CCJ Issued by Council regarding rental property

davidmcn · 19 February 2018 at 3:53PM

pinklady21 wrote: »

To try and find out what the Council were up to:
You can request the entire file from the Council under Freedom of Information legislation. In theory, you should then be sent all the documentation they have, held on file and on their computer systems.
They will probably have a central department that deals with FOI requests, phone them up or google their website to find out more.
you can get more info on the Information Commissioner website.

Why an FOI request? Surely the information required will be exempt as personal to the OP's dad's account? He'd be better with a data subject access request.

jayu619 · 19 February 2018 at 7:00PM

Hi All -

Dad sent an email this morning to the council legal officer stating that a cheque was made to satisfy the debt.

But he questioned the figures quoted by the legal officer and collections officer - both were completely different.

And he also asked why legal correspondence was being sent to his rental property when the council had his correspondence address which they passed onto their solicitors. She literally replied back saying she will confirm once the payment has come through.

Did not even address his question about where the legal paperwork were being sent. Do they have something to hide? Dad replied pointing out that she 'forgot' to address his question and that he'd be taking the matter further by going court, exhausting their complaints procedure and/or Local Authority Ombudsman. Awaiting her reply.

Thanks,
Jay

BorisThomson · 19 February 2018 at 7:05PM

jayu619 wrote: »

Hi All -

I sent an email this morning to the council legal officer stating that a cheque was made to satisfy the debt.

But I questioned the figures quoted by the legal officer and collections officer - both were completely different.

And I also asked why legal correspondence was being sent to my rental property when the council had my correspondence address which they passed onto their solicitors. She literally replied back saying she will confirm once the payment has come through.

Did not even address my question about where the legal paperwork were being sent. Do they have something to hide? I replied pointing out that she 'forgot' to address my question and that I'd be taking the matter further by going court, exhausting their complaints procedure and/or Local Authority Ombudsman. Awaiting her reply.

Thanks,
Jay

You or dad? Make up your mind!

jayu619 · 19 February 2018 at 7:08PM

pinklady21 wrote: »

To try and find out what the Council were up to:
You can request the entire file from the Council under Freedom of Information legislation. In theory, you should then be sent all the documentation they have, held on file and on their computer systems.
They will probably have a central department that deals with FOI requests, phone them up or google their website to find out more.
you can get more info on the Information Commissioner website.

For the Bank:
You can make a similar request to your Dad's bank. This is a Subject Data Access request, and he can ask the bank for their full file on his account. Again, this might throw up info about when and why the SO info was changed.

Both processes will take a few weeks and you and your dad will then have to spend some time going through the data they send you to see if it there is any evidence of who may have been at fault.

Once you know that, you can then write to them and ask for an appropriate amount of compensation.
If they refuse, go to either the Local Authority Ombudsman or the Financial Services Ombudsman with your complaint and see if they take it up.
Alternatively you could appoint a solicitor and take it to court. But you will still need to provide evidence that supports your claim.
Best of luck.

Hi PinkLady -

Thank you for your reply.
My dad spoke to the bank, person handling his complaint - he investigated the issue and found that a previous SO was cancelled and a new one made in Aug 2016, start of the period of arrears and to which CCJ relates to. But he was not able to provide any more info. The only other thing he suggested was that, possibly council sent a mandate for my dad to sign - and that mandate didn't include the reference to change over to new SC beneficiary account. Or if it did include the mandate, then the bank clearly are at fault for not setting up new SO with correct reference. The bank person said this was very unlikely but worth asking the council to check and/or provide.

Dad is thinking of doing it through FOI? Any advice would be helpful.
It sounds like again, council are trying to wash their hands off the issue.

Thanks,
Jay

jayu619 · 19 February 2018 at 7:09PM

BorisThomson wrote: »

You or dad? Make up your mind!

Haha dad - I edited the post but you have replied before I edited. Sorry. I am so used to using this to write as 'myself'

tealady · 19 February 2018 at 8:27PM

Hi
Have you thought about speaking to your local councillor(s). They may be able to help.
From what I understand (and I could be wrong) to involve the Ombudsman you have to have gone through the Councils complaints proceedure 1st.

jayu619 · 19 February 2018 at 10:35PM

tealady wrote: »

Hi
Have you thought about speaking to your local councillor(s). They may be able to help.
From what I understand (and I could be wrong) to involve the Ombudsman you have to have gone through the Councils complaints proceedure 1st.

Hi,
Thank you for that and yes you are right, the council internal procedure will have to be exhausted before going to Ombudsman. I will be helping my dad do exactly that.
Thank you,

D_M_E · 19 February 2018 at 11:58PM

There is another aspect to consider in all this:

Presumably the CCJ, which has now been paid in full, and which includes the so called "missing" payments - which the council now acknowledge they have recieved and allocated to the correct account, but what has happened to the iriginal payments? Have they been refunded?

If not, why not?

jayu619 · 20 February 2018 at 12:08AM

D_M_E wrote: »

There is another aspect to consider in all this:

Presumably the CCJ, which has now been paid in full, and which includes the so called "missing" payments - which the council now acknowledge they have recieved and allocated to the correct account, but what has happened to the iriginal payments? Have they been refunded?

If not, why not?

Hi D_M_E

I had a look over my dads email correspondence, the collections officer - after doing his investigation found the 5 payments that were being made but not attributed to his SC account. But they have since credited my dads account with those 5 payments in question to reduce SC in 2017/18.

He sent an email to the legal officer and collections officer asking about why legal correspondence was not sent to his actual home address (as legal officer blatantly ignored it). And he subsequently sent an email some moments ago asking for any sort of mandate that the council may have sent...

My dad is adamant that he had not been to the bank to cancel previous standing order and make a new one. After speaking to the bank, thy suggested a possible explanation could be that a standing order mandate was sent which he signed.

thanks

bazzyb · 20 February 2018 at 12:19AM

This seems to be overcomplicated. The solution seems to me very simple - he needs to apply to the court to have the judgment set aside. As he can evidence that the correspondence was sent to the wrong address, this will be sufficient to get it set aside.

Once set aside, he can put in a defence stating that he had made the payments and can detail the dates they were made etc. The council will then not succeed in getting a new judgment against him.

The only part I don't understand is that if he had already made the payments by standing order, why did he then also send them a cheque for settlement - has he paid twice?

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CCJ Issued by Council regarding rental property

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