paying token payments on unenforceable loan - what course of action?

[stardeed]

My OH took out a loan of £8,000 with a major bank early 2004. He made regular payments every month. In October [whilst he was not working] he requested a top up on the 1st loan of another £4,000 - this was done over the phone. He was totally honest and explained to the bank person that he was currently unemployed but that he was expecting to start a new job in a week or 2. He was told that was fine and the money was in our bank account within a day or so.

 

After a couple of years [sorry not exactly sure of the time scale] he was once again made redundant and claiming JSA, this meant he could no longer afford the repayments so the account went into arrears. A while later a DCA began phoning badgering him for payments. I think they were acting on behalf of the bank as we've never a NA or anything to suggest the debt was sold. Amazingly they agreed to accept £10 a month and this has been paid regularly each month without fail.

 

He also had a credit card with the same lender but the balance of this was paid in full in 2003 well before the loan [and top-up] was taken out.

 

 

So...

• Does the fact it was 7 years ago stop him claiming the charges back on the CC?
  

There was PPI on the loan, on the CCA [which we have - the actual original] it shows as a separate figure of almost £5,000 for the PPI- I'm not sure if this sum would be the total PPI that would have been paid by the time the loan was all paid for or something else, as when this figure is added to the amount borrowed, they equal the 'total amount' but there's no mention of the total repayable i.e. nowhere does it say how much it would be with interest added - only a percentage rate for the interest.

 

As I said above, we have the original CCA, for the initial loan and the top-up. I have run both of them through the 'checker software' on a website that allows you to check your loan agreement - I can't vouch for the site's authenticity - BUT..... on the initial CCA it found 5 breaches, on the top-up 7!! So it looks like we have a case to class it as an unenforceable debt!

 

 

 

What should I do now?

• Try to reclaim any charges on the credit card/PPI on the loan?
  
• Send them a SAR?
  
• Is there a case of any misconduct on the bank's behalf for topping the loan up while OH was not working - and after he told them as much? And could it be written off for that reason?
  
• Use the fact that their CCA is unenforceable and offer a full & final?
  

I'm really not sure what should be the next move, so your advice, oh wise caggers!

[harrassed senior]

Have you actually sent a CCA Request to either OC or DCA?

 

It does not matter that you have the original, file it away and 'forget' about it, they are required by law to send you a copy of an original that may or may not be in their possession. This should be send to whoever is dealing with the account now, probably a DCA.

 

When this is received you can remove all personal and identifying details and post on here for the experts to give opinion as to its' enforceability.

 

You can send the SAR to OC in which they should include a copy of the Agreement together with the other information you require with regards to the PPI.

 

CCA allows 12 + 2 days for them to send and then the account is in dispute until they do.

 

SAR takes 40 days.

 

Other questions will be answered by people with more experience than I on PPI etc.

[stardeed]

Thanks for replying harrassed, no, no CCA request has been sent. Our concern is that sending the CCA request and or SAR might result in them [DCA or OC] to re-examine the situation and decide to take some further action i.e. try to increase monthly payments or take court action, thus opening a can of worms we'd rather rather stayed closed.

 

Also wouldn't it be preferable to try to claim back any charges that were incurred on the credit card first as wouldn't that be harder to do once we start shouting 'unenforceable' at them regarding the loan?

 

Is there any way of getting the original CCA's that we have checked for enforceability - before we do anything, at least then we have a 'safety net' so to speak?

 

Have you actually sent a CCA Request to either OC or DCA?.

[Hardupnotfedup]

Scan them and post them up removing personal details

[palomino]

Why didn't you make a claim under the PPI? It sounds as though you had a perfectly good case.

[stardeed]

No scanner, but I've photographed them [one's only a photocopy so it's not great quality] I'll post a link once I've taken all personal details out.

 

Scan them and post them up removing personal details

[stardeed]

We fully intend to. It's just a case of doing things in the right order so as not to jeopardise ourselves with the token payments in the mean time.

 

Why didn't you make a claim under the PPI? It sounds as though you had a perfectly good case.

[stardeed]

If we manage to claim the PPI back, I'm guessing they'll deduct it from the outstanding balance that's owed them, rather than refund us?

 

Why didn't you make a claim under the PPI? It sounds as though you had a perfectly good case.

[Hardupnotfedup]

If we manage to claim the PPI back, I'm guessing they'll deduct it from the outstanding balance that's owed them, rather than refund us?

 

:confused:Why didn't you use the PPI you had in place to make the monthly payments whilst your other half was out of work after being made redundant?

[stardeed]

rather sickeningly, we only discovered recently [when finding some old loan related paperwork] that he HAD cover, they [the lender] never even suggested he claimed on the PPI when he explained the reason he couldn't make the monthly payments! But hey, I'm sure they wouldv'e found some way of wriggling out of paying anyway!

 

:confused:Why didn't you use the PPI you had in place to make the monthly payments whilst your other half was out of work after being made redundant?