welcome/lowell

[andy2965]

Hi everyone

 

first of all i have tried to look through the welcome finance posts but cant find exactly what i'm looking for.

 

I had a loan with welcome many years back (2003) and ive not paid anything since 2007 when i lost my job.

 

Up until then i had paid over £7500 for an initial £5000 loan and

 

i last spoke to them on the phone in 2009 when they said i still owed over £4000.

 

I recently checked my credit report with experian and welcome have entered a 6 evry month for over 5 years (no default entered) up until last month,

 

it now says balance £0 and above it says DEBT ASSIGNED TO CAIS MEMBER.

 

I have now started receiving letters from Lowell Portfolio asking for the £4000.

 

So i need to know firstly if i can do anything about Welcome not defaulting my account thus making it almost SB

and secondly can Lowell now start entering things on my credit report.

 

Any advice would be great thanks.

[BRIGADIER2JCS]

Hi, there is a huge number of Welcome accounts that have never been defaulted, but that will not affect the debt becoming statute barred, how ever it does mean the ''live'' account stays on file. Lowell can can continue to up date at present.

Have Lowell up dated the CRA files yet, best to check again now. I suspect they may default the account as on the date they aquired the debt, if so this can be challenged as unfair.

 

When exactly was the last oayment made to Welcome?

[andy2965]

Hi thanks for the quick reply, i'm not entirely sure when the last payment was made, it definately was no later than May 2007, would i be best contacting Welcome to find out?

[BRIGADIER2JCS]

Hi andy I was thinking that it might well be a good idea to Make a Subject Access Request under the Data Protection Act 1998 to get Welcome (which now trades only to recover the OS debt) to provide ALL the data they hold on the account, their ''paperwork'' has always left a lot to be desired!!

 

SAR requires a £10 statutory fee, and they have 40 days to comply, use the template from the CAG library, address it to the Data Controller at Welcome.

[cerberusalert]

Lowell are famous for buying debts that are either Statute Barred or nearing so.

[andy2965]

OK thats great thanks i'll get onto that and let you know when they get back to me, i'm also getting an up to date credit report to see if Lowell have entered anything.

[BRIGADIER2JCS]

Good idea!!

[andy2965]

Lowell are famous for buying debts that are either Statute Barred or nearing so.

I get letters from time to time from 1st credit for an old bank account i had well over 10 years ago chasing me for an amount which was all charges, i assume Lowell are similar to 1st credit so i shall file all their letters in exactly the same place!

[BRIGADIER2JCS]

Point is that bank account is almost certainly statute barred, but until you tell 1st Crud that it is SB and you are not paying they'll carry on sending letters.

[andy2965]

Right ok ive just signed up to noddle and a couple of things have shown up with the welcome account. According to welcome my starting balance on 30/06/03 was £7124 with monthly payments of £170, despite me definately not paying since May 2007 at the latest they have me as upto date up until December 2007- at £170 a month since June 2003 that would mean i had paid £9180 back, yet according to the credit report i still owed £4155! Anyway the account now says settled with a £0 balance and Lowell have not entered anything. I should be getting my Experian report next week so i'll see if thats different. Also the address for the welcome account was wrong, not sure if that matters or not.

[BRIGADIER2JCS]

Emm Noddle is not always up to date I'm afraid, the entry is showing actual or notional payments??

When you get the new report please podt upa suitably redacted copy.