CCJ papers not recieved

fw1994

Hi All,


Me and my partner are in the process of applying for a mortgage, and after being requested to send over our credit reports, we found out that my partner has a CCJ issued in February 2017 for a total of £441.


He didn't know what it was for, so phoned Northampton County Court Business centre, who issued the CCJ who advised him it was for a Capital One credit card he had in 2011. He thought he had closed this account and paid the final bill. They also advised they had sent papers to an address (his mothers address) in January 2017; however these papers were never received at this address.


As he doesn't recall the outstanding balance, he contacted Capital One to request statements from the account, to check for fraudulent activity, they repeatedly said they didn't hold these statements any longer, until he insisted and they have now said they will send them and we should receive them in 7-10 working days (not sure we will ever actually receive anything). They also have passed the debt on to Cabot debt collectors. He then phoned them to ask if they had sent any notification of the debt, which they couldn't answer, and they also advised that someone had paid £260 of the debt to them by cheque but couldn't advise who?!?! It all sounds really weird and suspicious.


We want to get the CCJ set aside, and are hoping we have grounds to do so after all the weird circumstances above. Does anyone have any advice on a similar situation, or can tell me if it's more effective to use a solicitor to get a CCJ set aside, or if it's easy enough to fill out the N244 yourself?


Any advice at this time is HUGELY appreciated! We are quite overwhelmed about the whole situation

BoGoF

Did your partner notify Capital 1 of his change of address?

fw1994

No but technically he didn't change address. He was staying with me at the time but still registered as living at his mums. It would have been fine for the papers or notifications of debt to go to his mum's house, but she didn't ever receive any for him.

[Deleted User]

The court would have sent them to the address given to them.

They don’t not send paperwork

fw1994

Okay, but what if they were lost in the post? His mum holds back all his post for him and the forms were not there, so what can we do in this situation?


It's £400, we can pay it immediately and would have paid it years ago if we knew the debt existed.

[Deleted User]

You can attempt a set-aside - but the addresses should have been updated to where you were residing.

sourcrates

fw1994 wrote: »

It's £400, we can pay it immediately and would have paid it years ago if we knew the debt existed.

A set aside costs £255.00 and is far from guaranteed to be successful, so for a debt of £400 he just might as well pay it, as long as he agrees the money is owed, check the statements carefully when they arrive.

MEM62

fw1994 wrote: »

Okay, but what if they were lost in the post?

Unlikely. The postal system in the UK is nowhere near as unreliable as it would need to be for all the court documents that are claimed to go missing to actually do so.

fw1994

Agreed, but short of outright accusing his Mum of lying, what can we do? For arguments sake we can say he was living there, as he was there most days and only staying with me occasionally. So in the instance that she’s actually taken his post and binned it before he gets a chance to read it, what can we do?

We don’t want to pay the CCJ as it will still show on his credit file and damage our chances of getting a mortgage even if satisfied.

[Deleted User]

You should have updated your address

The letter being thrown in the bin won't constitute it getting set aside

National_Debtline

Hi fw1994


To agree to a set aside the court generally wants to see that someone has a real chance of successfully defending a new claim, or some other good reason. Not receiving the court papers is not usually enough grounds alone to agree to it.


I would suggest that your partner finds out more about the debt first, as if it turns out he agrees he does owe it, the chances of a successful set aside are slim. Also bear in mind that an unsuccessful application could lead to him having to pay costs, and that is in addition to the £255 it costs to apply. Although if you have a low household income you do not always have to pay all of the court fee.


You can find more information about the process here https://www.nationaldebtline.org/EW/factsheets/Pages/howtosetasideacountycourtjudgment/settingasideaccj.aspx.


Good luck with it all


Susie
@natdebtline