HSBC want to discontinue there CC claim, help needed.

[TM123]

Can someone help me how to proceed on this matter, hearing is in a couple of days, but DG Solicitors want to discontinue their claim after I sent in my witness statement and defence. Claim was for a credit card account taken out in 1994, agreement never signed and have proof to show that from there own records.

 

What I want to know is what can the defendant do in this situation. Is it only cost that I can demand from them or can I ask them to clear my credit file and stop any further harassment, which they said they will do. received the following letter

 

 

WITHOUT PREJUDICE

Dear Sir

 

HSBC Bank plc —v- Mr ---

 

We refer to the above matter and in particular to your letter of 25 September 2011, enclosing a further witness statement amongst other things.

 

After considering the matter further, our client has decided not to continue with legal proceedings in respect of the above claim. This is based on a commercial decision and with no admission as to liability.

 

Notwithstanding the above, the sums remain due and owing to our client and we now require your repayment proposals. In the absence of which, we will take our client’s further instructions who may instruct that the matter be passed to external agents for recovery.

 

With the forthcoming hearing in mind (26 October 2011), please sign and return the enclosed Consent to Discontinuance by return. On receipt, we will file a Notice of Discontinuance at the Court and request that the afore-mentioned hearing be vacated.

 

Yours faithfully

[gezwee]

Hi TM

 

Welcome to CAG

 

Are you able to post content of consent, less identifiers?

 

Gez

[TM123]

I have attached file

hsbc.pdf

Edited October 22, 2011 by TM123

[TM123]

Not sure if the file attachment worked, but here is the content of consent

 

HSBC -v-

DG Solicitors

October2011

 

HSBC v MR

 

B--- County Court — Claim No. 1----

 

Consent to Discontinuance

I, ---------- , do consent to the Notice of Discontinuance in respect of the above claim.

It is further agreed that each party shall bear their own costs of this action.

 

Signed

Date

 

DG Solicitors

Solicitors

12 Caithorpe Road

Edgbaston

Birmingham B15 1QZ

[Loser4u]

In the first letter (1st post) they are not saying they will stop harassing you and they are not admitting that they don't have a case. They say the sums owed are due and asking you for your repayment proposal or they may pass this on for further recovery.

They don’t need your agreement to discontinue and can do this anyway but are looking to prevent you asking for costs.

It is up to you if you want to agree or not but given they consider the money is still due its unlikely they will agree to adjust your credit file.

[TM123]

DG Solicitors acting dishonestly, can someone help. I want to get as much money out of them as possible, there behaviour is unacceptable.

 

I wrote to them on 7th oct and told them I wont £250 for costs, account closed and mater closed and credit file put right. Did not receive reply, so phoned them to as what they want to do on Friday as hearing in few days time. They said they are going to discontinue and that there client will not pay any cost because they still believe agreement is enforceable. I told them that is not acceptable, the very least they should pay the court fee (£80) plus postage cost. She agreed that was far and so a payment of £100 was agreed. **

 

Confirmed with court on Monday, the claim was discontinued.

 

Now today received the following letter. Payment not been sent but used pay disputed credit card balance.

 

What I want to know is can I go to court and file for cost.

 

Dear Sir

 

HSBC Bank plc —v- Mr ------

 

B----- County Court Claim Number: 1-------

 

We refer to the above matter and our telephone conversation today.

 

As discussed, our client has decided not to continue with legal proceedings in respect of the above claim. This is based on a commercial decision and with no admission as to liability.

 

In the event that the agreement was unenforceable, which our client denies, it does not mean that the debt is not payable. We have enclosed guidelines from the Office of Fair Trading, which explains what happens when an agreement is unenforceable. You will note that it states that the debt is not wiped off and that information can still be passed on to a credit reference agency.

 

We confirm that our client will pay your costs agreed at £100.00. In light of the above, we confirm that this will be used to reduce the outstanding balance.

 

We also enclose a copy of the Notice of Discontinuance, which has been sent via facsimile to Court today along with a copy of this letter.

 

Yours faithfully

 

DG SOLICITORS

[the_shadow]

Hmm did they make you sign anything? do you have anything in writing where they say they will take the amount off of the outstanding balance?

 

I'm a bit confused on how the agreement for payment was made... £80 court fee? These obviously were not your costs so by rights you wouldnt be able to claim them under a wasted costs order.

