Poppa H vs Barclays Bank

[andrewjb]

Sent the relevant letters to Barclays, for charges totalling £2700. Received an offer of £1500 which I declined. Filed MCOL.

Barclays have issued a defence which presumably is the standard defence.

With the defence was an order saying 'The filing of an allocation qestionnaire be dispensed with in this case unless the District Judge at the court of transfer orders otherwise'

Any advice as to what this means / what is likely to happen / what I do next ?

[dar£n]

Your Allocation Questionaire has been dispensed with, this is the courts attempt at speeding the process up.

Your case will be transferred to your local court with directions sent to you accordingly.

 

This however, does not mean you will not have to pay the £100 fee for the AQ... no worries, this will be repaid on settlement.

[andrewjb]

Received a letter from the court assignng a date, but including the following:

 

On Thursday 14th June 2007, District Judge Avent considered the papers in the case and ordered that:

 

1) there will be a preliminary hearing in this case (and several others which raise the same or similar issues and involve the same Defendant) at a time and date to be notified to you with this Order

 

2) The hearing is intended to give directions for the hearing of some or all these cases in a way which saves time and expense

 

3) It is hoped all parties will attend but if this is not practicble the Court will be pleased to consider the written views of any party provided that these reach the Court by no later than 3 clear days before the hearing

 

4) In the event that both parties fail to attend the hearing the Court shall make such order it sees fit including striking out the Claim and/or Defence as the case may be

 

5) Notwithstanding the value of any claim and whether it fails to be allocated to the Small Claims Track or otherwise, it is the provisional view of the Judge that the cost rules for the Small Claims Track should apply to them all

 

6) Because this order has been made by the Court without considering representations from the parties, the parties have a right to have the order set aside, varied or stayed.

 

A court date of 17th July 2007 at 11:00 AM has been set

 

Advice anyone please ??

[saintly_1]

I would suggest that you contact B's litigation team i would advise an email to Dino as he seems to be the one that will reply ..

http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/barclays-bank/94602-barclays-litigation-team-good.html

 

contact details are found in the above link

[andrewjb]

Thanks, is there a template anywhere for the email I should send to them ?

[Camdenite]

Hi all, Andrew, I'm in the same day as you at 10am for a Preliminary Hearing against Abbey. I had the same Order as you on the 14th June. What i am confused about though is why this is needed when an AQ has been filed by both parties? Other threads seem to indicate that the judge is set to strike out the Defence but I don't want to get carried away. Any thoughts?

[welshcakes]

Hhmm, does seem odd that the mass hearing includes cases that have already filled out an AQ and therefore the court should have already established which 'box' to put them in.

 

"2) The hearing is intended to give directions for the hearing of some or all these cases in a way which saves time and expense"

 

I wonder if the judge is going to issue a mass Special Directions requiring the Defendant to produce a breakdown of how the charges are calculated so that all parties can examine whether the applied charges reflect 'no profit' administrative costs.

 

As we know they don't and B's can't possibly provide this information in a true and accurate form, so maybe the judge intends to force Barclays into an early Default position.

[Camdenite]

Hi Welshcakes. I guess we'll just have to wait & see. There is another thread regarding Central London CC & Judge Avent in the "General" section.

 

Any idea what I should be taking with me? Most of the Preliminary Hearing "mini bundle" is concerned with allocating to Small Claims Track & liability for costs. My judge has already stated in the Order that I should not be eligible for costs whatever track it is deemed to be seen under.

 

Any advise appreciated.

[andrewjb]

I received this email from Barclays today:

 

Dear XX

 

Thank you for your email. According to our records, your claim is due in Central London County Court for a Preliminary Hearing on the 17th July. At present, our intention is to send a representative to this hearing as there are a number of claims in the same stage of the process as yours and therefore whilst I think you for your settlement offer, it is not something I am able to address at this time.[/font]

 

Thanks,

 

Tom

 

Wonder if this is the start of them fighting back - advice anyone?

[saintly_1]

http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/guidance-notes/64911-got-court-date-guide.html have a read here

[Camdenite]

Wish I could help. I've not had any word from Abbey concerning them attending but I think it's a smoke screen. There's no reason to believe they would start to turn up at these hearings unless there had been a major development.

 

Also, according to the Order, it's only a preliminary hearing to decide on how the court proceeds. This means we cannot "lose" the case on the day.

[andrewjb]

From all the evidence to date, Barclays appear to have been settling before this stage, be interesting to see how this proceeds.

[Camdenite]

http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/guidance-notes/64911-got-court-date-guide.html have a read here

 

Hi Saintly, I'm a little in the wrong place here, but have a thread on the Abbey Forum (Camdenite Vs Abbey) where I have asked a couple of questions concerning the neccessary paperwork for the Preliminary Hearing. I've not had a response so far to my last set of questions and could do with the help as it's getting closer to D-Day. Do you have 5mins to take a look?

[welshcakes]

"Wonder if this is the start of them fighting back - advice anyone?"

 

I suspect this is just the same old same old of putting off writing out the settlement cheques.

[Camdenite]

Would be nice to think it's just a tactic, but seeing as how their representative would not have to "reveal their true costs" at the hearing then maybe they are changing tactics in order to frighten us into dropping the case?

[andrewjb]

Think they have loads more to lose than us, if they were forced to reveal the minimal cost of these letters

Think its more a delaying tactic

[welshcakes]

... course if any of the claimants entered a request for a Draft Directions as per the http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/general/53570-new-strategy-allocation-questionnaires.html?highlight=new+strategy+aq

 

and B's could face a huge problem?