Brief history; Obtained two student loans in around 1993 and 1995 on the "old" mortgage style agreement. Paid some of the loans back and then moved to Ireland around 1997 where I continued to pay money back. However, ultimately my wages dropped, and moving house a few times I contacted them to update my address and request deferment forms. None were ever received. Tried contact a few more times with no success, then moved again and in the way of things got on with my life. After around 5 years in Ireland I moved back to the UK in 2002 before heading off to Australia where I stayed for over a year. Arrived back in the UK in early 2005. It was towards the end of 2005 that I discovered I had a CCJ against me (I did a credit check with Experian as my partner and I were beginning to think about a mortgage and settling down). I did not know what the CCJ was for, but it was due to expire in a matter of months so I decided to leave it as it was not going to impact on our plans. Subsequent application for a mortgage in late 2006 was successful. A few years back I started receiving "statements of account" from the SLC stating the outstanding balance and also that "This is not a request for payment". I did nothing with them as over 10 years had now passed with no contact. A few months back I received notice that Erudio was taking over the loan. Then earlier this week that they had passed the account to drydens fairfax. Yesterday I received a letter from drydens stating that; The CCJ was for the loan and was awarded on 2nd March 2000. "Where we have information that suggests you are employed, our client may look to obtain an attachment of earnings order (AOE) against you. A fee may be added to the outstanding balance and the court may make an order that requires your employer to deduct payments from your wages until the judgement amount is repaid." "Where the judgement is over 6 years old we may apply to the court for permission to issue a warrant of control enabling a County Court bailiff to attend at your address to take good where appropriate to the value of the judgement amount. If the judgement is less than 6 years old we can issue a warrant without permission." "If we have information that suggests you are a homeowner, our client may also secure its position by applying to the court to obtain a Charging Order over your property." They enclose a financial questionnaire as well. What strikes me is; The number of times the word "may" is used in all of this. I was totally unaware of the existence of the CCJ until about 4/5 months before it expired. Does that have any relevance to anything? It has now been over 8 years since the expiry of the CCJ (over 14 since it was issued). My understanding is that they would need to get the CCJ reinstated or something which is very unlikely given the length of time and the fact that I have done nothing to hide myself other than being in other countries for a number of years. It has probably been around 15 years since I last contacted the SLC or anything regarding this loan. So. Is their letter just an attempt to scare me into doing something stupid when they can do nothing at all on this matter any more? If so, what response should I make to them - should I be requesting details of the alleged debt, copies of the contract, etc.?

Having successfully sent the mother company Cabot packing, they have now brought out the pop-guns against me in the form of a letter from FIRE Ltd. So I did a couple of the usual checks on them. First Companies House: 'Kings Hill (No 2) Ltd' company number 03959268 became 'Financial Investigations and Recoveries (Europe) Ltd' company number 03958421 on the 14 March 2005. Of course the registered address of Kings Hill (No 2) Ltd as we all know is .... 1 KINGS HILL AVENUE KINGS HILL WEST MALLING KENT ME19 4UA Next The Information Commissioner's Office: Registration Number: Z511230X Date Registered: 11 January 2001 Registration Expires: 10 January 2010 Data Controller: FINANCIAL INVESTIGATIONS AND RECOVERIES (EUROPE) LIMITED Address: C/O CABOT FINANCIAL (EUROPE) LIMITED 1 KINGS HILL AVENUE KINGS HILL WEST MALLING KENT ME19 4UA Now the interesting bit: When applying for a data controller licence, it is the applicant's duty to keep the record up to date. Not to do so within 28 days of a known change is a criminal offence. In accordance with the rules quite clearly laid out on the application form: Data controller address If you are a limited company you must provide your registered office address. In all other cases you must provide the address of your principal place of business. If there is no place of business (e.g. for a small local voluntary body) you should provide the address of the official who has completed the form. Now, according to their letters and Companies House, the registered address for FIRE Ltd is Unit 5 Mitchell Court, Castle Mound Way, Central Park, Rugby, Warwickshire. CV23 0UY. Therefore the address for FIRE on the ICO website, which should be the registered data controller address (I've checked with them) is wrong. I have sent a letter pointing this out to the ICO. What I don't know is if this invalidates their data controller licence, so making their actions in processing my (or anyone else's) data unlawful whilst this address remains unamended.

