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Good morning all, I wonder if it might be possible to request a little help with a scenario I find  myself in following a redundancy a few years ago and having moved. - 

 

Having read through the other posts on this forum, I think this is the format to brief and hopefully give enough information to act - I'm a little worried about this as I was under the impression that on moving house, the service would transfer, but it appears that the contract totally restarted. However when I asked for clarification from Lowell regarding their claim, they sent generic details that made no sense and didn't provide any address details beyond one in Bognor that I couldn't 

 

Name of the Claimant  - Lowell Portfolio 1 LTD

Date of issue – 6th of March 2019

Date of issue 6/3/19+ 19 days = 25th March,  + 14 days to submit defence = 8th April (33 days in total)

 

Particulars of Claim

What is the claim for – the reason they have issued the claim?

 

1) The Defendant entered into an agreement with talk Talk Telecom Limited under account reference xxxxxxxxxx ("the Agreement")

2) The Defendant failed to maintain the required payments and the service was terminated.

3) The Agreement was later assigned to the Claimamt on 13/09/2017 and notice given to the Defendant.

4) Despite repeated requests for payment, the sum of £311.31 remains due and outstanding.

And the Claimant claims

  1. The said sum of £311.31

  2. Interest pursuant so s69 County Courts Act 1984 at the rate of 8% per annum from the date of assignment to the date of issue, accruing at a daily rate of £0.068 , but limited to one year, being £24.90

  3. Costs

 

 

Have you received prior notice of a claim being issued pursuant to paragraph 3 of the PAPDC ( Pre Action Protocol) - Not until the 11th - received on Monday.

 

Have you changed your address since the time at which the debt referred to in the claim was allegedly incurred - Yes, though only 1 time and talktalk were informed.

 

Did you inform the claimant of your change of address? yes though only by phone.

 

What is the total value of the claim? £421.21

 

Is the claim for - a Bank Account (Overdraft) or credit card or loan or catalogue or mobile phone account? they're claiming it's for a mobile phone account, however it's for a broadband only supply account, claiming for an address in bognor, but with an East grinstead tel number.

 

When did you enter into the original agreement before or after April 2007 ? After 2007

 

Is the debt showing on your credit reference files (Experian/ Equifax /Etc...) ? Not so far as I can tell. However I can’t see it.

 

Has the claim been issued by the original creditor or was the account assigned and it is the Debt purchaser who has issued the claim.  Assigned to Lowell portfolio, purchased by Lowell group - debt purchaser issued claim.

 

Were you aware the account had been assigned – did you receive a Notice of Assignment? Not until they sent their ‘letter before action’ - received last month [the 12th]

 

Did you receive a Default Notice from the original creditor? Not at my address, however I moved house following redundancy.

 

Have you been receiving statutory notices headed “Notice of Default sums” – at least once a year? No

 

Why did you cease payments?I did not, they cancelled the contract and payments further to the new tenants setting up their broadband a few months after i’d moved out. This was following advice that as the contract was 16 months old, the 2 months payment would be less than a cancellation fee. Talktalk did not get back to me to clarify the options and following redundancy, and having to move back with family, i did not chase it [which I accept was foolish]

 

What was the date of your last payment? Nov 2016

 

Was there a dispute with the original creditor that remains unresolved? Yes. though they didn’t reply to any requests for confirmation regarding the contract length. [was with talktalk for over 2 years, but they’re claiming the house move restarted a contract, which was not made clear upon moving house for work.]

 

Did you communicate any financial problems to the original creditor and make any attempt to enter into a debt management plan? No, beyond telling them that I was being made redundant and having to move out, they said they’d put a hold on the account but following that, while payments were continuing to be made in good faith, they cancelled the account and claimed a large charge [£336.21] for ‘cancellation]

 

 

 

I'd be happy to expand fully on any points, but at this point am concerned that I've no way to prove the communications from my side as I've been pretty awful with paperwork after moving, retraining as a teacher and then moving again for work.

