CCA Request - Littlewoods

Jesthar

Hi Dark,

Basically, accounts opened after 6th April 2007 don't require a manual signature. This is mainly because you can't sign an online application, so the law was changed to accommodate the growing popularity of internet based applications.

You can still make a CCA request in the normal way, yes, but a CCA request does not automatically put an account in dispute itself, only if they can't supply you with true copy of a valid CCA within 12+2 working days.

If you do submit a request and get one back (which is much more likely for recent accounts) your chance of it being invalid are greatly reduced as most companies had tried to get their act together by then and sort out the issues that were letting people off paying. Can't blame them for that really!

You should really contact them and request due to unemployment to go on 'token payments' for a while of £1 a month or whatever greater amount you can reasonably afford, but if you just stopped paying them in the first place you may have negatively affected your chances of them agreeing to this.

And, I know this is going to sound harsh, but as far as Littlewoods are concerned they do NOT know that you are 'good for the money' - as far as they are concerned you are just another account holder who has stopped paying for some reason, and is therefore subject to routine interest and penalties. You have every intention of paying them once you can, but many people who default don't, and they have no way of knowing who is who - and let's face it, as much as we'd like to believe they would just take your word for it, they wouldn't be sensible to do so given how many people promise with no intention of delivering!

You'll also have to accept that stopping adding interest and late fees is entirely at their discretion, as they are within their legal rights to add them - they will be in their terms and conditions you signed up to.

Anyway, as Littlewoods haven't actually done anything wrong here, you really need to try negotiating with them for token payments until you can find new employment. Be polite, stress that you want to pay but can't, plead with them to stop the interest and late fees for a while, and offer them whatever you can afford a month. They may agree, they may not - it's up to them. If they don't, you can always come back here for more advice.

Hope that helps!

~Jes