will be taken, including but not limited to, police attendance.

Yours faithfully,

Sorry second email back to them

I don't have to confirm anything, your reference is in the subject, just look it up in your database. Please note any phone calls or texts will be reported to the ICO as I do not wish to communicate with you any way but postal. Any attendance to our home WILL result in prosecution as you will be trespassing

I got a well known credit card company to stop hassling me by emailing the CEO telling him that every time I got and email or letter I would email HIM to tell him.

Within DAYS the harassment stopped and I got an apology letter.

So maybe everyone who gets mail should do this, a CEO email is easier to find than their home address

Nice one, one up on them is good.

I've take to winding DCA's up to the point of breaking,

two of them owe my wife £25k and Lowell Owe £10k so far,

I know we will never see the money,

but I worked them into the same "tick box" type contract that the credit companys use,

and one DCA rather than sending me a curt few lines sent me a 2 pager with obvious panic in them..

. I will reveal all when I'm done with dealing with the DCA's,

but I have a double edged sword with Lowell,

they used my information illegally and I WILL have them over the coals one way or another..

I HATE DCA **** BAGS.

[removed]

By contacting me without being sure that I AM the person they are after, as per Conc, see above..

"A firm must not pursue an individual whom the firm knows

or believes might not be the borrower or hirer under a credit agreement or a consumer hire agreement.

[Note: paragraph 3.5f of DCG]."

Hi Guys,

The letter is a phishing one, I have been trying to take Lowell to task over this,

I complained about their illegal use of my personal information in June and they are "investigating",

but so far even though I have prodded them a few times, I have heard nothing.

I contacted the Financial Ombudsman but they can't help because I am not a customer of Lowell so they can't get involved.

I thought as it's my personal information can the information commissioner help.

.. No it's not a bit of legislation they Police (odd I thought they are there to do just that).

I tried the FCA whose website the document is on, and they can't help, if fact told me to go to the Financial Ombudsman.

Can anyone steer me in the right direction please?

Incidentally and on the side

I have 2 DCA's chasing my wife but have got them tied in so many knots,

the absolute panic in the last letter I got from one of them made me laugh out loud.

I'll post it all in a separate thread when I've done turning the thumbscrews..

. I may well be able to get a DCA set on them and have a go at a CCJ, then send the Bailiffs.

. I'll give you all a laugh about that later, you'll love it.

Hi,

Sorry for the delay putting up a scan of the letter, been extremely busy, but here finally is the letter.

[ATTACH]52431[/ATTACH]

Yup, I will scan and post it up later, have to go to work now.

dx100uk My wording was probably misleading, I know Experian don't send DCA's but unless they where sure that I was the person in question they should not have handed out my address and the DCA should not have used it without being sure it was me.. Simple date of birth or looking to see if the address is linked to my address list.

There is something wrong with how Experian and the DCA have treated this and I don't see why I have to be at the receiving end, they should NOT have contacted me for ANY reason because I am not the person they are looking for

Thanks Silverfox,

I am concerned that my details have been used in relation to whatever debt this person has,

the DCA should not be sending letters out to everyone on file that shares my name as clearly shown below.

A firm must not pursue an individual whom the firm knows or believes might not be the borrower or hirer under a credit agreement or a consumer hire agreement.

[Note: paragraph 3.5f of DCG].

I've just complained to the Financial Ombudsman and also am looking into the Data Protection Commission , my information should NOT be used this way, that is the whole point of the Data Protection Act surely?

Hi,

Recently I had a letter from a DCA asking me if I was a person of my name who lived at an address in Rhyl.

Apart from the fact I've never been near Rhyl

I was concerned that my information as provided by Experian was now linked with this person who shared my name.

So I contacted the DCA who assured me that the information was not linked.

Which now leads me to the Data Protection Act

where a company is not allowed to pass on an individuals information

unless they are sure that it is that person.

I have checked my Experian Equifax & noddle accounts and Rhyll does not shown in any of them,

so how could Experian be sure that the person was me

and be confident about sending a DCA to hassle me about somebody elses debt.

I am REALLY unhappy about this,

I had to about 5 years ago make myself insolvent because I lost my job,

but have worked my way back and now have a reasonable credit rating

and now have credit cards back again and am managing them perfectly.

So to have this random DCA has really had me rattled.

What can I do about this, the ICO web site is not really helpful when it comes to complaints.

Thanks for reading

Gary

Thanks for your comments guys, I have been in constant contact with the council CC'ing my local MP who expressed an interest when I let her know about my 9 month long battle with them over council tax. But I have not raised a formal complaint, so have asked the Chief Executive (or what passes for one now) for the procedure

Hi,

I've recently been having a 2 and fro with the council about council tax I didn't owe, I eventually made an agreement with the council and they said they would put a attachment on my JSA, which I was quite happy with and didn't raise any objections.

