Help regarding a debt collector

[CREATIVE!11]

So since you used to chase people for energy bills or whatever,

How do I get off the radar then? best moves to avoid paying a bill I don't owe as previous housemate didn't cough up his share.

I just can't be bothered to pay it was gonna just move and leave it.

Advice OP? (Semi serious)

 

[Ilikeitblackplease]

So since you used to chase people for energy bills or whatever,

How do I get off the radar then? best moves to avoid paying a bill I don't owe as previous housemate didn't cough up his share.

I just can't be bothered to pay it was gonna just move and leave it.

Advice OP? (Semi serious)

don't sign up for the local council voting, when registering with companies miss a letter in your name or do not give them you date of birth as it is not a requirement, they can set up a password for you instead.

 

[Haggisman]

So since you used to chase people for energy bills or whatever,

How do I get off the radar then? best moves to avoid paying a bill I don't owe as previous housemate didn't cough up his share.

I just can't be bothered to pay it was gonna just move and leave it.

Advice OP? (Semi serious)

Not sure how you come to the conclusion that you don't owe it? If the bill was in your/joint names then you owe it, simple as that.

 

[shoes]

So since you used to chase people for energy bills or whatever,

How do I get off the radar then? best moves to avoid paying a bill I don't owe as previous housemate didn't cough up his share.

I just can't be bothered to pay it was gonna just move and leave it.

Advice OP? (Semi serious)

Lol no I wasn't a debt collector. I used to investigate personal injury insurance fraud. The more cute claimants usually had one address listed for the insurance company but lived at another, the point being that if a surveillance exercise was undertaken then the 'target' would be their brother/cousin/tenant etc. We had limited access to some superb tools from equifax which allowed you to follow where people had registered their services to.

For example, if we knew you had a mobile phone registered at 123 anystreet and it showed up on your credit history, we could then ask the system to show us where this person of this name, dob, previous address, credit agreement etc. is now and it will literally spit out a name and address which was 99 time out of 100 accurate and up to date.

Bearing in mind the financial industries have full access to these tools, and legally we could only access a fraction of them, it's amazing debt collectors take so long to collect debt.

To answer your question, you don't want to be off the radar man. Electoral roll, landline number, credit agreements (non defaulted), traceable history etc. all add to your chances of getting credit, including mortgages.

If the bill you are trying to avoid is in your name then short of never changing the address on your car insurance/phone/ISP/bank (!!!) etc. then no, you can't disappear to the best of my knowledge.

There are other tools available too which are quite intrusive, although the only time I got to play with them was at the equifax training session. When we got back to the office the number of service modules available to us was severely limited compared to the training session.

 

[CREATIVE!11]

don't sign up for the local council voting, when registering with companies miss a letter in your name or do not give them you date of birth as it is not a requirement, they can set up a password for you instead.

Oh yeah never give date or birth out unless you really have too or fake it.

It's big one people never remember. Especially when putting stuff on internet etc....

 

[CREATIVE!11]

Lol no I wasn't a debt collector. I used to investigate personal injury insurance fraud. The more cute claimants usually had one address listed for the insurance company but lived at another, the point being that if a surveillance exercise was undertaken then the 'target' would be their brother/cousin/tenant etc. We had limited access to some superb tools from equifax which allowed you to follow where people had registered their services to.

For example, if we knew you had a mobile phone registered at 123 anystreet and it showed up on your credit history, we could then ask the system to show us where this person of this name, dob, previous address, credit agreement etc. is now and it will literally spit out a name and address which was 99 time out of 100 accurate and up to date.

Bearing in mind the financial industries have full access to these tools, and legally we could only access a fraction of them, it's amazing debt collectors take so long to collect debt.

To answer your question, you don't want to be off the radar man. Electoral roll, landline number, credit agreements (non defaulted), traceable history etc. all add to your chances of getting credit, including mortgages.

If the bill you are trying to avoid is in your name then short of never changing the address on your car insurance/phone/ISP/bank (!!!) etc. then no, you can't disappear to the best of my knowledge.

There are other tools available too which are quite intrusive, although the only time I got to play with them was at the equifax training session. When we got back to the office the number of service modules available to us was severely limited compared to the training session.

