Welcome Car Finance - have I been done?!

[m200]

Ok the story starts all nicely back in 2005 when I brought a car through Welcome, they were helpful and lovely (hmmm!)...2yrs on I decided I needed an upgrade and they were more than happy to take the old car and I walked away with a 54 plate car, only increasing the payment by about £30 a month. The agreement I first signed up to as definately an HP agreement, I have that paperwork, unknown to me as stupidly I didnt realise, when they refinanced, they changed the agreement to what they are now calling a personal loan, although they always have referred to it as a car agreement. Back in May of this year (09), I complained about the car to customer service as it has had no end of problems since i brought it, but they refuse to do anything about it, the problems arent simple ones and would be costly to fix, so I asked if I could sell the car, pay off some of the finance and get something else, I was told (and I have it in writing) that I was not able to sell the car as it is an HP agreement, but i can VT the car, so I said please go ahead and let me see the figures, the docs came through (I still have them) with the liability figure etc., I then had a call from a guy to pick the car up, I said that my complaint with WF was still ongoing and I wanted to wait to see what they did. The did nothing which will be of no surprise. A month ago, I decided to contact my bank, they gave me a loan to pay off the liability, pay off my personal loan and enough to buy a car, nothing expensive...so I would be free of WF...I then said to them ok VT the car. 3 weeks later I receive a call to say I cant VT as its not an HP agreement but a personal loan, at no point was I told this when I signed up, but having had many an arguement with them, they just dont care if you didnt know at the time. So I am now left with a defunct car that they say I can sell, I wont get much for it and will be left in the lurch with this debt. I saw on a previous post a copy of someone's agreement and he/she was VTing the car, my agreement looks exactly the same as that one. So the questions are: are they legally entitled to change my original HP agreement to a different agreement and how on earth do I get out of this situation and get rid of them forever!

[m200]

Anyone got any advice they can impart to me on this?

[maroondevo52]

Hi,

 

I'll move this thread to the Welcome Finance Forum.

 

Regards.

 

Scott.

[postggj]

hi m200 and welcome

excuse the pun

 

well you realise this sorry excuse for a finance company is now on its last legs so you need to be quick

 

you need to send a sar request with a ten quid postel order to the address below.

most important, send by recorded delievery.

 

welcome financial services

compliance

ruddington field business park

ruddington

nottingham

ng11 6nz

 

next you need to give these people a call and ask what details they have on you and to send all policy docs etc

 

Direct Group - Where Insurance and Innovation Combine - Home Page

 

 

can you post up any agreements, letters etc onto your thread minus personel details

google photo bucket and use the upload link for message boards with out thumbnails option to post

 

any probs and i will pm my email address and post them for you

 

lets see if we can now sort out these cretins

[postggj]

[your address]

 

 

 

[their address]

 

 

[DATE]

 

 

 

 

 

Data Protection Act 1998

Subject Access Request

 

 

 

 

Dear Sir/Madam

 

 

ACCOUNT NUMBER: xxxxxxxxx (or multiple numbers if more than one account)

 

 

Please supply me with copies of all the data which you hold on me in relation to any matter and in any form and for any period of time.

 

Please note that I require disclosure of any personal data which you hold on me for the entire period of my dealings with you.

The Subject Access is not limited to my transaction history and it is not linited merely to 6 years of historical information.

Additionally, where there has been any event in my account history over this period which has required manual intervention by any member of your staff, or any other 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 banking business with you.

 

If you are unable to supply this data because there has been no such manual intervention, then please be so kind as to confirm this in your response.

 

I enclose the statutory maximum fee of £10. You have 40 days in which to comply. Furthermore, if I discover that you have levied disproportionate penalties or charges which are invalid under the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations against me, then I shall be reclaiming them together with any interest charges which you have levied on them.

As it is your wrongdoing and mishandling of my account which has created the necessity for this Subject Access Request, I shall also be reclaiming the enclosed £10 DPA subject access request fee.

 

If there is specific information which you require in order to satisfy yourself as to my identity, please let me know by return. However, please note that the above address is the one which you normally use to communicate my private business to me and which you have hitherto found to be acceptable.

I would be happy to collect the Data from my local branch.

 

 

Yours faithfully,

 

 

[signature]

 

 

[name]

[m200]

Your a star! Thanks! I have raised the query with WF and will await the response...the best was from the branch 'If you havent heard by Wednesday call them'....why dont they call them if they are so keen for a response! The one good thing I have learnt from them and something maybe other people can take heed from is that if you put in a complaint to customer service, the branch/ legal dept cannot touch your account or hassle you at all - and they dont, maybe once a week they call for an update, and weirdly they are really nice to you!

[m200]

Ok will send them the letter and post up my previous agreement and current agreement and anything else I can find! Also, I didnt take out any insurances this time around as I felt the last time I did they were useless - which then leads me to think if I had them last time, when they calculated the 'part exchange' and amount of finance owing on the first HP agreement, I bet they didnt refund anything on the insurances. Will be interesting to see responses once I post the docs up.