The job centre then refused the attachment order, which unbeknown by me, the council rather than coming back to me, put the debt out to rossendales, from whom we got a letter.

I immediately contacted the council and asked them why they had done this rather than coming back to me so we could sort payment another way. They agreed to reclaim the order and agreed to me setting up a standing order.

A week or so later possibly a little longer a bailiff knocks at the door and we told him to get lost because they didn't have the order. He called his office, apologised and left.

Next thing we know we have a letter telling us if we don't pay £42.50 costs they would re-attend and enforce the court order.

I complained to them and the council (twice now) and the council are adamant that they have the court order and they are happy with the current agreement, but Rossendales keep sending us letters saying "we are investigating this matter" and sending more and more aggressive letters.

I have made it clear to the council and the bailiff company that I do not feel this is part of the original court order and that they should take me to small claims court, but I seem to be banging my head against the wall with them.

Anybody have any ideas

I thought I'd let you guys know the latest.

Me and the council have come to an agreement, they have reduced the amount I have to pay and have taken it back from the Bailiff company. I have agreed to pay £3.55 per week, which I can live with.

The way I managed to swing this in the end is I complained to the Chief Executive and also got my MP involved.

The council claimed to have left me a voice mail giving me a hearing date, but the only voice mail I had from them was "call to discuss my council tax". I did point out that it would have been better to have followed this up with a letter or email.. I have actually had a lot of problems with my voice mail including getting a womans voice mail instead of mine (and her calls) for 2 days and for 2 weeks the mail box was corrupted and my network provider had to delete it and make a new one.

But I'm happy enough with the outcome, I don't object to paying council tax, on the whole my local council actually do a good job, it was their collection methods I didn't agree with.

Don't worry the bailiffs will be wasting their time!

Has anyone else on here had the £100 summons letter and did you try to defend yourself?

I am also refusing to pay the outstanding balance of £28.85 so that they HAVE to take me back to court even if it's for committal proceedings, at least then I get the chance to defend myself

Hi,

I could do with a bit of advice about councils and liability orders.

Basically my local council last September recalculated my council tax and it went from me owing £40 to owing nearly £1000, which being on a low income I had no chance of paying by april.

I got the usual summons letter in November and attended the court, to find them not is session, in fact we had to go to the basement and talk to a council employee, for which we where charged £100

I had turned up with all the paperwork I felt I needed for my day in court, so asked the council lady when we would see the magistrate. She told me that I would only see the magistrate if I disputed the amount. I them made it very clear that I did dispute the amount and that I wanted to defend this in court.

She then insisted we make a payment agreement, which we didn't want to do, but she said we couldn't progress unless we did.

Before leaving I asked again when we would see the magistrate, and was told I would get a letter in a few days.

A few days later we did get a letter with the words "As you are aware we have obtained a liability order".

So they never gave me a chance to defend my corner.

Since then December I became unemployed so the council tax was recalculated to £38.85, which we where very happy about, until 3 weeks ago we got a letter from a bailiff company chasing £319.

I have emailed the council several times, but they keep avoiding answering my question as to why I didn't get a chance to defend myself in court and avoiding the fact that I keep asking for it to go back to court.

Was this a infringement of my rights? Surely I should have been given the chance to defend myself?

Thanks for reading

Well, We decide to appear in court, so I got all my self employed and personal income and expenditure together along with all the paperwork we'd had from the council and sat outside the magistrates courts, only to find out that it wasn't a court it was 5 or 6 council employees sat at tables with everyone standing in a queue to be spoken to.

All of them where telling people to call their agent (bailiff company) and make an arrangement to pay. When it came to my turn I asked the woman why I was talking to a council employee instead of a magistrate, surely I was paying the £95 summons fee to speak to a magistrate. She then informed me that I would only see a magistrate if I disputed the amount. I showed her a copy of the letter where I had written to the council disputing the amount and asking for an appeal.

Her attitude changed and she suddenly wanted to make a council payment agreement. I think because there is a possibility that it could go against the council if a magistrate hears the cases.

I will be once more disputing this and if I don't get to see a magistrate I will also dispute the £95 summons, that was not a summons to go to court at all, it was a summons to see a council employee and be told to call their debt collectors in front of 40 or so other people in the same boat.

Has anyone got any advice on this at all please.

Hi,

Most of it seems to be from 2010, when my wife had a part time job 2 hours a day 5 days a week, taking home less than £100 per week, at the time I had just started my business, and only made £440 profit for the entire year.

The rest we really, really don't understand because I was on JSA for 12 months before that, and 2011 I only made £3759 profit for the year, which I was proud of to be honest for a new business to make any profit in it's first year during a recession is quite a feat, but it seems I'm not allowed to succeed, this year I may have to sign back on if things go as they are, so all the hard leg work I did was for nowt .

