I have been a barclays customer for 33 years, a Premiere customer for the last 20 years. I had a 9000.00 agreed permanent overdraft facility I have used on and off and it was at 7300.00 OD. I live permanently abroad (monaco) and following advice from a barclays manager, I wrote to barclays last year to inform them I am now separated from my wife and the divorce is taking place in Monaco, and with the account being in joint names, there was a mandate dispute (this is what the manager said to put) and I wanted them to stop any further payments being made from it (to avoid my wife spending more money and increasing our joint debt). I sent them back my barclays card and they actioned my request. I sent them my new address and started receiving statements, the last of which was March of this year (2011) The interest accumulating was only 18.00 and it was added to the overdraft monthly. Due to the ongoing divorce, despite the fact I am a high earner, until the divorce is resolved my outgoings are much higher than normal (I am having to pay rental on two homes now and associated expenses of two separate households). In 12 months my situation will be much better. At no time did I receive any communication from barclays that anything was untoward, that they wanted the loan repaid, nothing at all. Two weeks ago I received a letter from RMA, a debt collector acting on behalf of Barclays. I contacted them by phone and said I knew nothing of this or any problem between myself and Barclays bank whatsoever. They said they were only interested in recovering the debt. I asked for copies of any correspondence from barclays to me re the debt and they refused. I contacted my local branch via email and related the above. They said the account had been cancelled and they were very sorry, but now it was in the hand of debt collectors there was nothing they could do, and weren't even able to access my account to see if any letters had been sent or why the account was ever in dispute. They apologised but said there was nothing they could do. I wrote an email asking for my complaint to be made official as it struck me as irregular, and I wanted the ombudsman to look into it. I received an email saying that my complaint had been forwarded to barclays customer services and to contact the ombudsman if it wasn't resolved by barclays. Last friday the debt collector called me and I expained I had made a complaint to barclays bank and needed a couple of weeks to hear their response. They agreed to put it on ice for two weeks. Three days later (monday this week) I received a post card from the UK saying that someone from RMA debt collection would be visiting me this thursday between 8am and 8pm at my home (in monaco). I called them to confirm my conversation with their associate re two weeks on ice and they said that that had been posted prior to that conversation. I work from 8am to 6pm and am not able to hang around all day and can't believe this is how they operate. Are they seriously going to fly someone to Monaco on the offchance I might be in to discuss a 7000.00 overdraft? I have never previously owed any money, or had any dealings with debt collectors. I am a high earner, who, for the first time in my life needs to use an overdraft for one year (until the divorce is resolved and our assets split). Does anyone know if Barclays are allowed to just put my overdraft with the debt collectos, or have any advice as to the above? I have no problem servicing the interest on the debt, but can't pay it off right now. Nobody at barclays will talk to me as my account has been cancelled and is now with debt collectors. I repeat, I had no forewarning of this whatsoever and it has all come as a complete shock. Does anyone know how long I have to wait for Barclays to come back to me on my complaint before I am allowed to write to the ombudsman? Thanks for any advice. I can't believe this is happenning and I am really stressed about it.

Here we go again. Back in 2006 this wonderful website enabled me to claim back over £1600 in unfair overdraft charges from HSBC. Following the media storm over PPI I decided again this was the place to get my information ! I've kicked things off with a initial letter using the template from the Which? website, this was sent on the 26/04/2011 and I'm yet to receive any sort of from them. The PPI insurance was taken out in September 2004 and is on an active card. Should I expect any sort of acknowledgement from them or will they just reject my 'claim' in approx. 8 weeks ? Thanks again for the informative website, I'll update this thread as things progress. Jordan

