Restons Solicitors/CCJ advice

SunSeaSand

Hello,

I'm just after a little bit of advice.

I have a credit card debt of around £3800 from HSBC which was sold to Marlin Europe.
Long story short my mum was diagnosed as terminally ill and with a lot on my mind I ended up making duplicate payments of £10 per month to both HSBC and Marlin, I then ended up canceling the wrong one and was subsequently taken to court by Restons Solicitors on behalf of Marlin. I was given a CCJ and ordered to pay £50 per month which I cannot afford. I have since asked the court for a redetermination (to pay £5/£10 per month) as at the end of the month I am left with around £10,

I received a particularly unpleasant letter from Restons stating that as I had Sky TV (18 month contract at £55 per month, already reduced due to cost) and my living expenses were what they considered too high (£100 per month for food, toiletries, birthdays, petrol, vet bills, medication etc.) that they would not budge and they wanted their £50 per month which I absolutely cannot afford.

Do they have any right to dictate my outgoings, and are they seriously suggesting I break my contract with Sky in order to pay them? Potentially another default/CCJ!

I didn't think they were able to do this? Myself and my adult son both suffer from depression and rarely leave the house other than for work purposes, Sky TV is essentially the only entertainment we have.

I am very worried that they would be able to tap my wages or send bailiffs/sheriffs! What are my rights, would it go back to court before Restons can act, and what can they do, and indeed not do? What power can the court grant them if I am offering what I can afford?!

Arleen

You should post a complete SOA here. Without it, we are not able to comment on whether their claims are okay. On top of that, it will allow the great people here to point out some great savings opportunities .

As for sky, if you cannot pay your actual debts then it seems sensible to break the contract as you cannot afford it and it is a luxury. It will likely result in another default on your account, although write them informing that you are breaking the contract immediately as you cannot afford it anymore. You can attach your income and expenditure, and if you write it well, they may just cut you some slack. In the end, it would cost them more to reclaim money for those remaining months than it's worth.

But the defaults should be a very low priority concern for you as they don't hurt your day-to-day life, focus on getting your finances back on track instead.

As for alternative entertainment, you can get books from libraries, or get an aerial antenna. Heck, a cheap internet connection will allow you to watch online content on all the electronic devices you have. Or you could go half-zies with a neighbor on his wifi. Or maybe some outdoor entertainment could help, depending on where you live, parks are great this time of year. There are many alternatives, though they will not be as nice, well, it's only temporary setback while you get everything back on track .

fatbelly

The whole point of a redetermination is that the court decides the level of payment.

If you cannot afford to pay the debt in a reasonable timescale, and £50 x 76 is about as far as 'reasonable' stretches, then the court usually issues a 'forthwith' judgement, i.e. pay the lot in one go.

Both the court and the claimant know that you are unlikely to do this but a defaulted judgement means they can look at the other options:

• Charging order
• attachment to earnings
• third party debt order
• warrant of control - as a credit card is a consumer credit act debt they must use the court bailiff; they cannot escalate this to High Court Enforcement Officers (which is what I think you mean by sheriffs)
• bankruptcy

I agree a soa will show us your options.

sourcrates

The link to the SOA calculator is here :

http://www.stoozing.com/calculator/soa.php

National_Debtline

Hi all

fatbelly wrote: »

The whole point of a redetermination is that the court decides the level of payment.

If you cannot afford to pay the debt in a reasonable timescale, and £50 x 76 is about as far as 'reasonable' stretches, then the court usually issues a 'forthwith' judgement, i.e. pay the lot in one go.

Both the court and the claimant know that you are unlikely to do this but a defaulted judgement means they can look at the other options:

• Charging order
• attachment to earnings
• third party debt order
• warrant of control - as a credit card is a consumer credit act debt they must use the court bailiff; they cannot escalate this to High Court Enforcement Officers (which is what I think you mean by sheriffs)
• bankruptcy

I agree a soa will show us your options.

At the risk of splitting hairs, Restons wouldn't have the option of making SunSeaSand bankrupt as the debt is below £5K. Not that they would be very likely to consider it even if they could.


OP - are you still waiting to hear back about your redetermination request?


If you can post your SOA, great. Even right now, though, Restons' querying of your £100 groceries figure does not strike me as very reasonable, but then again their sole aim is recouping that debt over the shortest period possible.


Dennis
@natdebtline

sourcrates

SunSeaSand wrote: »

.

Do they have any right to dictate my outgoings, and are they seriously suggesting I break my contract with Sky in order to pay them? Potentially another default/CCJ!

I didn't think they were able to do this? Myself and my adult son both suffer from depression and rarely leave the house other than for work purposes, Sky TV is essentially the only entertainment we have.

I am very worried that they would be able to tap my wages or send bailiffs/sheriffs! What are my rights, would it go back to court before Restons can act, and what can they do, and indeed not do? What power can the court grant them if I am offering what I can afford?!

They have the legal options that Fatbelly listed above (except Bankruptcy, you can forget that).

So lets break that down, they can use any or all of those options, but each stage costs them more money, and if they cant recoup that from you, its unlikely they will escalate it much further.

They can attempt to dictate what ever they like to you, in the same vein you have the option to ignore them.
As Dennis said, they are just looking to collect this money as quickly as possibly, they have a reputation for been awkward, thats why its best practice to deal with them in writing only, stay off the phone to them in the future.