What happens when I cant pay?

Iwanttobefree

Oddly, Wife received an email from Moorcroft today saying her Vanquis account has been passed over to them.

By far the most irritating at the moment is link.

Sent link an explanation of why we could no longer pay when we sent all the others creditors the same.

Was totally ignored and hassled for non payment.

Sent a followup containing all the original documentation along with GP report.

Received more letters complaining we hadn't paid and zero notification of letters.

Sent an email politely explaining we had sent the info twice, and also cc'd it to their complaints department.

Today got a letter from Links complaints department not upholding our complaint (and completely ignoring what our complaint was), but they did say, quote:

"As you mention a vulnerability , I am happy to forward our account to our specialist support team for further review, however this would be dependent on the basis that you are able to supply medical documents and a completed budget account"

Which have both already been sent and was why I cc'd it to the complaints department in the first place.
I kind of think it's down to pure luck whether the person reading it has any common sense at all

I suspect with regards to Vanquis, it's luck of the draw, 10 different people could look at the same scenario, 3 decide to sell on the debt, 3 decide to write it off, and 4 decide to issue a default and keep hassling you.

I also received a strange letter from Link, addressed to my house, with my surname on but a completely unknown first name, and a debt that had zero to do with me. I emailed them a copy of it on 24th May to tell them I think they have made a mistake, zero acknowledgement.

fatbelly

I'm afraid you're scraping the barrel when you deal with Link.

I never thought I'd say this but Lowell are now one of the better creditors to get a sympathetic hearing from.

Iwanttobefree

Intrum have replied refusing my request to write it off.

They have asked me to give the following information.

(The statement of affairs was done by the CAB online site as was the letter asking them to write it off, didn't speak to them in person)

We understand that you completed your financial statement with the assistance of North East Derbyshire Citizens Advice Bureau. We note that from your financial statement, you are in a deficit of £60.16 per month. So we can fully understand your circumstances, we would kindly ask you to confirm what financial advice your local Citizens Advice Bureau provided you.

Please confirm the following information:

1) If a creditor was unable to accept you request for closure, what have you been advised to do?

2) If you have been advised to offer a token repayment, please confirm this would be the case with your account.

3) Have your local Citizens advice Bureau informed you of any insolvency options?

Please be advised your account was passed to us from J D Wiliams as a non-defaulted account and we continued to report on your credit file as such. When a payment is missed arrears occur and these are usually reported on your credit file. Once arrears reach four months worth of payments, in this case £4.00, then a default notice is issued. If the arrears are not paid within the required time, a default mark is placed on your credit file for this account.

As a business we have reviewed this process and due to your health we have taken the decision not to report any further arrears on your credit file. This means that while the account is with us in the Customer Care team, we will report any payments made but the status of the account will be shown as unknown. Should we look to pass your account to another department where arrears will be reported we will lwt you know and explain the impact on your credit file.

Once we have received the above information, we will be able to review your circumstances and discuss alternative options for you.

The account will remain on hold for 30 days .........

Any advice on how to respond is greatly appreciated.

Many thanks

Iwanttobefree

I know you guys are busy, but a quick bump as I want to get back to them and don't know what to say.

Many thanks

sourcrates

Iwanttobefree wrote: »

I know you guys are busy, but a quick bump as I want to get back to them and don't know what to say.

Many thanks

1) If a creditor was unable to accept your request for closure, what have you been advised to do ?

Answer : Ask the creditor to write off the debt again.


2) If you have been advised to offer a token repayment, please confirm this would be the case with your account.

Answer : My budget is in deficit each month, no payments are possible.


3) Have your local Citizens advice Bureau informed you of any insolvency options?

Answer : The only insolvency option for my circumstances would be an IVA, but with no disposable income, this is not possible.




See if Fatbelly agrees with me before you reply to them.

fatbelly

Yes, I agree with the above.

fatbelly

Iwanttobefree wrote: »

Vanquis have just emailed me to let me know they've written off my £2,262 debt and are sending me a cheque to for £20 to cover the medical report.

