Help :( Debts and cant sleep for worry :(

[toibs]

So I had an email from Experian earlier tonight (I have their Credit Expert thingie), and I have just found out that I have a CCJ against me from the start of December, which must have been issued to my old address...

 

So, let me explain.

 

I have a total of around £27k of debts, £25k from old credit cards (Egg/Barclaycard and Co-operative Bank), 1K taxman and 1K lloyds "overdraft" (Who i continue to bank with as a current account only). The cards are all from around 3-4 years ago. All in my name, all caused by My Ex. - However I do realise i am liable for these debts.

 

Anyhow, When I moved out, all were advised by telephone of my new address/info, and i indeed have demands from previous collection companies (for the two cards anyhow) to this address. However it seems like the court documents sent to my old address, and I was completely unaware of this until now. Now i find i have a CCJ and i dont know what i can do.

 

I live on my own, and whilst i get a decent salary, the CSA also deduct lots of money at source for my children (Around 35% of my salary), so I have very little money to live on. I have possessions in the house that i REALLY don't want to loose (having been divorced once, with another pending, I have had to rebuild from scratch twice with the help from money lent to me by my great parents). I live in fear of the bailiffs coming around and taking what I have.

 

It also seems that as part of the CCJ, the amount owing on this one card (previously £13k) has now jumped to £18k.... Seems to have happened just before the court case i wasnt aware of.....

 

I dont know what to do, or where to go to get this sorted out - All i know is that i'll hapilly pay what i can, however because of the size of the debt i doubt it will be enough.

 

I stuck my head in the sand as all I was getting was harassing post and phone calls DAILY to both my home and work numbers

 

I cant sleep since finding all this out, hence my posting at 2:15am I'm so scared

 

Please could someone advise me what i can do

 

Thanks

Paul

[fkofilee]

Toibs... Welcome and dont worry, weve all been there,

Im dealing with 9,5k myself which im working on.

 

Now this court case... Who was the company that took you to court>?

[fletch70]

Paul

Please try not to worry , easier said that done I know.

 

I have 45K of debt which I can not repay at the moment.I remember waking at 2am in a panic . It got to the point I was going to bed on a bottle of wine and waking at 2 am and not sleeping again after that, now when i don't sleep it has nothing to do with money. You are a very very long way from having your goods taken.

 

Actually facing up to the problem is the first step and personally I would suggest calling National Debt Line and have a chat . They should be able to give you a list of options and will have heard it all before.

[fkofilee]

Fletch is right!! This will help resolve your woes...

Your stuff wont get taken unless they try to enforce the CCJ but even then , it has to go through a lot of different processes. Now , once youve spoken to them come back here and list all your debts!

 

Then we will give you advice on what to do

[toibs]

Toibs... Welcome and dont worry, weve all been there,

Im dealing with 9,5k myself which im working on.

 

Now this court case... Who was the company that took you to court>?

 

A Company called Marlin Financial services apparently....

 

Many thanks for the Reassuring words. I'll give the national Debt line a call and see what they can advise....

 

Will respond back once i have spoken to them - at least it may be of help to others that find themselves in the same situation

 

Paul

[fkofilee]

Paul... There are people here with more than me

 

The site team... Fletch70, brigadeerjcs, Renegadeimp!

 

We are all here for each other

 

Marlin were recently scrutinised in a damning documentary. What are the terms of the CCJ?

[Desperate Daniella]

You may be able to get the CCJ set aside if you can prove the company was given your new address but issued the claim to your old address. Some companies do this quite deliberately so they can get judgment by default.

 

Some judges will only give a set aside if they feel you had a valid Defence but as £5,000 of charges have been added to the account you can argue that you want proof that these were properly applied to the account.

 

If the company sent statements/correspondence to your new address you can show that the claim was sent to the wrong address.

 

I certainly couldn't sleep before I found CAG. We'll all help you as much as we can.

[fletch70]

DD I was thinking about the set aside as well but having no experience of them didn;t want to confuse anyone. I believe that Marlin have a bit of a track record for this sort of thing. Lets be kind and say they are incompetent as I am never cynical

[Desperate Daniella]

Hi fletch,

 

If someone doesn't have a chance to defend because they don't get the papers then it should be possible to get a set aside. However, as we both know, judges are very different, and some may only set aside if they think the Defendant has a proper Defence if the judgment is set aside, and things start again, so to speak.

 

However, £5,000 is an enormous amount of charges and Paul is entitled to ask about them.

 

DD

[Desperate Daniella]

Paul,

 

Marlin are obviously not the original creditor. The Court Claim should show what this debt is about, so call the Court office and ask them, and ask them to send you a copy.

 

DD

[Desperate Daniella]

Sorry. You have already said it refers to one card. Which creditor?

[toibs]

Many apologies all for the delay in getting back. Took some courage to contact National Debt line, however i finally did it.

 

Firstly - in answer the the above question, original creditor was Co-operative bank (Credit card).

 

So - the national Debit line took all my info, we went through a long list of all my debts, and then a list of my income and outgoings. It seems that i have around £25 a month free after all my outgoings are done (Tho despite the fact i dont drink, they suspect my 20 a day smoking wouldnt be accepted by the creditors, since thats £240 per month )

 

One suggested option was Bankruptcy, however apparently not to be taken lightly. Details will be forthcoming.

 

Anyway. I have been told to do things in the following order..

Contact Tax man and get payments started, since the taxman can basically do anything they want and can come in without a court warrant to seize assets.

Secondly, to contact The main creditor (the one with the ccj) to get a breakdown of the reasons why the costs have increased from £12K to £17K. Now the downside of this is that they will have my new address, so it's windows and doors locked, and car parked down the road apparently

Thirdly to be careful of having my main bank account and a debit with lloyds as they can whenever they decide take the full amount owing - he suspects an administrative error as to why they havent done this yet!!

Forth and finally I need to speak to the other Card company and explain and make a payment of £1 per month whilst all this is sorted out.

 

Really concerned about the seizing of stuff still, however his words were lock the doors and windows and dont answer the door!!!