Barclays partner finance Telephone Harassment

[pl26]

Apologies if this is in the incorrect forum,but i would be grateful for advice on my current situation.I have a loan agreement with Barclays partner finance(BPF) for a car purchase taken out in 2010,

 

all payments made on time as agreed for the last 3 years,having suffered from depression i had to reduce my working hours leading to a drop in income i contacted all my other creditors explaining mt circumstances and all have accepted my reduced payment offer,which was worked out using the" My Money steps" website

 

some have defaulted the account but have still been understanding,all except BPF,i have wrote to them 4 times,3 times i have included I/E breakdowns,but all i have received in return is 3 late payment charge notices,my last 2 letters to them were recorded delivery,asking them not to contact me by phone,only in writing i also included the Telephone harassment template letter,

 

but i am still getting 4-5 calls a day,i told them i was a shift worker and the disruption this was causing but still the calls keep coming.

 

I have E mailed consumer direct with my complaint,who passed it to Trading standards,and so (finally) to my question,at what point would it be considered acceptable to issue small claims proceedings for harassment,

 

i forgot to add that the most recent letter from BPF,was to inform me that the matter was being passed to Mercers for further collection action.

Any advice gratefully received.

Edited June 3, 2013 by citizenB
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[citizenB]

I think you should now write to their Head office marking your letter "Formal Complaint".

 

Pretty much explain as you have above. That you have a financial hiccup, that your other creditors have accepted that you are unable to make the contractual payments and on receipt of your I&E which has been prepared via a Debt Charity, have entered into payment arrangements with you.

 

Explain that you are not attempting to avoid your liability and have been totally honest about your situation. You are therefore very distressed that B/shark have been the exception, that not only have they embarked on a campaign of telephone harassment - you believe they are attempting to intimidate you into breaking faith with your other creditors by trying to prioritise their debt above others. In fact you believe they are not "treating you fairly".

 

You are now requesting one last time that they accept you are unable to make your contractual payments, that they accept your I&E and the payment of £ XX that your budget sheet explains is all you can afford. That they also cease adding charges and interest whilst this financial hiccup remains.

 

That they also call off their rotweilers. That telephoning you between 4-5 a day amounts to harassment and unless they cease you will be forced to make a complaint to both the Office of Fair Trading and the Financial Ombudsman.

 

You look forward to their response within 14 days from the date of the letter.

 

Include your I&E and send the letter by Recorded delivery if you can afford it.

 

Just so that you know, Mercers are in fact B/shark trading as Mercers. They haven't passed it on anywhere but to themselves.

[citizenB]

If the response to the letter above does not see them cease making the calls, then I think then would be the time to consider taking a small claims action against them.

[pl26]

Hi,i and thanks for taking the time to reply,i'll send that letter off tomorrow.The most frustrating aspect of this(apart from the phone calls)is that they havent even acknowledged my offer or even the receipt of it,i've still been making the reduced payments anyway,which amounts to about 35% of the contractual amount,they have just flat out ignored me,it is as if i am speaking to them in a foreign language! I actually feel like answering the phone and telling them where to go,but that kind of defeats the object of asking them not to call.I'll post updates as received.

[citizenB]

Yes, they are a law unto themselves and from what you have said they are breaching every OFT guideline and also their own Lending Code. Then they wonder why people ignore them!!

 

Please do keep us up to date with your progress and just shout if we can help further

[luckysandpiper]

I am in a similar position to you in that I found out in March that I could no longer keep up the installments on a loan I have with them. As soon as I found out I wrote outlining the problem and offered to pay at a little over 50% of the previous rate. I had their acceptance IN WRITING at the beginning of April with a new repayment schedule. HOWEVER, the day after the missed payment I started to receive telephone calls, initially from 0845 numbers all attributed to Barclays Bank. At the and of March I stopped getting these and assumed all was well, but shortly after the first new installment was paid they started again from a machine with a number beginning 01213.... and they have persisited until the end of June. I logged each of these calls by time/date and they now number 109 in total.

