Repairing my credit file - possible?

sammy115

As you may know my OH lost his job and was out of work for 12 months. I then lost my job whilst on maternity leave (subsequently won loads of dosh for constructive dismissal but the company had gone into administration so no chance of ever getting the money!). Until then we were well paid but lived beyond our means and ran up debts. Debts that we were paying and had never missed payments until we lost our jobs.

We have struggled and we are now on the road to recovery. I am snowballing my debts, have budgets in place and a long term plan.

Part of this long term plan is to remortgage (currently on IO). Problem is between me and OH we now have 4 defaults.

1. Westcot - for about £2,400 and was for a loan with Barclays. Have paid nothing on this loan since lost my job last year. They have not chased me for the money and I have not rocked the boat.

2. Argos Addition/Shop Direct - I had payment protection on this account and made a claim. It took sterling ins 12 months to pay up, by which time more interest and charges had been applied to the account. The insurance co would only pay the amount outstanding at the time of my claim. Therefore I have a default of £244 - I am currently disputing this with them.

3. La Redoute - got sent to a debt collector (intrum justitia) fairly rapidly when we fell into difficulties. I am currently paying Intrum Justitia £10 per month. This is defaulted at £260.I have asked them for a CCA and a copy of the default on this account

4. Abbey - As my exemployer failed to pay me the day before my DD's were due to go out ALL my DD's failed and we were charged quite heavily. When I then explained the situation to Abbey they very kindly withdrew our overdraft which led to more charges and extortionate interest. When I claimed my charges back Abbey tried every trick in the book including shutting my account, passing it on to their in house debt collectors and threatening me with default. I eventually got my charges back after nine months, but this left me with an outstanding balance of approx £1,500. (How I wish now I had gone for contractual interest - but oh well). Result - default of £1500. I am not currently paying them anything and they have started to chase.

My question is to all you lovely people is - how would you deal with Westcott and Abbey. I haven't currently got the money to ask them for Full and Final settlements which I would be tempted to do if I had the money, but only if they agreed to remove the default.

Has anyone else got defaults removed in any way? I am gutted that after having a spotless record for years that my credit record is in tatters thanks to my ex-employer.

sorry this is so long!

boo2905

Hiya :hello:

I can't really advise you but just wanted to say keep your chin up and you'll sort things out. I'm sure someone will be along shortly to advise you on it all.

S

immoral_angeluk

PErsonally I would write a strongly worded letter of complaint to abbey. They way they acted is appalling!! As for wescot, like you say, I wouldn't rock the boat. Until they start chasing you just leave it. Then when they do contact you go down the usual channels of asking for a CCA etc.

Good luck with everything and hope things start looking up soon!

sammy115

Thanks IA - thing is I want to remortgage in Feb (thats when the redemption penalties are up). A strongly worded letter will be winging its way to Abbey - I have thrown a lot of !!!!!! at them over the last twelve months, but the tribunal started to take up a lot of time and then I kind of went through a bit of a non-fighting slump.. I have to say though your progress has kind of put me to shame a little, but your recent triumphs have given me renewed vigour.

:T

immoral_angeluk

Oh shush you lol.. everyone's situation is different and you have a lot more going for you than we do! You've come back from you both losing your jobs and you own your own home.. something we probbaly won't be able to do for a very long time!

As for the remortgage with the defaults on your file it's going to be hard for you to get a decent mortgage. They'll stay on there for 6 yrs even if they're satisfied so the only way you can limit the damage is to fight to have them removed.

sammy115

Oh well, I may just have stirred up a hornets nest, but it needed dealing with.

I have just rung Wescott who say the debt is no longer with them. It has been passed back to the client. They think!

They are going to see what they can do to either negotiate a settlement in Full and Final and remove the default (some hope!) or try to restart making my normal payments (and remove the default).

Message will be left on answer phone for when I get home. Fingers crossed and like I said lets hope I've not made a massive boo boo!