 

Thoughts?

 

Thanks in advance 

 

A

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  • drewbot changed the title to Lowell / Talktalk vs drewbot - from 2016, CC issued

Hi and Welcome to CAG

 

Just a slight amendment to your post.

 

Acknowledgment of service must be done by Friday 22nd March and your defence submitted by Friday 5th April 4.00pm

 

Regards

 

Andy

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I'm a bit surprised that the move results in a new contract rather than simply a transfer. Have you seen that in any of their terms and conditions? Could you post there terms and conditions here or at least provide us with a link please

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That was what shocked me after moving too [ was in a rental, and the original landlord wanted it back - so i moved and transferred the service - didn't require any engineer visit or anything to set up so i'm a bit baffled why they restarted the contract after a fair while at the house] 

 

anyway, in their t's and c's - updated as of 2018, they say this... [though i can't find any from when I actually signed up with talktalk years ago]

 

17 MOVING HOUSE 17.1 If you’re moving house and want to continue using the services, you must tell us at least 14 days before so we can cancel your old service. Further important information is available on our moving home page (www.talktalk.co.uk/movinghome), including that we may need to start you on a new contract and there may be an additional charge.

17.2 We’ll try our best to transfer the services but, if we can’t transfer some or all of them, and any are in the minimum period, you may have to pay the charges to the end of the minimum period.

 

http://www.talktalk.co.uk/media/pdf/legal/TalkTalk_Customer_Terms_and_Conditions_v20190301.pdf 

 

Thanks for your thoughts all.

 

A

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Thank you.

You come onto this forum and ask questions but actually you haven't set out your story.
I think it will be very helpful if you will now set out your story in a chronological bullet pointed way so that we can understand the complete timeline of events.

Keep it factual – not too much narrative

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Are there two different account numbers ...old and new address ?

 

1) The Defendant entered into an agreement with talk Talk Telecom Limited under account reference xxxxxxxxxx ("the Agreement")

We could do with some help from you.

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Fair point -  Sorry for the confusion.

 

 

So in as close to a chronological order as possible...

 

I took out broadband service in May 2014 - fibre service. In my house at the time.

 

I moved to Bognor for work in early Oct 2014, notified them as soon as it was confirmed [24th oct] and transferred the service to my new address, which took them till the 6th of Nov to make live [without any engineer visits ] - at that time there was no implication of a new contract, so I took it to be ongoing.

 

Due to the landlady moving back into my flat, I was forced to move to a new flat, in the same area, and moved service [again] - details were updated according to talktalk on the 22nd of May 2015

 

The data breach was notified to me via email from talktalk on the 23rd of October 2015. 

 

I contacted talktalk on the 21st of October 2015 and informed them that due to redundancy, i was moving out and wanted to see how I could put a hold on the account. They informed me that it would be cheaper to continue paying as there were only a few months left on the service, and it would be cheaper than cancelling early. I agreed to this verbally [unfortunately didn't get it in writing] and continued paying. 

 

On the 11th of December [2015] - long after I'd moved out of my flat, I received an email from talktalk telling me that they'd received cancellation instructions from 'another provider' - none of which I had instructed as I had not instructed anyone to cancel, however was assured that the service would continue, albeit only for a few weeks due to the notice period.

This email stated that I was to be charged £256.91 for 'early cancellation fees'

 

I queried this via phone, but they were unable to answer why a new contract had been logged, when there was no agreement to do so. 

 

On the 29th of December 2015, my bill read an outstanding balance of £35.50, which I thought was closer to the correct figure, and was paid off accordingly.

 

I then received a bill on the 16th of January 2016 saying that the balance was now £291.31 - Which i queried and was told there was some confusion, and that they'd get back to me. I did not hear from them other than to reiterate their demands without clarifying where this large charge had come from, except that it was on the account. 

