Elephant in the room

[transformer999]

Re: Elephant in the room

Thats a great help Paul...maybe I could get him to assess Blemain's solicitors costs in my possession claim as they are nearly £10k'ish...the swines...

Going back to templates...I am dealing with a small debt from BG.....have not started a thread as I don't have enough time. Looks like the DCA sent a letter again after they said they would hold all action until I received proof and copy of my bill....still have not received my bill...and they sent me another threatening letter the other day.

I was a bit pissed off and thought I will file and ignore....but thought no!!! I need to reply...so I did by email.... and received this response from the TOSSPOTS yesterday...so must have worked.

This is the email I sent them:

Dear Sirs,

Further to your email dated the 12 November 2012 you advised me that you had requested a copy of the bill and placed the account on hold whilst you were waiting for British Gas. You also advised that I would not receive any further contact from you until then.

Today I have received a letter dated the 30 November 2012 advising you may take further action. I have not received a copy of my the bill from either you or British Gas.

Please explain why you have sent me this letter.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Kind Regards

Their response

Dear T999,

We write in reference to your recent email received 10/12/2012 with this office regarding an account that you hold with our client, British Gas Residential.

We apologise for our administrative error regarding the letter that you have received regarding further action, as this was wrongly sent out after we had responded to your letter concerning your dispute of this account.

We can confirm that we have requested a copy bill for this account from our client.

We have placed your account on hold in the meantime, which will suspend any further action whilst we await their reply.

We will contact you as soon as we receive a response.

Please do not hesitate to contact us on 0844 55 65 440 if you have any further queries regarding your account.


Yours sincerely,

Administration Department.

I have been promised a copy of my bill for over a year now,...the amount is only £150'ish....but I want to see if I owe this or nor first...

[Paul.]

Re: Elephant in the room

costs?

I dont do costs, but Civil and Commercial costs lawyers are the firm i use for all my costs now.

David Jones is excellent, a really good professional and very helpful.

[transformer999]

Re: Elephant in the room

Maybe there should be a template that people can read up in front of the judge if they cock things up with sending templates un-amended to their own personal circumstances? ...as I certainly could do with one with my possession case (only kidding), but yes it is very important people understand and know what they send when they do reply with templates.

As there is no templates helping people who get landed with a costs bill...or worse repossessed.....

[Paul.]

Re: Elephant in the room

Indeed Niddy but horrifically ive seen people send letters with (Insert here) still written on them which shows me that

A) the template hasnt been edited at all

B) the person using the template has no idea about their case

oh and C) it shows the DCA being written to that the writer is a easy pickings and doesnt know what they are on about

[Paul.]

Re: Elephant in the room

Indeed Niddy but horrifically ive seen people send letters with (Insert here) still written on them which shows me that

A) the template hasnt been edited at all

B) the person using the template has no idea about their case

[transformer999]

Re: Elephant in the room

Debt purchasers will litigate without a thought, ive seen this from Arrow Global, Hillesden, and many others.

What is interesting, is that when they are hit with templated letters, they litigate, however, in each of the cases ive dealt with over the last few weeks, the minute the actual proper disputed points were on the table that is where the opponents collapsed and withdrew.

An important point in my humble opinion.

Although what happened to me and OH in our situation, which is much different from CCA debt...was when my OH was made bankrupt and receiving many letters from the trustee...we filed and ignored quite a lot......back then not knowing any better I thought that was the best thing to do......but from bitter and a very expensive experience I now believe and think it is vital that one should not ignore any letters they receive from a lender or creditor.

Reply to them whatever your circumstances are at the time...even if its a few lines but never ignore as the bite you will get in the bum......when the shite hits the fan.....will leave you scarred for years and years IF things go tits up.... as they did for me.

I ended up having to re-mortgage my house which was a capital & repayment mortgage with Abbey National to a sub prime lender GMAC for £40,000.00...and god knows I coulda done with that kinda equity in my property today.

