HSBC passing debts on.. and on..

katfish81

Hi all..
I wonder if anyone cas help.

I have just payed off my over draft with HSBC and had a few hundred in credit as a result.
I have now seen that they have taken £200 from my account.
On enquiry, i was told that this was against a credit card i had with them..
My husband sent a cheque ( we are in the process of finding out exaclty what happened to this cheque!) For the full owed ammount.. £1600 ish around a yr ago.
I therefore thought it had been payed off and game over..
But, I now find, there has been no payments for 2 yrs according to them.
It was passed to Metropolian Collections and now is in the hands of another agency which may be Allied. But, as i have no record of known corresponcence, wheni call they pass me to a call waiting and then answer phone. I have attempted to conact them all morning to no avail!

Apart from the obvious chech on the.... Cheque that was sent, what is my next move??

dfh

Luckily for you,cheques can be traced.I would wait for the outcome of that before making your next move.

stephane_2

When your husband sent the cheque for £1,600...did you not check that it did reach them. £1600 is a substantial amount and surely you would have noticed if that amount had been taken from your account?

ALIBOBSY

I would wnt to check if the debt was sold on and fully assigned to a debt collection agency in which case HSBC had no right to take £200 out of your account.
If they were using the debt collectors to pursue it, but still maintain ownership then unfortunately most banks have it in the terms and conditions that they can hold one accounts credit against anothers debt (but this only usually happens when you have a mortgage with them which seems to legally tie your accounts together) and surely they should inform you before taking the money.

Have a read over on the debt forums for advice re debt collection agencies. But like you say first stop is the cheque you sent, plus surely you got credit card statements at the time?

May be worth looking at doing a data request to HSBC for all info they hold on you, this may show the sequence of events and prove this is an error on their behalf.

You my need to do a written complaint to HSBC which my have to be passed to the FOS to sort things out in the end, but firstly you need to find out what exactly happened.

good luck
ali x

katfish81

Thank you for the above advice.
I am trying to find out about the cheque still.
Getting information from collection agencies is almost impossible. ow on earth can i ...if i do still owe this... pay anything back when they wont tell me a thing!
grr

katfish81

I have not has a statement from HSBC in over a year also!

never-in-doubt

ALIBOBSY wrote: »

I would wnt to check if the debt was sold on and fully assigned to a debt collection agency in which case HSBC had no right to take £200 out of your account.

Not entirely true because an OC is well within their right to pass details to any third party and as a result they can send the account to an internal DCA without NOA and still remain as the enforcement body. What I mean is that HSBC could ask a DCA to collect the money but not assign it, therefore if the OP paid the DCA this would be unlawful as they are not the legal debt owners as the debt was not properly executed by way of assignment.

However, the way you describe isn't true because HSBC are the OC and as they took the funds, this pretty much confirms the debt was not officially assigned and they are well within their rights to ask someone else to collect, using the HSBC account as the recipient account.

ALIBOBSY wrote: »

If they were using the debt collectors to pursue it, but still maintain ownership then unfortunately most banks have it in the terms and conditions that they can hold one accounts credit against anothers debt (but this only usually happens when you have a mortgage with them which seems to legally tie your accounts together) and surely they should inform you before taking the money.

This is called right to Offset.

katfish81 wrote: »

Hi

OP - what i'd be doing is immediately putting the account into dispute and issuing s.10 cease and desist, whilst investigating the dispute. During this they cannot chase you nor can they add derogatory data with the CRA's. This buys you 28 days to get things sorted at your end.

This isn't so much to do with the FSA - you need to go to the bank that cashed the cheque and get a copy cheque (will cost a tenner or summat) and this will, on the reverse, show what account it was paid into.

If the cheque never was cashed then your hands are tied.

To summarise;

1. Find the bank statment that would show the cheque withdrawal (using dates)
2. Ask the bank for a copy cheque
3. Put the account into dispute and s.10 cease & desist from processing data (click me for details)

Good luck - keep us posted!

p.s
If you need specific help assuming you never paid the cheque, then come over to Sutton Default Thread and we'll sort you the appropriate letters to send to enforce removal of any default etc they may have added.......

Windscreen_Viper

ALIBOBSY wrote: »

<snip> unfortunately most banks have it in the terms and conditions that they can hold one accounts credit against anothers debt (but this only usually happens when you have a mortgage with them which seems to legally tie your accounts together) and surely they should inform you before taking the money.

Er... No, that is the last thing they would do as most people would simply remove the money if given prior warning - they have no requirement to tell you until after the fact, and even they only if they feel like it.

And also, no it does not only happen if you have a mortgage with them - it will happen if you have a debt in one account (of any type) and you have available funds in another, then they have a legal right to offset one against the other - so if as would seem in this case, the credit card is not paid then they will take the funds from an account with a positive balance (or even with available pre arranged overdraft funds)