 

I then heard nothing following this until a few weeks ago when lowell piped up with demanding payment for something I was under the impression was an irregularity in record keeping - By my calculations, when I had moved out, until the 'cancellation' date, I had been a customer of talktalk for a little over 19 months, and thus the contract 'early termination' was not applicable. 

 

Hope this clarifies somewhat. I do look forward to any advice that could be suggested as to my next steps.

 

Thanks again for your time and efforts. 

 

Yours

 

 

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Not as far as I can tell in all my records - been going back and the number seems to be the same one. The concen is when they claimed to restart a contract, without any request to do so.?

 

Quote

Are there two different account numbers ...old and new address ?

 

1) The Defendant entered into an agreement with talk Talk Telecom Limited under account reference xxxxxxxxxx ("the Agreement")

 

 

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Well it shouldn't be difficult to defend..the claimant will require to evidence the following...

 

2) The Defendant failed to maintain the required payments and the service was terminated.

 

I dont suppose you have any proof that you gave 14 days notice or requested a change of address?

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Hang on, what I'm reading here is that the cancellation was nothing to do with moving but was because you'd been slammed by another provider. Is this correct?

 

Whatever the situation, please will you send an SAR off to TalkTalk immediately – today. Use one of our templates and send it by recorded delivery. Don't hang around

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Also send a request to Lowells for disclosure of information under CPR 31.14

Please get that off today as well. Don't hang around

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Will do, thanks for this - I'll pop the SAR off and CPR this evening, [working till five]

 

As to the move/cancellation, I did move house back to my parents and having called talktalk as described, I accepted the likely extra few quid to pay for the full notice period. however, I was indeed shifted away from the service by the new tenants' other supplier rather than by my own request for cancellation. 

 

Quote

Well it shouldn't be difficult to defend..the claimant will require to evidence the following...

 

2) The Defendant failed to maintain the required payments and the service was terminated.

 

I dont suppose you have any proof that you gave 14 days notice or requested a change of address?

 

I have the emails saying i was booted, and the first two house moves were confirmed in an email from them, but I don't have any letters from me as I did it all on the phone [foolish me at the time]

 

I'll get a SAR off along with a CPR, Should I adjust anything specific to account for this situation?

 

Thanks again - I really do appreciate the calm confidence as I could really do without a CCJ and staying calm is tricky.

 

Yours

 

A

 

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Yes, so it turns out that we don't really know what has happened at all.

If you have been slammed – then who was it? Did you actually end up in a contract with the new supplier?

I'm not sure if it still goes on but a few years ago slamming happened a great deal. It seemed to have been accepted throughout the industry – even by the big players like British Telecom. There were industry agreements which simply meant that if they were approached by another supplier, then they honoured that suppliers instruction to close you down and to transfer your service without any authority from the customer. It was assumed that the new supplier had obtained this authority. In fact this wasn't the case. I don't know what happened but I can imagine that unscrupulous employees were selling off data to unscrupulous suppliers who would then use the slack systems and not worry about data breaches in order to get customers transferred from their existing suppliers.

Of course, it is entirely possible that the cancellation occurred as a result of a move – but even that would be recently easy to defend against based on what I have seen in TalkTalk's terms and conditions.

Although you have tried to lay out methodically – I'm afraid it's still not massively clear.

Did you have one move or two moves? For some reason or other it occurs to me that you had two moves and that in one move they transferred without any difficulty and in the second move we have the issue cancellation – which may or may not have coincided with you being slammed.

Who was the new supplier and did you use them?

By the way, have you filed an acknowledgement of service? You should do this immediately

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3 minutes ago, BankFodder said:

Did you have one move or two moves? For some reason or other it occurs to me that you had two moves and that in one move they transferred without any difficulty and in the second move we have the issue cancellation – which may or may not have coincided with you being slammed.

Who was the new supplier and did you use them?

By the way, have you filed an acknowledgement of service? You should do this immediately

 

Thanks for all this - I don't know what slamming is but I assume it's not legit? 

