Who to approach about an old debt

bravobeastie

This may be a long post so my apologies. Also details are sketchy as it was a long time ago but I will do my best...

When I was 16 (mid 90's) a boyfriend convinced me to add my name to his bank account, effectively making it a joint account. These were the days when you could pay for your shopping with cheques as commonly as using a debit card today.

Anyway, between us both we managed to go into the overdraft and more or less overnight the bank (i can't even remember which one it was now) doubled the charges and froze the account meaning we owed about £1000 or thereabouts.

I wasn't too far off my 18th and working so as soon as I could I took out a loan from Barclays and cleared the debt with the other bank and closed the account.

Now, the loan I took with Barclays (1997) had ppi on it. By this time the boyfriend was long gone and I added to the loan after a car accident. I made payments exactly as I should have done then in 2000 I became pregnant. I was quite ill with the pregnancy and carried on working as long as I could until I was offered voluntary redundancy which I took. I contacted Barclays and found out the illness I was suffering with wasn't covered as it was due to me being pregnant. Long story short I defaulted on payments and the debt was sold to CCS

Since 2001 I have been paying £5 a month and had no contact from CCS. They seemed quite happy with the arrangement, so was I. I contacted them though a year or so ago to inform them of a change of address and they were wonderful. Still no request for increased payments either.

Summer of last year I had a letter from another debt company (i can't remember the name of them) saying they had bought the debt from CCS and requested an income expenditure form. During one phone call I asked for a copy of the credit agreement for my own records and the next thing I knew they sent me another letter saying they were happy to continue accepting £5 per month (i hadn't even sent in my income/expenditure form at this time)

I can't even remember now the original amount of the debt before it was sold, Barclays have no details of me or the debt and after looking on my credit report (which had a score of 754 - Fair) there is no record of Barclays or any default etc

I would like to know how much of the debt is left and how much i've paid off and whether I could claim back any of the ppi which i am assuming would be difficult if not impossible due to the age of the loan.

I don't want to cease payments to the debt company as it's taken me quite a while to get my credit report to something I think is pretty decent but just not sure where to start.

Hope that all makes sense and I haven't bored you all too much

Thank you in advance for any help/advice

fermi

Factsheet here on how to get information on the agreement

https://www.nationaldebtline.org/EW/factsheets/Pages/39%20EW%20Credit%20agreements%20-%20getting%20information/Default.aspx

Sublinks of the above.

• What rights to information do I have ?
• Which letter should I use?
• What kind of information should they send me?
• What can I do if I do not get the information I have asked for?
• What if the creditor has sold the debt to another company?
• If the creditor does not reply to your Data Protection Act request
• Useful contacts
• Information about your agreement under the Consumer Credit Act sample letter
• Information about instalments still to pay under a credit agreement sample letter
• Personal information under the Data Protection Act sample letter

sourcrates

So its not on your credit file, and the bank cant trace the account, and you still want to pay it ?
You should make a CCA request to Barclays, and, once they have confirmed they cant find your credit agreement, thats it, you are no longer obligated to pay them.

Makes no sense paying an old debt such as this, if they no longer hold the correct paperwork.

The down side is you probebley wont be able to reclaim the PPI if the agreement is no longer available.