 

S.

[TM123]

Nothing was signed, £80 is the fee I paid to the court to have the claim struck out.

[the_shadow]

Right, got you. ok so you are actually out of pocket you could try and guzzump their discontinuance. Threaten that you will seek a wasted costs order anyway and let the judge decide if their repayment to the balance is just as you are out of pocket and DIDNT agree to the repayment being taken from a balance that is contested

[Jasper1965]

Nothing was signed, £80 is the fee I paid to the court to have the claim struck out.

 

Have they discontinued in response to your application the claim be struck out?

 

IMO as you can prove that you never signed an agreement it's in your best interests to let this one go all the way to judgment where the agreement will be deemed iredeemably unenforceable if you've put your case together correctly.

Litigating on the back of dodgy, little or no paperwork especially non existant or unexecuted agreement deserves exposure and humiliation and tbh this would provide some ammo for those who are fighting cases where the creditor pulls somebody into Court to attest that "systems were in place to ensure the account could not be opened if there was no signature on an agreement" so you might also be doing a number of people a favour.

[Docman]

This is another example of HSBC/DGs being sneaky with claims and costs.

They pursued me for £15k for over 2 years but 2 days before the full hearing, they withdrew the claim in full. Initially, they tried the argument that both sides should bear our own costs. My solicitor had told DGs that since they admitted they did not have a signed agreement, the Court could not grant judgement and because of this, he insisted that HSBC meet our costs and remove any comments with the credit reference agencies. In the end, we agreed that HSBC would pay £1,000 of my costs (half the total) and remove the credit references. My solicitor advised that as both sides had instructed barristers, attending the court hearing to ask for the balance of £1000 would have cost additional £2000 and since HSBC had withdrawn the claim in full, he thought the Court wouldn't be too pleased at a hearing to argue over costs if I had had over £15k of a credit card debt written off. There was never any suggestion that HSBC would try to pass on the 'debt' to another agency or DCA.

I had a couple of other cases a couple of years ago where the DCAs eventually discontinued. In those cases, I was a LiP and my total costs were in the region of £900 for each case. Both tried the 'no costs' approach but again I negotiated a reasonable outcome and accepted their offers of £750 and £600. Both debts were removed from my credit file and no further claim has been made.

The rules about discontinuance are fairly straightforward. The side that discontinues is liable for the other side’s costs unless both sides agree otherwise. The discontinuance operates from when the Notice is filed at Court which means the case ends EXCEPT as to the issue of costs. The side that is not discontinuing can ask the court within 28 days of the Notice being filed for costs. In one of the two cases above, one DCA wouldn't be reasonable at first so I filed an application for costs (additional £75 fee) and then asked for £750 in settlement instead of the £600 I had accepted from the second DCA. In short, solicitors play hard ball when it comes to costs (it’s 'their' fee) and so you should do likewise.

I suggest you respond to HSBC/DGs by telling them you do not accept their view that there is no liability and that you never agreed that £100 could be retained. Tell them that if they don't pay you the sum of £100 forthwith, you will make an application for your costs to the court on a full indemnity basis. Hit the ball back HARD!

[TM123]

Docman

 

Do you if you have to use the form N244 or N252 for costs.

[TM123]

I have been told by a DCA that they can make a doorstep visit without an appointment. I had sent them the following.

 

"Furthermore, should it be your intention to arrange a “doorstep visit”, please be advised that under OFT rules, you can only visit me at my home if you make an appointment and I have no wish to make such an appointment with you."

 

 

I could tell them that if they enter on to my property (garden in front of my house) they will be trespassing and I will sue for damages. But taking such a mater to court will be of no benefit because I will have to show damages.

 

But there is nothing stopping me charging them a fee for entering my property, as long as I inform them of the charge. I will see what they have to say to this.

 

The only purpose of visit is to intimidate, harass and embarrass me. I would love to take mater to court and claim £100 for entering my property.

[unclebulgaria67]

Nice thought, but a bit unlikely a Judge would agree with you. If a creditor has lent you money under an agreement, which you have not kept to, then they can pursue the debt reasonably as per the OFT debt collection guidelines. As these are guidelines only, I don't believe that creditors have to comply with your request for communications in writing only i.e no phone calls or visits. There may be situations where doorstep visits would not be seen as reasonable e.g elderly or other vulnerable people. People can ask doorstep visitors to leave their property immediately and they must do so or they risk being reported for tresspass.

