Hi I think my employer is trying to force a redundancy. After several promotions and promises of additional resources which were never forthcoming, a few months back they announced a part of my job had changed. More recently they announced in a meeting where there were others present that someone else was coming in to take over another part of my job and report to someone else and that I should hand over to them. I also know that further changes are afoot. I didn't agree to these changes so have to do something. A redundancy situation couldn't be fair as the work has not diminished? It has increased. The thing is that they've done this with others. I don't want to go the grievance route but I feel I have no option? I always think of grievances as the relationship breaker but having said that the relationship appears to be broken anyway? I know I have to act soon but any guidance on where I stand would be greatly appreciated. Their behaviour to me on a daily basis is both hostile and distant and the stress over the last few months has been enormous. Thank you

I opened a Club Lloyds account prior to Xmas, primarily for the benefits it advertised. Under doctor’s orders, I am currently abroad to reduce my stress levels. I have a large sum of money in my account, and have been trying to use the time to move this to other accounts I have that it will earn interest on. Each time I try to make a transaction, either using online banking or via debit card, to other accounts in my name which are already set up with my online banking, Lloyds block them and make me call their Fraud Team. I am making the calls from abroad, I think the shortest call to date has been around 30 minutes, each time I am made to answer questions from my credit file and a trace is left on my file each time they make me do this. Yesterday, at circa 3pm, I tried for the second time to move a large sum to an account I hold with RCI bank, the payment, for the second time was blocked. The call time I made to the Fraud team was in excess of 1 hour. The end result of the call was that my account is totally blocked and Lloyds are forcing me to return to the UK to present myself and ID to a Lloyds branch before I can access my money. This is my normal day-to-day banking account which I can no longer access, check that payments are being made into it, or make ad hoc bill payments or move money. The guy I spoke to in the fraud team, his attitude towards me inflamed the situation, he refused to let me speak to a manager, pass the call to a manager, or get a manager to call me back. He lied to me and told me he would put me through to customer services to make a complaint, he didn’t he put me back into the long queue to wait again for the Fraud team. Directly after this, I called the Complaints team. again a long wait to speak to someone., before starting on a 2-hour call with them. After they liaised with Fraud I was told that there was no block on my online banking (with me accessing my account while they were still on the line to ensure this was the case) that all I had to do was call Fraud again to go through more credit file checks to get the payment authorised. The complaint I had changed from initially being about the block on my account and enforced return to the UK, to about the conduct and attitude with ....., the Fraud team member. I was offered compensation of £160 to cover the cost of in excess of 3 hours of international mobile calls. I did not accept this to close the complaint, I elevated the complaint to a higher level (.......), where we went over everything, double-checked everything, and it was left in his hands to investigate further while I was left to go through the rigmarole regarding my transfer with the Fraud team again. This whole scenario which started at 3pm, concluded with the termination of this call after 6pm. 9 am this morning I went online to check my bank account before getting up the courage to tackle another call with the Fraud dept…..my online access was blocked. The start of many phone calls was to the complaints department to speak to either of the two people from the day before, this was not possible and I was put into the ‘care’ of a lady called ..... informed me that my account was blocked and that I would have to return to the UK, etc, before it would be unblocked. To cut a long story short, she confirmed with me the address of 3 branches in Edinburgh that I could do so, with me informing her that I wanted to make face-to-face contact with the manager of the branch to address my issues, and that I would be pursing costs for flights, transfers, accom, time off work etc. She refused my request to speak with someone senior and she terminated the call with me. started to look at flights to find the first available one is not until next Saturday, a week away. started to try to get contact details for the branch so I could phone to ensure a manager would be there, to make sure they could do everything that had to be done (from their side and from mine), and to make an appointment. You would think this would be easy, but being Lloyds, no it is not… .there is only an 0845 no provided, extortionate to call from abroad, and I was forced to call the call center. On doing so I was informed that there are in fact no Lloyds branches in Scotland, that the branch we were looking at was a Bank of Scotland one, with no telephone number for customers, as are all branches apparently, that I cannot talk to anyone in branch directly and that if I wished to make contact I had to do it via an agent in the call center, who then tried to call it for me with no joy. This call terminated after 1pm today, another 4 hours of my life wasted.

