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Rossendales Debt Collection Company

2

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  • hollydays
    hollydays Posts: 19,812
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    The technique of threatening to take personal photos etc is not a tactic used just by Rossendales,and it is used to put maximum pressure on you to pay up.I am not saying this is right,but it could be seen as one way of doing a job to get results.THere is no doubt there are some horrendous bailiff companies out there and they must make a bad situation 100 times worse.
    I have never found myself in that situation,but people do,and sometimes through job loss or sickness,we shouldn't be too harsh.
  • hollydays wrote: »
    The technique of threatening to take personal photos etc is not a tactic used just by Rossendales,and it is used to put maximum pressure on you to pay up.I am not saying this is right,but it could be seen as one way of doing a job to get results.THere is no doubt there are some horrendous bailiff companies out there and they must make a bad situation 100 times worse.
    I have never found myself in that situation,but people do,and sometimes through job loss or sickness,we shouldn't be too harsh.

    Rossendales appear to be acting merely in the capacity of a debt collection agency, not a court-appointed bailiff.
    "You were only supposed to blow the bl**dy doors off!!"
  • Anyone else had any dealings with them?
    No, as I pay my council tax by direct debit. I would expect my council to go after those amongst us who do not pay the regressive tax though.
  • Thanks to hollydays and other posters here for the voice of reason.

    Paying Council Tax is a "there-but-for-the-grace-of-God-go-I" situation, so those who do shouldn't necessarily feel morally superior to those who don't, because amongst those who don't are many, many who can't.

    Yet they're caught up in a cycle of viciousness that the holier-than-thou would much prefer not to acknowledge. So here are a few reminders:

    * A client in Warwickshire had council tax arrears going back six years. The client was unemployed due to injury and depression and was unable to deal with financial matters. He had a liability order which had been passed to the bailiffs for collection. The bailiffs called and took his entire fortnight’s benefit, less £4. As a result the client could not pay other essential bills including electricity, gas and water or buy food. The client was extremely distressed and attempted suicide.

    and:

    * A client in Surrey was a lone parent, who prior to separating from her partner, had got into arrears on two council tax accounts. After separating, the client was making payments to the bailiffs but they were denying receipt of these. While trying to sort out the problem by sending the bailiffs copies of her bank statements, she stopped all payments. The bailiffs then added £168 to each account as an ‘attendance fee’. They also phoned the client to say that if she did not pay them £200 by Friday, they would take her into custody and “’tough luck” if no-one was there to look after her children (she recorded the call).

    and:

    A West Midlands client had given up his job to care for his terminally ill wife. As a result he fell into debt. He was on income support and deductions were being made to pay off his council tax arrears. He was moved from income support to jobseekers allowance. He queried whether the deductions would be continued and he was assured that they would. However, when he contacted the jobseekers allowance office, they said that they could only make deductions if the local authority requested it directly. The local authority refused to do this so the debt was passed to the bailiffs.

    and:


    * A client in Sussex was in receipt of means-tested benefits with council tax arrears. Although the client had been trying to make arrangements with the council to pay off their arrears, the council insisted that they had to wait for the case to go to court before they would come to an arrangement. This would add further costs to the client’s arrears and meanwhile the arrears would continue to accumulate.

    All the above are actual Citizens Advice Bureaux case histories.

    The picture they paint is of a situation infinitely less acceptable in any Society which calls itself civilised than any non-payment of the iniquitous tax.

    I pay it, because that's the Law, and in an ideal world it would be great if everyone else did -- though don't let anyone make the mistake of thinking that if the collection rate was 100%, Council Tax would go down because it wouldn't: local Councils would quickly figure out a way to recruit yet more £20,000-a year Anti Smoking Enforcement officers on final salary pensions in a taxpayer-funded Local Authority pension scheme now running into £billions.

    Moral of the story: if you're fortunate enough to be able to keep up with your Council Tax payments, then lucky you. If you're not, then contact CAB immediately otherwise you'll find yourself no longer living where you think you are, but out in Stalinist Russia circa 1948.
  • Thanks to hollydays and other posters here for the voice of reason.

    Paying Council Tax is a "there-but-for-the-grace-of-God-go-I" situation, so those who do shouldn't necessarily feel morally superior to those who don't, because amongst those who don't are many, many who can't.

