i've checked and they have now blurred the registration plate, which is better

thanks, i've found it and reported it. waiting to hear back.....

yes. its a conservatory!!

you are right. ours is an old picture, from before christmas, but the number plate is as clear as if you were standing on the driveway though, so the recognition thing obviously didn't work very well that day!!

oh my god! that is shocking!!! i bet there are loads more situations like that. i cannot believe they didn't consider that this kind of thing might happen as a result.

thanks for the quick reply. thats a big relief!

I have recently been informed that Google Earth is so accurate that you can actually see inside my house, garden, car etc. I had a look and it is true! It is shocking, you can clearly see everything, from my kids toys in the garden, to my stuff inside my house, and even my cars registration plate. Its a burglars paradise. Surely this is an invasion of privacy? Is there anything I can do about it? I have a six foot fence around my house to keep my privacy, and all it takes is the click of a mouse and the fence is worthless!!!

thank you!! i feel like one!

thanks, freaky. i'm loving my new title!! hopefully, it might just help others to see that there is still hope, even under the current circumstances.

i have heard nothing whatsoever, and it has been quite some time, so i think its a pretty good result!

thanks pete. im feeling pretty chuffed, i must admit. i just wish all those others could have their own situations resolved so satisfactorally. still, i have faith, its only a matter of time.

hello everybody, i thought i should update you. my oh finally made it to court, after the stay case being postponed due to a backlog. the judge was most sympathetic and gave the hsbc a serious talking to about the way they have treated this case and their customers in general, and sent the sheepish looking solicitor off to phone the bosses to see if they were prepared to make an offer there and then, but the answer was no. the judge then adjourned the case for a few weeks to give us chance to provide more recent financial details (they were about 6 months old as a result of all the waiting). at the second hearing, the next judge was also sympathetic, but as our financial situation had now improved (we have ditched the hsbc account and let them apply their charges to their hearts content and so no longer have any charges every month so we are back in control of our finances again,) he could not remove the stay. however, shortly after, we received a letter from the ombudsman saying that hsbc had offered to clear the overdraft and close our account, as a gesture of 'goodwill'(the overdraft was almost the same amount as our claim) and if the bank lost the test case we could reinstate our claim for any shortfall. I THINK THAT MEANS WE WON!!!!!!!!! obviously, we accepted!! obviously

thanks for your replys. i am going to ignore the notice and stand my ground. its nice to have the support in these matters, i might otherwise have ended up paying it, so thanks again.

Hi could somebody help me please? I have recieved a parking ticket from a pub car park. I have read the stickys, but i'm feeling a little daunted. I cant quite work out where I stand. The was a sign in the car park, but it is a small sign in a fairly large car park, and once I had received the ticket, it took me quite some time to locate it. How clear does the sign need to be? Does it matter at all, because there is hardly any information on the ticket so im wondering if the ticket is legal, anyway. I would scan it, but i have no scanning facility at the moment, but basically it states: PARKING CHARGE NOTICE(£60) Parking charge notice no**** PART 1 DETAILS ON (day)***(date)***at (time)*** location*** a vehicle registration number**** make**** colour***** was seen in circumstances which gave me reasonable cause to believe that contractual obligations indicated below have been accepted. VEHICLE WAS PARKED ON PRIVATE LAND WHERE PARKING RESTRICTIONS APPLY- THE USER-REGISTERED KEEPER OF THIS VEHICLE WILL BE LIABLE TO A FEE OF £60 PER VISIT IF THE VEHICLE IS NOT DISPLAYING A VALID PERMIT AND IN DOING SO ACCEPT THAT THEY WILL PAY THE CHARGE WITHIN 14 DAYS OF THE DATE OF ISSUE OF THIS NOTICE. SIGNS VISIBLE / PART 2 EXPLANATORY NOTES EFPN administers and manages the scheme on behalf of: Landlord to the above named location ISSUED BY **** CODE**** You have two options 1: The notice procedure provides that the allegation which is detailed in Part 1, may be discharged by paying a FIXED FEE of £60 within 14 days or 2: produce a valid parking permit within 14 days. Failure to reply within 14 days may result in a county court summons, you will also be liable to £27 late payment fee total £87 and all additional costs incurred by EFPN. Any suggestions how I should handle this? lolly.

i'm sorry to hear that, pete, but on the other hand, i'm pleased that you had an enjoyable day out. i must admit if theres one good thing about hsbc, its that you do get a good laugh from time to time. i had a nice conversation with somebody a couple of days ago, and when i asked him awkward questions, he kept repeating the same answers over and over again, so i asked him if he was reading from a script. he went quiet, so i guess the script doesn't cover that particular scenario!!

thanks for the word of warning audrey. to be honest, i'm not feeling optimistic, the court case just feels like a waste of time. if it weren't for the fact that a no show would ruin the entire case, i would be telling my oh not to bother turning up.

