Drydens Fairfax/HBOS Sabre Rattling??

[clampchamp]

Hi all

Been very quiet on here for quite a while, due to no DCA's trying to contact me about the usual.

 

 

Today however, I have received a letter from a company called Drydens Fairfax.

 

There is perhaps one debt I have that COULD still be enforceable - mortgage shortfall, sadly!

 

 

All the others to the best of my knowledge, Statute barred.

 

Any idea who the clients of this outfit could be??

 

The letter is the DCA's usual, "Are you XXX? Do you know where XXX is?? If you are not XXX, please accept our apologies........."

and so on and so forth.

 

Obviously I have no intention of contacting them unless they come up with something a little more convincing.

 

Worrying thing is, the wife has one as well, which means if there is a debt, it's a joint one,

and there's only two of I know of that could be - one being the shortfall, another being Wel**** Finance.

 

 

It's a company based up north, which makes me think it may be from Cattles Group/Welcome finance, which is definitely SB.

 

Any words of wisdom, folks??

 

Thanks.

[dx100uk]

go get your credit file.

 

 

dx

[clampchamp]

Already did - nothing showing recently.

 

 

All I have in the last two years is car insurance searches, my car finance, Littlewoods, and at the back end of 2013, a Wonga search.

 

 

In the same last two years, there has been one defaulted payment on a credit card (my misunderstanding!!) and nothing else.

 

 

That was all from Noddle.

[dx100uk]

then if its not on your CRA file

and you know the debt has had nowt paid

toward it in the last 6yrs

 

 

its statute barred.

[clampchamp]

Not if it's a mortgage shortfall it's not, is it??

[dx100uk]

opps was on a small screen.sri.

 

 

if no-one has chased you in 6yrs

the mortgage lending council consider it 'dead'

[clampchamp]

But that doesn't mean a DCA will see it the same way, or does it??

[dx100uk]

stuff the DCA and their fake/tame sols they are powerless

they are not bailiffs

 

 

dx

[dx100uk]

I'd wait for a more concrete phishing letter

 

 

dx

[clampchamp]

That's kinda the way I was thinking. If they KNOW how much I owe, and EXACTLY what it's for, I guess they'll ask for it!!

[clampchamp]

Hi all.

 

 

Recently posted about a letter I had from these guys about a mortgage shortfall.

 

 

I've had another one today from them, but

 

 

this time it has a letter on Bank Of Scotland headed paper with it.

 

 

On the headed paper, it tells me how much I owe (£xx,xxx)

and it tells me that the debt has been transferred over to Drydens.

 

 

The letter reads as follows -

 

We are writing to you regarding your mortgage shortfall with Bank of Scotland (Halifax division)

We have withdrawn your account from HL Interactive and transferred it to Drydensfairfax solicitors with immediate effect.

You should be aware that the decision to instruct them specifically relates to a process change within the bank.

 

Then it waffles on about contacting them, and how if I contact Bank of Scotland they will refer me back to Drydens.

 

Apparently, drydens have been instructed to recover the balance by agreeing a suitable arrangement.

 

The letter from Drydens states about how I must contact them with the refernce number, and how they make progress collection activity etc etc.

 

It was only a fortnight ago I had one of those letters from them asking if I was XX,

did I know where XX was, and if I wasn't XX then did I know how to contact him.

I have not contacted them at all, but they now appear to know how much the debt is for and what it is for.

 

What next??

 

 

This letter worries me a bit, as it does look very genuine

- especially with the Halifax Bank of Scotland letter in there as well.

 

 

Just another DCA dirty trick, or should I be flapping a bit??

[numbers666]

How old is the alleged shortfall ? and I would change the figure in the post above - it is precise and you COULD be identified from it.

[dx100uk]

threads merged

 

 

please keep to one thread

 

 

dx

[dx100uk]

right so you've now got the drydens 'discount letter'

 

 

sort of confirms the shortfall is outside of 6yrs me thinks.

 

 

dx

[clampchamp]

It does appear (after reading it a couple of times) that they are prepared to take an offer to settle it, yes.

 

 

As an aside, after I wrote the last post, I googled the postcode, and it shows up as Blair and wotsit.

It is not older than 6 years - the last payment made by the domestic authority was made in Augustish 2009.

 

On the Drydens letter, it states the following:-

 

We understand that payments have been made towards this account in the past

and from this we have determined this account is not in dispute,

there is no legal reason for it to remain unpaid and these payments are an admission of liability.

If you believe this not to be the case you must contact us immediately to advise us of the details.

 

Then:- From today all communications and repayments must be made to drydensfairfax solicitors

 

And then :

- It is very important that we recieve a repayment offer from you,

if you were unable to maintain any previous arrangement because the payments were too high we can help.

 

 

Any offer made requires us by law to assess your personal circumstances before accepting it. (they do? I don't think so. Do they?)

