Advice on Student Loan Court Action

Nurselayer

Hi all,

I'm after some specific advice. Erudio Student Loans issued a court claim against me in 2020 regarding student loans that dated from 1994-1998. I submitted a defence that the claims were statute barred. I requested a CCA Section 77 request and a CPR 31.14 request. Neither request was fully fulfilled.  Erudio did nothing and judgement was stayed. 

In 2021 they applied to lift the stay and to get summary judgement claiming that due to BMW Financial Services v Hart and Doyle v PRA these debts weren't statute barred. 

They also included a "reconstitued" Notice of Assignment in their court pack. I never received a Notice of Assignment at the time, and looking at the reconstituted NOA none of the dates in it make any sense when compared with other evidence they submitted/have sent to me.

I went to court a couple of weeks ago and the judge said that she couldn't make a decision on such a complex issue in the time allowed and adjourned the hearing for a future date with an order that Erudio submit a written skeleton argument supporting their claims.  She also seemed to heavily infer that I should amend my defence to bring up all the other subjects that I wanted to raise (no NOA, breaching CCA regs, etc).

I've had much conflicting advice since about whether I should apply to amend my defence, and I can literally find no information on how to do this apart from sending an N244 form. 

Until Erudio issued a claim against me I had never responded or acknowledged them in any way and I am convinced that any debt would be statute barred, I'm also convinced that due to them not complying with my S.77 request and not responding to my CPR 31.14 request that the debt is unrecoverable.

So, how do I proceed with this? Do I submit an N244 and amend my defence to include the above or do I just put this in my witness statement when I respond to their skeleton argument?

Also, will the adjourned hearing just be to decide whether or not to give them summary judgement, or will it be a full hearing? IE. If I win at the next stage, have I won or will they still be able to take further litigation against me?

fatbelly

If they lose their claim, then that is it.

Old-style student loans are regulated by the Consumer Credit Act 1974. This means that you should expect to receive any letters that are required to be sent under the Act, as they would with other fixed-term loans.

https://businessdebtline.org/fact-sheet-library/repaying-student-loans-ew/

Business Debtline may be some help but ideally you need the help of a solicitor who specialises in CCA court claims, like Paul Tilley or Diana Mayhew/Joanna Connolly.

I'm not sure if the AAD website is still active but Di used to post regularly on there. It's a long time since I've seen either on these boards.

@Just_Di

@pt2537

Nurselayer

AAD website? I'm on the Consumer Action Group, but don't know of AAD? Got a link?

fatbelly

https://all-about-debt.co.uk/

That does seem appropriate to your query. They have an unenforceability section.

Nurselayer

Thanks for this. What's strange is that I've tried twice to sign up to the AAD website and each time it promises to send a confirmation email but I've not received one. I've tried emailing and had no reply. Anyone got any further help?

silvercar

Nurselayer said:

Thanks for this. What's strange is that I've tried twice to sign up to the AAD website and each time it promises to send a confirmation email but I've not received one. I've tried emailing and had no reply. Anyone got any further help?

Often emails end up in spam and can be blocked at the server end. I sometimes find trying again with a gmail address often works, though I’ve never used this particular website.