Dealing with a DCA while living abroad

[EJMcKane]

Hi - I will apologise in advance for the length of this post - I am new to this...

 

I currently live in Spain and have done for a while, however, I made a recent trip to the UK and stayed with my parents for a few months while I had a baby. After I registered at the local doctors using my parents address I suddenly started to recieve letters there from DCA's.

 

I must admit that I foolishly ignored an overdraft debt and a credit card debt with Natwest that I could not pay and I knew it would get back to me one day... My bank account was closed (by the bank) a couple of years ago after I failed to make regular payments (I had a period of unemployment due to redundancy and subsequently got into lots of debt etc etc) and my credit card was stopped too.

 

I had a letter firstly from Fredrickson International regarding my overdraft debt. As I didn't want this debt associated with my parents address, I wrote to them and gave my spanish address (since I am back in Spain). More letters were sent to my parents house and I instructed them to return them as "Not at this address". Then a different agency, Wescott, wrote to my parents address chasing the same debt and the credit card debt too. I sent them a letter confirming my spanish details but they continued to send threatening letters to my parents address along with a threat of bailiffs. I phoned Wescott to make sure that bailiffs would not attend and to make sure they wrote to me in Spain - I did not discuss the debt with them or give them my telephone number (though they asked for it). I now have a number of questions:

 

1) Will my parents credit be adversly affected since the DCA's wrote to me there?

2) Can they deal with me through the courts etc while I am abroad?

3) I have read somewhere on the site that I could ask them to provide a CCA and that if they cannot then the debt is unenforceable - is that true in my case - I know the debt is mine though I have not acknowledged it yet, is it worth sending them the request letter (I have no UK cheques to send and the spanish postal order equivalent may not be acceptable) - and does the DCA have to get a copy of the agreement to me or is it up to me to request it from Natwest?

 

Any advice would be appreciated.

 

Thanks

 

EJ