telephone harassment question

[veryweary]

How hard would it be to prove a case of telephone harassment against a DCA?

 

Usual story , phonecalls up to 5 times a day, 6 days a week from a DCA for months on end.

 

DCA has been told on numerous occasions by recorded delivery letter, will only deal in writing, also that individual suffers from severe health, and stress of calls affecting health. On individuals medical file that this is the case, and DCA been reported twice to the OFT who have it on file..

 

Logically if calls are being ignored for months on end the DCA should take the matter to court to obtain(or not as the case may turn out) a judgement against their victim.

 

But that would involve them in paying court fees upfront which may take a long time to be repaid together with the debt esp if the judgement allows repayment at a low rate. So phone harassment is a cheaper way to coerce payment.

 

I know a DCA would claim that they have duty(ha ha) to try all avenues/reasonable step before taking a case to court, but could this be classed as reasonable after 2 years?

 

If one person succeeded in a claim like this, and didn't settle out of court with a gag clause on them, it would perhaps be a small victory for others.

 

So how would a person go about researching all of this?

[Fred Bassett]

How hard would it be to prove a case of telephone harassment against a DCA?

 

Usual story , phonecalls up to 5 times a day, 6 days a week from a DCA for months on end.

 

DCA has been told on numerous occasions by recorded delivery letter, will only deal in writing, also that individual suffers from severe health, and stress of calls affecting health. On individuals medical file that this is the case, and DCA been reported twice to the OFT who have it on file..

 

Logically if calls are being ignored for months on end the DCA should take the matter to court to obtain(or not as the case may turn out) a judgement against their victim.

 

But that would involve them in paying court fees upfront which may take a long time to be repaid together with the debt esp if the judgement allows repayment at a low rate. So phone harassment is a cheaper way to coerce payment.

 

I know a DCA would claim that they have duty(ha ha) to try all avenues/reasonable step before taking a case to court, but could this be classed as reasonable after 2 years?

 

If one person succeeded in a claim like this, and didn't settle out of court with a gag clause on them, it would perhaps be a small victory for others.

 

So how would a person go about researching all of this?

 

To answer your question, I don't know, probably not easy.

 

If you are feeling harassed however, there are various things you can do to deal with it. The Trucall system advertised on here seems to be a blessing to those who have bought it. I'm not one of them, but there are plenty of people who vouch for it.

 

Personally, I gave all of my creditors a voicemail number as a contact quite a while back and that is the only number they ever ring. It wastes their time completely so they can ring as many times as they want as far as I'm concerned.

 

There is plenty of evidence on here of harassment by DCAs, but proving it in court would be a different matter. There is no harm in trying though and I'm sure you would get plenty of advice.

 

Good luck.

 

Regards.

 

Fred

[harrassed senior]

Either use a TRUE CALL machine, or if not contact BT if they are your providers and make a complaint about frequent Harrassing calls and they can intercept these calls although not sure if they will keep a record of how many how frequent as once the DCA knows they are being 'tracked' they will stop.

 

Re: Harassment by telephone

 

ACCOUNT NUMBER: XXXX

Dear Sirs

I am writing in relation to the quantity and frequency of telephone calls that I have received from your company, which I deem to be personally harassing.

I have verbally requested that these stop, but I am still receiving calls. (Delete if necessary)

I now require all further correspondence from your company to be made in writing only.

I am of the view that your continued harassment of me by telephone puts you in breach of Section 40 of the Administration of Justice Act 1970, and the Protection from Harassment Act 1997.

If you continue to harass me by telephone, you will also be in breach of the Communications Act (2003) s.127 and I will report you to OFCOM, Trading Standards and The Office of Fair Trading, meaning that you will be liable to a substantial fine.

Be advised that any further telephone calls from your company will be recorded. (**Even if you don‘t yet have recording equipment!!**)

Yours faithfully,

[NAME HERE]

 

Section 40 of the Administration of Justice Act

“S40 Punishment for unlawful harassment of debtors.

