Thanks for your reply - I eventually had to contact the council. The Magistrates Court who issued the LOs (there was a 2nd) had closed down and although I rang the one which had taken over records etc., they said they didn't have any going back that far. On ringing the council, I was short and to the point, making them note I had called and asking them to put it on hold (which she did for precisely 48 hours!) . I have spoken to a solicitor friend and also National Debtline (hugely helpful, sympathetic and hopefully useful!) and emailed the council with a Subject Data Access Request of ALL correspondence in regard to this account including payments made, warnings, summons, LOs etc., any correspondence to Law Enforcement etc (LOs were in 2003/2007 so I would have expected action to be taken). The council woman did admit that she could see the account had been in dispute. We'll see - I will update on an progress!

Hi - am in more than a slight panic!! (I have posted this problem elsewhere then remembered how helpful this forum was in the past.) A week ago I received 5 years worth of Business Rates demands - 2002/3, 2003/4, 2004/5, 2005/6 & 2006/7. There was no letter just the outstanding amounts. I had had during that time, a running battle with the Council about these rates due to my feeling the amount was unfair due to part of the property being unused, I didn't pay the landlord rent for it and I didn't receive any income for it (it was also pretty derelict and not fit for use). As a result the Valuation Office sent a nice woman out who agreed it should be split and the empty part be the responsibility of the landlord. His wife then hit the roof when the Council sent them a bill and it was rejoined (due to her bullying tactics no doubt!). The debate then went back and forth to the Council and was never settled properly (each time I got sent a new bill, I contacted them, challenged it and it stalled - I did make payments however). I left the property in late 2007. Eventually I packed up my business to care for my elderly disabled parent (which I am still doing). In 2009 (I think!) I was sent similar - just the bills, no letter. I had met a guy who said not a problem he would sort it out as it was his line of work. He duly got involved and I heard no more. Until a week ago when the same 5 bills appeared And then this morning I received a threatening letter stating a Liability Order had been issued on 19th May 2003 for £2927. And if I do not pay by this Wednesday, they will send in the bailiffs! I would NEVER ignore any court summons etc. and I was still at the property at the time. When I looked closer at the bills, the 2002/3 bill to which this LO presumably was for, the amount owed was £1131.40. The date of this bill was 1/4/2003. There was a small charge of £50 costs but it does not say what for and anyway it predates the LO anyway . No further costs on any of the subsequent bills. There are no names of contactable people on any of the correspondence. So what do I do????

The council cleared all the drainage ditches a couple of days later and seem to be doing them all suddenly round here which is unusual.

To be fair the road looks level on a normal day - you just wouldn't have expected it to have got as deep as that. It just looked like a shallow puddle that was low enough for the car to clear - And the Post lady agrees with me! I'm not someone that takes those sort of chances in a car - I cna't afford to!

No, no signs warning of flooding at all, despite the people living in the neighbouring farmhouse complaining previously. Mine is the 3rd car (that I know of) to have been caught out. And the drainage ditch was most definitely blocked - with 3 boulders!! And the farmer who helped me out of the flood would vouch for it and they cleared them all the way up the lane a few days later. The councils are supposed to keep these drains un-blocked but their work is very infrequent. As landowners we are supposed to clean up any hedgetrimmings when the hedges get cut annually which we do, so why can't they keep to their work?

Interested to read this thread. I racked up huge charges on my business account with Lloyds and they contributed to me packing up in 2007. Basically I set up the business in 2000 as a sole trader but then my Dad wanted to naively "safeguard" me from a partner so insisted on having 1%. Initially I was based down in Devon and had a good rapor with my BM. I needed to move premises and took out a loan of £5k (plus PPI which I am sure I should not have been made to take out?) with a £2k overdraft facility. No long after this, my BM asked if I could start reducing the overdraft by £50/month which I agreed on. This seemed to work fine and I got it down to £1k when the BM moved to another part of the bank and I was given a new BM who was totally unreasonable. By this time I had moved to Oxfordshire and the business was not doing as well as it should have. I desperately wanted to move my account to a local branch but my BM kept refusing. My new BM was not very pleasant and kept insisting on the overdraft being transferred into the loan. I refused and had some pretty nasty conversations with him, including one where he told me to eff off to another bank. Then 4 days before Christmas 2005, he removed my overdraft and I was left virtually penniless with animals to feed. To say I was stressed was an understatement. Things just got worse and worse. The charges were racking up and obviously making things far worse. Eventually having moved premises again, this time to Suffolk, I went to the cashpoint one day (April 2007) only to lose my card. When I went into the branch they told me my account had been closed. I admit it had looked pretty unhealthy for a while, but to close it with no notification! My father went to visit the BM in Devon who put on the charm and basically told him a pack of lies saying he had sent 27 letters to me. It was total rubbish. I never had a phone call - nothing. Nor had my father yet he was down as a partner and had had to sign for the loans/overdrafts etc. The loan was transferred to another and my father is still paying it. I can't find the original paperwork and Lloyds claim they don't keep "old loans" I am sure it should be paid off by now. Initially from 2001 I paid £129/month until 2005 when it had gone down to £91 and then he took over in 2007. I just can't believe there is much left to pay. I missed about 7 payments in all. I don't know who to ask for advice. Who can help me sort the loan out? What do I do about the PPI? We did try complaining to the Financial Ombudsman but didn't pursue it. And can I do something about the hideous bank charges? These are probably well over £3,500 and I am still getting pursued by creditors who I would like to pay off. Any advice would be appreciated.

