A grey blob?

That I wouldn't know to be honest as I'm not Ltd. but I presume that most limited companies would be better off leasing than buying anyway, in which case they're really up the creek without a paddle! One strange quirk of the law to bear in mind, the council can tow away an illegally parked car as well as issue a ticket but bailiffs can't take it (in these circumstances) after the event!

Just had a callback from Trading Standards who have done a little bit of research for me. The official answer is NO they can not take third-party goods, a car bought on H.P. is of course third party goods, the third party being the H.P. company. Therefore if the bailiffs threaten otherwise they are then illegally intimidating you into coughing up or handing over the keys in which case you should be chasing them for compensation for illegal harrassment as I will be doing.

I think they're bluffing. They tried it on with me, but I don't think they can take the car and sell it on any more than you or I can resell a car that is subject to an H.P. agreement without the permission of the owners, the owners being the H.P company of course. From experience, Phoenix Commercial Collections bailiff came round a few months ago to collect several hundred quid for an unpaid parking ticket and having been unable to gain entry to the house as usual. The guy started to hover around my car and tried the door handle, which set off the alarm. I went outside to ask him "what the hell he thought he was doing" at which point he presented me with the bill and said "Pay up or I take the car". The conversation went something like this: "Sorry", I told him, "But it's not my car. It's on H.P. You can't take it." "Yes I can", he says. "No you can't", I said. "It's not my car". "I'll have to do a HPI check which will cost you another £36" he said. "Sorry, but I've given you the facts, if you choose not to believe me and you need to verify that then it's at your own expense, not mine." At that point he made a phone call, got a call back a few minutes later and said "OK I've confirmed it is on H.P., that's another £36 added to your account but it doesn't stop me taking it. Please give me the keys." "I'd better phone the H.P. company first and see if they agree to me giving you their car keys" I told him, "as I wouldn't want to be a party in an illegal act. Phone them yourself if you like!". I offered him the number from my mobile phone contacts list but he ignored it, made another phone call which lasted about 10 minutes then got in his car and drove off! Not heard a word since and that was over four months ago. Actualy I would have been laughing my socks off if they had taken it in my absence as I AM genuinely self-employed and had already previously informed them in writing (sent by recorded delivery) several months before of the fact, so if they had taken it they would have knowingly done so illegally.

Yes, I've thought of that and approached Trading Standards some time ago, who didn't think that the Unfair Contracts Act would cover it. Personally I have found my local TS office to be less than useful on most times I have contacted them to be honest. I'm hoping to find something more concrete to hit them with rather than take them (Welcome) on "blind" as it were.

Thanks, I do add to other people's from time to time but never really took a lot of notice of them personally and wasn't too sure what their purpose was.

Very useful stuff, thank you all.

This article isn't concerned whether you owe the debt or not, just a bit of clairfication on what bailiffs can and cannot do. We all know that if you don't pay up they threaten to come along and take your goods. This applies to private bailiffs, e.g. those hired to collect a debt for non-payment of council tax or parking fines (NOTE: NOT speeding fines or traffic offences issued by the police, for non-payment of these you CAN be arrested). It also applies to court bailiffs, hired by the creditor after, for example, you have a CCJ against you and you don't pay it. The system is a little strange - councils will typically hire private bailiffs for collecting unpaid council tax (for example) whilst creditors actualy use the county court bailiffs for collecting unpiad monies from a CCJ! They have to pay an addititonal fee to the courts for this, so many don't bother especially for smaller debts. Councils on the other hand are publicly funded (that's by you and me) so will keep spending for years to pursue the debt. BAILIFFS Bailiffs of any kind can NOT enter through a locked door and can NOT break in. They CAN enter an UNLOCKED garage and take your car away. They CAN take it from the street. Without going into any more detail, the rules are simple: They CANNOT enter your home if you don't let them in - NEVER sign anything, even outside the door, they wil tell you it's a repayment agreement and you MUST sign or your goods wil be removed. RUBBISH! There is NO law which says you have to agree to or sign anything, and if you don't let them in they can't break in. if you DO sign you wil probably have been duped into signing a "walking possession agreement", this then means you have signed your goods over to them (such as your TV and video) and most importantly if you have signed they CAN then legally break in. DON'T SIGN ANYTHING. EVER! What about your car? Simple. Tell them you are self-employed. They can NOT take your car if it is for business use. Similarly, they can not take it if you are buying it on H.P. (Hire purchase) because you don't own it, so it's not yours to take. HOWEVER this does not apply if you got a loan (not H.P.) to buy the car. Go for the self-employed angle. If you get a letter saying "Pay up or we will come round and take your goods and/or car", just write back telling them that you are self-employed and you need your car for business use. Send it recorded delivery. Trust me, they wouldn't even risk taking your car. They may ask for proof you are self-employed. Ignore them. You have no obligation to prove anything. But to cover yourself, become self-employed for free. Open a sellers account on ebay - you don't have to buy or sell anything, but then you need your car to collect stock and take your parcels to the post office when you do. Sorted!