 

I had two home moves, and one moving out altogether [East Grinstead--> Bognor 1, Bognor 1--> Bognor 2, then Bognor 2 was cancelled]  both of which seemed to go off without a hitch, and certainly didn't require any engineer visits to incur costs. 

 

The last move, wherein I had to move out and requested the end of service, was the one that seemed to throw issues up as previously it was all running smoothly. [following that I didn't have a supplier as the building i went into already had one, however, I also didn't request cancellation at all as previously explained.] 

 

I haven't yet filed the acknowledgement of service as I was worried I wouldn't be able to defend it with so little information [and no legal background] 

 

Do I gather from the tone of replies that this is a defensible case? 

 

Thanks again - 

 

A

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Slamming is an industry practice whereby a telecoms supplier pretends to have your authority to take over your account.

The problem is that we don't really know what the claim is about. This is why you are sending an SAR and also eight CPR 31.14.

If the claim is because – as you have originally thought – it is because you moved home and so therefore your contract with restarted, then we have to ask ourselves why did it only happen in one case and yet in the second case it didn't appear to happen.

This inconsistent approach is helpful to you because it suggests that there is no contractual term which allows them to do that. Secondly, looking at the terms and conditions, I don't see anything there which says unequivocally that this is what will happen. They say that they will cancel your contract if you move and they say that they "may" start a new contract – but there is nothing firm. In any event, it seems to me that if you were obliged to move home and they use that opportunity to cancel your contract and yet penalises you for an unused contractual portion and then go ahead and open another contract, then this is an unfair term. In fact I will also say that it is an unfair trading practice.

On the other hand, if what has happened here is that you have been slammed then we would want to know about that because we would then have an issue with the company which slammed you and also with talk talk for letting your account go without your authority. Of course they would then say that they let the contract go because that is industry practice. This has been the standard excuse throughout the industry for ages. I find that an unacceptable excuse and I see that there is no reason why should we should simply say to them that that might be practice within the industry but it doesn't affect you as a customer because you are not part of the industry.

That's all theory. We need to find out more. You should certainly find an acknowledgement with intention to defend. You can always change your mind later.

Don't hang around. I think it's a shame that you even have to wait until tomorrow. It would have been nice to get the letters off today in today's post.

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I've asked you a couple of times which company took over the contract from TalkTalk – but you haven't answered and in fact you haven't even referred to it

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get these done now..

 

pop up on the MCOL website detailed on the claimform.
.
 register as an individual
 note the long gateway number given
 then log in
.
 select respond to a claim and select the start AOS box.
.
 then using the details required from the claimform
.
 defend all
 leave jurisdiction unticked.
 click thru to the end
 confirm and exit MCOL.
.
 get a CPR 31:14 request running to the solicitors [if one is not listed send to the claimant]
https://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/topic/332546-legal-cpr-3114-request-request-for-information-when-a-claim-has-been-issued/
.
type your name ONLY

no need to sign anything
.
you DO NOT await the return of paperwork.
you MUST file a defence regardless by day 33 from the date on the claimform [1 in the count]
 

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please don't hit Quote...just type we know what we said earlier..

DCA's view debtors as suckers, marks and mugs

NO DCA has ANY legal powers whatsoever on ANY debt no matter what it's Type

and they

are NOT and can NEVER  be BAILIFFS. even if a debt has been to court..

If everyone stopped blindly paying DCA's Tomorrow, their industry would collapse overnight... 

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" I haven't yet filed the acknowledgement of service as I was worried I wouldn't be able to defend it with so little information [and no legal background "

 

Dont worry you know more about it than the claimant Lowell...all they have is a debt amount an agreement number and your name and address :classic_biggrin:

 

We could do with some help from you.

