I'm hoping someone can give me some solid advice/help here. We had a magistrates court summons for unpaid council tax, and as a previous years was on an attachment of earnings already, wrongly assumed that when the liability order was granted, this would be collected that way too. Around 1 week ago, we received a letter from Chandlers advising they were going to visit. At this stage I tried to speak to the local council who have refused to queue it as an attachment and wouldn't consider my payment plan or recall from bailiffs and allow me to deal direct with them. Next thing I know we were woken up at 8 today with knocking on the door, and as we didn't answer a Notice of Enforcement was put through the letterbox. I spoke to the council again as well as bailiff and the bailiff told me that no it was too late to make a payment arrangement and he would be back in hour and a half to seize goods. I went to speak to the CAB who phoned both bailiff and council, and got told much the same, bailiff went on to say he was coming back tomorrow morning and if we didn't let him in next step was apply to courts again for a locksmith. CAB arranged an appointment to come back in tomorrow and do a money plan/budget thing with them which they say will go in my favour and help in trying to sort this. I thought, but admit this could be wrong, that bailiffs couldn't just come and take your goods they had to levy them first. So am I falling for scare tactics from Chandlers or can they if they were to be let in, just up and seize stuff? Any advice on what my next steps should be, as it is a minefield when neither Council not Chandlers are prepared to talk to you and let you arrange a repayment plan.

Sorry for perhaps not being clear in my original post but rather than a general moan about Argos I am hoping one or more of you knowledgeable caggers can give me some advice and some legalese for contacting them. I guess my questions are: My contract of sale was with Argos I believe, as they sold the goods and took my money, is this correct? Are they in breach of contract due to their failure to deliver and failure to resolve my complaint? Should I get an immediate cancellation of contract? Does this then mean Argos should refund my money straight away? Are there any specific phrases I should quote when contacting them via email? Should I be giving them a timescale in which to resolve this before I escalate it? If I should need to get a body involved would it be Trading Standards? All help and advice most gratefully received!

On 30th April, I placed a large order with Argos online. Fridge freezer turned up when it was supposed to to, as did the kids bike and single bed frame. However, the set of garden solar lights I ordered have not arrived and despite chasing every week they have never been able to give me any explanation other than goods coming direct from supplier and they will chase it up. I have now reached the end of my tether as on 31st May I was told they would contact me in 48 hours with the suppliers response. I have of course heard nothing from them so emailed them to say cancel the order and refund my money ASAP. They have responded with this: I am sorry to read that you wish to cancel your order. I have notified the supplier of your desire to cancel. Once the order is cancelled, the refund of £25.99 may take up to five working days. Please note, in the event that the goods have already been despatched, a free return will be necessary before the refund will be possible. I am not at all happy with this response as surely the cancellation should be immediate and the supplier must be able to say if items have been sent or not. Instead I am left kinda hanging not knowing if they will eventually turn up or I will get my refund soon. Can someone give me advice on how to handle this please as I'm about to go off the deep end! Yes it's only £25.99 but they've had my money for over a month now.

I will do, we can move our vehicles to the local shopping centre car park and keep them there for awhile today. I will then get onto the Council on Monday and see if I can get things sorted through the bailiffs held off. Really good advice from this site as always. So nice to have somewhere to turn to when you don't have the answers yourself

So we still need to move them tomorrow just in case? Am planning to pay off a large chunk anyway to the Council, just don't know when it will be as waiting on some funds to come through. Maybe I can get the Council to put a hold on the bailiffs in the meantime if I'm lucky! Out of interest, since our vehicles are parked right in front of our house, I asusme he can pop back at anytime and levy them?

Can he still levy on our vehicles though if he turns up here anyway?

My husband said he did have an attachment of earnings when he was working and was paying all this off then. He lost his job and went onto JSA and the payments stopped, he heared nothing more from the Council and knew nothing about a bailiffs visit. He wants me to query all this with the Council in the hopes we can get it taken back from the bailiffs and pay the Council direct. The bailiff had mentioned we'd have to pay £25 for him to do a levy so our first payment would be £50 for their charges. He now thinks it best to tell the bailiff it will be queried first with the Council before we make an arrangement so not to bother calling round. If he does, we won't answer the door and I said to hubby we need to move our car and bike away for the day! Will we have any luck getting the bailiff to wait awhile until we talk to the Council?