Gary

Hi Guys,

My son recently moved out so we informed the council and they did a recalculation, we expected the housing benefit to go down, but we didn't expect the headache that followed.

We got probably 25 sheets with different calculations on going back over the last 3 years and the final one was the recalculated housing benefit & council tax benefit, the housing benefit had gone down from £114 per week to £55 per week and they where taking money at £15 for a previously unknown overpayment.

So I called them and they said that I had been overpaid in 2010 and 2011 (Interesting I was on JSA in 2010, and self employed making very little 2011 to now) and that £1500 had to be repaid, My hair stood on end and I asked about the council tax, and it seems that I now owe a total of £921, instead of the £74 from before, £299 being this years, and the rest making up the difference between the overpayment they claim was made during 2010 & 2011.

I have since got them to look over the situation 3 times, and even printed out 4 years of bank statements and 2 years of accounts to prove I wasn't earning more than they seem to think.

But my problem is, can they make me pay this overpayment when it's their fault and over 2 years old.

Can anyone think of anything I can do, I'm tempted to let it go to magistrates court and appear to explain what's happened to the magistrate, because we just do not have the £121 per month, we are now struggling to pay the rent let alone all the other bills that are now behind.

Hope somebody can help

Gary

Hi Smartcard,

Don't worry, I got them sorted, a few months ago I had a DCA letter and emailed them to ask what it was for (it only had amounts no client) and when they said it was for Swindles I told them that I disputed the debt and that I would not be paying any monies unless ordered to do so by a court and also for good measure added the CAG doorstep letter to it in case they felt like popping in to see me.

Haven't heard a thing since

Hi Guys,

We live in rented accom, and a bailiff company has been calling for a person who lived in the flat below us about 4 years ago according to the landlord. (The flat has been empty for over a year)

All the letters which come for people who don't live here have gone back "not at this address" and one hand delivered letter with a bailiff address on it was handed to the landlord, who both phoned and wrote to the company to inform them that the person does not live here.

Yesterday we ad another hand delivered letter but this time in an envelope so it went in the post box "not at this address", which of course will cost them postal penalties , but this morning at about 6am there was a prolonged hammering on the communal front door and OUR doorbell was rung more than once, even tho the bells are clearly marked.

I looked through the window and saw a familiar character I have dealt with before and went back to bed, ignoring it.

My question is, as this matter is for somebody who no longer lives here and hasn't for some time, and they have been informed by the land owner in writing, and they are disturbing other innocent parties and unsociable hours (11pm-7am), am I allowed to use "necessary" force to remove this indivual from my stairs, where as far as I am concerned he is trespassing and causing a disturbance.

Gary

The last contact I had with Swindles Debt Collector was a letter I sent them asking them to remove all phone numbers from their files as I would only communicate via post, and that I would not be paying any monies unless ordered to do so by a court, and that any harassment would be pointless and logged in a diary to present when the time came for a court case.

Not heard a thing since.

They are Bullies who try to make money by making you think you owe for a cancellation and then setting the hounds on 7 days after first writing to you.

I will NEVER use Swindle ever again, and have warned my family against them

Thanks citizenB , sadly I can't write to the culprits because I never had their address, they dropped the laptops off, to be honest any where I have the address I drop the PC off to the customer.

I also did a google and couldn't find a lot, but back in the '80's I seem to remember that you could dump the property after 3 months if you had been in contact with the owner and after 12 months with no contact, but my memory is a bit vague about it, and it's almost certainly changed since then anyway.

To be honest I just want rid of the darned things, if I can dispose, I'll rip out any useful bits and send the rest for recycling.

Gary

Hi Caggers,

I fix peoples computers and occasionally the owner never appears to collect their PC despite calls.

I have 3 laptops where I gave in calling and they have been here for around a year and two which belong to 2 friends who twice now have arranged to collect the laptops but failed to turn up (last time was 3 months ago).

I seem to remember there is a law or statute that says after a certain length of time I can dispose of the items.

All are now subject to storage fees anyway, I'm fed up with moving them around in my parts cupboard so have decided that if the owners appear they can pay a £2.50 per week storage fee back to when they abandoned it on me, hence taking up valuable space (I live in a 2 bedroom flat, so space is at a premium).

Can anyone throw any light on the disposal law and if I am acting legally by charging storage fees should the owner ask for the laptops back.

Many thanks for any help you guys can give me.

And a donation will be made via paypal to the CAG fund.

Gary

Well if it does carry on, the way I stopped them was emailed their CEO in the USA and told him every time I got a call or letter related to our disputed account, I would email him to show him how annoying it is.

After 2 weeks and more than 40 emails I got a polite letter from the customer services director of Cap One UK thanking me for my emails to Rich Fairbank and assuring me that the harassment would end.

And it did.

Here's that email address should you need it [email protected]

If they have your court details they cannot do anything, just let them waste their time and money and have fun "escorting them from the premises" if they call