A person commits an offence if, with the object of coercing another person to pay money claimed from the other as a debt due under a contract he- harasses the other with demands for payment which, in respect of their frequency, or the manner or occasion of making any such demand, or of any threat or publicity by which any demand is accompanied, are calculated to subject him or members of his family or household to alarm, distress or humiliation; falsely represents, in relation to the money claimed, that criminal proceedings lie for failure to pay it; falsely represents himself to be authorised in some official capacity to claim or enforce payment; or utters a document falsely represented by him to have some official character, or purporting to have some official character which he know it has not.

A person may be guilty of an offence by virtue of sub-section (1) (a) above if he concerts with others in the taking of such actions as is described in that paragraph, notwithstanding that his own course of conduct does not by itself amount to harassment.”

You actually by law only require two instances (proved) for the criminal Act of Harrassment. Use an answer machine to record calls

[Drexl Spivey]

If you want evidence against a dca for telephone harassment , these truecall gadgets are ideal. You can either block them completely to stop the harassment, or you can record everything they say if you wanted to gather a record of disagreeable phone calls.

[Guest HeftyHippo]

The OFT guidelines have a section about phoning at unreasonable times or frequencies. But you may have tried that already. I would suggest contacting your MP if you don't think the OFT have done enough.

 

What I is when I first ran into problems was to give the creditor an old mobile number and said that was my new number, house phone taken out and they should bin the number. I spoke to them all a few times on the mobile..... and then turned it off. You can get free sim cards from most of the companies now, Tesco and Asda about £2. As soon as they have used the number so they know it works, you can answer the phone when you like.

 

Or, get a VoIP phone. Give them the number, tell them to delete the numbers they have, and choose when you answer the phone.

 

If all else fails, answer the phone, when they ask for you, say you'll go get them (don't hang up) then go and carry on what you were doing. If you like, come back every couple of minutes and say "you're" just coming. Eventually, when they realise they'll get through and start paying for the call but won't get anywhere, they'll give up. That's because most have an automated dialler that connects to an operator-monkey when you answer.If you don't answer, no man-hours are used. If you answer, you tie up that person who is on commission, so the last thing he wants is some body wasting his time by leaving him listening to the TV.

 

Or, if you have the cash, buy truecall. There is also software you can get for the later mobiles that you can program to reject, or give the engaged tone to blacklisted callers. You don't hear it ring.

[welshwizard]

Is there a 'Trucall' type system for mobiles? I would have thought that technology would allow for recording of calls with your mobile. Anyone any ideas?

[Guest HeftyHippo]

Is there a 'Trucall' type system for mobiles? I would have thought that technology would allow for recording of calls with your mobile. Anyone any ideas?

 

Perhaps. Read the my post above. I also contributed to a thread in the last couple of weeks on this subject and posted several web addresses for such software.

[Bazooka Boo]

How hard would it be to prove a case of telephone harassment against a DCA?

Usual story , phonecalls up to 5 times a day, 6 days a week from a DCA for months on end.

DCA has been told on numerous occasions by recorded delivery letter, will only deal in writing

 

Harassment is a 'Criminal Offence', and reporting their continued harassment to the OFT, TS or whoever else, WILL NOT stop them from committing the offence of harassment.

 

As it is a 'Criminal' offence and you have evidence of telling them how they should make contact, then it only takes a further two occasions for them to have committed the act of harassment by ignoring the request.

 

This MUST be reported to your local Police station, if they try to fob you off that it is a civil matter ask to speak to a senior officer, or preferably ask to speak with the Duty Inspector, and make the complaint to them.

 

It will only take one phone call from the local Police to put an immediate stop to the harassment, otherwise they will either be prosecuted or receive a Police caution for the crime.

