Letter from Buchanan Clark and Wells

MarieB63

Hi, I received a letter in the post today addressed to my married name (I'm now divorced) entitled Verification Letter.

It says :

Dear Mrs

---

,

We are trying to contact Mrs ....... ........ with regards to a private matter. We have confirmed your address through a credit link obtained via a credit reference agency as being the same person who previously lived at the address above.

We act on behalf of a third party who have instructed us to contact you.

Please contact us on tel: ...... quoting the above reference number and one of our operators will be available to take any relevant details to resolve the matter.

If you believe that you are not our customer, and have no connection with the above referenced client, please contact us as soon as possible on tel....... to enable us to amend our records and remove your address from our file system.

My first assumption was that it was either a phishing letter or perhaps an identity scam to get you to confirm name and address as I know I don't have any outstanding debts. I was going to bin it then decided to mark it 'Not at this address' and put it in a letterbox to return to sender in the hope that they would delete my address from their system.

Having thought some more it occurred to me that perhaps payments I had been making for a household bill when I was married have since been stopped and the only thing I can think of was the Internet account with Tiscali which was in my name.
When I moved out over 3 years ago I transferred the payments from my account to my ex's business account and tried to change the name on the account to him but they wouldn't let me so I told him if he wanted to change provider to ring them and cancel it.
If he has stopped the payments and not told them am I still liable?
This is the only thing I can think of as the letter didn't say who the creditor is.
I'm am getting really stressed out about this now and I am scared about what might happen next.
I would welcome any advice please.:(

fermi

Typical BC&W fishing letter.

If it was me I would probably just wait and see if they write again with actual details of the debt they are chasing.

They may do so soon. Or you may not hear again.

MarieB63

Thank you for responding so quickly firmi.
If it does turn out to be a genuine debt do I have a leg to stand on? (knew I shouldn't have trusted my ex to deal with things properly!) :mad:

anniecave

You're certainly not responsible for the service for a period after you moved out, if you notified them that you were leaving, unless you were still within a contracted period or something similar.

If you think it genuinely could be that, then I would personally phone up Tiscali and ask about the account. Why wouldn't let they transfer the name? (I would think it shouldn't have been a change of name, it should actually have been a closure of one account and service in your name and the opening of another account and commencement of service in his name). If you can prove when you moved out of the property (for example final bill on an another utility/council tax) then you may need to provide that to them and confirm when you made payments up to.

Could it be that ex has now moved out of the property or cancelled the service and there is a small balance which is the difference between a bill and the payments from when you lived there?

Alternatively it may have been a mixup with a final bill and actually it's as simple as the ex needs to pay it and you can just point them back at him.

MarieB63

Thanks for your thoughts anniecave - It's so long ago now I can't remember what was said to whom and when and I no longer have details of the account. I was in the middle of a traumatic separation at the time and faffing about with internet accounts was the last thing on my mind, I just wanted to make sure I wasn't paying for stuff I wasn't using!
If Tiscali are the root cause of this debt enquiry surely they would have tried to contact me themselves so any letters addressed to me at my marital home should have been passed on to me or may have been binned by my ex.
I will wait and see if I get any more letters from BCW and if they identify Tiscali as the source then I will phone them, although it may be possible that Tiscali have sold their debt on to one of these collection sharks in which case I really don't know how to deal with that one!
It's all hypothetical at the moment - I shan't be contacting anyone until I am sure it's genuine!

MarieB63

Yesterday I recived a 'Formal Demand' letter confirming my suspicions - they have been instructed on behalf of Talk Talk Telecom Ltd to recover an overdue debt of £123.53. Not a huge amount of money thankfully but still more than I can afford!
I spoke to TalkTalk customer services yesterday who advised me to write to their correspondance department explaining the situation which I have just done. In my letter I also asked them to take the matter out of BC&W's hands as I refuse to deal with them.
I will keep my fingers crossed in the hope that Talk Talk will let me off but I am still worried about what BC&W will do. I do not want to contact them at all, not even by letter as having read other people's experiences with them I am scared of what they might do. _pale_

sum1cool

MarieB63 wrote: »

Hi, I received a letter in the post today addressed to my married name (I'm now divorced) entitled Verification Letter.

It says :

Dear Mrs

---

,

We are trying to contact Mrs ....... ........ with regards to a private matter. We have confirmed your address through a credit link obtained via a credit reference agency as being the same person who previously lived at the address above.

We act on behalf of a third party who have instructed us to contact you.

Please contact us on tel: ...... quoting the above reference number and one of our operators will be available to take any relevant details to resolve the matter.


If you believe that you are not our customer, and have no connection with the above referenced client, please contact us as soon as possible on tel....... to enable us to amend our records and remove your address from our file system.

My first assumption was that it was either a phishing letter or perhaps an identity scam to get you to confirm name and address as I know I don't have any outstanding debts. I was going to bin it then decided to mark it 'Not at this address' and put it in a letterbox to return to sender in the hope that they would delete my address from their system.

Having thought some more it occurred to me that perhaps payments I had been making for a household bill when I was married have since been stopped and the only thing I can think of was the Internet account with Tiscali which was in my name.
When I moved out over 3 years ago I transferred the payments from my account to my ex's business account and tried to change the name on the account to him but they wouldn't let me so I told him if he wanted to change provider to ring them and cancel it.
If he has stopped the payments and not told them am I still liable?
This is the only thing I can think of as the letter didn't say who the creditor is.
I'm am getting really stressed out about this now and I am scared about what might happen next.
I would welcome any advice please.:(

I believe this company buys bad debts from companies like British Gas. They wrote to me some months ago about a debt they say was mine but in fact it belonged to a lodger who rented my flat.
Although the contract was with the lodger they still sent a letter to me claiming I was responsible. I think this is just a tactic they use for getting the forwarding address and details from you. However after having a heated discussion with them over the phone I ignored the letters they sent to me and they did eventually go away. I later discovered they had given me a bad credit rating which I had to apply to get removed. I think something should be done about this company as they are out of order. Don't let them bully you contact citizens advice.

MarieB63

Before I went away on holiday I wrote a letter to TalkTalk customer services re the outstanding balance on my ex-husband's account. In that letter I asked them to take the matter out of BC&W's hands.
On my return there was another letter from BC&W entitled 'Final Notice' stating that unless payment is made immediately they will recommend that their client commences legal proceedings. Would they really go to all that trouble for £100?
The fact that I am already dealing with TalkTalk directly will hopefully mean that this will not be the case. I sent BC&W an email telling them that I was corresponding with TalkTalk and asking them to revert to their client and to remove me from their case list. I have not received a reply to this yet.
So, the tale goes on...................:mad:

bargainbetty

If you get anything else from BC&W before you get a response from TalkTalk, email them back stating formally that you consider the account to be in dispute and have opened a communication directly with the original creditor. State that until this process is completed, you will consider further correspondence from BC&W to be harassment and will report it to the relevant regulatory authorities and to the creditor they claim to represent.

Good luck

fermi

You are dealing with TalkTalk direct. Ignore any idiotic threats from BC&W. They have no power to do anything. They are irrelevant.

TalkTalk

HI MarieB,

If you tweet us @TalkTalkCare or join the TalkTalk Members Forum we will be happy to provide you with support and assistance regarding this matter.

Regards

Mark
TalkTalk Online Community Department