Not yet BR but I need help with neighbour issue...

affluenza

I haven't posted for a while and as yet I haven't been able to get together sufficient resources to go bankrupt. I have no entitlements to any benefits or assistance as I am self employed. As I have not had a contract in 2 months, my only means of living is to sell off my belongings on Ebay but even that is apparently too much to define me as being in need of financial support! So I have actively been seeking a permanent job.

Now I have an issue with my neighbours - some creditors have taken to sending my mail to my neighbours, they have also begun to make calls and they have sent people.

My creditors were advised some time ago that I do not live at my neighbours' address yet they persist in contacting them. My neighbours are now beginning to withold my mail (addressed to me personally BUT at their address) and are opening it - and what concerns me is that several letters have been written in such a way as to reveal my details and to encourage WHOEVER reads it to contact the collections agency.

It may seem strange but it is quite obvious from one particular letter that it is designed to cause dissent between a debtor and their neighbours and to cause maximum humiliation and embarrassment.

Unfortunately this particular set of neighbours are less than friendly and talk too much (for example when I met a new neighbour it appeared that they already knew what I did for a living and that I had some financial issues!) Just to add that when I first met the neighbours who are witholding and opening mail, they were friendly to me but did not have a good word to say about anybody in the flat complex where we live and that made me wary.

Although I do not care that people know I am financially circling the drain, they are not fully appraised of the fact that my debts are the result of my marriage and subsequent divorce and dispite what people think women do not necessarily get off lightly (especially when they were high earners and owned their own property).

So, I need to disassociate my neigbours again which I thought had been successful, need to find a way of ensuring they know that they stop witholding mail (they have been keeping it since 11 June and opening it), and write a letter which will once and for all make it crystal clear that I do not live at that address.

I would like to think that my neighbours have been doing this with the best of intentions to try and resolve the mail misdirection themselves but since one of the letters is from the 11th of June and yesterday was the first time that we got to speak (or rather I spoke, she yelled and I had to speak with her husband who is slightly less volatile) I suspect that she is doing it maliciously and he is doing it out of stupidity.

Ultimately if I am not aware of a situation which I thought had been resolved as I receive all my other collections type letters to my correct address, I can not resolve it.

I hope all of this makes sense and that someone has some constructive advice.

Holes_in_my_pocket

openning other peoples mail is actually illegal you could get the police involved

k2nga

Holes has a very good point there plus i would contact these companies.

I think you should go down and see the CAB i think you will find that even if you are self employed without work you should be able to claim benefits especially if you have now decided to seek full time employment as this would then make you a jobseeker. Also take along the details of the companies who are doing these letters as the CAB will write to them on your behalf and that should help and also CAB have a legal team who might be able to help as well as often these companies will do what they want if they are left unchallenged.

skylight

Your neighbours now know everything, you don't like them so why worry about it? Its actually your neighbours problem (getting mail/calls/visitors etc that have nothing to do with them) - they should be sorting it out. You've done what you can by notifying the creditors.

So why worry about it? Is it only creditors that are writing there? Nothing important is going there? Your OR will contact you at your address when the time comes.

Horrid neighbours would mean no help from me.



OOooo. I'm in a sod it mood today.

affluenza

Skylight - I appreciate that I could leave it however it does also make me wonder if any of my other correctly addressed mail has been witheld, namely ones that relate to job applications - because the letter for the interview I had yesterday was only received late last week and it had been posted locally about 2 weeks prior.

The postman has been made aware of this before, as it has been ongoing since I moved here, but it has resurfaced recently so my thoughts are that they are selling on debts without updating the details.

skylight

If the creditors have the wrong address then thats one thing your neighbours need to sort out.

But the interview letter would have been addressed correctly as you would have given them the correct address on your application/CV?? So thats a post office issue. If the postman has already been made aware then you need to make a complaint to the local sorting office. It could just be a slow postal service thats taking so long for your mail to get to you. We have a great postie until he goes off on holiday or is sick. It can be days before we get anything then.

Could you get a PO box address and you collect the mail - at least stuff to your address won't go missing.

affluenza

Hello - quick update on this saga...

I have found out the Post Office's position on this - it is against the law to interfere in the DELIVERY of mail by a Post Office worker.

They deem a letter as posted when it goes to an address NOT a name.

Apparently it a moral thing as to whether or not the neighbours open mail or forward it on although the majority of people will write "return to sender".

They are still playing silly b*ggers but my sorting office are now aware of my issues and are returning to sender rather than delivering to Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee.

fiveyearplan

I think the P O Box is a good idea. I've looked into it myself for other reasons.

debt_doctor

Hi,

If you are / were self employed and now have no income then you are entitled to income based JSA, council tax benefit, housing benefit (if you rent) or mortgage interest payments after 13 weeks, free prescriptions, exempt from court fee's etc.

You need to sign on asap. Also when in work you may be able to receive some of the above plus tax credits if you meet the criteria.

DD

affluenza

debt doctor - that was not what I was advised, I was actually given quite short shrift that as I was still looking for contract work I couldn't therefore be classified as unemployed "otherwise all freelancers would be signing on!".

I was told that because I was getting some money coming in from my Ebay sales that it would count as income. I don't get this at all, because I was looking for work, I was using my Ebay money to job hunt. The way it was all presented to me was "you are self employed - you have to prove that you are unemployed".

I can't really go and sign on now because I start my new job on Monday, would there be any point. You know I could have really done with help with the rent, because now I am in arears and I need to scrape together what I am selling on Ebay to just make up the shortfall.

Thank you at least I know if it all goes pearshaped with my new work I would be entitled to something.

Newbie06

Affluenza,

This is slightly off track from you post, but I recently discovered I was entitled to Working Tax Credits despite being in a full time job and having no dependants... I am also aware of a friend who is self employed and recieved this benefit - so it may be worth you looking into it if you haven't already...

Sorry, if you have already been down this route...