Egg cancelled credit card

[tobyspencer]

I'm not sure if this is the right place for this as no claim is being made, nor is one intended to be made, but I thought perhaps there would be someone here who can offer some advice.

 

My brother moved to China two and a half years ago to take up a teaching post. Originally he had planned to stay just a year, but he has obviously extended his contract.

 

He asked me in his absence to check his post for him for any important letters. Well, about two weeks ago an important letter arrived. It was from Egg informing him that his credit card account has been cancelled "due to his failure to satisfactorily comply with the terms of the Statutory Default Notice" that they [apparently] recently sent him. His account is now being handled by an external debt collection agent, RMA.

 

This came as somewhat of a surprise to him when I told him because he had not received any prior warnings that there may have been a problem with his account. As far as he was aware, everything was fine. I check his post, so I can confirm that he has not received any other letters from Egg in the last few months and they have not tried to contact him through their website's secure message system. He has reliably informed me that he makes a monthly payment to his account of slightly more than the minimum payment and has done every month without fail since he arrived in China.

 

A few days later a letter arrived from RMA demanding full repayment of the outstanding balance. There was a premium rate phone number to call to discuss repayment options, but it cannot be reached from mainland China (don't ask me why, it just can't). My brother has contacted Egg though their website several times to ask why his account was cancelled, but they reply by saying they can't help and he is to call the premium rate number (which he's told them doesn't work from China).

 

He won't be back from China for probably another year, but I imagine RMA won't be prepared to wait that long. I doubt they'll talk to me either as I'm not the card holder. What can he do? He can't contact RMA and Egg refuse to help. Has anyone else been in this situation where your account has been closed without warning or explanation?

 

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

 

Toby

[Mistermind]

Have not heard of RMA before. UK-registered companies can be accessed for basic info free from Companies House. For fuller details like directors' names and addresses and annual accounts, you would need to subscribe at £5 per year I think. For such a common name like RMA the exact name of the company would be needed.

 

As RMA wrote to your party, I would be surprised if they left a premium-rate number but no UK address to write to. Was the letter even on headed paper? Most unlike Egg which in these things has been pretty correct, using ARC (Europe) for their debt collection.

 

Even if Egg has closed your bruv's a/c they are still legally obliged to respond to a SAR request. For a payment of £10 your bruv can demand a full bundle of info, everything Egg has kept on his a/c. This would include monthly statements and adequate payments on time, and any email traffic, and the alleged warnings and Default Notice issued. Everything is traceable, and without evidence Egg's stance would collapse like a house of cards. I wonder if it was the case, that Egg learnt that your bruv has gone halfway round the world, so fears for the longterm security of their balance, so trumped up unfounded charges.

 

There may be a practical difficulty, in that Egg normally demand proof of address (bill originals) and identity before preparing then sending their one-inch thick bundle in response to SAR. Not sure if there is anything in their T&C's to restrict their cardholders to residents of the UK. Perhaps your bruv can request SAR via Egg Secure Email, paying £10 by another credit card. This has sometimes worked in the past, bypassing demands for proof of identity and address.

 

If all the evidence corroborates your bruv's good a/c behaviour, Egg would not have a leg to stand on -- unless their fine print has a clause enabling them to close a/cs for cardholders no longer resident in the UK. To cool the frantic excitement at Egg and RMA, suggest yours or bruv's letter be copied to the OFT. They have a debt collectors licensing office in west London (find via Google), to which RMA would look for renewing their annual licence to carry on their livelihood. It would make no difference if the OFT ignores you -- Egg/RMA would have to worry about it.

 

Best of luck.

[kennythecelt]

Very comprehensive and helpful answer Mistermind!

 

Good work!

[patrickq1]

you may also need to get a letter from your brother to say you have full authority to act on your brothers finacial and legal affairs in the UK ,cause no doubt kenny you know they will ask for this just to be on the safe side its better armed with this now...

patrickq1

ps kenny i am looking for any information concerning rule changes from the FSA AND ICO so if you have any snippets of info i would apreciate it here is something for you to look at

oh fore i forget whats happening to strachan he is getting some stick at the mo isnt he,must be the blue noses trying to put the bhoys off from winning more titles lol

[tobyspencer]

Thanks for the replies.

