Help - being messed around by C&G

vicky-lou_2

Bear with me, this is a little complicated, but any advice would be very gratefully received.

I'm trying to buy a new car as my current one has died and I need it to commute to work. I was going to use a 0% credit card to increase my deposit but got unexpectedly turned down so checked my Experian credit report.

The report suggested I had three late payments on my mortgage account which was the first I'd heard of it so I contacted my mortgage company. We've had our tracker mortgage for over 2 years and they said we had been in arrears from the first month although they had never notified us of this. We pay on direct debit and when we set up the first payment the bank details were incorrect (the bank cleverly sent us two account numbers, one of which was incorrect) - as soon as there was a problem with the first payment we phoned them to sort it out and settled the balance over the phone. As it was two years ago I can't remember exactly how we paid but it may have been split between our two cards. They now say they only ever received half of that first payment and the account has therefore been owing approx £550 ever since. We have NEVER been notified of this but C&G say that is because the amount has always been equivalent to less than one month's payment. Until, that is, interests rates fell so much that our payment dropped (briefly) below £550. Then the account registered as having an overdue payment but our direct debit went in the same day and the note was then removed. Apparently this was long enough to show up on our credit ratings but NOT long enough for "their system to generate a letter". So we had no chance to rectify things at any stage and stop it going on our records.

This has been really frustrating and the main things I wondered were:

1) Will a company really let you owe them money for over 2 years without notifying you just because the amount is less than your usual monthly payment?

2) How can a company recognize your account as being arrears for long enough to show on a credit report but not long enough to have the courtesy to inform you of the problem - surely that is unacceptable?

3) Does anyone have any idea how I can get this sorted out quickly so I can just sort out getting a car (the only thing I wanted to do in the first place?

Argh. Rant over. Any thoughts would be very gratefully received.

vicky-lou_2

Thanks, thoroughly helpful. I have never defaulted on any payments (mortgage or otherwise), the original missed payment was due to incorrect direct debit details which we thought had been rectified in full as soon as we were notified of the problem. After phoning C&G to sort it out at no stage we were contacted again to say there had been a problem and the full balance hadn't been cleared. Our mortgage statement did not show that the account was in arrears and when I spoke to them earlier in the week they told me there were no problems with the account.

Sorry if that was supposed to be slightly tounge in cheek but I've had a pretty rubbish day -I'm particularly annoyed as I'm otherwise pretty financially organised hence having something of a sense of humour failure.