This is f....g rediculous. They mess up my calculation...let it run for years and then give me a 2 year backdated attachment of earnings. for over 800 pcm. (for one child). I had to leave my job....I got a much lower paid job and they were taking 350 for maintenance and arrears. I get another low paid job...they then accepted 250 for arrears only as the regular payments had stopped. I get another job and try to contact via email and web enquiry. No reply. Suddenly...without warning. £425 per month out of my bank account. I cant even afford my rent or electricity. And this is without travel to work costs or food. What the hell do I do.

Basically, I am self-employed and have been for the last 2 years, When I first started I had to take my books in every three month and a new calculation was done. that was fine I had no problems with that at all. Towards the last three months of 2014 and the first 2-3 months of 2015 my income went up considerably and so my housing benefit entitlement dropped to the point I was only getting maybe £10.00 per week and virtually nothing on Council Tax. No problems with that as the money I was earning covered the increase and I was happy with it. The problem started at the end of March 2015 when the income from SE started dropping (knew it would during the Spring/Summer Months). I took my books in as normal but they said they where not going to do a re calculation again until August and then every 12 Months after that. This of course left me paying high rent at a time I could barely afford it (I managed but it was tough going). Anyway August came and I took all the books in again but because they were now basing it on twelve months books which included the very good months the HB only came down by £23.00 per week likewise CT had only a £5.00 pw reduction. This caused severe financial hardship and I basically had to scrape the barrel in order to get to now. To give you an indication of the income reduction, February 2015 was £2200.00 but February 2016 was only just over £1200.00. Most other months since September 2015 have been down between 200 to 700 pounds. I still have 2 months to go before they will do a re calculation but as I said to the Council I can see me quitting SE and going unemployed before August comes in. Right now my last three months are running at about 40% of the previous years income and I cannot see any improvement at all in income until November 2016 So basically is there anyway that I can get the council to return to the three month recalculation that we were originally doing or is it going to be a question of grin and bear it until August. If thats going to be the case I can see the income support people are going to have at least one more customer and I will then also claim care allowance as I would qualify for it based on my wife's PIP. On a side note, I know there are benefit calculators but for some unknown reason I end up with some stupid figures which do not make any sense when I use them. FYI, Current income based on wife's PIP (standard rate both care and moto) Child Ben for a 16 year old who is going to go college this year. WTC (around £92.00) due to working 40+ hours a week and lowish income, CTC for the same child mentioned above. + £65.00 drawings a week (makes up the difference between what I used to get on the dole and what I get from WTC) If I go unemployed income would come from Child Ben for the 16 year old CTC for the same 16 year old, Wife's PIP as per above Income Support (what that would be I don't know so if you could enlighten me then thanks) Carer's Allowance (about £62.00 I believe) and a larger reduction in HB and CT I think. So whats better for me ???? Any help with any the questions is appreciated. neword.

Well now you know why your Local Library or Swimming pool is closing down ! No money for social care - because staff are being paid to prevent whistleblowing or criticism of bosses. Local Authorities are apparently requiring staff who are taking early retirement/redundancy or leaving after a dispute, to sign a gagging order (compromise agreement). It would appear that the person leaving receives more money if they do this.