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35 minutes ago, BankFodder said:

I've asked you a couple of times which company took over the contract from TalkTalk – but you haven't answered and in fact you haven't even referred to it

 

I'm guessing you mean the new supplier at the flat? I don't know who they are - I had moved out by this point and, other than continuing to pay the months' notice period as I had been advised, had no further contact with the flat, or agency [beyond having given them a forwarding address if required]. 

 

Lowell solicitors are the company that are acting for Lowell portfolio 1 ltd and appear to have bought the claim. 

 

Sorry If I've irritated - I genuinely don't know who the ''new supplier'' was as I was not living there any more- It did seem strange that they'd assume to just cancel my contract without any contact or confirmation that I wanted it cancelled. 

 

I'll put the acknowledgement of service thing in now, and print/post the papers off as advised tomorrow morning [a spare 5 mins while the post office is open to do the admin]

 

Thanks again.

 

A

 

 

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How do you know that the service was taken on by new supplier? Was the transfer to the new supplier carried out during your occupation at all? I'm getting a bit confused.

I had gathered that during your tenancy, there had been a change to a different supplier.

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Not while I was there - It was transferred, presumably to a new supplier, about a month after I'd moved out of the flat, but rather than offering me the choice to transfer service to another location for the month left on the contract [as I had thought], they just cancelled the service altogether. 

 

I had been required to move house a few times, and all along, taken the service with me, under the impression that the contract wasn't renewed, merely continued. But when I did finally have to move out due to my redundancy, I kept the service going, and paid for, for so long as they carried on the service - at no point did I call them to actually cancel the service

 

At the time, I did inform them of my redundancy and resultant likelihood of a moving house and was advised to continue paying for the notice period.

Not supplier at that time as the service [barring the data breach shortly before moving] was excellent.

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Okay, in that case the account hasn't been slammed.

So I understand that you have had several moves. Each time you continued with talk talk at your new address – but you haven't understood whether in fact it was a continuation of the same contract or each time it was a new contract.

The issues seems only to have arisen after you moved out of your last address. Presumably you've moved to a new place now? You haven't taken talk talk with you. Is this correct? I'm struggling to get a full picture here.

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Yeah, I've moved since, and haven't taken TalkTalk with me - I was under the impression that the contract was over by date, and seeing as they've completely confused me with their data control, I wasn't inclined to go again with them.

 

Does the contract restarting seem sufficient to be worth defending? 

 

Thanks again in advance. 

 

Yours

 

A

 

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So what I'm hearing from you is that you have been with talk talk, you have moved home twice and each time you assumed that TalkTalk weren't recommencing the minimum period with a new contract.

If in fact the contract was simply being continued – the same contract but at different addresses them by your calculation you had one month left to go. You moved home but for some reason rather they didn't offer to transfer the contract to your new home.

However, the amount of money that they are claiming appears to be for a much longer period than that and you now think that they have been starting off on a new contract each time.

Does that summarise it correctly?

I notice that in your explanation of the claim that they have brought against you, they say that you failed to make payments and so therefore they terminated the contract. Did you have a poor payment history?

When you made your final move, did you approach them at all to transfer the contract to your new address?

I don't know why but I'm finding it very difficult to nail the story down – although I have the feeling that we are getting there.

 

Quote

May 2014 took out contract

October 2014 moved home and continued contract

May 2015 moved again – continued with talk talk

October 2015 moved again – instructed to keep on paying.

2015 TalkTalk service was cancelled – presumably on instruction from new tenant

TalkTalk claimed £256.91 early cancellation

was the TalkTalk contract a 12 month contract or a 24 month contract?

I don't think there will be very much you can do until you get the SAR and also the CPR 31.14

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I didn't have a poor history and would always pay when requested. 

 

From all the information I can find said it was an 18 month contract. 

 

I did ask and they said they couldn't pause the contract without an address until I moved, so I continued paying to give me the month to find a new place... 

 

 

Otherwise you've got the facts of it there. 

 

 

Thanks again

 

Yours

 

A

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