MacKenzie Hall

hbslc

Sorry a long one:
In mid May I sent the following letter to the infamous MacKenzie Hall:
Disputed amount outstanding
I acknowledge no debt to your company nor to Black Horse. As advised repeatedly I have referred my dispute with Black Horse to the Financial Services Ombudsman. I understand that the Office of Fair Trading requires that Debt Collection Activity will not be carried out where it has been informed, in writing, that there is reasonable cause to believe that the debt is in dispute. If you continue to carry out Debt Collection Activity I shall pass this onto the Office of Fair Trading.
Authority
Black Horse have not forwarded a letter of authority to me, to advise me that you are authorised to act on their behalf. I shall not communicate with you in any way until I receive a letter of authority from Black Horse.
Telephone Harrassment
You have repeatedly telephoned me, dispute me previously informing Black Horse and repeatedly informing you that all communications should be in writing. I deem the quantity and frequency of telephone calls that I have received from your company to be personally harassing. This is further exacerbated by the behaviour and threatening nature of your callers. I have noted your repeated attempts to contact me by telephone and these have been duly logged by date and time.
You are reminded of the following under The Administration of Justice Act 1970.
Section 40 of the act provides that a person commits an offence if, with the object of coercing another person to pay money claimed from the other as a debt due under contract, he or she:
(a) harasses the other with demands for payment which by their frequency, or the manner or occasion of their making, or any accompanying threat or publicity are calculated to subject him or his family or household to alarm, distress or humiliation;
(b) falsely represents, in relation to the money claimed, that criminal proceedings lie for failure to pay it;
(c) falsely represent themselves to be authorized in some official capacity to claim or enforce payment;
(d) utters a document falsely represented by him to have some official character or purporting to have some official character which he knows it has not.

I am of the view that your harassment of me by telephone puts you in breach of Section 40 of the Administration of Justice Act 1970, and the Protection from Harassment Act 1997.

If you continue to harass me by telephone, you will also be in breach of the Communications Act (2003) s.127 and I will report you to OFCOM, Trading Standards and The Office of Fair Trading, meaning that you will be liable to a substantial fine.
Therefore, please note my address above. I now require all further correspondence from your company to be made in writing only to this address. Please be advised that I will only communicate with you in writing.
Be further advised that any further telephone calls from your company may be recorded.
Visits
Furthermore, should it be your intention to arrange a “doorstep call”, please be advised that under OFT rules, you can only visit me at my home if you make an appointment and I have no wish to make an appointment with you.

There is only an implied license under English Common Law for people to be able to visit me on my property without express permission; the postman and people asking for directions etc (Armstrong v. Sheppard and Short Ltd [1959] 2 Q.B. per Lord Evershed M.R.). Therefore, take note that I revoke license under Common Law for you, or your representatives to visit me at my property and if you do so without my permission, you will be liable to damages for a tort of trespass and action will be taken, including but not limited to, police attendance. You would also be conspiring in a trespass if you sent someone to visit me nevertheless.

There response was dated early June, and:
Final Response
Further to your letter dated XXX, the contents of which have been noted.
I can confirm that Mackenzie Hall has fully completed our internal investigation and I am in a position to further clarify the following:
First and foremost I find it prudent at this stage to confirm that Mackenzie Hall have received no prior correspondence from you since our assignation on XXX.
We have not been made aware of any dispute and despite the contents of your letter the details of the dispute have not been provided and I cannot consider that “reasonable cause” has been shown to us.
All telephone numbers have now been removed from your account, however we reserve the right to reintroduce these numbers into our system at a later date should the account remain unpaid and details of your alleged dispute not be forthcoming. We would not consider this process as falling foul of the administration of justice act 1970, or similar statute, as we are contacting you in a legitimate manner for a legitimate reason and if our initial calls have been been answered there would have been no need for further communication.
In regards to a doorstep visit I can only assume that you refer to section 2.12 (f) which prohibits the use of a ‘doorstep’ visit when an account is disputed or deadlocked. I would once again refer you to ‘reasonable cause’ and ask you to provide full details of the dispute.
I would like to think action the I have taken and the decision I have made will be to your satisfaction. However, if you remain unhappy with my reply I am enclosing a leaflet about the FOS. Should you choose to contact them, you will need to do so within six months from the date of this letter, enclosing a copy of my response, which they will need for their investigation.
Yours, Compliance Manager
Black Horse are aware of the dispute and IMHO shouldn't have passed this onto any DCA. So, is it okay to not respond to MacKenzie Hall, and to just forward it straight onto FOS and OFT?