Hello I am new here and desperate for some advice. It's complicated but will try and keep it brief but below is a summary. In August 2006 myself and my now ex husband needed to refinance an existing loan with GE Money a broker referred us to Blackhorse and we were offered a secured loan of £40k. We were categorically told that we could only take the loan if we had the PPI as well even though we said the repayments were way to high to afford. We were convinced by the Blackhorse rep that this was our only option like idiots we signed. The loan agreement states Regulated by the Consumer Credit Act 1974. Total amount of loan with PPI was £52,075.05 (we did query this as we were told absolute max allowed to borrow was £39,000 the balance is cost of PPI). 10 year repayment period. Interest rate of 11.9%. A year on and we realised that the PPI should not of been sold to us as we had our own insurance through our employers (we had told the Blackhorse rep this before signing)! After a bit of a fight £10,373.35 was credited (so it shows on my statement). Another year down the line and a divorce. I got into payment difficulties and missed a few payments (I always made Blackhorse aware of when and why). PPI came to light again as when Blackhorse credited the original amount they had failed to refund the payments we had made and the interest. In 2009 Blackhorse finally credit the account again with a refund of £3,561.31 only after I had refused to pay anything until they did! I carried on paying reduced payments to Blackhorse as I was struggling on my own with the loan and main mortgage but had accrued arrears made up of missed payments and charges of £23,435.47 Blackhorse went for a SPO in November 2012. Blackhorse wrote to me the same month to say they were charging me 11.292%. I have carried on paying the court agreed sum however on occasions I have not been able to pay the whole amount on the due dates and payments have either been split, late or not the full amount. I always called Blackhorse and made them aware if paying extra when I could and for once they were helpful! In October 2014 I received my annual statement and was shocked to see that even after paying over £7K the balance of my loan had only gone down by £145! I queried this and put in a complaint to the FOS. Within in 4 days Blackhorse rang me and said "good news - no more interest, when I queried why all of a sudden they said "good will gesture"! Roll on to May 2015 when I receive letters from Blackhorse and Skye to say loan was sold on. I rang Blackhorse and asked why they said no longer "allowed" to operate those loans" however everything with my loan would remain the same. I then called Skye when my first payment was due 1st July 2015). Made the first payment via debit card however the rep entered the wrong post code so had to do again. Again was reassured smooth running of account by Skye. Checked bank account later that day to find I missing two lots of large payments! Rang Skye oops sorry a mistake we don't have the money it's in limbo, called my bank who confirmed the wrong payment was in limbo and would have to wait until it wasn't collected to recredit my account. My bank then blocked my cards as believed it was fraudulent due to high amount twice! This took almost two weeks which meant I incurred bounced direct debits bank charges and £253 liability order for non payment of council tax! Skye just said oh we didn't have the money physically so tough, On making my next payment the lady I was speaking to said about setting up the payment plan by direct debit. I explained I was unable to do that as sometimes I have to make split payments as money was very tight. She said send in your pay slips, statements and expenditure and income and we can see if we can get you a more comfortable payment. She asked was was comfortable now I said the amount but what about SPO. She said well it's a fresh start with us and took the reduced payment. She confirmed to make the reduced payment until they had reviewed my finances. I made the reduced payment (split) this month on 29th. Thence stepdad I received a call from a rep who told me she had reviewed my finances and the history of the account from Blackhorse and as there are still £9,315 owing on the arrears and as my finances clearly show I ve no extra finances to clear these - they suggest I sell my house to clear the whole balance on my loan otherwise they will possess. I was shocked! She said they are no ,onger able to help me and I have until Monday to respond. Sorry this is so long but thought the whole history would be helpful. Sorry I forgot to mention I have paid £45,102.41 to date and the balance on this loan is ......... £42,676.88, the lady who called from Skye in Friday also said the the original term of the loan was up last month and that I had breached the SPO as when it sent to court a new agreement was put in place (news to me as I never signed any new agreement) that the loan would be extended by 4 years to allow for all arrears and payments to clear however I would need to be paying over £900 a month to do this - I currently pay £700 which is £80 more than agreed by court.