Please support and sign this ASAP, it's on Go Petition

Good afternoon, I received a phone call on my French phone nearly 5months ago from a company called "regents legal" concerning an outstanding liability of 462.50 british pounds. I was shocked to receive this call as I have never had any bank problems in my life (either in the UK or in France). The company explained that I owed barclays 462.50 pounds when I never spent that much money. I waited months to receive a proper explanation from the company barclays had contacted. Their answer was always "when are you going to pay us Mr. Lacroix", and we are unable to explain why you owe barclays this money. They finally sent me a mail in February(that I never received), followed by an email of my account details (1month later, only after I spent40 euro twice on my phone calling them up!) I had money left on my British account, all my mails where transferred from the UK to my French home, and my UK bank manager told me that my UK account would automatically be closed. I used my credit card while I was in France, and when I realized I had a 50pence dept, I immediately tried to transfer funds onto my account. Unfortunately, I was unable to do so since Barclays where more concerned about making me pay 462.50 pounds than letting me pay my debt of 50 pence. I now owe more than 400 pounds to Barclays because of this, and was not told about their "reserve fees", when I went to their bank at Picadilly Circus, I was told it was like in France, where in case you make a mistake on a transfer one day, you would not have to pay any fees. I was therefore lied to, because there are fees of 22 pounds to pay per week, whatever the amount. To make things even worse, the second company just called back and told me that I would have to pay even more fees. What should I do? I believe this to be outrageous behaviour on behalf of barclays, and shall never go to this bank again. I tried calling barclays,but each time I got them on the phone they told me they weren't dealing with my dossier anymore. Furthermore, Regents even said they would start to press charges?? Do you know what I should do since some people here seem to have the same problem? john

i have an outstandng dispute with egg card and heve been chased over the years by various DCA'sI have now heard that Barclays have brought egg.I have a barclays account can they take money from this account to settle the egg card

I've an open thread about PCI compliance and just had a thought regarding the recent Sony Playstation server hack. Sony must have some pretty high security standards; much higher than the average company would usually install and yet personal credit card information was hacked. How on earth is a small to medium company supposed to stand up to the new rules credit card companies are imposing if Sony can get hacked? £50,000 fine is nothing to Sony but that will put most small companies out of business... Or is that the idea?

I am currently running a claim on behalf of my brother from Barclays now Woolwich mortgages for charges of £40per month for arrears admin charges. Barclays have issued him with their final response with a resounding no so taking it to court, I am unsure how restitution would be calculated on the claim and appreciate any help cheers

