Letter from debt collector saying I owe £1000 debt and they want £250 admin fees?

dekaspace

Whats the legality of that? its apparantly a BT account but the thing is I have had an BT account for 4 years and still have it and am paid up, the address given is for a property I have lived in, so I assume someone has done a con, reason being is that the name is slightly incorrect i.e if my name was John Smith, so J Smith it came addressed to something like Jason Smith which leads me to assume that someone got hold of a letter that arrived after I moved out and only had my first name as an initial so guessed the name.

The company rang my mobile also earlier but the line was silent and after about 30 seconds died.

fermi

Have you confirmed with BT that you owe nothing from that address? I know that sounds a 'given', but it would be handy to be able to refer to that.

If the account is not in your name and was for a period when you had left the property, then the DCA hasn't got a leg to stand on.

Have you returned the letter saying that they have the wrong person?

ItMightBeUsefulOneDay

dekaspace wrote: »

the name is slightly incorrect

If it's really as big as John --> Jason and not John to Johne then that's not slightly: That's vintage DCA phishing.

Don't speak to them on the phone. Just hang up.

If they don't know your first name they have the wrong person. The debt is not yours. Send it back with "not known at this address". If they persist in phoning you there's a letter you can send which tells them to only communicate in writing (the template is around here somewhere, I'll see if I can find it). I'd adapt it slightly to say, "I am not Jason Smith" and sign it digitally J Smith (so they still don't know your real first name)

dekaspace

ItMightBeUsefulOneDay wrote: »

If it's really as big as John --> Jason and not John to Johne then that's not slightly: That's vintage DCA phishing.

Don't speak to them on the phone. Just hang up.

If they don't know your first name they have the wrong person. The debt is not yours. Send it back with "not known at this address". If they persist in phoning you there's a letter you can send which tells them to only communicate in writing (the template is around here somewhere, I'll see if I can find it). I'd adapt it slightly to say, "I am not Jason Smith" and sign it digitally J Smith (so they still don't know your real first name)

fermi wrote: »

Have you confirmed with BT that you owe nothing from that address? I know that sounds a 'given', but it would be handy to be able to refer to that.

If the account is not in your name and was for a period when you had left the property, then the DCA hasn't got a leg to stand on.

Have you returned the letter saying that they have the wrong person?

I have a surname which isnt that common, in fact I have only ever come across one other family ever with the same surname(and the father of family had same first name of my dad! weird!) and since the address given for the debt is one I have lived at within the last year its likely someone got credit in my name, happened to me around beginning of this year too, in a similar case, I lived in a property before and over 2 years later recieved council tax and utility bills saying I owed thousands on each and that I still lived there.

Some nasty greedy people about these days!

I havent rung debt collectors yet as bound to get accused of lying and getting unhelpful people on the line which is why I was checking what to say first.

I reckon its as I say, a letter probably arrived after I left with my initial but not my name and the new tenant took a guess at name.

I cant owe BT debt since each time I move house the account is transferred too.

FTW

Sounds like they're phishing - hoping that someone with the same name bites, panics, and starts paying. If it's not yours and it's in the wrong name, ignore.