Nope am sure he hasn't as all he did was hand me copies of the liability orders from the Council. Think my obvious lurgy was putitng him off having any dealings with me!

OK thank you for this advice, will make sure my husband knows not to let him in and we will need to move our cars. Does it matter that he already saw them today? Or that our lounge window is at the front and if blind isn't down you can see in the house?

I opened the door this morning to find a bailiff on my doorstep. This was over Council Tax from 2011/2012 I think. He gave me a copy of the liability orders when I spoke with him.I was surprised as had forgotten I owed this, especially as I thought my husband had put it all in his name now and had been handling it. I do know at one point deductions were being taken from his wages, but they stopped when he lost his job. He is now back at work and I'm thinking he hadn't expected this to happen either. As I can hardly talk at the mo due to laryngitis, the bailiff asked me to get my hubby to call him to make an arrangement. Hubby phoned him and the guy will be coming round tomorrow to do paperwork and make an arrangement. Seems we have to pay £50 straight off which we won't have until hubby gets paid. I don't work due to health issues and hubby is on a very low wage so is concerned we might struggle if they expect big repayments every month. Am I right in thinking we shouldn't let the bailiff into the house as that gives him access another time, or is that old thinking these days? Any advice on how we should handle this as I'm dreading losing our belongings. Thanks.

OK guys, looks like I'm crystal clear on all this now, so thank you all very much for the help and advice it's much appreciated

If I can at least get half that's better than nothing. I'm guessing the loan was done in both names due to it being secured on a jointly owned house, so may well be that the PPI was joint as well. So the fact all payments were made from an aco**** in my sole name has no bearing on this? Neither does it matter they have his name wrong?

Well I shall wait to hear from them as I sent the acceptance back to them signed by me but with a covering letter explaining I am no longer in contact with him and he was only a signatory due to owning the house with me. So I can expect them to come back and tell me not good enough whereupon I will ask for proof that it was joint cover. I so hope it wasn't, especially as I was the one making the payments. Guess if someone avdised it to be joint we may have gone for it but time will tell. I can at least get something out of them as another loan was solely in my name and they have agreed a PPI refund on that one. Out of interest, if the PPi refund in question was on a joint cover, can I get anything without his signature such as half the amount they are offering? On their acceptance forms they say they will pay by cheque, no doubt hanging onto it as much as they can. Cheque in this day and age???!!!

OK so I ask them to prove it was joint cover, and if they can't they then have to pay just me? As this was a loan from the then Cedar Holdings that they took over, I'm gonna hope they don't have any proof!

I don't have the agreement as this was a very old loan taken out at least 10 years ago, and long since paid off. I think his name had to be on the agreement as the loan was secured on the property we jointly owned? Possible only myself covered by ther insurance as I was the one paying but no way of knowing. Perhaps I should mention they had his name wrong on their acceptance form, which amkes me wonder if they couldn't read his writing when he signed something.

I am hoping someone can give me some advice on where I stand with a Black Horse PPi claim. I received notifications on the amount they owe after they have upheld my complaints. Cue much joy and skipping round the room until I read the acceptance forms they want me to sign. One of these loans was originally with Cedar Holdings a very long time ago, and when it was taken out due to my bad credit rating it was secured on the house I then owed with my ex partner. The loan would have been granted to me, whether cheque in my name or into my bank account and I know all repayments would have been from my sole account and not a joint account. Black Horse require all parties to sign the acceptance, and given I split up with my then boyfriend around 8 years ago and have no idea where he now lives, this is impossible to do. Where do I stand on this, can they refuse to pay out as he hasn't signed, refuse to pay the amount to me only even though all payments would be from my account and a direct debit would have been active on my sole bank account?

Thank you that's perfect and just what I was looking for! Have now drafted and sent a concise email detailing what went wrong and where they failed me.