 

Just because it is a tin pot DCA who is harassing the alleged debtor, does not mean that they are above the law, complaints to the relevant bodies whilst necessary, will not stop the DCA's from their methods of harassment.

[veryweary]

Harassment is a 'Criminal Offence', and reporting their continued harassment to the OFT, TS or whoever else, WILL NOT stop them from committing the offence of harassment.

 

As it is a 'Criminal' offence and you have evidence of telling them how they should make contact, then it only takes a further two occasions for them to have committed the act of harassment by ignoring the request.

 

This MUST be reported to your local Police station, if they try to fob you off that it is a civil matter ask to speak to a senior officer, or preferably ask to speak with the Duty Inspector, and make the complaint to them.

 

It will only take one phone call from the local Police to put an immediate stop to the harassment, otherwise they will either be prosecuted or receive a Police caution for the crime.

 

Just because it is a tin pot DCA who is harassing the alleged debtor, does not mean that they are above the law, complaints to the relevant bodies whilst necessary, will not stop the DCA's from their methods of harassment.

 

This is where I think our society or governemnt or whatever lets us all down. If there was a financial dispute between 2 joe normal members of the public and one of them kept phoning the other for months on end, I'm sure it would be easier to get it stopped.

 

Seems because this is big corporate financial business,the response is 'well its your own fault, pay up or keep getting harassed with the calls.

 

Even their letters infer this when they say ' we have removed you number as a gesture of goodwill for 14 days to enable you to contact us. However if we don't hear from you to arrange a payment we reserve the right to resume our telephone procedures. I cant' think of any other traslation to this other than 'pay up or we wil hound the living daylights out of you by phone'

 

Even in the recent case v British Gas for harassment, which at first glance seems a clear cut case, ie she owed no money but was being hounded by letter and phone, the court judge said the woman had taken this case to court at great personal financial risk as she stood to lose hundreds of thousands in legal fees if she had lost.

 

It was settled out of court no doubt with a gag clause. One wonders if she hadn't settled out of court would the judge have ruled against her even in a clear cut case because he would be afraid to open the floodgates of harassment claims against these companies which contribute high tax revenues to the goverenment?.

 

I live in a small village, so I may take a wander in to the police station and ask what they think. As well as that I'll also call my free insurance legal advice helpline. Like most of these insurance legal services they take your money but usually have a get out clause if you need them to take on a case, so might as well get my premiums worth out the advice helpline.

[babybear39]

The case is Furguson V British Gas Trading. Quote it to the harassing DCA in a recorded delivery letter cc the letter to TS, the OFT and your MP

[Guest HeftyHippo]

Its actually

Ferguson v British Gas Trading Ltd, some quick links:

http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/legal-issues/195020-warning-debt-collectors-their.html

 

https://www.eversheds.com/uk/home/articles/index1.page?ArticleID=templatedata\Eversheds\articles\data\en\Personal_injury_claims_litigation\Lisa_Ferguson_v_British_Gas_150409

 

Ferguson v British Gas Trading Ltd [2009] EWCA Civ 46 (10 February 2009)

[Guest HeftyHippo]

Harassment is a 'Criminal Offence', and reporting their continued harassment to the OFT, TS or whoever else, WILL NOT stop them from committing the offence of harassment.

 

In addition to being a criminal offence, its also a civil tort and can be held liable for damagers on a much lower level of proof than a criminal action which is not likely to be vigorously pursued by the police.

 

However, any company regulated by the OFT can have its conduct taken into account when its licence is considered. In that instance, reporting them to the OFT may have some benefit.

 

I do agree with veryweary though that the public get almost no protection from the cowboy element (which accounts for virtually 100% of companies) in this industry

[babybear39]

'Scuse spelling, dyslexic...

[willrubins]

Telephone harassment, whether using cellphone, land line, VoIP phone service or any other services can be easily fend off if you register to the DoNotCall Registry. Equipping your phone call with caller ID, call screening or other call management features can help as well.