Please could someone help me to stop an eviction order, looks like I am going to lose my house on 17 Feb 2011 !!! I am desperate and at my wits end. Apologies in advance if this post is too detailed but i wanted to try and include all the facts. Please do not hesitate to contact me if you think i have left anything out, or have any questions. I have put what i think are the most important points in bold, i hope that is ok. Unbelievably, they have a judgement to sell the house for not less than £229,500 when the house was valued last year at £260,000. This is for a judgement of £4,680 (Original judgement was for £6500, £4000 of which was costs !) ! So, after all costs I will most likely have nothing. I have offered to make a payment of £1400 includes o/s amount including march 2011, but they said they would not stop the eviction unless i paid the full judgement amount now standing at £4860 ! Possession hearing details :- The original judgement was served in 2004 from Northampton County Court, but I knew nothing about it until 2008 (at the time I was recently unemployed and on benefits). In 2008, the claimant filed for a possession order at Edmonton County Court and I went to court on 3 occasions, I filed a set-aside judgement, the first two occasions the hearing was adjourned, the judge advised me to re-submit the set a-side. When i first received the possession order i took some advice of the debt collection agency who advised me to request a signed copy of my credit agreement. i wrote to hlcf and received a reply from booker management services who said that they didn't have a copy of my credit agreement, but didn't need it as they had already secured a judgement. i included this in my set aside application which was never heard. further more, the judge advised rather robustly that if i applied for the set aside it would be unsuccessful because 5 years had passed since the judgement and that i would have to pay costs, and was not interested that they had got the judgement because the summons was at an address i hadn't lived at for over 6 yrs after it was served ! On my 3rd visit to court, Nov 2009 (by this time I was back in employment), the judge refused to hear my set aside, stating that i should have filed it to the court where the judgement was granted, when I advised him that on my two previous visits neither judge had mentioned this and indeed told me to send the set aside request to Edmonton he said he was not interested and found in favour of the claimant and grant the possession order. I must admit that i never noticed the judgement was for £6500, of which over £4000 were costs ! Bizarrely despite both the original judgements being for similar amounts, one of the possession orders was for about £2000, and the other for c.£4,500. Not sure if it is relevant but the two original judgements were consolidated to one judgement at the final hearing (where the possession order was granted). Needless to say, i was very overwhelmed by the experience (possibly one of the worst bar this eviction notice). the judge was obviously riled that i asked why he wouldn't hear the set aside because he even added costs of about £400 that the claimants solicitor said that they were claiming, but the judge said it was listed on the claim documents so he was including them. At this point I was totally intimidated and just want to get out of the court room (which I would never be in a work situation but this was different), so when he asked how much i was going to pay a month i foolishly said £200 per month, even though i knew this would stretch me, but i planned to file a set aside or make an offer to the claimant if that was not successful, so wasn't thinking about how that much money would disadvantage me regarding any offer. Post Possession order:- My first payment was for Jan 2010, and i made payments until July 2010 via the claimants solicitor Blake Lapthorn. In July / August 2010, I received 2 letters from Geoffrey Parker Osbourne (GBP) saying that they were now handling the account and enclosed a notice of change of solicitor. In the top box, they listed the court as Northampton CC not Edmonton CC who granted the possession order, not sure if this is relevant ? Also they named booker management services as the previous solicitor not blake lapthorn. The two letters i rec'd from Geoffrey Parker Osbourne, one that said that the current balance £5042.80, one that said i owed £1,552.17, this confused me as i had already paid around £1200 of the original debt. even more confusing was that the claim numbers quoted both related to only one of the debts, as did the change of solicitor notice. A month letter i received another letter saying i owed £4642, at the time i thought they was no way that i owed over £10000. in my conversation with them this week they said the debt was £4842.50, a different amount again. I wrote to Blake lapthorn asking them to confirm that they were no longer dealing with the account, but heard nothing from them. I spoke to them when i received the eviction notice and they confirmed that they were no longer dealing with the account. They advised that they didn't reply to my letter as they were no longer dealing with the claimant, and that they would have issued the letter to GBP. In September, my work contract finished so i am no longer working, i am not claiming benefits which i believe means i would have to pay any court fees, but in the scheme of things this is small fry and not a problem. however, this is the part where i stuck my head in the sand, partially because i was waiting money to come in for the work contract i had just completed. this invoice wasn't paid until end of december, so knowing i didn't have any money i put off contacting GBP. I had planned to file a set-aside judgement to Northampton CC, but in the meantime i received the eviction notice I called geoffrey parker osbourne solicitors when i received the notice (31 jan 2011), the call was taken by a very unhelpful collections dept (not a solicitor), when