 

This is what the OFT state.

 

k.

ignoring or disregarding debtors' reasonable requests in respect

of when, where and how to contact them

[TM123]

Well I would love to see them turn up in court and explain to the Jude what debit they want to collect.

 

I failed to mention that HSBC had taken this mater to cout in 2011. They discontinued thier claim 2 day before a hearing to have he claim stuck out. Their behaviour in this matter has been appalling and they have breached various OFT guidelines.

Edited May 15, 2013 by TM123

[SWLABR9]

Really then to deter unwanted callers and to make them go when you wanted to, would you want to open the door to them with your videocam pointed in their direction and tell them politely to leave at once? I can't see debt collectors wanting to bother with guidelines otherwise seeing as how what they want is the money and they don't seem to bother about behaving lawfully in general.

[citizenB]

Yes, they do have to abide by the communication wishes of the debtor. This is allowed for in the lending code and the OFT debt collection guidance.

 

As advised, you can indeed send them a "do not visit me" letter, however if they choose to ignore it you simply don't answer the door to them or if you do in error, just tell them to go away.

 

Why do you not simply write them a letter and advise this has indeed already been to court where the principal lender decided to discontinue.

 

Has this debt now been assigned or is this DCA only collecting on behalf of HSBC ?

[rameses_qc]

I have been told by a DCA that they can make a doorstep visit without an appointment. I had sent them the following.

 

"Furthermore, should it be your intention to arrange a “doorstep visit”, please be advised that under OFT rules, you can only visit me at my home if you make an appointment and I have no wish to make such an appointment with you."

 

 

I could tell them that if they enter on to my property (garden in front of my house) they will be trespassing and I will sue for damages. But taking such a mater to court will be of no benefit because I will have to show damages.

 

But there is nothing stopping me charging them a fee for entering my property, as long as I inform them of the charge. I will see what they have to say to this.

 

The only purpose of visit is to intimidate, harass and embarrass me. I would love to take mater to court and claim £100 for entering my property.

 

Trespass is actionable "per se", which means you don't have to show any damge. The damage is the trespass to the land. This is true of trespass to the person (assult/battery) The matter can be heard by a Court without proof of any damage

[TM123]

Why do you not simply write them a letter and advise this has indeed already been to court where the principal lender decided to discontinue.

 

Has this debt now been assigned or is this DCA only collecting on behalf of HSBC ?

 

Well HSBC has been advised a number times of this, but they claim that they discontinued the claim due to commercial grounds only and that they did not agree that the debit is not due. So the debit needs to be paid, they have passed this matter to 3 or 4 DCA since court case.

 

Buchanan Clark & Wells is just the latest one to contact me. I sent them a simple letter to inform that this debit is disputed and the matter has been to court and their client has also paid wasted cost of £940. Also that all corresponds needs to be in writing only.

 

I receive a two page letter back trying to justify their position and convince me that the debit needs to be paid. They are collecting for HSBC and the letter seamed to be written with collaboration with them.

Edited May 15, 2013 by TM123

[Seminole]

Personally if it were me, I wouldn't try to charge them for a doorstep visit but I would write to HSBC telling them that if they continue to use agents to harass you, they will be charged for your time (at £9-10 per hour) for dealing with the matter.

 

Alternatively just ignore anyone who writes to you about it.

[citizenB]

Well HSBC has been advised a number times of this, but they claim that they discontinued the claim due to commercial grounds only and that they did not agree that the debit is not due. So the debit needs to be paid, they have passed this matter to 3 or 4 DCA since court case.

 

Buchanan Clark & Wells is just the latest one to contact me. I sent them a simple letter to inform that this debit is disputed and the matter has been to court and their client has also paid wasted cost of £940. Also that all corresponds needs to be in writing only.

 

I receive a two page letter back trying to justify their position and convince me that the debit needs to be paid. They are collecting for HSBC and the letter seamed to be written with collaboration with them.

 

If it were me, I would tell them to go ahead issue the claim, which you will defend as a vexations claim. HSBC have already discontinued once, because of commercial reasons. I think they are unlikely to issue another claim. IMHO this is harassment pure and simple and you would of course be within your rights to bring this to the attention of the courts.