My point exactly. The tricky part is how to present a legally viable case.

Thanks, I'm toying with the idea that if the PPI part of the agreement was invalid (and obviously a lot of people have managed to get their PPI cancelled/refunded), then could it not be argued that as the PPI was origininally part of the agreement, then the fact that the PPI part is void renders the whole agreement void? Hope this makes sense, in otherwords if part of an agreement is invalid then possibly it could be argued that the agreement as a whole is invalid? I'm not exactly sure what might be gained if this was the case, except perhaps a decent reduction in the interest being charged?

I would be interested to know a little more too as I have an HP agreement with Welcome Finance. The original agreement had PPI on it too but i immediately telephoned them and asked them to remove it. They said, "Sorry, but it's a legally binding agreement". I said "OK then, take the car back as I won't be paying a penny. Feel free to default me if you wish but you won't get any money." They cancelled the PPI. My payment record has been OK for the two years I have been with them but the interest rate is extortionate. The biggest issue I have with them is for the past couple of months, having missed one payment, they decided (without telling me) to add another £30 a month to the payments to recover the missing payment so I cancelled the direct debit and began paying them in cash at the local office. However the local office has now been relocated out of town and I no longer am able to get to them with cash payments. I don't have a cheque book so they insist on calling at my home for the money, charging me £25 a time. I have now told them that I will ONLY pay by bank transfer as I can do this online and although they initially said this couldn't be done they are now going to supply me with the details. What I'm getting at is can I do anything about the high interest rate? The rest of the issues (callout charges, letter charges etc.) I can deal with. I will not be in a position to get another loan at a lower interest rate and still owe (according to them, I think it's less) about £5,000+

Any more details on this, JonCris?

What are they exactly and how are they attained? Just curious to be honest.

Great stuff, this gives the rest of us valuable ammunition when claiming in our area. please keep us informed.

But surely if something is unlawful then it's illegal???

I don't really see the difference between "unlawful" and "illegal", whatever the correct terminology might be it amounts to the same thing. Currently having the same argument with Capital One who have imposed a £12 overlimit charge on my account. Sorry Cap One but I checked my statement online and it told me there were sufficient funds for the transaction before I made it so it's your cock-up and I ain't paying your "fine" - oh yeah, I nearly forgot, I don't have to - the charge is unlawful/illegal anyway!

Excellent thread which I have only just got around to reading, but what exactly are we supposed to be responsible for? Nobody is twisting the banks' arms to pay out when we go overdrawn, they could choose to reject the direct debit or whatever it is and leave it at that - no more work is involved in rejecting it than is involved in paying it, so why is one instance free and the other chargeable? Banks are the only organisations I know that can TAKE your money upfront regardless of whatever other bills you have to pay, thus putting you in the position of having to find enough money to pay them back before you can pay any of your other bills (say from an account that your salary goes into) regardless of how important those other bills may be (such as car insurance, which is a legal requirement, or mortgages, utility bills etc). Not all of us are good with money; the banks on the other hand are supposed to be experts, there to guide us, not extort us. How many of you have incurred late payment charges from other organisations because subsequent direct debits could not be made due to previous charges added to your bank account? How much stress and trauma, hassle from debt collectors, phone calls and letters have you had to put up with as a result of the banks' illegal fines? Quite frankly given that most of us are ONLY claiming back illegal charges means the banks are getting off lightly in my opinion. There is no defence whatsoever for their profiteering, and that's all it is make no mistake about that. Let's not forget that by taking several days to clear cheques, BACS payments and so on they are making a profit from EVERY PENNY we pay in already. BACS paymants in much of Europe clear same day, so IT CAN BE DONE!