i said that i wanted to talk about the account he asked me my name and address, which i provided. He then asked for my date of birth, i have never provided this at any point of the case so don't even know how they have it, rightly or wrongly i declined to give this at this point, so he refused to speak to me about the case as he said he needed my debt of birth to comply with the data protection act, is this true ? ? I have tried to call the court on a number of occasions but they don't seem to pick up. I called my local citizens advice bureau, who are also v busy, when i did get through to them they said they had no appointments for over a month and provided me with names of the community legal advice centre and some solicitors. I spoke to community legal advice when the possession order request was issued in 2008, and they said 'maybe its best you let them sell your house', not really the advice i was looking for, esp as i have at least 60K (if not £100k) of equity in the property, of which there is unlikely to be any left if the solicitors/hlcf get their hands on it. As i mentioned earlier i called the original solicitors blake lapthorn to confirm they were no longer dealing with the account which they confirmed. I asked if they had the outstanding debt amount on their records as gbp had indicated i owed more than i thought, they replied that had sent all the details to gbp and that I request a full breakdown of the amount from gbp. I then called GBP and said that i wanted to bring the account up to date including march 2011 and would set up a dd for the remaining monthly payments, this would give me the chance to apply for a set aside to northampton. (i believed this to be c.£1200), and explained i hadn't paid earlier primarily as i never received a letter from blake lapthorn, hlcf or booker management services. i also said that the amount they said was o/s seemed to differ on their letters to me, and asked for a breakdown of the account. They advised that the o/s amount was £4862.80 but said they couldn't provide me with a breakdown of the account ! They advised that to bring the account up to date would be £1200 and initially advised me that this would suspend the eviction notice, i asked how would i know for sure that the eviction notice would be suspended for sure, and they said i had to trust them ! Something told me that this was not sufficient so i asked for a letter to confirm that they would suspend the eviction. She said that she couldn't do this but would speak to the person handling the account, she put me on hold and a few minutes later said that they would only suspend the eviction notice if i paid the full £4862.80 ! Despite my asking if there was any way we could an amount between the o/s amount and the £4862.80, she said that they had an eviction order and would not even consider suspending the eviction unless i paid in full ! Am i not entitled to a breakdown of the amount owed ? This seems grossly unfair since the debt is £4800, as i am prepared to bring the account up to date, and the equity in my property is property is over 20 times that amount ! Furthermore the costs associated with Bailiffs and selling the house will no doubt dwarf the £4800 claimed Please advise anything i can do to stop these people stealing my house. If i have to i will borrow the money from family to pay the o/s amount, but how will i know for sure that they will stop the eviction bearing in mind the eviction is Thursday this week and that have already said that i will have to just trust them. i would rather not have to borrow this money, is this my only option ? If i did pay the money would i be able to file a set aside and if successful claim back the £6800 i have paid these people ? Esp as this hlcf do not appear to exist ? If i filed a set aside to northampton straight away, would this suspend the eviction until my case was heard ? can i file a set-aside (is this a n244?) online ? If i apply to Edmonton county court to suspend the eviction order on the basis that i am able to pay the account up to date (c. 6months behind) plus march 2011, and if absolutely neccassary even put the rest in a neutral holding account until the set-aside has been heard, do i have any chance of being successful ? What should i do ??? Can i even do anything, except pay the amount in full, and what assurances can i get from gbp that they will suspend the eviction, do i contact the bailiffs ???? Apologies for such a long winded message Debt History :- (not sure if relevant ??) In 2000 I closed my account with barclays (which I had held with them for 12 years) because they kept debiting unauthorised payments to pay AOL from my account (I didn't even have a contract with AOL !). I spoke to them on two occasions which resulted in them stopping the payments, but on checking my statements within a couple of months they restarted the payments without my authorisation and at NO time did they credit me the amounts deducted, instead telling me to contact AOL. The 3rd occasion that they restarted taking the payments I cancelled my account. Roll onto 2004, at this time I was TOTALLY unaware of what proceeded to happen. As far as I can make out Barclays sold two alleged debts in my name to HLCF, who filed and were granted a county court judgement(s) in their favour. one judgement was for £1080 relating to a bank account, and one for £1200 for a barclayloan so total £2280 plus costs which i believe were £206 for each claim). I believe that I do not owe these monies and would have defended the case. I have never had a copy of these judgements. I was unable to defend these cases as I believe the court summons were issued in my name to an old address which i had not lived at since around 1998. Barclays WERE aware of my new address, as these case relates to an account I closed back in 2000, and never wrote to me when i closed my account to say that i owed them any money, I believe this relates to interest and charges which they 'fabricated' when i closed my account.