i thought you might say that, its what i was thinking, and to be honest we've been waiting for so long now, i'm past caring, really, its just the principle, it makes my blood boil that they think they can do what they like and say what they like and we'll just sit back and take it. we tried something along those lines in the telephone conversation and they just said that we could have a load of cash stashed away somewhere else for all they knew! my oh argued that if that was the case, then surely we wouldn't need to be falling behind on repayments, risking losing our home etc and their reply was that they needed proof, end of story. thanks i'll try that:)

the removal of stay hearing is in a few days time, and i have received the banks argument. they are saying that while my oh is arguing financial hardship he has provided no proof of the fact. a short while ago he sent the soliciters a copy of his income/expenditure form from the cccs, which will be included in the bundle i have prepared, which contains copies of all written correspondance between my oh and hsbc. he also had the conversation a few weeks ago where he spent over an hour discussing both of our financial situations to somebody at hsbc, but they have never sent him written confirmation of this result, in a final decision. is this enough to argue with, or have the soliciters got us by the short and curlies? also, could somebody please advise me as to whether he needs anything more to take to court, please?

thanks everyone. i shall definitely be keeping my beady eye on them from now on!

a quick update, i have been on the phone to the insurers, apparantly the finance company who deal with the payments is actually to blame, so the insurers have cancelled the direct debit and have set up a new payment through themselves, (cutting out the middle man, so to speak) and have refunded the default charges to the policy, AND agreed to refund all bank charges once I send proof, so alls well that ends well. I get to stay with the company i like, and get rid of the incompetent idiots, that have messed up so badly. i have cancelled the direct debit from my end, too, so fingers crossed they keep to their word. thanks for all the advice, its good to have a rant about these things.

thanks for the suggestions, i have checked and the car insurance has not been cancelled yet, but i have been considering changing companies. its a nuisance, because i have been with them for years, and they have always been very good, but they have more than made up for that in the last few weeks. i am glad you warned me about paying by card, it makes sense, really, i just never thought about it. no matter how you look at it, there is no safe way of paying. the direct debit guarantee means squat, and there is no security with a debit card, where is our protection as consumers? maybe it could be something to tackle the banks about once the whole test case business is over. i do love a good battle!!

I am having a really bad time with my car insurance nightmare. It's abit long winded, so please bear with me while i explain. Last month my car insurance repayments were due to start after a two month break. Because of the lousy post around here, I didn't receive the letter from the insurance company until after the date, otherwise I could have nipped it in the bud. The first problem was, I have been trying not to use direct debits and so was paying it every month by debit card. Unfortunately, the company decided to use really old bank account details from a direct debit I had set up years ago. This account is no longer in use, and there was no money to cover the direct debit. It was returned, and the bank charged me. After a really irate phone call to the insurance company, they agreed to cover the bank charges if I sent in proof, but said if I paid by card there was a charge of £12.50 for doing this. So I set up a new direct debit for my new account, and requested that they take the payments on the first of the month, directly after pay day. This was supposedly fine. I sent in the proof of the charges with a note saying that as it was an old account, and since I had covered the charge myself, I would like them to refund the charge a different way. Last week, without warning, (middle of the month!!) the insurance company took out 2 payments, plus an additional £25 late payment charge. There was only money to cover the direct debit in there, as this was the only bill of the month left to be paid, but some of it was swallowed up by the unexpected £25 charge, so 2 direct debits were returned, causing more charges by the bank, and still no car insurance payments made. Another phonecall later, this was again supposedly sorted out, they accepted they had made another huge mistake, refunded the very first bank charge from 2 weeks ago, saying they had tried to put this back in the account, but the bank wouldn't take it (i had told them it was out of date in my letter) promised to refund the new bank charges, on receipt of proof, and also the £25 charge they had taken as a direct debit, and said that they would take both the direct debit payments out on the first of the month as requested. With past experience I didn't quite trust them so I made sure the payment was in the account in case they tried again. Yesterday they did. Unfortunately they took out another £25 late payment charge which, again caused the genuine direct debit to bounce. To date, they have now cost me £164 without me even managing to pay my car insurance. They are saying the account is in arrears which is why I am getting charges. My arguments are, a, they are not telling me in advance what is happening so I can be prepared, and, b, it is their fault I am in arrears, I could have paid them a long time ago if they had only done as I had asked. I can't seem to get anywhere with them, and it is costing me more and more money each week. I am having to use money put aside for food and other essential items, and it is rapidly running out. I need to nip this in the bud, but dont know how, when they keep taking random amounts on random dates. Does anybody have any advice PLEASE?

hi linnikins. not long ago i was in exactly the same situation, until i discovered that british gas have a grant for people struggling with their bill.(funny, they never mention it to people!) i applied, which did take some doing, but the first benefit i found was that during the 2 months-ish it takes them to process your claim, your account is frozen, meaning they will take no action, so you get a bit of breathing space. when i did hear, they paid my entire £500 debt. they do need to know you have a valid reason for the debt (in my cas bg refused to accept any meter readings for 2 years and estimated all bills) and they also want to be convinced that it wont happen again in the future, but it is worth doing just for the peace from phone calls in the meantime. you could even clear a bit of the debt while you are waiting, if you are unsure of success. i hope this helps, good luck!

hi dougal. my oh spoke to this julia woman, too, to discuss his financial position, they spent a good hour going through all of his finances after completing the income and expenditure form they asked you to complete, and was told that he clearly was suffering financial hardship, but as far as his charges claim went, 'because of the test case, they are not refunding any charges until it is completed', so it really is, as you say, simply to get you, and the press off their back

thanks. it's shocking that its happened to so many people!