Any legal eagles here ?

Associate
Joined
8 Apr 2004
Posts
487
Location
OXFORDSHIRE
I've managed to get into debt with a CC, and have been in constant communication with them. So far over the last 3 months i've written 3 letters, and at their request, have sent in an income / expenditure list, which states exactly how much i have spare at the end of the month. They have acknowledged the Exp/Inc list, but say its not enough.

Quite seperately, i;ve been getting phone calls at all hours of the day, including Sundays, from the same company telling me i should pay the outstanding amount, like they have never heard from me.

At the start of all this, i contacted Payplan who help with these matters, unfortunately, they've done very little except give me a link to that Exp/Inc form template which i duly filled out and sent off, as noted above

I have a letter here now, from some bod by the title of " head of pre-litigation " . The threat in the letter states:

Threat 1
" Possible county court Judgement "

Threat 2
"My employer being ordered by the court to make deductions from my meagre wages through an ' attachment of earnings '

Threat 3
" A Bailiff being instructed to recover my goods "

Threat 4

" A charge on my property " ...i dont own a property so i suspect this last one is redundant.

Are all these legal ? And why are they pretending on one hand to review a reduced payment plan ( this was something i asked them in one of my letters, and subsequently, why i sent them the Exp / Inc list they asked for ) and then on the other hand, i get phone calls at work, at home, at weekends, asking why i havent paid all the backlog off ?
 
FIRST THING is do not worry. These letters are intended to sound intimidating - but in most cases their bark is worse than their bite.

this website is your friend

www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk

which debt collection agency is it?

:D

Hi Surf - the debt agency has not been involved yet. All the comms. / letters / phone calls have been with MBNA who issued the CC
 
[ slight offtopic, ignore if you want ]

Huh ?
You get thretened when debt? Really ?
My dad is always 1000 euro's in debt with Visa and about 300 on 2 other normall accounts, and I don't recall him talking about any concequences, it's still within his debt limit ( 2500€ for Visa iirc, and 500€ on the bank (maestro) accounts.

Being an inexperienced teenager, do you really get fines/threats if you go below the 0.00 mark ?

You get threatened if you tell them you can no longer pay the debt. I dont blame them, cos i borrowed their money, and then i lost my job, and couldnt pay the monthly payments. I then got another job, but its so poorly paid i still cant make the payments. They dont like this sort of thing, so all they are doing is trying to get their money back - but they are not being particularly helpful
 
Thing is, i've already listed an Income and Expenditure, and this is something they asked for when i sent them a letter asking for interest to be stopped, and i will pay off the outstanding loan with what i have left after essential outgoings.
I cannot afford anymore, so asking another body like the CAB for a plan wont help me much, because i'm already paying what i can afford

PS i've been paying them that amount since the start of this.
 
Thank you everybody. All advice noted :)

I dont mind CCJ's. They dont kill ya !

I didnt like the Bailliff bit or the employer threat though.
 
Thanks again people.

Ok, since i first knew i was going to be in trouble, i contacted them by letter, and it was ignored. I wrote again, was ignored. There were phone calls etc.

To put it in a nutshell, as soon as this all started way back a couple of months, i've been paying exactly what i told them i could afford, backed up by an Inc / Exp. form i sent them. I have listed all essential outgoings. Its not much of a monthly payment ( £5 ) but i've kept this up throughout from the beginning and havent missed any of those small payments. I also asked them to correspond only be letter, but they simply ignored it, and still are.

Soon, i will be changing phones, then they wont have any choice but to write.

Oh by the way, that letter i got today with the 4 threats posted above, says that if i dont phone them within 7 days, the procedures above are open to them to persue

Anyways - thanks all for diving in here with your advice.
 
Strangely , i already have a letter from them stating all interest has been stopped. Then, as if nothing has ever been said, i get phone calls saying i'm behind with my monthly payments, they want it brought up to date etc etc. Its as if one dept. is not talking to the other dept.

And then letters telling me to call or we'll blah blah blah ...as in the letter above with the threats stated.

Maybe i should just ignore the calls and letters, because i'll only have to repeat everything yet again, and as i;m paying them monthly on a reduced payment, as stated in the Inc/Exp form exactly what i can afford, i dont see what there is to talk about anymore.

All this to-ing and fro-ing is merely to get me to pay more. Its like i have a car that maxes out at 80, and they insist that it should do 90
 
I phoned them again and asked ( again ) for contact to be made by letter. Also, going to take some advice from the good folk here and try one of the proper help bodies mentioned. Or all of em !
 
Back
Top Bottom