This is to ensure the amount you pay is affordable and will not have a detrimental impact on your financial finances.

 

Please contact us on blah blah, quoting bla blah within 14 days.

If we do not hear from you in this time we will have no choice but to progress with further collections activity

and would use this letter as evidence that we have made every effort to help you address this debt in a fair and affordable way.

 

The Letter that has Bank of Scotland on the the paper

- is that a very clever ( and possibly illegal??) bluff??

 

 

The mortgage was actually with The Halifax

- all correspondence with them was on Halifax paper.

The address at the bottom, just after where it was signed by a "H Singh" is PO box 66, Rosyth, KY11 2WG

- which shows up as Blair someone and someone.

[dx100uk]

Halifax and Bank of Scotland

Blair Oliver Scot [bOS]

 

 

all the same lot.

 

 

what do you mean by this comment:

 

It is not older than 6 years - the last payment made by the domestic authority was made in Augustish 2009.

 

 

if YOU didn't make the payment then I question if these do reset the 6yrs indicated by the mortgage lending council

on chasing shortfalls outside of 6yrs.

 

 

it would be much better if we could see these letters please

scan them up.

 

 

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............

[clampchamp]

The letters received are attached as a .pdf to the post, with all personal info removed, as advised.

 

 

By Domestic Authority, I meant my good lady wife,

 

 

sorry should have made myself a bit clearer.

She's not quite as switched on as me.

 

 

We had another DCA chasing for this before - Direct Legal Collections (DLC)

- they were able to bully her into paying a little more each month.

That's what Drydens will be referring to.

[dx100uk]

oh dear so it has been paid in some part then.

when was the repo [was it?]

 

 

tell us the full history please

 

 

dx

[dx100uk]

you need to ditch the postcode barcode

[2Grumpy]

Presumably a mortgage shortfall like any other account would need to be legally assigned if sold, otherwise I would presume that TB are just acting as debt collectors with no legal powers ...

[clampchamp]

That upload should be better.

 

Full story - here goes.

 

Bought a house for just under a hundred grand in the early part of 2007.

Didn't have a deposit, got a 100% mortgage from Halifax.

Looking back, I suspect it was mis-sold, but that is a story for another day.

The price we paid on paper was 102,650, because we had what is known as a vendor gifted deposit.

 

stuff happened, (as it does in life) and myself and the good lady split up, leaving her in the house without means to pay.

I'll add that at that point we were struggling to pay the mortgage anyway, and we were at least 2 months behind.

It turned out that one mortgage payment was just over 2 weeks money, based on my wages at that time.

 

I moved back to my home town, and, three months later, the wife joined me up here with the children.

We knew that the Halifax would be looking to repossess due to us now being at least 5 months behind.

 

Rather than wait for them to repossess us, we wandered into town and handed the keys back to the Halifax.

(after giving her dad a clear week to rip out the kitchen cupboards we'd only just fitted!!)

 

We heard nothing for around 6 months,

then we started being harrassed by a company fairly local to us by the name of Direct Legal Collections,

who had managed to prise a couple of hundred pounds out of us by harrassing my wife every month

she rung up to pay something, telling her they wanted more.

 

 

We eventually told them to go forth and multiply in short jerky movements.

This would been the late summer/early autumn of 2009.

 

Moved house later that year, and heard nothing for a bit.

Then we had a company called Mackenzie Hall chasing us, possibly for this,

possibly for another debt that is definitely statute barred.

Then possibly another DCA, then a bunch of cowboys by the name of HL solicitors, and now these guys.

 

Having read a lot of info on this sort of thing (as you do, when you're having another sleepless night)

I understand that although a mortgage shortfall can be chased for 12 years,

as long as the company that gave the original mortgage is/was a member of the FCA,

it's an unwritten rule that it won't be chased once 6 years have elapsed.

 

I'd also like to add, that since this all kicked off, I've been able to get a car on finance,

a credit card and an account with a catalogue company, so my credit rating clearly isn't that poor,

and on my credit file, this debt is not currently showing at all.

 

Also, myself and the wife sorted it out, and still live together to this day..........

[dx100uk]

its the mortgage lending council about the 6yrs thingy.

 

 

the thing is

IF that money got back to Halifax then they do have a lever on your.

 

 

however, theres very few cases whereby you get nailed on mortgage shortfall through court

 

 

my OWN pers advice is let it run.

those letters are rather weak and speculative.

 

 

dx

[clampchamp]

The only way the money could have got back to HBOS would be if the original DCA was working on their behalf, right?? The house was sold, so Halifax would have taken their dosh and probably sold the debt, right??

 

What's likely to happen next??

[dx100uk]

sar time to HBOS

[clampchamp]

That would tell me what became of the debt, right?? It wouldn't admit liability??