I received County Court papers a few weeks ago about a debt for Cabot Financial for £2.7k. The debt is years old, can't remember exactly, but certainly more than 6 years. The debt has been sold on many times in that period. I returned the forms disputing their claim and used the following as my defence: The alleged debt is barred by the Statute Of Limitations Act 1980 Limitation action 1980 Section 5 “an action founded on simple contract shall not be brought after the expiration of six years from the date on which the cause of action accrued.” I have since had a reply from their Solicitors: The Court has served us with a copy of the Defence you filed whereby you dispute your liability to the Claimant on the basis that you believe the Claim is statute barred under Section 5 of the Limitation Act 1980. We note, however, that you have provided no information / evidence of when you believe the limitation period commenced, nor have you provided any details of when you believe you last made a payment towards the debt or when you last acknowledged your liability for the debt. If you are able to provide any evidence in support of your Defence e.g. a copy of the Default Notice served on you to show when the limitation period commenced / statements of account for the last 6 years to show no payments have been made towards this account etc., then please do so within the next 14 days. If however, you are unable to provide evidence in support of your Defence, we invite you to withdraw your Defence by completing the enclosed Form N9A and returning it to this office within the next 14 days. In the event that the Defence is not withdrawn or evidence is not provided in support of it, our instructions may be to make an application to strike out your Defence / for Summary Judgement and to seek an Order that you pay our Client's legal costs associated with that application on a contractual (indemnity) basis. I was under the impression that it was up to the claimant to prove the debt is not Statute barred and not me. I can see that they are trying to scare me into an admission and get me to withdraw my defence. My initial thoughts on receiving this was to do nothing and let them prove its not statute barred. I would appreciate any comments or guidance on my next move - if any Thanks