A few weeks ago driving down a lane I use most days, I drove into what turned out to be a 2 foot flood. Now when you drive along there on a normal day it looks pretty flat with a very small dip and on this occasion, we had a large amount of rain. I stopped the car immediately and realised I was in trouble. The water poured in via the footwells and I was forced to get out of the car as I feared I was in danger of the car getting swept over the bank. I waded through the water which was over my knees and went to the neighbouring farmhouse whose owners I knew. I rang another famer who came along in his tractor to tow me out. By this time the water was so deep, I could no attach the towline as I would have had to go under water to find the hook, so he pushed me out from the rear. While my car was still in the water we used a shovel to try and lower the bank and found a large drain, which was blocked with large stones, which we removed to one side to try to lower the water level. None of the drainage ditches had been cleared for months, a fact confimed by the owners of the farmhouse, despite their complaining to the council that this was a high-risk flooding area. As I was arranging to leave my car at the side of the road higher up, the postlady appeared and told me she had written a Roayl Mail van off in that exact same spot 2 years previously and it was impossible to know that the water would be so high at that place. I decided not to claim on my insurance but have been advised to claim compensation for my car repairs from the council for a) neglecting to keep the drainage ditches cleared and b) failing to put a sign up warning of flooding in bad weather. I now have a bill from my local mechanic totalling £438 (no doubt it would have been £1,000s had I used a big garage). Fortunately my car survived but as I only receive carers allowance, can I claim from the council? After all if I fell over a crooked paving stone I would be due loads if I injured myself Any advice would be much appreciated. The postlady and farmhouse owners will back me.

They're back! I got a fetching pink letter today. The balance has gone back down - erm? where have all those solicitor & court costs gone? But they have given me a priority telephone line I can contact them on! So now I have until 13th Feb to pay or else!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'm looking forward to their debt collector tunring up!

They haven't called this week or sent me a letter - first time since November - I think I'm starting to miss them - not!!! But then its only Wednesday!

Further update as I am still getting those letters/calls and I need some reassurance. The 2 most recent ones quote: "we have been instructed by our client BT to collect £393.67 on their behalf. We're aware that you may not have heard from BT in some time, however it is believed that the outstanding balance is still liable for collection............... ...etc etc" now I am taking that this is a load of baloney and the very fact that the words they use are to cover them from a legal point of view. Should I ignore this too? Second letter sets out a nice little table with outstanding balance plus court fees? and solicitors fees? amazingly it all adds up to even more. I htink the giveaway is that they only state the solicitors fees are £80 when we all know you sneeze and they charge at least £180/hour or part thereof! Anyway I know I am answering my own questions here but just need to know I'm not being blonde and ignoring the obvious! I still don't know how they were able to get hold of BT to send me the orginal bills? I did initially foolishly state my name, DOB etc. is this how they are able to do this? Would they ring up posing as me and ask for BT to send me old phone bills for my records? No copies of any "red" bills or letters from BT have turned up at all.

Thank you again - I guess I just panic every time!! And because they were initially nice - I thought they were in the right for a change! Usually they are agressive from the start. The last one I did owe the money but managed to bypass the DCA, went straight to the creditor and got it sorted out.

Thank you for that but how are they able to send me genuine phone bills from a previous address? They have done this twice now. (and then admittedly putting on a huge whack of their own for "admin costs!") How on earth do they get the bills from BT in the first place? I have done battle with other DCAs in the past and have won out in the end never paying them a penny but these have been the worst by a long way.

Hi I am just another in the long list of those being pursued by Advantis. I received a letter similar to everyone else asking if I was XX of XX Street, Xtown and if I ignored letter they assumed it was me and would go to war... They gave no details of whom the debt was for and the address was one I had moved from over 4 years ago. Sadly I did not know of the existence of this site and I foolishly rang them (without withholding my landline form them - BIG mistake!). I confirmed only the details on the letter (they did not have my first name) and refused to give DOB. They then told me it was an outstanding bill from BT from this address. Well I never had a landline at this address so I told them so. They couldn't have been more reasonable initially. They apologised and said they would contact BT but were 100% adamant that the bill was from the address they had. A few days later, I received 2 bills from BT from a different address - over 5 years ago and 3 moves before the address they were claiming the debt was from. Now 5 years is a long time but I am pretty certain they were paid. In fact I can virtually remember paying them in the Post Office in cash but as to where the bills are. I also had a BT line at the next address which was over 6 months as I am cerain that a) they wouldn't have let me continue with the landline as I just transferred my details and b) they would have cut me off pronto. I really needed the landline at that address so there is no way I would have put its use in jeopardy. I have checked my credit report and there is no sign of any CCJ's to do with this. Advantis have hounded me day and night ever since- (mobile/landline/letter) invariably using an assortment of mobile numbers that I don't answer. . Initially I found them to be reasonable as I bought time trying to dig out old bank statements but after 5 years this is impossible and that bank account is closed. I spoke to them last on Thursday (funnily enough they wre pretty quiet all through CHristmas) and told them I was dealing with BT and as a result they had not reason to call me as I was disputing the bill and it wasn't their problem. Mmmmm - they didn't like that!! I now have a "red" letter threatening me with bailiffs or court action if I don't pay up/call by 18th Jan. Now - do I call BT? I find it odd they have taken 5 years to approach me when I was perfectly traceable and still held an account with them How much clout do Advantis have? I really don't want any bailiffs turning up as I am a carer for my elderly parents and the phonecalls are bad enough. So any help/advice would be hugely appreciated.