Never mind...whats done is done....and from that I learned never to ignore the letters I was receiving from HSBC when they issued a claim....and touch wood....that claim has been stayed 2 years this month.

[gravytrain]

Re: Elephant in the room

From my point of view the hardest part of writing to a DCA or anyone is the, blank paper syndrome, staring at the piece of paper and wondering how on earth to get your arguments on there in an intelligible form.

This is the beauty of a template, it gets your arguments down in black and white, once you have the bones on paper it is far easier just to tweak the minutia to suit your specific circumstances.

[Never-In-Doubt]

Re: Elephant in the room

Templates are exactly that, within its own name the meaning shouts out - I am only a guide, you must edit me and personalise me to suit!

In a nutshell, cos I can't be arsed reading all this (sorry); I think it's safe to say it's best to try and communicate as best you can without giving the whole game of cards away. So if for example the creditor fails on s.78 plus other things then by all means edit the templates slightly to point out that they have failed in s.78 because of, X & Y and keep Z up your sleeve. Likewise, if you've been hassled, the DN is bad and they've sent the LBA to the wrong person, tell them! Don't spell it out but at least let them know they have done this, that and the other wrong - without correcting it for them - you must bear in mind things can be classed as de minimis and/or rectified so try your best to give them something, but not everything.

Well that's my interpretation of how to play it, I thought that was always clear to users (which does coincide with Paul's point of view) and should be the preferred way to deal with aggressive DCA's and their pet-solicitors.

[Paul.]

Re: Elephant in the room

I think the point is whilst letters like the template's serve a purpose if it doesn't address the point your trying to make then using on its own is redundant.

You wouldn't use the same brush to paint an entire room you would use a roller for the walls and an edging brush for the edges.

I think that is what Pauls blog is trying to get it... You can't respond to everything with just a template letter- you may need to actually throw something else in there otherwise your not addressing the point. (feel free to correct me if I am wrong)

indeed a very good summary

[jen_br]

Re: Elephant in the room

That seems to sum it up very well Jen....

LOl I may not speak British as my first language but I do try

[PriorityOne]

Re: Elephant in the room

I think the point is whilst letters like the template's serve a purpose if it doesn't address the point your trying to make then using on its own is redundant.

You wouldn't use the same brush to paint an entire room you would use a roller for the walls and an edging brush for the edges.

I think that is what Pauls blog is trying to get it... You can't respond to everything with just a template letter- you may need to actually throw something else in there otherwise your not addressing the point. (feel free to correct me if I am wrong)

That seems to sum it up very well Jen....

[jen_br]

Re: Elephant in the room

I think the point is whilst letters like the template's serve a purpose if it doesn't address the point your trying to make then using on its own is redundant.

You wouldn't use the same brush to paint an entire room you would use a roller for the walls and an edging brush for the edges.

I think that is what Pauls blog is trying to get it... You can't respond to everything with just a template letter- you may need to actually throw something else in there otherwise your not addressing the point. (feel free to correct me if I am wrong)

[gravytrain]

Re: Elephant in the room

it still has to be an actual copy of the actual CCA1974 not what it may of looked like surely? otherwise variations over years could deem the constituted copy was nothing like original?

The copy regulations state that an upto date copy of the current T and C's should be provided along with a true copy of the ones applicable at execution of agreement.

[jon1965]

Re: Elephant in the room

it still has to be an actual copy of the actual CCA1974 not what it may of looked like surely? otherwise variations over years could deem the constituted copy was nothing like original?

It has to be a true copy. Big difference

[jon1965]

Re: Elephant in the room

how would that have changed had carey been the defendant though? thats the question

My thought is that when the more likely than not proof is looked at very little.
If i have this right,on the balance of probabilities Emma Carey did sign an agreement although she said she didn't. If the creditor was making the same claim wouldn't the outcome have been the same.
It's not criminal law where beyond all reasonable doubt exists,although i have a sufficed view of criminal law.