elderbridge.... i need help

the_fitter

I took a loan out with Barclays in 2006 for 45k over a 17 year period so it finished at the same time as my mortgage. in 2016 my loan was ' moved' to Elderbridge. I assumed this was part of Barclays, received letter from elder bridge stating that i did not need to do anything at all and my payments would remain the same. And so they did. i have just over 3 years and 4 months left on the loan, paying £377 a month. I asked for a settlement figure which came back as 20k! How can this be right? and what can i do? the loan was secured with Barclays on my property so are they allowed to 'sell' a loan off without my permission and still have it secured on my property? And where do i stand with the settlement figure? I signed nothing with Elderbridge so how can they control the loan? all these questions and many more. Is there anybody who can advise me the next steps to take please.

cooltt

In a nutshell, you missed payments (which you haven't mentioned)  Barclays got fed up sold your load to a debt collector (they call themselves credit admin or something silly like that) and they have put their fees and charges ontop.

DrEskimo

Your settlement should be about £13,500 if you were repaying the loan back on time each month.

Your APR is around 7%, so over 17years you would be paying back around £32,000 in interest.

Brock_and_Roll

In answer to the legal question:

"so are they allowed to 'sell' a loan off without my permission and still have it secured on my property? And where do i stand with the settlement figure? I signed nothing with Elderbridge so how can they control the loan? all these questions and many more. Is there anybody who can advise me the next steps to take please."

Yes absolutely. If you refer to the original loan agreement you will see an "Assignment" paragraph. This gives them the right to assign of novate the agreement to a 3rd party without your consent and all security will remain enforceable by the buyer. You of course agreed to this when you signed the original agreement.
HOWEVER Elderbridge cannot vary the terms of the agreement they have taken on without your consent. They have to stick to the terms in the Barclays agreement. So from a legal perspective you should be in no better or worse place than if Barclays were still the creditor.

Clive_Woody

the_fitter said:

I took a loan out with Barclays in 2006 for 45k over a 17 year period so it finished at the same time as my mortgage. in 2016 my loan was ' moved' to Elderbridge. I assumed this was part of Barclays, received letter from elder bridge stating that i did not need to do anything at all and my payments would remain the same. And so they did. i have just over 3 years and 4 months left on the loan, paying £377 a month. I asked for a settlement figure which came back as 20k! How can this be right? and what can i do? the loan was secured with Barclays on my property so are they allowed to 'sell' a loan off without my permission and still have it secured on my property? And where do i stand with the settlement figure? I signed nothing with Elderbridge so how can they control the loan? all these questions and many more. Is there anybody who can advise me the next steps to take please.

How many payments did you miss?

PaulW922

Barclays sold a large portfolio of loans back in 2015. It was mostly lending that was either sub prime or higher risk and which the bank had acquired during various takeovers over the years or made when its lending criteria were different. Most of it was 'second charge' lending and included some older Woolwich Building Society loans and those from 'First Plus' (remember them) as well as lending made by other parts of the Barclays empire. Elderbridge was part of the group that bought the debt up so I assume that your loan was caught up in that. 

amy77

the_fitter said:

I took a loan out with Barclays in 2006 for 45k over a 17 year period so it finished at the same time as my mortgage. in 2016 my loan was ' moved' to Elderbridge. I assumed this was part of Barclays, received letter from elder bridge stating that i did not need to do anything at all and my payments would remain the same. And so they did. i have just over 3 years and 4 months left on the loan, paying £377 a month. I asked for a settlement figure which came back as 20k! How can this be right? and what can i do? the loan was secured with Barclays on my property so are they allowed to 'sell' a loan off without my permission and still have it secured on my property? And where do i stand with the settlement figure? I signed nothing with Elderbridge so how can they control the loan? all these questions and many more. Is there anybody who can advise me the next steps to take please.

I am just copying my post on another website for you, but you have been wronged - please see below! - I am not able to post links as I am too new! but if you want them I can message them to you - let me know.

The FOS have finally seen that there is a massive issue with these loans after years of customers telling them. I was taken to court by them in 2013/2014 for possession but successfully got a decision from the judge that the interest rate variation clause written in the contract was unfair (see Firstplus vs Murphy & Dye) but others have not been so lucky - some have lost their homes to these people or are maybe still struggling to pay them

If you have a first plus loan (now transferred to Elderbridge) please make sure you make a complaint to Elderbridge or Barclays first plus asap! please feel free to use the court judgement above too - although it did not set a precedent, it will only help you!

 in archived web pages from first plus's website

the first is in 2006 - under the section
How does the variable interest rate affect my loan?

they state quite clearly

"From time-to-time, your monthly repayments may go up or down in accordance with the Bank of England interest rate movements."

 Yet they did not reduce their rates when the BOE rate dropped to a historic low did they?

then 2008 where you can see they changed it to say "This is the rate of interest that fluctuates over time with general interest rates" – becoming quite vague in their explanations.

 And finally in 2015 close to when they sold their loan book to Elderbridge they then changed their website and then said that it is not tied to the BOE or FHBR 

Here it states

"The product is a variable rate product and the rates charged on the loan are not tied to the Bank of England or Finance House Base Rate.