 

On closer inspection it seems that RMA is the trading name for NCO Europe and yes, there is an address he can write too, but again, from China this could be a problem, but I will certainly suggest it.

 

I can only tell you what my brother has told me with regards to the phone number. It's an 08712 number. It may not be 50p a minute to you or I, but from China it might as well be. To call overseas from China requires an international calling card which set him back the equivalent to a week's grocery money, and even then he couldn't get connected. He tried from a pay phone and even from his office as well, but all to no avail. Apparently there are simply some numbers that just don't work from China.

 

Egg have been fully aware that he has moved to China. He told them when he left over two years ago, so they've been happy with his situation and his repayments all this time, which is why it was such a surprise to him when they cancelled his account.

 

What really annoys me is their reluctance to help. They just keep refering him to RMA. Sorry, but he doesn't have an account with RMA. Until a couple of weeks ago he'd never even heard of them. Surely the best people to answer a question about his Egg account would in fact be Egg. And what is their response to: "I can't phone RMA from China"? It's: "We can't help you there. You'll have to phone RMA". Imbeciles!!!

 

I think the next step will be to ask him to write an official letter to them telling them that I have authority to act on his behalf. He has told them this in his emails to them, but it's probably necessary to have it in an letter too. I think I'll also get him to send a S.A.R at the same time.

 

If he does contact them to make a S.A.R is that enough to show that the claim is in dispute, should the debt collectors show up at my door?

 

Regards

 

Toby

[Curlyben]

DON'T ever call RMA or any other DCA.

They will say anything to get payment.

In my experience RMA are one of the most obnoxious DCA's about.

They completely ignore ANY dispute that you have with the original creditor and are very abusive and harassing.

 

You can try writing to them, but it will most likely be ignored while they continue to send regular nasty grams.

The good news is they do give up, but this normaly means that they have passed the account onto another DCA for action.

 

RMA/NCO will threaten all sorts including home visits, but these are merely scare tactics and are utterly spineless.

[Mistermind]

08712-xxxxxx is not exactly a premium line charging £1 a minute, I think it charges 10p to 12p per minute when dialed from the UK. As for not being able to dial it from China that's easy. Your bruv could ring your UK home phone, where NCO has already been dialed in on a party line. Surely you have speakerphone? If not, just bringing two handsets together will also work, with the voicepiece of one handset placed adjacent to the earpiece of the other, i.e. your brother speaks to NCO direct, via your two home handsets, at 10p per minute on your phone bill.

 

NCO would be irrelevant and can be easily expelled from the situation if your brother's payment details are correct and verifiable. Two stories currently do not agree: one says all payments were made, the other says many payments were not. Can recent Egg monthly statements be viewed on Egg's website to pinpoint which payments from China did not reach Egg? What was the payment route and mechanism, were there no receipts? Everything can be traced.

 

Egg might wish to wash their hands of a debt already sold, but if verifiable payments were sent to Egg and allegedly were not received, Egg has an inescapable obligation to investigate where the payments got to -- a technical question for which there will be an unambiguous answer.

[tobyspencer]

If not, just bringing two handsets together will also work, with the voicepiece of one handset placed adjacent to the earpiece of the other, i.e. your brother speaks to NCO direct, via your two home handsets, at 10p per minute on your phone bill.

 

Well I certainly wouldn't have thought of that. Not sure what the quality would be like. Plus if he could call home, I'm sure he would have at least once in the two and half years he's been gone. I think, for him at least, it really is prohibitively expensive to call the UK, or maybe that's just an excuse he's using:roll:. I do know that the only way for me to reach him is by email or MSN.

 

NCO would be irrelevant and can be easily expelled from the situation if your brother's payment details are correct and verifiable. Two stories currently do not agree: one says all payments were made, the other says many payments were not. Can recent Egg monthly statements be viewed on Egg's website to pinpoint which payments from China did not reach Egg? What was the payment route and mechanism, were there no receipts? Everything can be traced.

 

I've checked his online statements going back 12 months and they all show his monthly payments being made so I haven't a clue what they're on about. I suppose it's possible that even though he was making payments, they weren't for the right amount. Either that or they closed his account because he's been away for too long. It would be nice though if they could just tell him one way or the other.

 

Thanks for all your help.

 

Toby

[patrickq1]

find out if they have a skype phone number or voip then it wont cost more than a few pence even from china