Unlawful Car Repo? MotoNovo

[orfoster]

So sorry I thought I'd posted this....

 

she knew someone was coming but not when,

they arrived and she was at school

so they got the keys from where it was "at home on private land".

 

They did a report which we only saw a couple of days ago adding costs on for various incorrect things

and made a note on there "nobody to sign"

ie she didn't give consent,

nor did she ever get a default notice and

they say nothing held on file,

nor did they get her informed consent (been researching)

because they never gave her details of her statutory rights.

 

Hope that helps

[dx100uk]

great so there's even witness . the landlord. that can verify everything inc whose land.

 

brill

squaddie, I thinks this is slam dunk guaranteed!!

 

dx

[postggj]

Slam dunk indeed

 

I will crack on tomorrow with this

[orfoster]

Thanks Squaddie

[orfoster]

Ok before Squaddie puts up his complaint I thought I'd have a stab at it because I know I need to get savvy on this issues at hand.

 

Here is my first attempt at a complaint tonight.....let me know what you think.

 

Dear Sirs,

Thank you for your letters and emails in relation to my recent Subject Access Request, as you will be aware this account has been in dispute for some time now and you have failed to respond to my complaint.

I now write to make a formal complaint in relation to the unlawful repossession of the vehicle in question and the unfair processing of personal data.

Unlawful repossession

The Agreement supplied recently makes reference to “option to purchase fee (optional)”, within the balance statement this shows that this fee was added to the agreement on 14 November 2009, the day the agreement commenced. I believe this to be an unfair fee which prejudices my position had I wished to exercise my right to terminate under the Consumer Credit Act, this fee was not advised to me as being optional at the time nor was this something I opted for, I was not aware at the time that this fee had been added to my agreement already and should have in any event been added to the end of the agreement.

As you will be aware that the Consumer Credit Act 1974 s90, it is unlawful to recover items after payments have been made up to 1/3rd, I believe it to be the case that I had made payments exceeding 1/3rd of the total cost and that therefore my goods were “protected goods”.

The vehicle was repossessed from private property without my consent, you will note from the Inspection Report dated 15 June 2011, only recently supplied, it states “no one to sign”. In your letter dated 17 June 2011 you state “From the inspection report that you signed to agree to the damages and the items returned to us” You will note that I did not sign the inspection report. I subsequently complained and entered into a dispute with MotoNovo, you failed to respond at all.

You will be aware that the Consumer Credit Act 1974 s91 is quite clear in this matter and outlines the rights of the debtor in cases where the creditor has breached s90 of the act.

In addition you failed to seek my “informed consent” in relation to the termination of this agreement, more specifically MotoNovo did not inform me of my statutory rights in relation to this matter.

Unfair Processing of data

As you will be aware, this account has been in dispute since 12 June 2011 when I wrote outlining my complaint and again on 27 June 2011, I didn’t receive either an acknowledgement or a response to my complaint raised and therefore the dispute is still outstanding.

Since raising this dispute, which has not been resolved, you have filed default notices with Credit Reference Agencies, you will be aware that the Information Commissioner in August 2007 (Data Protection Technical Guidance – Filing defaults with credit reference agencies) stated that “If we conclude that there is a genuine, reasonable and unresolved dispute between the borrower and lender, then we are likely to find that personal data has been processed unfairly if a default has been filed”

You will note following disclosure of information provided in response to my Subject Access Request a copy default notice was provided dated 1 February 2010, clearly from the agreement notes it is clear that this default notice was served in error.

I have not at any point received a default notice regarding this account which is in direct breach of s87 of the Consumer Credit Act, it is clear that a default notice served under s88 is “necessary” before the owner or creditor can become entitled to, among other key points, “recover possession of any goods or land”.

A default notice has been registered on my credit file along with other errors previously admitted which have seriously damaged my financial reputation.

 

 

Outcome Sought

1. Full repayments of payments made as required under Consumer Credit Act 1974.

2. Compensation that the unfair processing of personal information has caused to my credit file - £1,000

3. Full removal of any entries made to my credit file relating to MotoNovo.

 

It is clear that on a number of occasions MotoNovo have breached clear pieces of legislation and I am taking this matter extremely seriously.

Failure to respond to my complaint may result in court action where I would look to apply interest and costs.

I look forward to your response within 14 days.

Yours faithfully

[dx100uk]

one line will do:

 

on dd/mm/yyyy you instructed xxxx repo company to take my car.

this was from private land without my written consent or presence.

 

this was unlawful under section xx of the CCA, I now demand etc etc

 

dx

[postggj]

I welcome your enthusiasm Orfoster, but we are dealing with legislation contained within the CCA 1974

 

Sections of that ACT stipulate the recourse needed, do not go all guns blazing as you will end up with egg on your face, softly softly and test the water

 

We do not put all our eggs in one basket, what we are after is a paper trail to show we are being reasonable. Enough needs to go into the complaint as they will have 56 days to give a final response, but we need enough to counter attack if needed. I will be honest, this may take 6 months to get any sort of settlement on the table.

 

I will post up my draft in a few days as i cannot make any mistakes on the correct legislation or they will exploit it as a weakness

 

Please do keep studying the CCA and repossessions though

[postggj]

I like your thinking DX100UK

 

Direct and to the point

[Peterbard]

By all means send this but there are a few points you should be aware of.

 

Firstly the option to purchase fee forms part of the total charge for credit( see oft guidelines) as such it is included within the agreement TAP for purposes of calculation of the APR and for will be used in calculating the one third and early settlement figure stated on the agreement.