I'm trying to get a problem with my disconnection resolved. Basically, my husband lost his job in January and as I don't work due to ill health we were living off jobsekkers. This meant we struggled to pay the BT bill and as we needed a phone line and internet for job applications etc we wanted to keep it going. I phoned and told BT twice what our problem was and asked to set up a payment plan and was told I would get a callback to discuss how BT could help us through this situation. I did not receive a callback only bill reminders and disconnection threats. My support worker and also my mother spoke to them about this and the only help we got was our line reconnected but with full services for which we were being charged rather then incoming calls only. With the help of my support worker I was able to get most of the bill cleared, and as I had received a temrination notice and final bill with huge charges for contract cancellations etc, she phoned them to explain a cheque was arriving which would clear most of the balance and could we arrange to get reconnected as we could then manage to pay the final balance in instalments. She was told no we couldn't as the contract was cancelled. I complained about this and was told I would have to pay all of the charges for the cancellation plus a £50 deposit to enable me to set up a new contract. This would mean around £300 left to pay instead of about £80 odd. Having looked into their code of practice of how they will operate when their are financial difficulties, they did not follow this practice at all, and if they had have done so I believe I would not now be in this situation. I have tried their contact us page, to send them an email, but only get told to write to them of phone them. Only having a mobile I have no wish to call them, but want to contact them via email. My question is, have they acted unfairly by not following thier code of practice and do I have a legitimate complaint or do I have to just forget it pay the bill and notch it up to experience! Also does anyone know how I can email them and it go to a manager rather than say customer services who will reply from what their manual states?

I think it's 156 odd. Last time we tried to sort it, Federal said we had to do income and expenditure before a repayment plan could be agreed, which I wasn't happy to do! I accept that we owe it and don't want to be taken to Court, just wanted to know if they could take us to Court or if we could just make an offer that wouldn't cripple us and they had to accept it.

No T's and C's at all, just an order form from one of those duplicate order form books, it just had on it that we would be instalments of x per month withn x number of months. The only date on it being the date it was made.

About 5 years or so ago, I took out a secured loan from Welcome, can't remember what for now. My circumstances deteriorated after I became pregnant and my husband lost his job so hardly any money coming in. This meant I struggled with my mortgage who refused to help me. In the end I faced reposession and as it looked like the Council would try to get out of helping me if made homeless. I made the hard decision to sell house to a buy to let company as it was only 1 bedroom house and because we had a child we needed bigger house but wouldn't get a mortgage for it. If I didn't own a house I hoped I could get social housing, which I did in the end. Welcome agreed to remove the charge for half the loan and said the balance would be turned into a personal loan which they never did. They sent a collector out and said they had paperwork from the solicitor agreeing to this, but I didn't when asked for them to send it all to me they didn't send anything. I moved house and they traced me and sent another chasing letter at least 18 months later, I ignored it and they didn't follow up until recently. My question is what is their legal standing as no new loan agreement was made, and original agreement was secured on a property I don't own. Can they still take me to court? Thanks

Last year my husband and I had a family portrait done as we'd won a free session. Originally we were just going to have the portrait done and accept the free standard size photo and leave it at that. In the end we decided to go ahead and get a picture from them as they offered instalment plans. They are not, or weren't then, licensed credit brokers so there was no interest charged. There was no credit agreement as such, just an note on the picture order form saying how much and how many instalments and my husbands signature. We started off quite well and for about 6 months or so made the payments, then as we headed into Christmas and money needed to be stretched further we missed a couple of payments and I think one time we paid less. Husband lost his job so all payments ceased and we had a couple of letters and phonecalls asking us to pay and advising if we didn't they'd pass it onto Federal, debt collectors. Even when my husband got a new job we weren't able to make payments again as we were behind on rent and had other things we needed to clear first. I asked Federal for a copy of the credit agreement and they posted me a photocopy of this order form, making sure they told me that was the agreement and we had made payments against it. When this first happened my husband was still out of work, so told them I was unable to offer a payment as we were waiting to hear re benefits. They then got forgotton about, and now they are threatening court action. My query is, is what we have a legally binding credit agreement so can it be enforced in court? Thanks

My husband and I also have a Provident loan, and a few months ago he lost his job. We told our agent as one week we had nothing for her. She said as long as we could pay £1 a week, there was nothing thery could do about it. We would get arrears letters but not to worry about them. Not sure how accurate her advice was, but we didn't have any problems and even though my husband is now working again we're still not making full payment yet and again not had any problems.