Interesting, always intriguing to hear how stuff goes on behind the scenes. Like you said if they have access to all this stuff how they aren't quicker god knows.

 

[Rroff]

Seems to be happening a lot lately - I know of 2 people (one of them a relative) who are being hassled by debt collectors over 5+ year old phone contracts with t-mobile that they are sure were all completeld and paid up properly.

 

[div0]

He has told me to just ignore it, although I'd sooner send the letter mentioned earlier in the thread and know that they have stopped chasing me.

Firstly, I'm only going from memory here, so I will reiterate my earlier posts.

It is great for people to post helpful template letters, but you'd be much better off visiting the sites that they have been taken from, such as ConsumerAction, or MoneySavingExpert. There you will be able to read up on the various situations that they apply to.

Now in layman's terms, the original letter was sent to you to try and establish that you are the owner of a particular debt.

You were under no obligation to phone them, and indeed are under no obligation to reply to any of their letters (at this point). If it did go as far as court action, then obviously you would then have to start taking things seriously, but at the moment they're just 'fishing' for information.

So you can ignore them, but the will continue to harass you via phone and letter. Their correspondence will likely get more and more threatening, but ultimately will (likely) be hollow threats.

Or, you can reply and state your rights (of which you have many).

Firstly, they need to establish that you are the 'owner' of the debt. If they can't do this, then they shouldn't be pursuing you - you're under no obligation to help them. There are template letters about this on the sites I've already mentioned.

Secondly, they need to prove that a 'valid' debt does exist. To do this they should be able to provide a copy of the original agreement. Again, there is advice and template letters relating to this on the forums already mentioned.

Finally, I'd point out that the above advice is just from my memory of being in a similar situation. I sent a template letter (taken from MSE, or ConsumerActionGroup) and they immediately replied and agreed that they would drop the matter and cease correspondence.

So as I've said, letters such as the one posted by Mejinks are good - but there is so much information available, that you really are best reading up on a specialised forum. There's actually been a lot of good advice posted here by various people (as well as some not so good), but if you want to get these people off your back, I really would advise an hour or so on the specialised forums that have already been mentioned.

If you do decide to send a letter, I'd advise getting it checked over, either on here, or better still on ConsumerActionGroup, or MSE forums.

 

[Westyfield2]

Do you have any proof to provide them that the 02 contract had been cancelled properly without debt?

Edit: just noticed the part where you mention the lack of documents.

You're boned.

I recently left O2. I was about three years past the end date of an 18 month contract, and was on a rolling 30day SIM only deal. I never used to get any paper bills or anything.

To leave I requested my PAC, and then used it (to move the number to EE) a couple of days later. I never formally cancelled with O2, but as expected after the number migrated to EE my O2 SIM died. The next month’s O2 bill was as normal, and then they stopped taking any money by the direct debit. After a couple of months I cancelled the direct debit at my end.

I've never received any documents or anything.

 

[shoes]

My step dad changed from O2 back to orange not long ago and kept his number, I'll ask him whether he had to quit the contract in writing or just verbally followed by a PAC request.

 

[mattyfez]

Right I have spoken to my boss who used to be a debt collector. His take on this is as follows:

The debt most likely does exist but probably only through an error at their end. The people who contacted me take on written off debt and offer the client a small percentage of it (bearing in mind it's already written off) if they can get paid. They then work on the basis that for every 1000 letters they send out they hope that a handful of people will be scared into just paying up. And that is where they make their money.

He has told me to just ignore it, although I'd sooner send the letter mentioned earlier in the thread and know that they have stopped chasing me.

Exactly this, enter into no communication, they dont even know your name as it stands.

 

[Skii]

It is highly likely that the debt is Statute Barred, this means that if no one chases you and no CCJ is awarderd against you after a period of 6 years the debt is subject to the 1980 Limitations Act.

Mackenzie Hall rely on people being unaware of this, they buy lots of written off debt from finance companies and threaten all sorts of nasty stuff.

Feel free to contact them, but Do not acknowledge the debt, claim the 1980 Limitations Act and tel them politely that any further attempts will be a waste of theirs, and your time.

Simples.