Letter from Brachers Legal Services re: 'American Express Services'

PixelPound

Amex have not breached GDPR, if the DCA is acting on behalf of Amex or have been sold it then they can request the information. If they believe they have the right person and info is requested and sent, no breach of GDPR.

OP states it mentions "pre-action protocol" so it is the new LBA, don't ignore as it could result in a claim form with costs and fees (Yes it can be disputed by sending a defence to the court but why let it get that far!)

Was the statement to your address. If going down the DSAR route, you may want to DSAR Amex as well, since the DCA will only provide the information they have and won't be able to provide information Amex have. Often DCA go on limited info unless they need to request more and in the days of DSAR will often only request the bare minimum they need.

sourcrates

I think you have done what would reasonably be expected of you in denying this debt, but it appears to be having no effect at all, did you return the pre-action notice ?

I think what you need to do now is to send a written complaint to Amex, CC a copy to the debt collector also, outline the steps you have taken to deny this account is yours, and what their responce has been to that.

Tell them how you would like this matter resolved, they then have an 8 week timeframe to provide you with a written final responce.

Dependant on that responce, you would have the option of escalating this to the financial ombudsman, and also, because they are now reporting this account on your credit file, send a complaint to the ICO as well.

The FOS and ICO will conduct an investigation as to what has gone wrong, as something clearly has, they will identify any failings, and tell the companies concerned what to do to make things right.

You need to experdite these actions, because things will become a lot more difficult if Amex take you to court for this.

D_M_E

Think you made a big mistake by sending them a scan of your passport - it gave them all the information they needed to pin the debt on you and it's probably why it's now appeared on your credit report.

Write to both Amex and their stooges strongly denying any association whatsoever with the debt and point out that what they have sent so far does not and never will constitute proof that the debt is or ever was yours.

BenParker

I will write to Amex and send a copy to Brachers as outlined above.

I recognise that sending a passport scan might not have seemed like a logical response, but did so under advice and I am attempting to demonstrate that I have been compliant with the requests made to me to date.

Is it worth me trying to speak to Brachers first over the phone to try and expedite resolving this, or will this be a redundant exercise?

I presume that the UK Executive Customer Relations address for Amex listed on their website would be the best place to send the letter?

sourcrates

You need to realise that conversations on the phone are all a bit pointless, and are seldon productive, make your case, and complaint in writing, and leave it at that.

Catx15

What was the outcome with this?

ber119

I'm not the OP, of course, but thought it might be helpful to say that I've had a very similar experience. The first Brachers letter arrived in April, asking for contact details (that one was telling: the header listed their client as Amex and then the next line read '[My Name] and Ground Floor' - it's a ground floor flat but I think they'd harvested my address somewhere). Then one claiming I owed 8k on a credit card from Amex, which I've never had. We exchanged some letters, I told them it wasn't my debt, they told me to fill in a form declaring personal details and explaining why - I refused, twice. They phoned me but wouldn't continue the call when I wouldn't tell them my DoB. In my final letter at the beginning of June I quoted the FCA rules on debt collection as one of the earlier posters suggested, and declared (again) that I wouldn't be filling in their form. They seemed to have given up on me now which is good news, but it's outrageous they behave this way - it takes a lot of confidence to resist this, and I'm sure people are being terrified into paying off debt that isn't theirs.

I suspect the real debtholder was a previous tenant of our flat; when we moved in 9 months ago there was a lot of post which, lacking any forwarding addresses, we returned to sender but some of it looked rather like debt collection demands. So my speculation is Brachers somehow got my name associated with this address, and ran with it on the off-chance they got lucky.

[Deleted User]

No. You've been connected to the debt via your name, not your address.