Introduction I'd like to document the correspondence of my dealings with Erudio, aka Arrow Global / CarVal Investors in the hope it will help others; my student loans are from 92-95. Mission Objective To get written confirmation of deferment, as has been the case since loans were originated via SLC. Salvo #1 First contact was a big wad of paperwork as documented in other threads, asking for bank details, eye colour, inside leg measurement et al....and a signature! I ignored this first contact. They phoned and I requested any further correspondence to be in writing.. .they sent a second wad of paperwork, the same as the first; this accounts for three trees chopped down thus far for their thud of paper through the letterbox. This also had a cover letter saying I was in arrears for ~£200....huh? Salvo #2 I ignored their paperwork and instead scanned the original SLC document I had, with a signature and no more, I did not divulge any bank info on this form. I then copied my bank statements for the last three months into a PDF (I redacted all personal info from the statements) and along with the SLC doc, sent them via email: Dear Sir/Madam, Please find attached a signed deferment form and three months of bank statements. My customer reference number: xxxx Regards John Doe Salvo #3 They replied two days later via return email: Please be advised that the information that you provided is currently being processed and you will receive a letter in due course. Salvo #4 Almost two weeks later, they sent an email: Please be advised that the bank statements you sent were unreadable , could you please resend them again so that we may continue to process your deferral application. I resent my statements as a PNG picture on the same day as their email. This email from over a month ago, was the last correspondence I have received. Salvo #5 Today I received a letter stating another notice of arrears, this time it's gone up to ~£400. No mention of the deferment nor any other confirmation of the process thus far. It seems they are just sending generic letters with the computer regurgitating random amounts to scare the peeps; their goal is to get payment...any payment so they have your bank details. Salvo #6 Removed. Will update as and when they reply... -------------------------------------- Edit: I'm removed the email I sent in salvo #6 , as I'd prefer to wait for their response before publicly posting info; you never know who's reading these forums. He who is prudent and lies in wait for an enemy who is not, will be victorious. - Sun Tzu, The Art of War Txs dx - I think it was one of your posts buried deep in another thread that inspired my verbiage.

I stopped in a loading bay at Hammersmith to load items in my car, their traffic management Order states clearly that "if you are disabled or are injured you can stop for as long as it takes to set down or pick up with your bags/luggage, no time limit. The council lied at the tribunal and refused to give a copy of this traffic management Order. The tribunal Judge referred the decision to the council who still wanted the money from me. The tribunal is aware that they lied but will not do anything about it, I tried judicial review but they said the tribunal had no case to answer so they did not deal with it. I have contacted the ombudsman but they said to write to the council again and have this investigated first before they will deal with it, but the council will not investigate because the tribunal has found in their favor so they still want this injustice to continue. They have now applied for a recovery Order again and I need to apply for a TE7 extension of time in order to have this dealt with by the ombudsman. Any one has any help and or advice? TNX

Hi guys, I would like to ask You about such thing, I'm working for some company , now I'm on probation period for 2 months more (6 at all) my contract contains "it is a condition of your contract of emplotment for overtime to be worked in order to meet customer requirements" , I'm working 4 on 4 off shift 12 hours each, but usually I don't have my 4 days off cause my employer always wants me to do overtimes saying like "you have to" not asking if I can, when I said I'm busy on last days off and can't do this 5 minutes later he came and said like "You are on probation period, if You would not do this overtimes You would not receive permanent contract" is that bullying? Do I have to do always overtimes for him? Looking forward for Your answers, thanks a lot.