I recently got a quote for my car insurance from Bedford Insurance of Wimbledon. I was quoted £463.57 - very nice, considerably less than the next nearest quote. I paid the deposit of around £139.07 having been offered the chance to pay the remainder by direct debit. No problem. The policy cover note and documents arrived and all seemed well. Then a letter arrived from Amber Credit with a direct debit form and agreement to complete for the remaining balance. This stated an APR of 34.2%. The documentation than adds, "We will charge interest on the account at the rate of 15.5% per annum. We may vary the interest rate". Next up it says, "Each month on the calculation date we will calculate interest at the interest rate on your account and add the interest to your account". So if I'm reading this right, they are charging 35.5% p.a. interest PLUS adding interest on the remaining balance of 15.5%!!!!! :o Anyway I'm having none of it. When I paid by deposit (by credit card) over the phone I was not told about these interst rates, as I believe is my legal right, and I have told the company (by letter) that I will pay the remaining balance for the car insurance as quoted to me in full but will not pay their extortionate interest rates. I've also told them that I will be deducting the £15 administration fee they have added to the account from my payment - although this was included in the original quote, they did not tell me about it; again they should have done before I paid my deposit. We'll see what happens.

Yes! Absolutely no question about it!

The point I was getting at is I think the rules are different in Scotland so I didn't want to send the stuff to the Scottish office only to find out later the claim was invalid because of the different rules.

Thanks, that's a great help. I did look at that list but there were so many addresses I didn't know where to start - I have also had letters from Telford.

Sorry if this has been covered, i'm sure it has but I can't find it. Like many people I have just been too busy to proceed with a claim having had the usual rebuff from my Letter Before Action, but since they have now sent me a letter ("Formal notice of intention to file a default and to take action to recover debt") I'm now almost ready to send off my claim for just over £600. The debt they are claiming is for the overdraft on my noe disused account of £285.72 which is entirely made up of bank charges and presumably interest. My question is, because the collections centre are based in Scotland can I still issue a county court claim against them or do I send it to my local branch? I'm based in Blackpool, England.

I'm not sure a marketplace is what I wanted to see from CAG, but I had a look anyway and since it's there I might even use it. However one glaring omission seems to be the obvious lack of a link back to CAG. It needs to be there and it needs to be prominent.

Great stuff Bookworm, the key is to always leave enough in for your next direct debit or whatever, or better still cancel them and pay them via bank transfer using internet banking. I've had rows with the mortgage company over this who don't like the idea of me cancelling the direct debit and insist it's part of the agreement that a d/d is set up but I just keep paying by bank transfer anyway; I'm not in arrears so what are they going to do exactly? They can't take me to court for non-payment because I'm paying them! For bills such as gas, electric etc. it also helps your cashflow because instead of them taking the payment on time you can leave it a week or two, take the extra interest and still pay your bills. That bit extra interest adds up over time. Late payment charges? Just knock any added charges back off the bill and sent them a polite letter reminding them that such charges are illegal. Never fails! PS good idea about the alarm reminder, I do this all the time. Just about everyone has a mobile phone and just about every mobile phone has a calendar in which you can easily set remiders with audible alarms. If not, most PC's have Microsoft Works pre-installed as standard, this also has a calendar in which you can set up audible and visual (pop-up) alarms. Use it!

Haven't had the chance to get on the forum much lately, but worth bumping for anyone who hasn't seen it yet. Some good posts here. Incidentally in the four months since I first posted this it's worth pointing out that by using this method I haven't paid a penny interest. OK I only have a small credit limit to play with but as originally stated remeber that whatever you owe on your credit card bill you WILL save money in interest this way, and eliminate late payment charges etc. Now trying MAKING a bit of interest - even if you don't have a good credit limit and can only get a basic bank account. I do it using a basic Halifax Easycash bank account and a Halifax Web Saver account. The Easycash account doesn't offer a debit card, cheque book or overdraft but does offer direct debits, standing orders, bank transfers etc. and can all be done via internet banking. The Web Saver account is exactly that, an internet-based savings account and pays over 4% interest (can't remember the exact rate at the moment but I think it's slightly above base rate). The beauty is by using internet banking you can transfer all your money to and from the savings account instantly, so keep as much as possible in that and as little as possible in the Easycash account until a payment or direct debit is due, then simply transfer the funds you need back from the savings account - as I said the transfer is instant and the funds are available immediately. Other banks will have similar options but check that any transfers between accounts are immediate.