hi can i have some advice please got a letter off my mortgage company/bank saying they would close my mortgage reseve facility, i am in arrears with my mortgage so am thinking about selling my house as i have roughly 50 percent equity in it i have been blacklisted so would not use their facility if i wanted to anyway , was going to ignore it and let them shut it anyway read up about it and it seens its just a loan facility like a remorgage.... am i correct many thanks ...if i asked for a loan they would refuse anyway cant get an overdraft anyway!!!!!thanks alot

Following the advice of the promotions for bank visa cards I decided I would use my cards for obtaining cash whilst abroad. My cards were stolen and when I asked Barclays bank to transfer money and or replace cards I was told if I wanted to transfer money abroad I would have to return to my branch and do the transfer from there, (14000 miles and £1200 airfares). They said they could only send replacement cards to my home address not much good if no one is there to send the cards on. I think that the banks attitude was obstructive and insensitive to my situation, (they in effect told me I would have to starve to death in a foreign country). I find their attitude tottally unreasonable particulary as they do not mention in their promotins that if you lose or have cards stolen they will leave you to starve. Barclays had a branch in the city I was in and there was also a visa branch. so I do not understand why a transfer could not have been made. I am now suing Barclays for negligence so any opinions or advice would be very welcome.

I am beginning to have a very stressful time with Barclays, and the fact they can't seem to let go of money that is not theirs. Below is a draught of a letter I am preparing to send to whoever I have to. It will explain my situation a little better. Otherwise tomorrow morning I'm going to my local branch and refusing to leave until I get something out of them. Any help or advice will be much appreciated. * Ok let me explain my situation here: My father sadly and unexpectedly passed away nearly 3 months ago now. Barclays were informed straight away and his accounts were frozen. The will was old, but my sister and I were the beneficiaries, not executors. I had the three valid executors renounce their right and applied for probate myself. This took some time. I received Grant of Administration on the 25th of November. I rushed up from **** as soon as I had the certificates in my possession, and took them to my local Barclays branch in ****. I naively had a hope that presenting myself as the executor of my late fathers estate (with the appropriate ID and certificates to prove it), would enable me to immediately take control of his assets. I had no idea that I had stepped in the ring with a beast of bureaucracy. The staff certified it all and sent it off to the service centre. The service centre confirmed that they received it the following day. I was told to wait by the branch staff to wait until the middle of next week before phoning to check up. On Tuesday the 31st I rang and was told I needed to specify a method for the funds to be released to me. As I did not have an account with Barclays I was advised that a cheque would be the best method. It would take up to 10-12 working days for the cheque to arrive I was told. I realised, that with the taking 5 working days it would take to clear into my Nationwide account, It would take up to three weeks for the money to be available. Three weeks was all I had left in the country. I told you this. You assured me that I'd have it by then, and to speed it up I could open a Barclays account of my own – so that you could do a direct transfer into it. This made sense to me. I open an account with the bank, and the funds come through quicker. I'd been thinking about opening a new bank account anyway - to deposit some of the £60,000 I'll receiving as part of the pension payout my sister an I are entitled to. Two birds with one stone as they say. So that same day I rushed down to the **** branch, before they closed, and booked an appointment to open an account the following morning, December the 1st. I phoned you straight after opening the account to inform you that the funds were to be transferred there. Over the next week and a half I phoned you on a regular basis to check on the progress of proceedings. I was told that the paper work needed to be controlled and checks made. I told you each occasion that my time was limited. Each time you'd reply by saying that you'd enter my case as 'urgent' in the system. At the beginning of the second week of December, I was at one point told that it could take up to another 15 working days! By the end of week I was informed that the funds would be transferred on Tuesday the 14th. This finally cheered me up. I started making plans to pay back monies owed. On Monday the 13th I phoned again to see if you could confirm that I would be receiving the funds the next day. “Any day now” you replied. I remained optimistic. Tuesday morning: nothing yet transferred Tuesday lunchtime: ditto. Tuesday afternoon: I phone the service centre once more. I'm told to wait another 10-12 working days. My normally good patience has now run out. Now that the 'case' has been handed to the processing team I have to possibly wait another two weeks? Two weeks is too late for me. How am I going to pay the bills when you don't even give me internet banking to the account I opened with you. How will I access the funds when half way around the world? Could you not of already starting proceedings from the moment you received the original paperwork? Why does it take so long to make a simple transfer. Most of us can now do this in an instant. Why can't you? This is the 21st Century! Are you too busy investing in the arms industry to update your own systems? You have had enough time to get your act together and now I am left in a very difficult situation. As an organisation you obviously have no heart. I have informed you from the start that my time is limited. I had to drop two jobs in Asia to come back and deal with my late fathers estate. The last two and half months have been non-stop, and I now have a lot of bills to pay. My sister, who lives in Switzerland, is also in a tight situation and has many bills to pay by Christmas. These last couple of months have been very hard for us and we don't need this unnecessary stress. On Sunday I leave to spend Christmas in Switzerland with my family (I'm trying not to think about if I'll be able to buy presents in time), and right after that I fly back to Asia. I will spend the first four months of next year conducting a wildlife survey in a very remote location. Naturally I will be in no position to deal with any remaining issues here in the U.K. I have a lot of loose ends to tie up by the end of this week. The only thing holding me back is a lack of funds. Why does it take all this time to simply release these funds? Why do I kept being told different stories? To me it seems as if you are merely playing one delaying tactic after another. All you seem to care about is keeping our money for as long as possible, so that you can profit from it. Profiting from the misery of others is not commendable. I had been considering recently that I might use your bank to hold on to a large sum that is due imminently. But after being messed around these last few weeks I am reconsidering my choice of bank. I no longer think it'll be wise to bank £60,000 of my money with Barclays. I am appalled at how you treat grieving families. I hope you can now understand my position. When I need something done, I do it in the quickest time possible. Why can't you? Your regrettably, ****

Hi everyone, I'm a newbie here. I'm in the middle of drafting a complaint to the Financial ombudsman service regarding a swingeing charge from Barclays to redeem a loan. It seems Barclays did a 'swap' when the loan was first set up, without my knowledge. Could anyone direct me to any earlier posts by members in a similar situation so I can get some idea of the flavour of the ombudsman's responses to this sort of thing. There are other elements to my complaint about Barclays as well but there seems to be a dearth of information regarding 'breakage charges'. Thanks to anyone that can respond.