 

Secondly the notice of default may be the one that is sent by the creditor under the ICO guidelines which gives the debtor 28 days notice before filing the default and have nothing to do with the section 87 notice required by the CCA (which is of course needed if an agreement is to be enforced)

[postggj]

The main issue now is the repo off private land without consent

[orfoster]

Ok thanks, out of interest do you have a link to the referred to OFT guidance, issue I have is that it states this is optional but wasn't.

 

Squaddie, is the fact alone that they repo the car from private land unlawful irrespective of the 1/3rd issue?

 

Cheers

[postggj]

Yes, you are correct on the third issue

[orfoster]

Hello,

 

So we contacted Noodle to raise a dispute about the default held on the credit file, they responded and said it was accurate and we then e-mailed them asking that they put a notice on the file to say we do not agree and that we are in dispute, here is the reply we got;

 

Thanks for your email, I’m sorry to hear you aren’t satisfied with the outcome of your dispute. I’m afraid we’re unable to add notices of disputes to accounts unless we’re currently investigating them.

 

The data contained in your report is provided by the lender so your dispute is with them. We have done as much as we can to help and have asked them to make changes to the information they hold but have been unsuccessful in our attempt. Having failed here there really is nothing else that we can do.

 

I appreciate that you’ve been in touch with the lender directly and haven’t had a satisfactory response and I’m really sorry to hear this. The only advice I can offer is that perhaps it may be worthwhile contacting the banking ombudsman to see if they can help. This link will take you directly to their web page which details how to go about resolving complaints you have with a financial service - http://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/consumer/complaints.htm.

 

I really hope this helps and that you manage to make some progress.

[BRIGADIER2JCS]

In one aspect Noddle is correct it cannot change or remove data without leave of the company that provides the data ie the creditor so this must be challenged with them.

#As to notice of dispute Noddle is in a difficult position as the information was not actually reported to it via the creditor it is 2nd hand data from its parent company CallCredit.

 

If you dispute the data they should either place a dispute notice or remove the entry until the dispute is resolved.

 

A complaint to the ICO is the next step.

[orfoster]

Hi Squaddie,

How you getting on?

Found a solicitors blog on the issue but it was all out and like you say better not to put eggs in same basket.

[AndyOrch]

I welcome your enthusiasm Orfoster, but we are dealing with legislation contained within the CCA 1974

 

Sections of that ACT stipulate the recourse needed, do not go all guns blazing as you will end up with egg on your face, softly softly and test the water

 

We do not put all our eggs in one basket, what we are after is a paper trail to show we are being reasonable. Enough needs to go into the complaint as they will have 56 days to give a final response, but we need enough to counter attack if needed. I will be honest, this may take 6 months to get any sort of settlement on the table.

 

I will post up my draft in a few days as i cannot make any mistakes on the correct legislation or they will exploit it as a weakness

 

Please do keep studying the CCA and repossessions though

( Posted 3rd June 2013)

 

 

Is it nearly ready Squaddie ? OP has been very patient.

 

Regards

Andy

[orfoster]

We're ready to go get em....

[orfoster]

Today I'm gonna draft a letter in relation to the default notice, I wonder if dealing with them as separate issues is the best option.

 

MotoNovo never sent a default notice. I'll post it up in a couple of hours.

[BRIGADIER2JCS]

Posted 3rd June 2013

 

 

Is it nearly ready Squaddie ? OP has been very patient.

 

Regards

Andy

[orfoster]

Hello all,

 

So thinking through the default notice which was applied by MotoNovo, they never sent a "default notice" only a "notice of default sums".

 

I'm looking to send the below letter;

 

Unfair Processing of data

As you will be aware, this account has been in dispute since 12 June 2011 when I wrote outlining my complaint and again on 27 June 2011, I didn’t receive either an acknowledgement or a response to my complaint raised and therefore the dispute is still outstanding.

I do not acknowledge that a “default notice” should have been applied to my Credit File, this is on the basis that MotoNovo did not serve a default notice on me in compliance with Consumer Credit Act 1974.

You will note following disclosure of information provided in response to my Subject Access Request a copy default notice was provided dated 1 February 2010, on reading the agreement notes it is clear that this default notice was served in error.

I have not at any point received a default notice regarding this account which is in direct breach of s87 of the Consumer Credit Act, it is clear that a default notice served under s88 is “necessary” before the owner or creditor can become entitled to, among other key points, “recover possession of any goods or land”.

A default notice has been registered on my credit file along with other errors previously admitted which have seriously damaged my financial reputation.

I am seeking immediate removal of all information from my credit file relating to this agreement and a compensation payment of £1,200 due to the damage the unfair processing of data has caused.

[BRIGADIER2JCS]

Can we see this notice of default sums please??

[orfoster]

Hopefully attached.

[orfoster]

Well that was a rubbish attempt, its here at #15 http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?392358-MotoNovo-repo-d-car-unlawfully&p=4242244&viewfull=1#post4242244

[BRIGADIER2JCS]

So the default sum was just a 'management' charge.

 

No other actual default notice has been received?

[BRIGADIER2JCS]

The credit file entry is not a default notice, it is a report on the status of the account.

Have you placed a 'notice of dispute' on ALL CRA files showing this account?

 

What you really need to be doing is a 'Letter Before Action' laying out as 'bullet points' the errors that have been made and the remedy you seek to rectify the problems, with a fourteen day time limit, otherwise I can see this turning into a prolonged bout of letter tennis.