crumbling with phone calls

money_penny_26

hello everybody this is col i havent posted for a while usually i leave this to penny,however she is upset this morning so gone for a coffee with her pal. i would like to know the procedure for the handling of creditors by phone who after only 2 weeks of none payment are hounding us every day from 8_30 am.i did think that they would not be ringing untill at least the first missed monthly payment.we were told by cccs to answer the phone an to just put them off,by saying we would pay next month e.t.c.however these days they seem to be a bit more on the ball so to speak.a man from sky card rang this morning an was quite threatening to penny.it was on loud speaker an he had a robotic voice an just kept repeating an saying "penny you have promised to pay ,an if not i will be calling you again".in the end i just took the phone from her an put it down.my wife was upset an intimidated.so i just want to know what can they actually do within 8 weeks we have untill we are at court.already booked.an should we not answer the phone or would that make it worse. thankyou so much i just need to keep penny focused. regards col

fatou256

you have few thing at your disposal :

- tell them you are taking advise from CCCS , national debtline or the CAB and you will get back to them in due time
- unplug the phone .
- change your phone number
- play silly game with them on the phone until you are BR ( if it i s the road you are on ) they will get the message pretty soon

i know how hard and distressing these phone call can be but believe it will get easier in time ! good luck

fatou256

you can also follow this advise

http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/debt-collection-industry/99376-telephone-harassment-action-plan.html

dack_2

Hi Col,

Am going through the same myself, though been in arrears a few months now. The phonecalls are relentless! Many are automated calls, if you pick up the phone there's a click and the line goes dead. I believe this is a machine calling to see if you are in becasue if I answer it I will often get a call off a real person immediately afterwards.

I have tried answering them but it really does no good. If you can offer only token £1 payments they are only interested in intimidating you and trying to get you to pay off an amount (you no doubt cannot afford) using a debit card or another CC. I personally would suggest ignoring the calls completely, answering them only ever leads to more bad feeling, and a possibility of you being 'forced' into making a payment that you can't afford.

I tried answering once a month or so to try and placate the creditors, stay in touch so to speak, but it did nothing to improve my situation. I am now ignoring all calls I receive where I do not recognise a phone number (callerID) as a friend or other expected caller.

If your court date is two months away I don't believe you will have any problem with your creditors taking any action. I've been in default almost four months and the most that has happened is I've received default notices and had two CC accounts terminated (closed) - BIG DEAL! Don't want them no anyway Gl with it all.

dack

chinupchuck

I'm trying to save up the money to file for BR and every time I get a phone call that's what I tell them. They usually leave it a week or so before getting back to me after that. I find some of them really intimidating, they can be so harsh on the phone and I often find myself crying down the phone to them.
The worst ones are my bank's debt management team (smile/co-op bank) as they have three different call centres one for loan one for visa CC and one for current account and i get calls daily from them as neither seems to have any contact with the other and don't seem to read the notes on the account which should say that I've told them I'm filing for BR and can't pay them anything.
With most of them telling them I'm saving/filing for BR works and they leave me alone for a short while.
Good luck with it and don't let the phone calls get you down.

money_penny_26

thanks for your replys it looks like the best thing to do is just not answer it.i just thought this was the way to put their back up more.however when you do answer the phone thats the one that gets the back up for both partys concerned.

headoutofsand

You shouldn't really tell the creditors about you're impending BR as this sends them into a frenzy of activity. Tell them nothing, just do it.

For anyone else contemplating BR who is reading this, DON'T TELL THEM

FinancesOfAFiveYearOld

chinupchuck wrote: »

...
The worst ones are my bank's debt management team (smile/co-op bank) as they have three different call centres one for loan one for visa CC and one for current account and i get calls daily from them as neither seems to have any contact with the other and don't seem to read the notes on the account which should say that I've told them I'm filing for BR and can't pay them anything. ...

Co-op/smile were far and away the worst for me too. They called early morning, late in the evening and various times in-between. None of them ever admitted or acknowledged that anyone from the Co-op/smile had rung before (even minutes previously). They were also far more aggressive than anyone else.

Calls from other creditors I fielded seriously, I owed them money and they were only doing a job. With the rather relentless Co-op/smile however I lost patience and started playing games. If each call centre had rung once (or even twice) and accepted the BR details then fine, but no - call after call. So I started to play.

Go through the security questions and then tell them that you're actually dead and ask them how they got your number in Hell. Tell them they have a great voice and ask what they're wearing (the blokes especially get flustered at that question). One of my favourites was to ask them to hold on for a second while you switch off the cooker and then to put the phone into a drawer and check on it an hour or so later. I kept one bloke hanging on speaker phone for twenty minutes while I continued reading a good book.

If after the first couple of polite calls they persist then they're fair game. Use them to maintain your own sanity, not theirs.

That said, if it's upsetting the Lady Missus then don't answer, screen calls with caller ID, complain in writing and consider changing your number. Tell 'em the calls constitute harrassment and that you've made an official complaint to the OR.

You owe these people money, not your sanity or your happiness...

money_penny_26

what is a default notice is it the start of court proceedings then an have we got enough time untill we go to court to declare b.r.what exactly can they do within our time limit of 8 weeks i thought we were stronger than this regards col

LOUISE22_2

I changed my phone number. It was the best thing I did!

dack_2

money_penny_26 wrote: »

what is a default notice is it the start of court proceedings then an have we got enough time untill we go to court to declare b.r.what exactly can they do within our time limit of 8 weeks i thought we were stronger than this regards col

Just replied via PM Col