Is this a scam?

SkittlesnBandaid

Farfetch. I missed your input a minute or so back. As I believe (but could be corrected) the £30k came from an Equity Release offered by the original lender. The points you raise are true enough but for the lender to repeatedly give the impression (as I’ve said) that the money was theirs is undeniable. A heavy handed CCJ backed attempt to claw back the money isn’t good for anyone or PR. Why no evidence of previous correspondence or transcripts to accompany the correspondence of late is mystifying. 

I’m all for being business like but rushing to close a gate after the horses have bolted doesn’t look good. If anything and reading between the lines it’s the company who have already protected a combative stance.

what is a DSAR? And how would you proceed please? Thanks again 

SkittlesnBandaid

PS: I think the amounts being discussed here are a distraction at this point. The principals at work would be the same wether it were 58p, £58 or £580 etc. What matters more would (if all other matters are as the lender says true) what was paid? Was it original investment and interest, all interest or something else. Hope you understand -
thanks again. 

Nearlyold

SkittlesnBandaid said:

hello Dazed_and_C0nfused. On the face of it what you say maybe correct. But my question is how to establish those facts please? I understand under some circumstances the law protects the lender, but against that is the mistake of re-activating the account, then sending out a statement, then further giving my folks the impression that money was theirs, then agreeing to pay and then finally paying out. That’s 5 opportunities to distance my folks from the idea the money was legitimately theirs to be spent. This is different perhaps than from dropping money into an account one day and asking for it back the next.

Theres also the amount being asked for that could become  questionable. If they paid back the initial £30k as part of paying off the remortgage (which I recall them doing) the amount ‘owed’ could be far less than currently stated and quite possibly £0. In which case the company owes my folks a very big apology.

As you say it’s big league screw-up by the lender. As a result I would have expected all the evidence to have been presented along with the letter. It’s wrong not to. Bad practice bordering on elder abuse in anyones book IMHO

How do we establish the facts? Please someone enlighten me.
 Thanks 

The first thing to establish is whether or not your parents received the two pay-outs as alleged in the letter

Do the bank account numbers detailed in the letter match accounts currently or previously held by your parents?

Assuming they do it should be an easy matter in respect of the alleged erroneous  2018 pay-out to check with the bank if such a payment was received. Not so easy with the January 2006 one I guess.

The Portfolio Bond was/is an investment product designed to produce growth and typically a regular income over the medium to long term (if they were taking an income it would of course have restricted the net growth). Although the money that was originally invested in the bond came from the equity release your parents arranged, the dispute over the Portfolio Bond is not really related to the subsequent repayment or otherwise of the Equity Release Mortgage. 

NB I'm not sure that any court would accept the £57K payment "came out of the blue" if there was a phone call asking to surrender the Bond.

SkittlesnBandaid

Nearly old. Thanks. I might be wrong but I think they had forgotten about the bond around the time the statements were restarted. I imagine (again if what is said is true) that they sat on it for a while (we don’t know what else the statements said) and surrendered it about 12/13 months later. That’s what I mean by out of the blue. Is that clear?
 Thanks again 
S&B

sourcrates

Company says you owe them money, customer is unsure whether they do or not, is a common scenario regardless of the financial product involved.

They have sent you a standard "pay up within 14 days" letter, in the hope that you will just pay up without a fuss, as of course everyone has that amount of cash to hand don`t they.

Firstly their timescale is meaningless, and designed to induce a response, this is in fact just an opening shot across the bows in order to get you to engage with them, the earlier suggestion to send then a SAR (Subject Access Request) is a good one, it should detail transactions to date, you can also ask them for a more in depth explanation regarding there claim, as a short sentence saying there was an error, is just not acceptable.

I suspect because of the sum of money involved, this may end up in court, where the facts of the case will need to be presented before a judge, it will then be for them to decide what has happened, and if your folks are liable or not.

Hopefully this can be decided before that, at the pre-action stage, if they do owe the money, but have no means to pay it, then a CO is likely to be placed on their property once a judgement is made, however given their ages, health, and general circumstances, its extremely unlikely an order for sale would follow, so it would, as has been mentioned before, just sit on the title deeds to the house, and when it is eventually sold, sometime in the future, the debt would be repaid from the proceeds.

SkittlesnBandaid

Thanks Sourcrates. Shall I draft up a SAR type letter asking for more detail while admitting nothing? Best wishes 

S+B

[Deleted User]

The 2 steps you need to take are as above - send a DSAR (don't antagonise them with a denial of debt letter or statute barred) and get your parents to check their bank account records. If the firm proves they paid out twice, there is no way around it, they owe the money. Yes the firm had chances to check it, but by that token, so did your parents. Upon receiving the first statement, they could have asked why they had this when that account was closed 11 years before for example. This isn't being difficult, it's simply factual. Repeat for every one of the 4 other points you raised.

If the firm has solid evidence that they got the payments (and/or you can confirm that yourself), then you need to speak to them about a payment plan asap - don't ignore it, but do respond carefully. Something as simple as saying that your parents are elderly, have limited income and cannot raise such a sum in 2 weeks and that they acknowledge the company's letter but not the debt would be a start. Speaking to Citizens Advice on Tuesday might be a good idea too

sourcrates

[DELETED BY FORUM TEAM]

Isn`t that what I said ?

SkittlesnBandaid

Hi Sourcrates. I’ve just had a chat with my sibling who says that he is aware my folks actually did ask for a lot of re-assurances prior to accepting the ‘additional’ funds in 2018. Even going to the extent of consulting their solicitor and an estate planner regards HMRC/Inheritance Tax etc 

Grumpy_chap

SkittlesnBandaid said:

Hi Sourcrates. I’ve just had a chat with my sibling who says that he is aware my folks actually did ask for a lot of re-assurances prior to accepting the ‘additional’ funds in 2018. Even going to the extent of consulting their solicitor and an estate planner regards HMRC/Inheritance Tax etc 

This can only be dealt with on the basis of facts.

Start by challenging (for your own benefit) each of the statements in the letter.

Did your parents take out the bond for £30k?

Did your parents redeem the bond for £33.5k?

Did your parents start receiving statements after a period of time on the closed bond?

Did your parents receive the £58k?

If that all stacks up, which it seems it might, then it looks like the repayment is due.

It changes the way to contact the company.  By all means request further evidence, but do so in a non combative manner ( to buy time as much as anything).  Also start to think about ways to make the repayment.  Try not to aggravate the company - they are currently accepting this as their mistake and not seeking interest and that is something you don't want to change.

It might also be worth looking out the Solicitor advice from 2018 incase there is any possibility of a claim against the solicitors PI cover - though I doubt there will be.  What information did your parents share with the solicitor for them to say "just take the money"?

You mention repeated mistakes by the company.  It seems as though your parents also made mistakes and the time to really resolve this was when the first incorrect statements started to appear.