credit card payment abd buying investment land /property projects overseas

imran11

Hi,

Could you please advice me on the following before I make my mind of the puschase the land The following question is on assumtion that the desired land and/or property project overseas was misrepresented and didn't get the same development or investment return as projected intially at the time of selling/purchase;

1- Is section 75 consumer credit act is applicable if I have use the credit card to buy a piece of land or a property ABROAD (outside UK) from a company directly or through an agent and paying either directly to the company or to the agent and paying a proportion of payment by using my credit card.

2- I understand that the amount of the above mentioned land or property should be between £100 -30000. Is this still holds true to date or will it cover if the amount is above £ 30000.

Many Thanks.
Imran

jonesMUFCforever

Definite part answer!

If the total price of the land is over £30k then S75 does not cover you in any shape or form.

Back to you on this as we need more information from you.

chattychappy

General answer is NO you will not be covered. Even if YES, it will be very complicated (=costly to litigate on).

Reasons are as follows (no particular order):

1) Misrepresentation. This has a very particular legal definition in UK law. General advertising promises would not be covered. Stuff you could check out for yourself or ought to have known yourself is unlikely to be covered. Certainly anything hedged as a projection is unlikely to be covered. Eg "We expect the land to double in value." If it doesn't - well so what, that wasn't the representation. The only representation was as to the state of the mind of the person(s) making it. Could you prove that the expectation wasn't honestly held?

2) Jurisdictional issues. S75 dates back to 1974, an era when consumer credit meant buying a hoover on HP from a bloke that knocks on your door. Few had credit cards and those that did rarely used them abroad. (In the 1970s, as we know, most foreigners lived in mud huts.) More recently it was decided that S75 does cover transactions carried out overseas - but it is still unclear as to which law to apply when it comes to determining a misrepresentation or breach of contract. Certainly it is unlikely that the UK consumer protection terms would be implied into foreign countries. But what about local rules of misrepresentation? It seems unlikely that S75 would have the effect of imposing UK law on an offshore contract. More likely you would have to establish a misrep/breach according to local law.

3) Specific exclusion. There have been a number of amendments to the CCA1974 which remove land transactions from its protection - see section 16, 16C etc. People have been caught up in a number of land scams and I believe that one way of claiming off the CC has been to hold that the contracts themselves are illegal. Note that you will struggle here if the contract is formed offshore.

4) Agency. In general paying an agent will mean no S75 cover.

thenudeone

jonesMUFCforever wrote: »

If the total price of the land is over £30k then S75 does not cover you in any shape or form.

s75 might not but s75A might.
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1974/39/section/75A

It give similar benefits to s75 on purchases of £30k-c.£60k but with two major differences:

1) it only applies to a linked agreement, i.e. only if the credit was taken out specifically and explicitly for the purchase involved. A CC would never count because it's a general purchasing method.

2) the borrower MUST take steps to recover money from the supplier before the CC company.