County Court Summons

paleblue_1

Hi all,

This is my first post, so please bear with me.

Today I have received a notification of court summons by Mortimer Clark Solicitors for a Cabot Financial Services debt.

This dates originally from 2003, when I took out a car finance with Online Finance, via our old friends, Carcraft.

Due to losing my job etc etc, I defaulted on the original loan, however contacted them to arrange a repayment of the arrears and to set up a new direct debit,which the provisionally accepted, pending a visit from one of their agents. I dutifully agreed to meeting them (August 2004), and stayed at home all day awaiting their arrival.

They never turned up, I made several phone calls, to try and pay by debit card over the phone, which was refused, this went on for a number of months, into early 2005, when out of the blue, I received a letter stating they were coming to repo the car. I agreed that they might as well, and was assured sale price (full market value) would be deducted from the debt.

Role on about 6 weeks, I get notification that they sold the car for £1500! (at the time, I calculated full market value to be in the region of £5700, a 2001, Renault Megane, 1.6i, 5 door with all the trimmmings), purchase price including interest being around £10300, of which I had paid approx £3000, when the car was repo'd.

Roll to 2005 when I got a debt letter for £7300, the original debt, including interest less what I had paid, but not deducting the sale price, which I had tried to dispute, but all correspondence was ignored.

I set up a debt management plan, and paid for about a year, when I was made redundant, and ended up cancelling it because the firm I was with were useless.

Roll to today, 8 years later and I receive this court notification.

Please note that I have also moved house approx 8-10 times in this period, and have NEVER acknowledged or responded to any debt collection notices for this debt.

The court papers state that Cabot bought the debt on the 30/09/2008, the court papers issued on the 26/09/2014, 4 days short of 6 years from when they say they purchased the debt.

I know that I was getting letters to various addresses from as early as 2005 from Cabot, usually forwarded by previous landlords, or collected from previous addresses in person, but always ignored, and never acknowledged.

I need some serious and urgent help in compiling the defense, and help in getting this won in my favour, but haven't got long to do it in, 14 days.

I regret I have no longer got any documentation regarding the vehicle, sale etc due to house moves etc.

Please help me!!!

Lensman_2

It looks to me like this is statute barred for the (more than) 6 years between you stopping the debt management plan and now. Once it is statute barred it cannot be unbarred. Them buying it does not affect the clock. Only you paying or acknowledging it in writing does that.

However, if they get a CCJ by default it will create a new debt in law that will not be SB so you will need to defend and be absolutely compliant with the deadlines.

Have you actually got a claim form from a court with a court stamp on it? Or just a letter from them?

Your dates are wrong too. They cannot have dated it 26/9/14. That is next month.

You have 14 days to acknowledge service. I think you then have a further 28 days to submit your defence.

Although there are experts here, this is not a dedicated legal forum. You will get faster responses from Legal Beagles or the Financial Legal Issues Forum on CAG. I think you should post up there.

paleblue_1

Yes it is from Northampton County Court, dated 26.08.2014.
They say they purchased the debt on 30.09.2008, which I am sure is wrong.

matttye

paleblue_1 wrote: »

Yes it is from Northampton County Court, dated 26.08.2014.
They say they purchased the debt on 30.09.2008, which I am sure is wrong.

Don't worry about when they purchased it, just focus on the important points.

You raise a defence that the statute of limitations won't allow them to claim because more than 6 years has passed since you last paid or acknowledged the debt in writing.

When they bought the debt is of no concern to you or the court.

sourcrates

As said above, your full defence should be that :


"under the Limitation act 1980, section 5, the alleged debt is statute barred".


Please adhere to the timescales of the court.

longtermplanner

This is exactly why debts become statute-barred: after all this time you no longer have the relevant paperwork!

paleblue_1

Bump.

Full wording for defence if any one can help, I am getting advise from CAG too, although they are suggesting I request CPR and CCA from Mortimer Clarke Solicitors. I have done the AOP on the Court website requesting 28 days to prep defense but would rather get this sorted sooner rather than later

Marktheshark

You don't need the CCA, they do.
File a defence of statute bared, you should include a signed + dated statement of truth with the defence that you have made no payment or acknowledgement of the debt since 2005 which is 9+ years and request a individual hearing.
Also request in the defence £90 expenses be awarded for bringing a claim to which they had no standing to bring due to statute of limitation act and state that a competent firm that deals in these matters will be aware of the limitations act and therefore have caused you this unnecessary expense in bringing a claim with little chance of success.


Any solicitor of sound mind would withdraw the claim to save the expenses.

Lensman_2

CAG are suggesting you get started on a backup defence in case it turns out that a rogue or random payment appears on the account that scuppers your statute barred argument.

Unless you have submitted a SAR, got the history of payments and communication on the account and can 100% see that there is a period of 6 years with no payment or acknowledgement, a simple SB defence carries risk.

A CCA and CPR request are not much effort to do and may well give you a backup defence if SB fails.

fatbelly

Good advice here, though you must acknowledge service within 14 days of service, and this extends the period to submit your defence to 28 days from service.

If all you have by this time is a statute barred defence then you must lodge it, or you will get a judgement in default.

I'd be surprised if their solicitors give you anything in this timescale