Isn't it supposed to definitively state it's a 'letter before action' in so many words if that's what it actually is? Anyone? if they've been instructed by their clients to initiate court proceedings, why aren't they getting on with it instead of telling you all about it? This doesn't seem legit to me n't do anything rash till you hear from someone more knowledgable here.

I thankyou Brig. DX? Why does that date make it loo roll?

DX why does that date make it toilet paper? Brig, are you talking about pre or post 2007? There was the watershed around that time I think where if it's earlier you need an original copy not a put-together one for enforcement, that's the date I'm thinking of. I have one like the above from the year 2000 myself and Crap1 don't seem in any big hurry to go anywhere near court with it.

You're saying that's enforceable Brig? What year's it from (I confess I've lost track)? I'd have said since the T&Cs are separate and distinct from the signed application form and they aren't signed themselves there's nothing to suggest there's any connection between them.

Many of these people would appear to only be claiming to be self-employed as a way of escaping harrassment from DWP and WPP officials. The Tories disguised unemployment as sickness in their previous administration and they're similarly disguising it as self-employment in this one. These unfortunates, should UC ever arrive, not only find themselves having to justify future working tax credits but also the ones they've already been awarded. However, what evidence we have suggests UC is increasingly obviously no more than the fantasy of a madman. On the basis of the unending confusion and obfuscation surrounding it and everything to do with the DWP, I'd say we don't need to worry about it. Aint gonna happen.

I'd guess it's going to be like the bedroom tax with the law being created by precedent as it goes along.

Again, this doesn't seem to have been properly defined. I wonder how they'd define 'back of a fag packet'?

More back of a fag packet legislation from the Coalition

Very worrying and entirely predictable.

No, I think actually that's an inevitable consequence of this clearly unfinished legislation.

It's a license to print money for them, assuming they can collect, of course.

Where's the evidence for that? Not for the claim as I'm sure Grayling would say that, but for the actuality? How are visits to be substantiated? Do we know?

I'm not seeing anything in there about substantiating enforcement visits so I'd worry that in a lot of cases the charge would be for an imaginary visit. I'm sure this will be seen as a perk in some quarters.

Soon he'll be able to film lots of underwater mortgages

I might add we still don't know if we're talking about tools individually or collectively.

I would assume that's at least partly the idea, to funnel people into private prisons where they'll make up a cheap workforce making profits for the private contractors who run the prisons while the costs will be born by the taxpayer.

This sounds to me as if the intention is you're only held to be vulnerable in law and therefore afforded special consideration if a bailiff decides you are, so no-one is or will be.

And there's "22(1) The court may not issue a warrant under paragraph 20 or include provision under paragraph 21 unless it is satisfied that prescribed conditions are met. (2) A warrant under paragraph 20 or provision included under paragraph 21 may require any constable to assist the enforcement agent to execute the warrant. (A clear, and very significant change from the police attending only in order to prevent a breach of the peace)." One wonders where all these spare policemen are going to be coming from - are normal duties to be abandoned in order to assist EAs?

Then there's this; "What is vulnerable? This is now determined entirely by the EA. There is nothing in writing yet which determines this category of debtor. We have been promised new National Standards for Enforcement Agents, and as mentioned above, these are to be totally rewritten. They are not there (even in a draft form) yet. We must assume the EA’s will apply the criteria for vulnerability as currently exists." Well actually, we mustn't. What we must assume is until there's law made about it there's now no such thing as vulnerable.

"Tools used in the course of your work may be removed by the Enforcement Agent if they have a value of more than £1,350.00." Individually or collectively? It doesn't appear to say.

You're suggesting that after four years in office the best the Torys can do is passing Labour legislation? This begs the question, why vote for them then, why not just stay with Labour?

Where are the protests from Labour, one wonders?

When I left my old flat (in the same road I'm in now incidentally, a few doors along, the old one's waiting to be refurbed or demolished), there was £281 owing on the bill by their reckoning. Around £400 had been in dispute but they'd sent some of it off to a debt collector who'd written me a nasty letter or two then gone quiet. This was maybe three/four years ago. The rest of the debt (or alleged debt, depending on your viewpoint) was simply carried forwards on the bill and I paid every month the amount I thought they should have. In November two years ago I mived to a different flat in the same road. The leccy here was supplied by EDF but I changed it to BG as EDF didn't do a discount scheme for disableds. I've received occasional emails from a debt collection company about this alleged debt since I've been at the new address. I ignore them, life goes on Now today I get a letter from BG saying they're transferring the debt from the old account at my old address to my account one here. Can they do that? There's no problems paying the bills here, I should point out, I'm not in arrears or anything. On Noddle it says late payment against my old account but my account here's fine. The old one only got in arrears when a relative of the landlady's moved into the flat upstairs from me there there and my leccy bills went through the roof. The flats were conversions from an old, old property and eveerything was a bit higgledy-piggledy. When he left, my bills went back to normal. Go figure, eh? This went to court without my knowing and I lost. BG sent the boys round to change the meter for a PAYG one with what they said was a warrant but I refused to let them in and showed them my CPAP device, an electrically-powered device which assists me with breathing when I'm asleep. On seeing that they went away. I managed to get BG to put me on the cheap tariff they had for disableds after that incident, managed to get it in writing. Aapart from a few dumb emails, since then there's been nothing and today I get a letter saying they're adding the bill from my old flat to my bills for the new one. So, can they do that? Some might be wondering how BG could take me to court, which involves advising me first, without my knowing. Simples, they bombarded me with threatening letters saying more or less the same thing, bad things would happen unless I paid up etc. which were all similarly formatted. After you've read a few, you've read them all. I just glanced at them and filed them after a while. Then they sent one which appeared the same as all the others but when I went back to look at it later it did actually have a court date in it. Sneaky, huh? can they add this amount from the old account at the old address to my new bill and account here? You have to wonder why they didn't do it before if that is the case.

What's a section 10?

Why would they? It's Atos and the DWP who have everything to hide, not claimants.