Credit Card account re-opened after 5 years

steam_dan

My wife's Halifax Credit Card was reopened 5 years after it was closed after a recurring payment for £35 she had forgotten about was requested. As we have married since then and moved address we had not received any correspondence from the Halifax about this. We only found out about it after receiving several mysterious phone calls from the Halifax, who failed to explain the situation when my wife advised them that she did not hold a Halifax Credit Card. Eventually, someone at the Halifax put two and two together, by cross-referencing to my wife's Halifax Bank Account and sent correspondence to her. If that's what you can call a card that says "A representative of the Halifax will be visiting you to discuss your account on..." with no mention of the Halifax Credit Card. My wife only found out what had happened after she rang the number on the card, and discovered that due to non-payment the debt had grown to £150.
After much disappointment from the Halifax, they eventually agreed to write off the penalty payments if my wife agreed to pay the £35. After further wrangling we got the Halifax to remove the adverse credit that they had recorded on her Credit History.
My question is this:
Was the Halifax within their rights to honour this request for payment over 5 years after the Credit Card account had been closed?

Galstonian

Quite possibly they were, however, under the circumstances I would have hoped they would have declined the payment and let the requesting merchant work out where the problem is. A continuous payment authority can only be ended by the merchant, it is exactly what it says - a continuous payment authority. I would be tempted to launch an official dispute over the £35 charge. Did you receive whatever goods or services you were supposed to? If not then the card issuer is jointly liable.

In future if you want to cancel a CPA you should do that with the merchant, request written confirmation. If there is any problem with this you should write to the merchant to cancel and copy this letter to your credit card issuer instructing them that the agreement has been revoked and should no longer be honoured. If payment is taken then dispute it.

steam_dan

The payment was for a Cardsafe policy from M&S. When my wife notified them of the situation they cancelled the policy and gave a partial refund leaving my wife to pay the balance of £15. Under the circumstances, my wife accepts partial responsibility so she was happy to pay this.