I have sent a complete list of these calls to the OFT with a brief outline of the case, not that they can help in individual cases, but it swells what might well be a substantial dossier on Barclays Bank. I have also told Barclays that if they persist I will cease all payments and let them explain themselves in court. They have now registered the affair as a formal complaint (with a number) and have also registered my reply to that as another formal complaint (with a number).

There seems to be an ongoing competition between Collections in Manchester and Lending Operations in Leicester as to who can create the most havoc.

[pl26]

Hi,thought i would update on this ongoing comedy of errors by BPF,i sent off a letter of formal complaint to Barclays regarding the problems already described,their reply was both ridiculous,and arrogant.I have listed some of their reasons for not upholding the complaint,and the way they intend to proceed below.

FINANCIAL DIFFICULTIES.

I note that you contacted us 5 times between 02 april and 10th june 2013,i would like to clarify,our collections dept do not respond to rejected offers of reduced repayments.

 

Well,then how am i supposed to know it'been rejected.

 

Your offer of £75.78 has been rejected as your I/E shows you have a disposable income of £320.50,this is more than your monthly contractual payment of £188.61.also you have listed an amount of 181.50 for hobbies,which could be used towards your repayments.

 

So it would appear that your collections dept are incapable of understanding a I/E breakdown,a disposable income of £320.50 to be divided between ALL creditors as quite clearly illustrated on the supplied information,£181.50 for hobbies,REALLY! hobbies are in fact a sub-section of 11 other expenses of which hobbies amount to £11.00 per month.

 

COLLECTIONS CALLS

you raised concerns about the amount of calls received from our collections dept,and because you work shifts you are finding the calls disruptive,you have requested for no further calls,and if they do not cease you will conduct action for harassment and distress.I would like to assure you that this was certainly not our intention.I notice that you have requested to discuss this matter in writing only,however,as your offer has been rejected the calls will continue.

 

So you accept that i have told you that you are causing me distress,and that i do not want you to call me,but you intend to continue to cause me distress because my offer has been rejected,which going back to your first point,you don't actually write to tell me it has been rejected.

 

based on the information supplied your complaint has been rejected,please call us on xxxx xxxxxx,to discuss your account.

 

Err..i think i mentioned something about telephone calls earlier.

 

So that was received on 15 august,since then i have had 4 more letters from mercers with £22.50 charges for each one,any advice on what to do now would be most welcome,should i continue to make the reduced payments and ignore the letters,or stop paying,write to them and tell them to start court proceedings.

 

Sorry forgot to say,i wrote back to say the reasons for not upholding my complaint were based on incorrect information supplied by their collections dept,and detailing the points made above,but to no avail,and i did not receive a reply

Edited September 22, 2013 by pl26
missed information

[slick132]

Hi Pl,

 

Have you read the Article and template letter about Financial Difficulties here - http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/content.php?557-Letter-for-an-application-for-consideration-for-hardship

 

I think you need to tell the bank they should have stopped adding any interest and/or penalty charges from the date you first told them you were in trouble.

 

Remind them the disposable income shown on your I&E planner has to be shared between all creditors, it is not for them alone.

 

Remind them of their obligations imposed by The Lending Code and by the BCOB Regulations and say if they fail to treat you fairly, you will make a formal complaint to the FOS and you may also take direct court action citing the BCOB regulations.

 

Don't threaten court action unless you're prepared to follow it through.

 

[pl26]

Hi,thanks for your help,i'll try this approach and see how i get on,they refunded the charges added when i sent the formal complaint,then began adding them again,so effectively i' back where i started.

[slick132]

Noted.

 

Make your approach to the bank in writing - do not call them to discuss this, or anything else for that matter !

 

[pl26]

Hi,thanks for taking the time to read my post,i sent off another I/E breakdown and covering letter this morning,but as they informed me when i sent a formal complaint,"our collections dept do not respond to rejected offers of reduced payment" they just continue to send the usual letters of arrears,with a Tel No to call, and add £22.50 to the account,even though the link in the post above by slick132, clearly states"all repayment plans where a customer has informed the lender of financial difficulties should be made in a "durable medium" ie:in writing,they obviously pay no attention to the codes of practice.