Hullo all I was a member of an organisation called myphoneclub which provided connections via Orange(EE) on a 30 day contract basis. I ported my two numbers in from Carphone Warehouse over a year ago. On 7th February I received an email from myphoneclub to say they had ceased trading and called them. They advised that someone from orange would be in contact to sort out the phones. On or around 20th February I was contacted by Avenir Telecom a reseller of EE(Orange) who offered to put me on expensive 2 year 4G EE contracts. I refused. No other service from EE was offered to me or available even though I asked and my request for PAC codes was refused as they said they had no control of the numbers. I contacted Orange direct who refused to speak to me as I was "not the account holder" but took my word that myphoneclub had gone bust and disconnected my service and that of hundreds of others. The following day after I contacted the Executive Office the service was restored and I was advised Avenir could offer all the services of EE including prepay and 30 day contracts. Getting back to Avenir they said they could not, blaming EE who they hate and my service has gone down once again. This has been a long saga and I have only provided the high lights but here is my best understanding of the situation: Orange has a distributor called Avenir Avenir sold Orange services to myphoneclub. Orange say this makes myphoneclub Avenir's customer. Avenir are insistent they will only reconnect numbers on two year contracts and both Ofcom and Citizen's Advice have said contractually they are within their rights. I dont want to be forced into long and expensive contracts for a dubiuous 4G service I dont need but I dont want to lose my numbers. It particulary galls me that they should use the threat of permanent loss of numbers to force people to sign up, particularly people who joined myphoneclub in the first place in order to avoid long contracts. I would be most grateful if anyone can come up with any solutions. It has been suggested to me that I sign the contract then cancel within the time limits of the distance selling regs, getting my PAC's at that point though I don’t think that is much of a flyer. What I really want is some sort of business or contract law that I can apply in order to get a pre pay or sim only contract out of Avenir or failing that a strategy along the lines of first sign to restore the service then sue using the following......??. Is there any kind of unfair business practice legislation, or abuse of dominant position provisions anywhere. Any thoughts or ideas most welcome. Put your questions here. If you are ex myphoneclub in the same boat, please make yourself known either on here or privately if you prefer. Lets form a a gang!

When we moved into our new home earlier this year we decided to use BT as our internet service provider, picking the Unlimited Broadband package at just £16 per month. After many cancelled appointments (by BT) an engineer finally came around to get us online on 9th May. He fitted a new telephone line due to the previous one being “too old for internet” and we ran an extension phone line from the main socket downstairs to my office upstairs so the hub could be connected to the PC via an Ethernet lead. For two weeks everything was fantastic, download speeds were terrific and we were really happy with the service. Then one day I came home to find no signal from the phone and extremely slow internet speeds. Called BT (via mobile) who said the line was working fine, called them again two minutes later and they said the problem was outside our house and that an engineer would be around today (31st) at no charge. Still no dial tone and slow broadband as of this afternoon I called BT who said the engineer found no fault and that I would need to pay £99 for them to come out again. He must have been invisible as we live right next to the junction box and no one went near it today. explained that I felt a bit cheated as we’ve had their service for less than a month, have not touched anything save to try a phone in the main socket (still no dial tone so not the extension at fault) and now we have to pay more just to get a normal service! The man advised us that we had exceeded our (truly) unlimited download limits at 150GB and this was causing the phone to go dead and the broadband to drop. He said to fix it we would have to upgrade to the BT Infinity package at £23 a month (plus £40 installation fee) but it sounds too fishy to me. So then: 1) Since we don’t use the phone save once in a blue moon, why would the tone go dead because of our broadband use? 2) Is the Infinity option the only solution to this problem? 3) Are we still liable for cancellation fees (the man said we are) if we quit with BT now? 4) Also does anyone know if the £99 call out charge will cover any repairs they need to make if the fault is somehow ours? Sorry for a lengthy mail and lots of questions but I’m getting nowhere with BT customer support.

Hi, hope I am not breaking any rules here but I am a total novice at doing this kind of thing! Where can I post asking for advice on obtaining a court order to force a sale of property please? Thanks lots sewsew

