Phoenix/Carter Claimform - old GUS Shop Direct Cat Debt - returned faulty TV .**CLAIM DISMISSED**

[DonkeyB]

Train gets to Oxford just after 2 so could all be in vain... wish I'd heard from EMT... she has it all as PDFs on her email!

[babybear39]

Everything crossed good luck EMT.

[Undercover-Elsa]

Would it be feasible to fax the PDF's to the Court with a cover note to be given to EMT?

[DonkeyB]

Right... train running best part of an hour late... won't be there by 2... so have emailed the PDF to the court with a grovelling request.

 

And it's chucking it down. What a painful day. I just hope EMT has got the stuff and can use it. Carter should not win this in a month of Sundays, and I think she deserves £3k for putting up with their crap so far.

[Undercover-Elsa]

Well done DB. Typical British Rail. Good job it wasn't your own case!

Still, adversity often precedes success in sod's law, so let's keep positive.

Good job you're internet savvy on your mobile. Is it an Iphone?

[DonkeyB]

Just had a call from EMT... phew!

Her email was down.

She has the WS and has printed her copies.

Unfortunately she is going on her own, I've asked her to make sure that, as a disabled person, she gets help at the court.

I'll email the court and ask politely if they can wait until I am there... she does sound so nervous.

I feel a bit heartbroken over this.

Carter, I will get you for this

On my laptop with dongle.

I'll be lucky to be there by 3 the way this is going.

Still, it was slated for 2 hours - gawd knows why - so 3pm to 3.05pm should be long enough to fillet Carter, if I can be allowed as a litigation/McKenzie friend.

Righty ho,

here's the excuse for a WS that Carter dared to file.

Bear in mind this is against a widowed disabled senior citizen who has made clear to Carter that there is no debt, and remember that Carter has also tried to buy her off with £300 without guaranteeing the debt will not be sold on.

It's shameful, isn't it?

Oxford Court email on out of office autoreply... just as well we made contact.

Not even at Reading yet...

Carter WS.pdf

[Undercover-Elsa]

 

Beggars belief.

[DonkeyB]

They have made no effort to prove anything... and expect EMT to prove that something that doesn't exist actually doesn't exist. Prove a negative.

[babybear39]

Awesomely funny WS

[DonkeyB]

Just arriving at Oxford... offline for a while...

[Undercover-Elsa]

May your hooves be sharp and your kick well aimed...

[HadEnough]

May your hooves be sharp and your kick well aimed...

 

 

go get him Donkey:cool:

Edited June 9, 2010 by HadEnough

[DonkeyB]

Case dismissed.

Alas I can say little more, as a consequence of the settlement reached, other than please change the thread title to 'won'.

EMT was wonderful, and I got there in time. A good day was had by all. Well, nearly all.

Another one up for CAG.

I hate to add this, but it would really help EMT to keep any disparaging remarks off the thread from now on, but I certainly welcome words of congratulations for her.

She is a star.

EMT kicks ass.

[Undercover-Elsa]

Well done!!!!

Congratulations to EMT, you must feel like a load has been lifted from your shoulders.

As for you, DonkeyB, I think we should now officially change your name to

"WhiteChargerB".

Edited June 9, 2010 by Undercover-Elsa
in deference to above request ;-)

[HadEnough]

Great result well done WhitechargerB and EMT,

only wish we could hear more,

oh well it's enough that you WON:D:D:D

[Undercover-Elsa]

Well I've got to go sort dinner out now but I hope you both get back to your respective homes OK. put your feet up and have a nice celebratory glass of wine!

 

EMT..I've only stumbled across this thread in the later stages, but want to say very well done. It was a courageous thing to do, taking this on.

We're all proud of you!!

Elsa xx

[emtdickson]

Dear loviing people

My computer goes down when I am under pressure, and later that night there was a powercut here.

I am still very tired, but I have to say that without this site, I would never have managed to keep going, and without whitecharger, whom I had never met or had contact with except on this site, I know I would have broken down.

This brave young man came to help at his own expense, taking the day off to do so, and I hope that with this experience he will go on contributing to this site and helping others.

Each night I prayed for help, and whether you believe or not, there is no doubt that my prayers were answered.

This time has been particularly sad for me because in March, in the middle of all this, I had the first anniversary of my late husband's passing. The Judge ordered the hearing date for June, as a 'stay' from February would have taken me to the date of his death last year and I could not have borne that.

The comments you have all made since are like music to me and better than comedians on the box, and you are all the composers of it!

What can I say?

Not a lot really at the moment.

I will certainly put some more money where my mouth is, and a little bit more than the two and a half percent of 'winnings' which is the modest suggestion because I think this site needs to be kept going, and if my success enables you all to do that, then that is really the success, not just me.

I do not think the details of the settlement need to be included in the publication of events of the last six months to be able to help someone else in need. There are enough words between the lines to do that.

I think that the only way forward to helping people is to educate them into realising that there are those like BC who have no interest in them, just in getting their money.

This ruthless company buys up what the believe is a debt - and let's face it, there is not honour amongst debt collectors either - and will stop at nothing - including evidence that the debt does not exist - to get the last penny.

What struck me as well was the cowardice they displayed in instructing someone to act on their behalf only the day before, and that young someone lived miles away from Weybridge to boot.

They did not even attend themselves, and to my mind that must offend a Judge who gave up the afternoon for us.

I hope the internal grapevine will make BC's methods better known.

We have to realise that the small claims courts were set up to help ordinary people.

Before, it cost more to sue than the money.

Barristers and solicitors had to be hired to even attempt to get money back.

What helps the maninthestreet also helps others.

