Please Help the Newbie!!!

[Ginger1982]

Hello everyone,

 

Firstly, Thank god for this site!!!!

 

Secondly I appeal to anyone for advice please, my mum is literally about to slit her wrists over this matter.

 

She is being taken to court by marlin financial, over a debt sold to them by hsbc. She has pretty much always paid the debt.

 

Upon assignment to marlin (through pheonix?????), my mum set up a direct debit to pay the debt with marlin and received a comfirmation of dd set up. She thought nothing of it until a letter demanding full payment was received. Marlin had never set up the dd.

 

Cutting things short for now, she has received court summons and we are stumped as to how to respond.

 

They have obviously added the 8% stat interest and now the amount has doubled.

 

I dont understand how they can not set up the dd, thereby choosing not to accept my mums payment and can then take her to court for twice the original debt amount.

 

IT JUST DOESNT SEEM FAIR!!!

 

Any help is much appreciated asap xxxxx

[Guest louis wu]

Hello Ginger, welcome to CAG

 

Firstly, please tell your mum not to worry, things are not as bad as they seem.

 

You will need to give some more details as to whats happening, and clarification as to what paperwork/correspondance your mum's had.

 

Is this court summons from the court?, or is it a just letter from Marlin threatening it?

 

Have they supplied a statement explaining how they have come up with the figure owed, indeed, have they ever sent one?

 

It's important you get everything in order, and then we can look at ways to help your mum.

 

Please don't worry too much, you will get lots of help with this.

 

louis

[Ginger1982]

Hi Louis

 

Thankyou so much for your prompt response.

 

I have only seen a scanned image of the claim form, but it is a court summons rather than a letter. here is the particulars of their claim, and a brief rundown of where my mum is up to:

 

By an agreement in writing between HSBC Banks plc (HSBC) and the defendant dated 16/09/1996 (the agreement), HSBC agreed to issue the defendant with a credit card upon the terms and conditions set out therein. In breach of the Agreement, the Defendant has failed to make payments of not less than the minimum payment shown on the monthly statment. HSBC served a default notice on the Defendant stating the sum due and requiring the Defendant to pay the same. The Defendant failed to pay & the Agreement was terminated. The Agreeemnt was assigned to the Claimant on 05/10/2007.

THE CLAIMANT THEREFORE CLAIMS 1. 2582.54 2. Interest at the rate pursuant to the Agreemnt namely 1651.72 & continuing until Judgement or sooner payment at the daily rate of 0.57 or in the alternative interest pursuant to section 69 of the County Courts Act 1984. Also, interest at the rate pursuant to the Agreement from the judgement date until payment.

 

My version...............Don't remember and cannot find any copy of Default stuff (but believe this can be done without my knowledge) from HSBC. Do remember speaking to them at Debt Recovery dept years ago & they agreed it could be paid via their debt collection agency, Metropolitan Collection Services Ltd . Outstanding balance on their latest correspondence 19.05.06 was shown as £2659.54 This was paid regularly via DD at first £10, then increased to £15.00 (on 25.05.06) per month through the bank until I was advised by HSBC/Marlin simultaneously that the debt had been acquired by Phoenix t/as Marlin Financial and that the dd to hsbc was to be stopped. It was then agreed that a new DD (increased to £25.00 per month, not forgetting another account almost identical had been successfully tfrd from HSBC & payment set up by DD to Marlin & this had been running perfectly for 3 months at this point) was to be set up to pay MArlin at which point they were given bank details etc. They then sent me a letter of DD instruction confirmation, 'if details are correct , you need do nothing' , no date as to when dd was due, only amount to be taken & account details. Next thing was Claim form was received from them as they state DD was never received. My bank state they have never received a DD instruction from Marlin apart from the one already in place for £85 per month

 

We have sent a letter of complaint to marlins director, as the correspondence is being sent to my mums old house, she still owns it but does not live there.

 

We have sent the acknowledgement of service in, so we can have a bit more time to figure things out, and I have contacted the court who have said that our next response is due on the 19th march.

 

Thanks and please let me know what else i can fill you in on

 

Oh- no statement either, but i saw the template letter in the legal issues section before - is that advisable, i think it was the "request for information" letter.