Which helps my stress levels immensely. Hopefully they will reply along similar lines with regards to my wife's account with them (as both were sent identical information with the exception that mine also had the invoice for the medical report they requested).

This is a long thread now. Am I right that Vanquis and Capital One have written off substantial debts?

When you write to Intrum or Link or whoever it does no harm to let them know that (and send the proof if they request it).

They are under pressure from the FCA to treat debtors sympathetically and it seems, in comparison to others, they are not doing.

Iwanttobefree

fatbelly wrote: »

This is a long thread now. Am I right that Vanquis and Capital One have written off substantial debts?

When you write to Intrum or Link or whoever it does no harm to let them know that (and send the proof if they request it).

They are under pressure from the FCA to treat debtors sympathetically and it seems, in comparison to others, they are not doing.

Many thanks both of you

Yes Vanquis have written my £2,262 off but passed my wifes £2,320 to Moorcroft.

Capital one has written my £2,416 off.

Today I received a letter from Lowell writing off my Creation Finance debt for £5223

My wife has three accounts in Lowells hands (two for creation).

She had a letter saying they are looking into all 3 of her accounts and she should hear from them next week.

Having our debts reduce by £9,959 is a real relief.

And while I'm obviously very very very grateful, Vanquis for example takes off about 10% of my overall stress by writing my debt off, and in the process, writing very very sympathetic letters, but by Vanquis writing my wife very blunt letters then passing hers on to to Moorcroft, and then having Moorcroft phone up numerous times a day and leave messages asking her to phone immediately, having to sort all that out puts about 20% stress back on.

It could be coincidence, but it sort of looks like our creditors are being sympathetic to me, but not to my wife as it's her spouse whose ill and not her?

Iwanttobefree

Things went a little weird today.

Recap, vanquis wrote off my debt but past my wife's to Moorcroft.

I replied to the email telling me they had written it off, politely asking for it in writing and asking if my wife's account was meant to be passed to Moorcroft etc.

They responded

Sorry for the delay in getting back to you. That's no problem, written confirmation is on its way to you now. In relation to your query concerning your wife, please contact us on 0800 019 8231.

I responded

Do you need to speak to my wife regarding permission to speak to me about her account? She has sent the same email from her email account to your department?

If this is the reason, isn't there any way you can confirm her identity via email please as I'm not very good on the phone?

They responded

we could look to send out an authorised user form which enables us to speak with you regarding your wife’s finances if this should help?

So as it was just to confirm I was dealing with it, today my wife phoned them. They said they needed to speak to me.

I reluctantly took the phone

The lady then said words along the lines of "how can I help you"

While the lady I spoke to was very very polite, I found the conversation both very stressful and slightly threatening.

I don't think the lady was fully aware of our situation, not sure, but she asked about my wifes health etc, and obviously hadn't had time to read through all the info that was sent in by me.

The lady said that as my wife wasn't ill, she has to set up a payment plan with the financial support department (or something like that) and wanted to transfer me.

I tried explaining that it's due to my health, due to my circumstances that she cant pay her bill, the lady didn't want to know. As far as she was concerned, if my wife's health is fine, it shouldn't even be dealt with by the specialist support team and should be passed back to the normal team.

I said that I was sorry but due to my health I cant speak much on the phone and would much rather deal with it via email and I was under the impression this call was just to authorise that.

She replied (very politely) something along the lines of, No, I can’t authorise you to talk via email, you were asked to phone this number, your wife’s given me permission to talk to you and you are now talking to me about it.

I said that I cant deal with it over the phone. She asked if she could talk to my wife about it, I told her that I was the one looking after the DMP.

She said she needed to send out a form to get my permission to discuss it via email.

Twice she emphasised that the account has only been pulled back from moorcroft for a short time, heavily implying if I didn't carry on with the phone call it would be returned to them (which was the slightly threatening part)

In the end I felt so bad I apologised and said I needed to go and could she send the form out.

I suppose I should have known better than to try to talk on the phone, but I honestly believed it was just to authorise me speaking to them about her via email.

Iwanttobefree

Reading one of sourcrates other posts today, I see that Moorcroft no longer buy debts, hence Vanquis always owns it.

That's interesting to know.