Also, if BC is discredited, there are others waiting to take his place.

One important thing to remember is that saving paperwork for more than five years is becoming necessary.

It is not enough just to put things on computers.

You have to have evidence.

Now you can see that my paperwork saved was more than theirs.

Also, people should be aware that they can defend a case, and when they do so it is taken out of the Bulk Claims Court.

It may not help if you cannot show that you have paid the debt, but at least it gives you a fighting chance.

A court order gives Bailiffs the right to break into your home and take whatever they need to pay the debt.

The things are auctioned off and rarely make enough money, and dealers stand around like vultures getting goods cheap which they then sell off at a profit.

There has only been one programme about this - Beat the Bailiff.

Before I watched that this year I had no idea how it worked, and the people on that show never realised what would happen.

I thank you all, and whitecharger, from the bottom of my heart.

 

Elizabeth

[bazaar]

A very good result EMT, and Donkey, well, what can we say? Brilliant advertisement for yourself and all at CAG.

 

I'm not so sure we should be trying to get rid of good ole Bryan just yet though.

 

He seems to be willing to pay a lot of costs to whoever fights him, so maybe we should just milk this cow a little longer:D

 

I wonder if him and his employees get their knickers in a twist when this type of thing happens to them. Gotta luv it.

 

Well Done

[emtdickson]

Dear bazar

Thank you so much for your kind thoughts. In this case, they could not prove that there was a debt, because there was no debt.

 

I returned a TV to GUS under the Sale of Goods and Services Act because it was faulty, the engineer they sent said it was.

 

Now retailers do not like this Act if they can. The TV was collected by them. They did not credit me with the money I had paid. I consulted Trading Standards, Which? Legal and CAB. They advised me about the Sale of Goods and Services Act and I sent GUS a copy of the letter dictated to me on the telephone. I gave them a date by which they must repair or replace the item, after which I was entitled to a new TV. They did neither.

 

I ordered a replacement TV which they sent. I deducted the cost of the returned item. It was made easy for me to do this, because I ordered a replacement TV - a different make from GUS.

 

After about a year of arguing I sent GUS a final settlement cheque after deducting the cost of the returned item. They accepted it and paid it into their account.

 

When they made their claim against me I was very upset. I was at a loss as to what to do. I Googled BC and found a whole lot of stuff, and that led to my joining this site. I have received the most supportive advice from it.

 

The problem is not so much buying things from catalogues, especially if you are disabled. They do not charge for delivery and offer a large choice which would be impossible to source on the High Street before computers.

 

They also have interest-free payments, and you can return anything you do not like without question. However, they do not like the Act! When you have paid for an item which turns out to be faulty, it is difficult to get refunds. The fact that I ordered another make TV from them (they had come down in price) enabled me to deduct the cost of the returned item. Had they not sent out the replacement, I would have had to take them to court under the SG&S Act, as advised by Tading Standards etc., so it was somewhat easier for me. The problem is that it is easier for some people to buy beyond their means to pay.

 

I have never been in debt beyond my means to pay, but when something like this happens it can appear to be that way, so now one has to be very careful when making purchases, because if you do not keep the correspondence, you will have to make claims yourself against a retailer who thinks they are beyond the Goods and Services Act.

 

I think that BC could believe that an LCD TV 32" cost £1999.99 in 2004. Now, of course they are much cheaper. They wanted over £300 for a year's extended guarantee (which I refused to pay and which might have made them cross) in 2004/5. I would not buy any of their extended guarantees, despite the repeated requests, because I once had an extended guarantee on a washer. When it broke down the repair man quoted £200 (about 1990). When he heard it was insured, he said he had to go and check the prices in his van, and when he returned he said it would be £450 and that was more than the insures would pay.Eventually we received £200 from the insurers twards another washer!! We had paid far more than that in premiums.

I have learned that extended guarantees are not worth the paper they are printed on since the Act was passed.

 

I would never have been able to go out and buy large items I cannot use public transport and have no car, so would have to take a taxi. Now I can buy online. For years, everything we had had to be delivered, including food. My late husband was 19 years older than me, and he had never driven, so to us it was a convenience.

 

So long as you can make the payments and do not go beyond what you can pay, mail order can be helpful. People tend to think that only those who cannot pay outright use mail order. That is not always the case. It has always been more convenient for disabled people and those without transport to shop this way. Interest free payments are more a bi-product.

 

Buying online is common nowadays and more acceptable, and so mail order does not have a bad name.

 

If retailers accepted the Sale of Goods Act, firms like Paypal, for instance, would not need to refund customers buying faulty goods, so that Act was and is, neccessary, which is a shame really because although Trading Standards et al can help, they cannot go to court for you and retailers know this. We are very lucky to have the small claims courts.

 

I have discovered another thing: I have received catalogues through the post (the one I am thinking of now is clothes) which do not bear the name of Littlewoods, GUS or JD Williams and if you look at the fine print and note the address, are connected to the mail order business run from Manchester. When I saw that, my first thought was that if I did buy something from this, they may actually apply my card and pay off what they decided I owed. If they had done so, would this have been legal?

 

I don't know why this went on year on year. It would appear that someone who bought the debt assumed that there were a number of items included in the sum, rather than just one. I made no other purchases after settling the account, and could prove this, so that their saying the sum included several items in the years up to 2007 was simply not true.

 

If you got rid of them,there will be many others to take their place, and I suppose it is better the one you know.

 

I was 63 when the item was purchased. I am now 69. That is a chunk of my life they played about with. The Judge dismissed the claim AND the counterclaim. He told me that if He dismissed it it STAYED dismissed. That was good enough for me. He said I could keep the cheque I mentioned in May.