    Yet they're caught up in a cycle of viciousness that the holier-than-thou would much prefer not to acknowledge. So here are a few reminders:

    * A client in Warwickshire had council tax arrears going back six years. The client was unemployed due to injury and depression and was unable to deal with financial matters. He had a liability order which had been passed to the bailiffs for collection. The bailiffs called and took his entire fortnight’s benefit, less £4. As a result the client could not pay other essential bills including electricity, gas and water or buy food. The client was extremely distressed and attempted suicide.

    and:

    * A client in Surrey was a lone parent, who prior to separating from her partner, had got into arrears on two council tax accounts. After separating, the client was making payments to the bailiffs but they were denying receipt of these. While trying to sort out the problem by sending the bailiffs copies of her bank statements, she stopped all payments. The bailiffs then added £168 to each account as an ‘attendance fee’. They also phoned the client to say that if she did not pay them £200 by Friday, they would take her into custody and “’tough luck” if no-one was there to look after her children (she recorded the call).

    and:

    A West Midlands client had given up his job to care for his terminally ill wife. As a result he fell into debt. He was on income support and deductions were being made to pay off his council tax arrears. He was moved from income support to jobseekers allowance. He queried whether the deductions would be continued and he was assured that they would. However, when he contacted the jobseekers allowance office, they said that they could only make deductions if the local authority requested it directly. The local authority refused to do this so the debt was passed to the bailiffs.

    and:


    * A client in Sussex was in receipt of means-tested benefits with council tax arrears. Although the client had been trying to make arrangements with the council to pay off their arrears, the council insisted that they had to wait for the case to go to court before they would come to an arrangement. This would add further costs to the client’s arrears and meanwhile the arrears would continue to accumulate.

    All the above are actual Citizens Advice Bureaux case histories.

    The picture they paint is of a situation infinitely less acceptable in any Society which calls itself civilised than any non-payment of the iniquitous tax.

    I pay it, because that's the Law, and in an ideal world it would be great if everyone else did -- though don't let anyone make the mistake of thinking that if the collection rate was 100%, Council Tax would go down because it wouldn't: local Councils would quickly figure out a way to recruit yet more £20,000-a year Anti Smoking Enforcement officers on final salary pensions in a taxpayer-funded Local Authority pension scheme now running into £billions.

    Moral of the story: if you're fortunate enough to be able to keep up with your Council Tax payments, then lucky you. If you're not, then contact CAB immediately otherwise you'll find yourself no longer living where you think you are, but out in Stalinist Russia circa 1948.

    Bailiffs are appointed by a court, not by local councils.
    Neither Bailiffs nor a Debt Collector can take anyone into custody for failing to pay a debt - there are no such things as "Debtors' Prisons" anymore, and there hasn't been for the best part of 140 years.
    "You were only supposed to blow the bl**dy doors off!!"
  • maninthestreet: well, you mknow that, I know that, and so do many others.

    Including the bailiffs whose telephone call was recorded by the distraught woman who they threatened to take into custody.

    And who are now, thanks to that woman's wisdom in recording the threat, and CAB's intervention, are no longer in business.

    But if you think other bailiffs in other places at other times won't resort to similar fictions as part of strong-arm threats, think again.

    NB: the quotes I cited are exactly that -- no words of mine are in any of the texts. You can find further case histories by visiting CAB online.
  • I have just agreed to pay Rossendales 10 pounds per week. I owe them 250.
    I would like to pay them over the phone but i am scared to give my bank details in case they take the full amount even if i only instruct them to take the agreed amount of 10 pounds. Are they likely to do something like this?
  • SteelyDan wrote: »
    I have just agreed to pay Rossendales 10 pounds per week. I owe them 250.
    I would like to pay them over the phone but i am scared to give my bank details in case they take the full amount even if i only instruct them to take the agreed amount of 10 pounds. Are they likely to do something like this?

    Phone them up and ask them to send you some paying in slips, that way you can pay at the bank and you will have the counterfoil so that you can prove you've paid
  • Pay your council tax on time like everyone else and these companies wont bother you, its really easy.
    You have nothing to complain about, if you choose not to pay your council tax then tough

    You, are a complete plonka :mad:
  • Bart
    Bart Posts: 40 Forumite
    You, are a complete plonka :mad:

    Well said:T I became disabled 7 years ago, as a result we went on benefits, to cut a long story short my incapacity benefit went up £12 a month thus giveing us too much money:rotfl: The result was they stopped our income support and housing/ poll tax benefit. We were told a month later when the rent and poll tax were not being payed. It came as a shock as I also had to pay for my prescriptions @ £50 a time.
    Just out of curiosity which would you pay? poll tax or prescription for pain killers etc?
    NOT every case is so black and white.
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