Ginger

[Guest louis wu]

I can help a bit with this, but TBH, there are better people here who are experts in this, especially with court papers and what you need etc.

 

I will see if I can get someone to have a look for you.

 

louis

[Ginger1982]

Thankyou SO much for even showing interest.:grin:

 

My mum has always paid her bills, and she is devastated and distraught about getting a ccj, and thats the stupid thing, things have accelerated after setting up a dd to pay the blasted debt.

 

And the worst thing is, I feel like a total failure because I sit here and write this with the letters llb after my name!!!! And I just can't seem to help her.

[Guest louis wu]

Like I said before, please try not to worry, nothing has been settled/decided yet.

[ScarletPimpernel]

You will need to send the claimant a CPR18 letter, which will force them to produce whatever paperwork they intend to rely upon. I am in the midst of work, but someone will doubtless post the relevant letter soon.

 

They are probably hoping for a default judgment; alas for them, because you have found CAG they won't get one.

 

Firstly it is extremely unlikely that a valid, enforceable agreement exists for this account. HSBC probably won't be able to find the original after so long, and in any case their 'agreements' from this period didn't show the prescribed terms required by s.61 of the CCA 1974, and so are unenforceable.

 

Secondly. it is likely that the amount they are claiming consists partly of unlawful and unfair penalty charges. This will provide you with an opportunity to challenge the amount and make a counterclaim.

[Curlyben]

One CPR letter:

REQUEST FOR INFORMATION UNDER THE CIVIL PROCEDURE RULES.

 

Dear Sir/Madam,

 

I have received the Court claim filed by your Company. To enable me to file a defence and counter-claim, I require specific information regarding the account to be provided forthwith. Given that this matter is now the subject of legal proceedings, you are obliged to disclose under the Civil Procedure Rules, the information and documents detailed below. This letter supersedes the Data Protection request made to on the **DATE**. The information must be furnished by the **DATE**, which gives you ten days to provide what has been requested. If you fail to comply, this will be reported to the Court, a copy of this letter will be provided as evidence to the same and an Order enforcing your compliance will be sought.

 

1. A true copy of the executed credit agreement and any terms and conditions that applied to the account at the time of default and at the time the account was opened.

2. All records you hold on me relevant to this case, including but not limited to:

a. A transcript of all transactions, including charges, fees, interest, repayments and payments and both the original amount of the loan and any repayments made to it the account.

b. Transcriptions of all telephone conversations recorded and any notes made in relation to telephone conversations

c. Where there has been any event in my account history over this period which has required manual intervention by any person, I require disclosure of any indication or notes which have either caused or resulted in that manual intervention, or other evidence of that manual intervention in relation to my account formerly held with **CREDITOR**.

d. True copies of any notice of assignment and/or default notice or enforcement notice that you or the original creditor sent me, with a copy of any proof of postage that you hold.

e. Documents relating to any insurance added to the account, including the insurance contract and terms and conditions, date it was added and deleted (if applicable).

f. Details of any collection charge added to the account; specifically, the date it was levied, the amount of the charge, a detailed financial breakdown of how the charge was calculated, and what the charge covers.

g. Specific details of the fees/charges levied by any other agency in respect of this account and a detailed breakdown of said fees/charges and what each charge relates to and on what date said fees/charges were levied.

h. A genuine copy of any deed of assignment, or proof that you have a legal right to this money.

i. A genuine copy of any notice of fair use of my data as required by the Data Protection Act 1998

j. A list of third party agencies to whom you have disclosed my personal data and a summary of the nature of the information you have disclosed.

 

3. Any other documents you seek to rely on in court.

4. A copy of your complaints procedure, as required by the Consumer Credit Act 2006.

5. Clarification of the date you acquired the debt, what organisation you acquired it from, their registered office, their company number (if any) and what legal title they had to this debt, and what credit license number they had at the time that the debt was purchased or entered into.

 

I will require this information within the next ten days. I must advise you that if the information is not forthcoming, it will be reported to the Court that you are trying to frustrate proceedings and denying me the opportunity to file a defence and counter claim.

 

I would appreciate your due diligence in this matter.

 

I await your rapid response.

 

Yours Faithfully,