Well over ten years ago I had a credit card with Littlewoods, it later became The Associates, and then Citi Financial. During this time I was seriously ill and my income ceased. It was then put on an instalment plan, and sold to Hillesden Securities Ltd (HSL). In 2008 they obtained a CCJ. Due to poor health I did not challenge this, but agreed to continue paying it off monthly, exactly as before. HSL failed to supply, on written request, any statement or explanation of how the alleged balance was calculated. Even though interest and charges were supposedly "frozen", the balance had clearly increased by a substantial sum. That appeared to be (or include) undisclosed, unlawful charges, and/or interest. I worked out that the amount I had paid up to that point was roughly correct EXCLUDING any unlawful charges, and so I stopped paying any more. HSL also failed to comply with a CCA request, so it was and remains unenforceable. They have made no further contact, nor attempted to enforce. The CRA record for HSL was deleted months ago under the 6-year rule, but the CCJ itself remains permanently on file, unsatisfied, which of course fails to reflect that I have paid what I calculated was the agreed remaining amount, many years ago. Should I apply to the Court for the CCJ to be struck out due to something like maladministration (non-compliance with s78(6) statutory request)? I am concerned that if I just leave it, HSL might wait for me to be older, more feeble-minded and less capable, and then resurrect the CCJ and try to enforce it - even though the amount they claim is due appears to be solely residual unlawful charges or interest after the true debt had been cleared. The existence of this one unsatisfied CCJ is also a minor problem. Thoughts will be appreciated. TIA

Hello, I am posting her on behalf of my mother she along with all other employee's have recently received a letter outlining details of a new Employment contract with reduced Sickness and Maternity benefits after the current benefit system has been abused by many of the employee's. They have sent a proposed contract out for all staff to review, on the Proposal it says if you don't agree with the proposal you may be dismissed from the old terms and given a new offer of employment under the new terms(in which case she would also loose all the extra holidays she has accrued working there for 5+ years). She's been employed with them for 5 years in which time she hasn't taken a single sick day or maternity leave can they legally do this or does she have some form of protection?

Ok I know they cant cut me off in winter if I have children. Can they however forcefully install a meter (via the courts and a lock smith) that I cant afford to use? (effectively cutting me off) Because they wont just instal a normal meter I will have to pay off part of my 4000 pound debt and pay for what I normally use and im on benefits at the moment and in serious financial difficulty/debt and I cant afford to eat let alone pay my bills! The electricity company is E-On they are on the verge of taking the case to court to apply for the rights to force me to install the meter/ to try and disconnect me.

I moved into this private property, a single room on 21st March 2012 where I paid one months rent of £240 and £80 for a deposit on a three month agreed tenancy. All bills were included and with the following two payments for rent after that I paid £80 each time to pay a full deposit of £240. My contract having ended three months later I explained to the landlord I will stay another two months which has now turned unto three months until 21st August 2012. I have signed no new paperwork and was simply told to change the date on my original contract which I assume he has done so, however, I have not signed anything to state the new months I had stayed. I have just checked the three deposit schemes and can find no record of my deposit in any scheme and I have contacted asking him about this to no avail. I moved into a small room due to desperate measures of a bad ending to my engagement where the room was a complete mess, mold all over the walls, carpet had stains, mattress was in bad condition and the double socket was broken all to which I had informed the landlord but he never done anything about it. I replaced the double socket myself having been in the building trade to which he agreed to remove the cost from my rent. I have since moved into a free room downstairs which is £325 and as I have not been paid yet have not paid my rent due on 21st July 2012. I originally had pictures of the state of the room but having my phone break I lost the images so cannot prove it was in that state when moving in. My rent at times had been late however had fully been paid up to date apart from the one due for 21st July - 21st August. Furthermost, the landlord fails to repair things or when he does it is weeks later, the shower has leaked for months and after his many failed attempts at repairing it another tenant did it with a slight leak still. He had informed me on repairing the issue in my old room but never did forcing me to move to the room downstairs for the final month. Finally unless showing someone around the house there has been several times when other tenants in the shared house has felt threatened when the landlord called them out for lieing which I know they never did as it was the landlord who signed the tenancy payments himself, he comes into the house whenever he feels like it without notice or does maintenance on other rooms to rent out without notice at all and we constantly feel pressured by his behaviour. Any advice would be welcome on what to do about the rent (will be paid up to date next week when I get paid) and about the deposit and me not signing an updated contract and the other issues. Thanks!