Thanks

PNPSUKNET

Why not just tell them what the dispute is also by recorded del, then they cant say they have not been told. If the fos is involved already tell your case handler

magpiecottage

You can go to FOS - make sure you specify which of parts the OFT Guidance and/or the Credit Services Agency Code of Practice you consider to have been breached and why.

Para 4q of the CSA Code seems relevant here as do paras 2.6h, 2.8i and 2.8k of the OFT guidance.

The adjudicator may not appreciate this - if necessary force it to an Ombudsman.

hbslc

Thanks again. What do you mean by "The adjudicator may not appreciate this - if necessary force it to an Ombudsman."

PNPSUKNET

you say in your signature proud to be dealing with your debts, every post seems to be disputting them

Mikeone

Talking of signatures, PNPSUKNET, in yours you say: If you lend money pay it back.

Surely you mean 'if you borrow money...?'

PNPSUKNET

very true, I also have If you build a debt, take it by the horns and pay it off

magpiecottage

hbslc wrote: »

Thanks again. What do you mean by "The adjudicator may not appreciate this - if necessary force it to an Ombudsman."

Sorry - not picked up on this before.

The Financial Ombudsman Service engages contractors as adjudicators, rather than employees.

Generally they are not very good - seeing that an applicant has been an adjudicator at FOS on a CV is normally a reason why I would NOT want to interview them.

They are also subject to targets for cases so they look at things superficially.

But if either side disagrees with an adjudicator it gets looked at by an Ombudsman - who hopefully has a better idea!

Devils_Avocado

Mackenzie Hall are total, absolute bounders and chancers!

Years back - in 1993 - I was in dispute with Marks & Spencer over an unpaid CC of around £1100.

I'd taken out the loan as an employed sales manager and M & S talked me into taking out PPI with Cornhill Insurance.

I later became self-employed and then became unemployed, so I asked Cornhill to pay the debt under their PPI scheme. They said no, as I had become self-employed for a while, I couldn't then become unemployed, even though they were still taking my regular PPI payments.

Eventually, M & S took me to County Court. I hung in there and won the case. End of story - so I thought!

In 2009 - 16 years later! - Mackenzie Hall started to telephone and write to me, hassling me for the money. They took not a blind bit of notice of my written responses about 6 year limits, my having won the case, etc.

They were just phariseeaical. Dumb, dense, totally, totally stupid. In the end I decided not to humour or appease them in any way, recalling that such behaviour only makes an aggressor more aggressive.

I just stopped communicating with them totally and waited to see if they'd try on a CCJ. They didn't of course.

Mike

bottleofred

Hi,

Continue to deal with these bunch of idiotic, !!!!!! numpties in writing as I've found them to be aggressive, rude and have the inability to understand even the most basic request!

Good luck in getting sorted out

hbslc

Okay, an update.

An FOS adjudicator has been appointed and my dispute with Black Horse has a case reference. I have notified MacKenzie Hall of this. Yet they continue to send threatening letters to me, and have instructed Meritforce to make an AUTHORISED COLLECTOR VISIT who have also left me voicemails. This is despite me previously notifying MacKenzie Hall not to contact me by telephone and that I have no wish to arrange a doorstep visit.

Who is in breach of the OFT guidelines? Black Horse, MacKenzie Hall, or Meritforce - OR all three?