Our terms and conditions permit changes to the rate for various reasons, including to reflect changes to interest rates and to ensure our business is carried out prudently, efficiently and competitively. The reasons which allow us to vary the interest rate are set out in your loan terms and conditions."

This is a clear contradiction to the version in 2006 when most customers took out their loans.

This is simply mis-selling of product as well as being unfair, you have not been able to predict or rely on any specific market deviations that may give rise to a change, moreover, they do not provide any specific data to enable you as the customer to plan for any such changes.

I have now not paid them for 2 years and complained again last year - my case is with the FOS and I hope that it will resolved soon, I have done a simple internet search and found a freedom of information request to the FOS for the numbers of complaints about this, the reply was that they have negotiated settlements on 150 cases and have 60 outstanding (this letter was dated July 2020)

I in my complaint to first plus I advised that I have been given a lot of information from a friend who was in court with them but due to what she was about to ask for in court they very quickly settled her account in full after previously giving her a settlement figure of 189k! Based on this I stopped paying them 2 years ago and they have not chased me - now I do not suggest you do that as it will affect your credit score - I did because I had already suffered the default on my credit report for 6 years so would not affect me and I wanted them to take me to court again but they have not even written to me to ask why I have stopped paying.

So again please make sure you make a complaint now - you will need to give Elderbridge 8 weeks to resolve -they will deny that they have done anything wrong but after that make sure you send to the FOS. Do not be put off by anyone on other advise sites such as Moneysaving expert or Consumer Action Group, you have been miss-sold miss-led and generally treated badly and it's time for payback!

fwor

amy77 said:

This is simply mis-selling of product

I hope you'll forgive the pedantry, but this is not a case of mis-selling. When you think about it, what you are objecting to is not the selling process at all. Your complaint is about the administration of the product during its life, and the alteration of contract terms in a way that is unfair.

I would suggest that it's an important distinction, because any complaint based on mis-selling should be addressed to the company that sold the product to you, which doesn't seem to be appropriate in this case - Elderbridge did not sell the product to you.

amy77

The simple point is that this product was not what we were told it would be or what it was advertised as.
their site changed numerous times to but the first was the 2006 site, the contract itself never changed but was so vague!
we were told in the beginning that it would be "like a mortgage" and "go up or down in accordance with the BOE"  but it never went down when the market crashed in 2008.
So you can call it what you want, I just want as many people as possible to get some money back, we were lied to and it's taken 10 years to get anyone to listen! the FOS are finally helping so get complaining, so I'm not getting into arguments with anyone here about pedantry.
Firstplus no longer exist and the loans are administered by Elderbridge so complain to them, wait the required 8 weeks then go to the FOS - best of luck everyone

amy77

Please also check out the following urls (use chrome) - these are archived web pages from first plus's website
the first is in 2006 - under the section
How does the variable interest rate affect my loan?
they state quite clearly
"From time-to-time, your monthly repayments may go up or down in accordance with the Bank of England interest rate movements."
http://web.archive.org/web/20060812175251/http://www.firstplus.co.uk/new_customers_faq.aspx#loanfor
Yet they did not reduce their rates when the BOE rate dropped to a historic low did they?
then 2008 where you can see they changed it to say "This is the rate of interest that fluctuates over time with general interest rates" – becoming quite vague in their explanations.
http://web.archive.org/web/20080223123115/http://www.firstplus.co.uk/aboutourloans/Pages/loan-jargon-buster.aspx#v
And finally in 2015 close to when they sold their loan book to Elderbridge they then changed their website and then said that it is not tied to the BOE or FHBR
http://web.archive.org/web/20150511120847/http://www.firstplus.co.uk/FAQs(please select Interest rate changes for the dropdown to view)
Here it states
"The product is a variable rate product and the rates charged on the loan are not tied to the Bank of England or Finance House Base Rate.
Our terms and conditions permit changes to the rate for various reasons, including to reflect changes to interest rates and to ensure our business is carried out prudently, efficiently and competitively. The reasons which allow us to vary the interest rate are set out in your loan terms and conditions."

This is a clear contradiction to the version in 2006 when most customers took out their loans.

cajef

amy77 said:

the_fitter said:

I took a loan out with Barclays in 2006 for 45k over a 17 year period so it finished at the same time as my mortgage. in 2016 my loan was ' moved' to Elderbridge. I assumed this was part of Barclays, received letter from elder bridge stating that i did not need to do anything at all and my payments would remain the same. And so they did. i have just over 3 years and 4 months left on the loan, paying £377 a month. I asked for a settlement figure which came back as 20k! How can this be right? and what can i do? the loan was secured with Barclays on my property so are they allowed to 'sell' a loan off without my permission and still have it secured on my property? And where do i stand with the settlement figure? I signed nothing with Elderbridge so how can they control the loan? all these questions and many more. Is there anybody who can advise me the next steps to take please.

I am just copying my post on another website for you, but you have been wronged - please see below! - I am not able to post links as I am too new! but if you want them I can message them to you - let me know.

Why are you replying to someone that posted this nearly twelve months ago and  has never been back on these forums since?