Mercers won't accept my offer

garycomputerbloke

Hi

Just wanted quickly to say thanks for the great and informative site, everyone seems to learn a lot and everyone's so friendly.

My problem is quite complex but I will try and make it as brief as possible:

Got into a lot of debt and was paying far to much of it to CC company's, banks for loans etc. So went to the CAB who have been fantastic and have helped me so much with their "Help yourself debt pack" I have even got a certain bank with whom I owe £20k+ to to accept my offer of £16 a month, so has everyone else whom I have owed money to so i'm pretty much sorted...well...almost. I am having big problems with Barclaycard who received the same letter as all of my other creditors but who despite constant phone calls and letters will not accept £16 a month, my account has now been passed to Mercer's who have been a pain in the ar** phoning me at least once a day if not twice, and despite talking to them they have told me that they cannot accept my offer and that it has to be at least 1% of the balance per month which is around £50 - which I don't have spare! The last phone call from them ended with the operator saying that my debt is going to be transferred to yet another company to deal with and that they will only accept the £16 offer if it comes directly from the CAB and not as part of their "Self-help pack" (even though it's been certified by them).

Now as good as the CAB are they advised me that because they were very busy sorting out problems for people who were about to lose their house and who were in debt to several hundreds of thousands of pounds that they were happy to give me a self help pack and to go away and deal with the matter my self (which I was very happy to do). Now however I don't know what to do, despite still paying Barclaycard £16 a month by logging on online and doing so I can't get this debt sorted unless the CAB take the whole matter into their hands which is crazy as all of my other three debtors were happy to accept my original offer.

Any ideas? I feel stupid having to keep taking time off work to bother the CAB and you can see that some people who go visit them really are right up to their neck in it whereas mine is just maybe an inconvenience.

Cheers in advance!

DarkConvict

Mercers are inhouse debt collectors for Barclays, so in reality it hasn't moved yet.

By sorting out the debts like this, is called a self administered-DMP (debt management plan)
National debtline, CCCS and PayPlan (+ other debt charties) will managed the DMP for you for free. If you feel uncomfortable doing a DMP yourself these people will help.

The only thing you can do is keep paying the amount you can actually afford, creditors can take some months beforing saying they will agree.

garycomputerbloke

Hi Darkconvict,

It's not so much that I feel uncomfortable doing a DMP myself, i've already done a pretty good job so far, i'm just annoyed that I cannot shake this particular debt agency off. Mercer's have said that they are only interested in doing a deal with a DMP company or the CAB direct rather than myself - which is crazy considering that I am still offering to pay what I can afford.

Any other advice please, has anyone else had similar dealing with Mercer's that they have been able to sort out, and I wonder who the debt has now been passed to, have been told that whoever it is can accept less that the 1% minimum of the balance.

DarkConvict

Some agencies are like this, i do not know what you can do on that side, maybe one of the other regulars can provide some hints.

Well done for doing the DMP yourself though.

garycomputerbloke

Well I will keep plodding along and see what happens. Thanks for your word of wisdom if anyone else has any ideas then I would love to hear them especially if you have had experiences of Mercers.

Jamesf81

I wouldnt worry to much about their letters. Their job is to get the most out of you they can by using the various scare tactics they seem to use. As long as you are apying what you can afford i wouldnt worry about it.

What would they tell the court if they went for court action? We are making a claim as the creditor is only paying what he can afford? Courts would tell them to stop wasting time.

If they persist in contacting you make a complaint to the OFT and Trading Standards as trying to get a consumer to pay more to a debt than he can afford is against OFT Debt Collection Guidelines.

Just keep up your payments and use their letters for spare toilet paper or something.

Deep_In_Debt

Mercers are complete (insert your own expletive here). They hassled me constantly and even sent a doorstep collector despite me paying them all I could afford.

They will eventually accept, they seem to like to play games for a while.

InDeepDebt

In exactly the same situation with Mercers.

My counter attack is that I'm going to see if the card is legal. Going to send the first letter about enforceability - this puts the card into dispute which, if I'd read things correctly, means that they can't pursue me for the debt until the dispute is sorted.

Every other creditor has accepted a self administered DMP. Some may get nasty in the future though - Lloyds have given 9 months of token payments (£5 on a £15 debt); they have issued a default though. Mercers have just (today) announced to me their intention to issue a default.


Jim

LexieLou

InDeepDebt wrote: »

In exactly the same situation with Mercers.

My counter attack is that I'm going to see if the card is legal. Going to send the first letter about enforceability - this puts the card into dispute which, if I'd read things correctly, means that they can't pursue me for the debt until the dispute is sorted.

Hi,

I had this issue with Barclaycard too, and I also had sent the enforceability letter. Unfortunately Mercers don't seem to recognise this, at all. I ended up having to make a deal where I got one month of debt min payments paid by them and I paid the other 3. I then had to agree to reduced payment each month and they refused to accept my offers in worting or verbally.

I bowled over easily and am only starting to come out the other side now. But if you can go back to CAB and explain that it might not seem like life and death to them in relation to the problems others are having, but it's a huge problem to you.

Hope you get on OK.

I'll be thinking of you.

LLxx

Rainy_2

I have had such a hassle with Barclaycard, Mercers, Power2Contact and some other DCA I forget the name of (obviously made an impact :rotfl:)

I have been trying to pay them for 9 months now and they just will not accept anything lower than their 1% carp or as I have recently found out £5 they will accept through CCCS payment plan.

I too am self administering a DMP and have successfully managed to get agreements at first make token £1 monthly payments (for 5 months) and now a pro-rata split of available income ranging from £3.77 per month and £15 per month with 7 other creditors, all interest free, for the past 4 months.

But not Barclaycarp! The account has just been passed from pillar to post, all my correspondance ignored and is currently back with Barclaycard. I have now resorted to sending them my proposed £5 monthly payments by cheque (which is higher than the pro-rata amount I should really be paying them) and so far, none of them have been cashed. They just do not want my money :rotfl:

If they try to take it any further, they'll struggle to find a leg to stand on as I have a huge folder of all of my sent correspondence (15 letters in total and counting) plus the pile of uncashed cheques that they have signed for that they have chosen not to pay off against my account! It's certainly not from want of trying!

Sorry for the ranting but it frustrates me that we are obviously trying to be responsible debtors and try to pay off whatever we can!

I'll be standing my ground until they accept my money!

REMEMBER you can only pay them what you can afford to pay them.

InDeepDebt

Rainy wrote: »

...

I'll be standing my ground until they accept my money!

REMEMBER you can only pay them what you can afford to pay them.

I've been making my payments, of what I can afford and nowt else, by Internet transfer. Can you not do the same, or maybe make the payment in cash over the counter of Barclays bank or your own bank?

Jim