Hello, my first thread, just one of many problems I'm having!! After being with Barclays nearly thirty years, I thought they might have trusted me by now. I have a business account with an overdraft of £2000. A couple of weeks ago I recieved a call from a rude man at Barclays telling me my overdraft expired in Oct '09. I told him that was news to me. He said as my turnover of money through this account had drastically fallen over the last year, it was unlikely my overdraft would be renewed. He then said Barclays would be looking for payment to clear the overdraft. Kick me when I'm down why don't you! I explained that my business had been very quiet for the last year, however, I still pay their quarterly extortion charges. I told him they can't expect me to cough up £2000 just like that. He said if my local business manager will not renew my overdraft, they would have to arrange a resolve loan. Needless to say they wouldn't renew it. I've had nothing in writing from them, but they did leave a message on my voicemail this week asking to discuss this. I didn't ring back. My question is, can I say to them I'll pay £100 - £200 per month until its cleared? Can they refuse this? Can they say this is fine, then put an unreasonable interest rate on the balance? Thanks in advance for any advice.

Hi, I currently have a Barclays Personal Reserve which is costing me £22 every 5 days in charges. I can't afford to pay it off to get back in the black for another couple of weeks, but according to Barclays website, one can cancel it at any time. Does anyone know if I call and cancel it, will I still be charged £22 a week because I'm over the limit? or will cancelling it stop me from being charged any more? (I appreciate I will have to pay it back eventually, and will presumably be charged interest on the overlimit amount, but I'm trying to minimise the cost until I can afford to do so) Thanks Andy

Spoke to an uneducated muppet at BC this morning on a unlisted private telephone number (available upon request) in Kirby (Liverpool) which was thier IT & Data department, regarding the release of statement data and other sensitive info to HFO Services Limited. He did not ask me who I was nor attempt to carry out any ID verification process. He asked me what it was regarding, so I told him it was relating to release of data to a DCA for an impending court case. After I told him the names, (you all know who Im talking about) he said, "Oh well thats OK 'cos they are the same company". I said, "how can they be the same company when they are quite clearly listed at Companies House as separate legal entities, have separate DPA Reg numbers and separate CCL licences." He said, "well I thought that they were the same company." He tried to defend them in every way even attempting to use the analagy that Barclaycard and Barclays "are the same company". I corrected him and informed him that Barclaycard is a registered trading name of Barclays Bank PLC, and that the only other company which closely resembles Barclays Bank PLC is Barclaycard Funding PLC, which as the name suggests does exactly that, provides money (or should I say make believe computer money) to presumably fund the Barclaycard operation. He then made no comment. He further stated that regardless of who 'phones up from DCA's and asks for data, we will supply it if appropriate. This is the intelligence level of some of the people working for these financial institutions. Clearly this idiot should seek admission into another type of institution, not the financial variant I may add !! Have taken the matter up with Barclays Legal, ICO, OFT, FSA. He also gave me the Directors office details to make a complaint to. They are located in Pavillion Drive, Northampton. He claimed that any correspondence received by this office has a turn around time of 48 hours !!. Can pigs fly ? I await thier comments.

Hi, I have been out of week since September last year and my only income has been Tax Credits, I had a couple of £22 reserve fee's taken which I had forgotten about and since being on Tax credits I have not exceeded the money I had going in to my account but due to the original reserve fee's it has meant that I have been using my reserve every month without my knowledge due to the fact i knew the excact amount going in to my account and knew how much I could withdraw. My tax credits have dropped considerably and do not even cover the reserve amount let alone my overdraft now. Due to the first couple of reserve fee's the subsequent fee's since then have amounted to over £800 how do I stand in getting these charges refunded as I believe the Banks are not allowed to take charges from a benefit. Thanks