I have two old store card account cards which were last used around 2000/2001. I had a small credit on each of these cards as I always kept a positive balance on them. I did not close the accounts. I was informed by both companies involved that the accounts had been closed due to inactivity when i phoned them. They said they would have had no credit in order to close them. I received a reply to my second letter after no response after 8 weeks to the first sent re Evans Store card, now owned by Santander cards but administered by GE capital Global, from Santander. They say they no longer hold information, such as statements on my account due to the statute of limitations and they can't investigate further. They also say the FO Service have no juristiction on this matter. Is this correct? They have given me the address of the Finance and Leasing Association if i wish to complain further. Creation Financial Services who administer the Selfridges card have ignored both of my letters requesting information and a formal complaint. The first letter was sent in Mid December. Is there anything I can do? The balances in question are only small, but its the principle that matters. As far as i understood it banks are required to return balances from old inactive accounts. Do they differ from store card balances? Please advise. Puzzled. Thanks Iris.

Hi, My friend died a couple of years ago and I am one of the administrators of the estate. The debts we knew about were repaid from some life insurance and the balance went to his widow. His widow has now received a phone call, chasing a debt of which we have no knowledge. How would you suggest we proceed or should we ignore it? Should we contact them and ask them for full details of the alleged debt? If so, would you suggest we write or call? Is the debt still enforceable if they dont have a copy of the CCA?- The DRA is Phillips & Cohen. We believe the debt would more than likely be statute barred, however, we don't know whether a CCJ has ever been made. Am i right in saying that if a CCJ has been made, the debt could still be enforceable, even after the six years? Any advice, gratefully received.

I had a number of debts originating in the late 90's which resulted in me being credit blacklisted and spending a few years (mostly 2000-2003) being chased by bailiff's at various addresses. I part-paid these debts over a number of years with the last payment to any agency being made (at a rough guess) somewhere between 5 and 7 years ago (but most likely more than 6 years ago). I am not 100% sure what I still owe in total but was under the impression it must have been written off as have had no contact with any debt collector for approx 6 years and my credit rating has restored itself and is now good again. Rather annoyingly only about a month ago I shredded all my financial documents relating to that time period (basically anything that was over 5 years old) so have no evidence of anything from that time. Recently my parents received a call from Link Financial agency looking for a contact for me which was then followed up by a badly written letter to them which they have not acknowledged. They did not give out my phone number or address but I have now received a speculative letter from "Link Financial Outsourcing Ltd" to my correct address which states that my address has been highlighted to them "as a potential new address for our customer with whom you share the same name" I need help with the following questions:- 1) As this letter is worded in a speculative manner I presume it is best not to acknowledge it in any way? I do not know if they are simply "fishing" or have actual evidence that I am the person they think I am. It is possible that they have traced me through a friend/ colleague or online but I suspect they've just gone through the electoral roll as my credit reference report where I currently live shows no evidence of anything bad from the past. 2) Assuming their letters get worse and/ or more threatening what can I do? I believe this particular debt is my student loan from the 1990's. As I said already I believe that the last time I had any contact from anyone in relation to this was 6 or 7 years ago and in the 3 or 4 years prior to that it did the rounds with me receiving letters from about 7 or 8 different agencies. Is this covered by statute of limitations assuming 6 years have passed since I last made a payment? if I'm misremembering the date of this then at the very least it's been 5.5 years since any last contact. 3) How can all of this affect my current credit rating? As they now have my correct address (albeit that they dont know it's the correct one) can the fact they're chasing me again affect my current rating? Sorry for all the questions!