Dell Default

[dave]

My partner had a 0% deal on a Dell computer.

 

When the 0% period was up, she attempted to pay the remaining debt in full - there was nothing in the T&C's to stop her from doing so.

 

Oddly (yeah, very odd!), they refused to take her card over the phone for payment and wouldn't take cheques - pretty much a ploy to get her to carry on paying by DD and incur their interest at 99.99APR or whatever it is. She cancelled her DD.

 

Finally, they passed the debt to a debt collection agency who DID accept her card - she paid in full.

 

Or so she thought - the DCA's 'system' was down for over 3 weeks and they attempted to take payment when there was no money left in her account.

 

They then issued a default notice and she received a letter from a solicitor - she phoned immediatly and paid the balance in full.

 

The default has now had the effect of our mortgage application failing - despite having paid £300 for a survey to be done. This is returnable upon completion of the mortgage - which is now not happening due to the inefficiencies of the DCA and/or Dell.

 

What can be done?

[gothicf0rm]

same as bank charges... if the claimants impecunosity has been caused by the defendant then the claimant has not defaulted.

[BankFodder]

I think that you need to start gathering as much information as possible.

Serve a DPA request on Dell. You want to get all copies of screeen notes which hopefully will show that repeated attempts were made to make payment by CC and that you were refused.

 

Serve a DPA request on the DCA. This will show the date on which the credit card details were received and the date 3 weeks later on which they were processed.

 

Once you get this information then I think that you have a perfect case. It will be all the more perfect because it will be a case comprised of your opponents own records. They will not be able to make any challenge to them unless they want to say that their own records are inaccurate!

I would then start dealing with all parties in very short order. Aggressive deadlines. Formal notice as to defamatory content of the credit register.

Dell have potentially defamatory liability for making a damaging report about you to the DCA. The DCA have acted in a potentially damaging way by entering a default on the credit register. the CRA have potentiually defamed you by carrying the default and by publishing it to your prospective lender.

It would even be intesting to discover what part the solictor has played in the story but leave them until last. Start dealing them too early and they might give assistance to the other parties. But at some point seve him with a DPA request as well - after the rest is finished.

In fact it might be best to sort them out one at a time so that they don't alert each other too much that there is trouble in the pipeline.

 

Get the DPA requests in.

[dave]

Thanks - will do ;-)

[BankFodder]

I forgot to say that properly handled, this could be a nice little earner!

[gothicf0rm]

indeed, BF has identified three separate cases here for you... if you can flog this one properly youll come out quids in.

[Guest 10110001]

Your mortgage application failed because Dell (or their 3rd party company) passed information to a credit agency which damaged your credit rating. - Yes?

 

So, you now have to re-apply for a new mortgage which incurs a higher interest rate - Yes?

 

If the company passing that information erroneously caused you to pay higher interest charges, - whats to stop you claiming from Dell, the difference between the two interest rates for the full 25 year term of the mortgage?

 

To me, the above post would merit a claim for negligence. They screwed up and you seek damages.

 

Just a thought…

[buzby]

Ah... but there's no guarantee that the original mortgage application would have passed unhindered, and unless you gould prove this - using this rejection as the reason for refusal would be speculative, and could easily be challenged.

[Guest 10110001]

In the meaning of the above post, I meant to refer to the interest difference after the 2nd mortgage offer was accepted and already being in place.

Is it then not then possible to recover the interest difference from the errant company passing false information to a credit agency?

Is there a precedent for this yet? Or one that makes the credit agency liable for failure to check the integrity of the information that it sold and gave rise to the claimant paying the higher interest rate?

[dave]

This topic was closed on 03/07/19.

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