hi i have been burying my head in the sand over this court case and someone pointed me in the direction of this forum. Some time ago my husband and myself took out a loan for £35k with first plus, we shouldnt have done it as we were in debt already and saw part of it as a way out then by "consolidating" our payments, not realising that by taking this over a 15 year period at 10% APR it would be a huge amount to pay off. At some point last year the account went into arrears - i had a period of unemployment, then got a job away from home then split with my husband, my dad got dementia during this period and we had to place him in a home, not surprisingly the money things were far from my mind. First plus told me that they had handed the account to red castle at some point last year, i am not sure i got a letter about this, i think it was a phone call, red castle rang periodically for payments, then stopped doing this. In December my husband died, I sent a death certificate to both red castle and first plus. i rang red castle to find out what was happening, they said they didnt have my account, i rang first plus who said they didnt either, i told red castle this and they said i should pay them something anyway but i refused i said i wasnt going to do this without them sorting out who had my account. they said they would ring me back and sort things out but never did. i am afraid i then pushed it out of my mind, until first plus rang saying i had amassed arrears of around £2500. i said i would pay them £200 per month towards the arrears, they said they wouldnt accept this without an income and expenditure sheet. i said i did not wish to give them this as i didnt trust them with information what with losing my account details before. they then said they would take me to court. i emailed them a letter saying i thought they were being unreasonable not accepting my payment offer. then i received in working hours a visit from a fieldcall representative who asked my friend who was staying at mine at the time if he could speak to me and my husband - my friend told him that my husband was dead, he expressed surprise at this and said he hadnt been told this. i rang the fieldcall rep later who said he had been appointed by firstplus to give me debt counselling advice and that he could often get customers a low repayment rate of arrears and his job was to ensure i could afford to pay the arrears repayments. i asked how much these services cost - he said he didnt get involved with that side of things - i said i was already in debt and didnt want his services adding to an extortionate loan interest rate - he rang me another time and was quite hostile in his manner saying i should see him. i then emailed first plus and said i was being harassed by this rep and they told him not to contact me again - i again repeated my offer of £200 per month for the arrears, they said they would accept this but still take me to court. i am in county court tomorrow facing a possession order - i am wondering the following: 1. should i just ask them to produce the original agreement before we even proceed with this case? 2. does first plus even exist as a company anymore as i thought i read somewhere it went into receivership and i dont believe i had any written notification of that or of when my account has been passed to a third party. 3. the interest on my arrears are £9.27 PER DAY so i will never pay off the arrears as each day presumably these will increase. is this reasonable? thanks

Hi, I am having problems paying bills due to lack of work and have agreed temporary monthly payments with several CC companies including to my surprise after reading the forum MBNA. The only real pain has been Barclays Partner Finance who will not accept my offer for a token payment and have pressed me to pay more. They have received an income and expenditure report compiled with help from the CCCS but still ask for what I cannot afford. The loan was for a car which has since been sold and a cheaper one aquired to reduce costs and enable me to work. The calls with this company have been quite distressing after the first person I spoke to said that they would accept an offer of £5. I wrote another letter to offer this amount which was refused again. I tried to pay a token amount over the phone and was put through to collections who did everything they could do squeeze more out of me, constantly threatening debt collection and legal action, obviously this didn't help them as I don't have it. The people at Barclays do not listen, they talk over you constantly and are extremely rude, which I did expect , which I presume is their goal. The last thing they said to me after reluctantly processing my £5 payment was to tell me that they will be fast tracking the account for collection. Amongst other things said to scare me was that I should consult a lawyer and disregard the CCCS. I have paid a token amount for the last 2 months and have no details of any charges they have recently made to the account. At a court case what is the likely outcome? Surely they can only order me to pay what I can afford is that correct? If that is the case then they will end up with £1 a month, surely they know this and why would they bother? Or is all this hard talk designed to scare me into paying them? I don't think I can avoid a court date just need to know what to expect. thanks in advance and apologise if the post is too long for you! Royal.

Hi, this is my first post on this site and I would like to thank you all for help and guidance I have recieved. This is my history so far;- 9th October sent 2 x DPA letters to Barclays Bank 9th October sent 2 x DPA letters to Barclaycard (only got reply on one) 9th October sent 14 day letter to Barclays requesting £1180 refunded 14th October recieved letter from Barclaycard stating files on microfiche "not readily accessable" Asked for £3 per statement 17th Octboer recieved 2 x lots of statements from Barclays 24th October issued small claim against Barclays (£1180 increased to £1482.75) 24th October sent 14 day letter to Barclays for refund of £3535.00 I will keep you all posted, thank you.

I have just sent a letter requesting details of my charges to Peter Townsend, Manager, Barclays Data Protection, Radbroke Hall, Knutsford, Cheshire,WA16 9EU. He replied promptly saying that copy statements are underway and my cheque for £10 has been returned. However, he has asked me to explain what I mean by manual intervention. Elsewhere in the forum it has been pointed out that this is an indication that there is no manual intervention on the account. He has also advised me that "under the DPA you are entitled to a copy of the material held across the Bank that qualifies for disclosure as your "personal data" - this is known as a data subject access request." This will cost £10 Should I ask for this information as well?