County court claim

mnas786

I have received a county court claim form the claimant is Cabot for a current acc I had 4 years ago. I have submitted a acknowledgement of service. Please can anyone help the best way to defend my claim and what is best way to come around this.

sheramber

More details needed.

What is your defence?

LightFlare

As above.

What are they claiming for ?

Is this something you know/knew about ?

Was anything disputed/agreed/resolved originally?

mnas786

sheramber said:

More details needed.

What is your defence?

They are claiming for overdraft and the charges. At the moment my defense to this is that I wasn't aware of this debt and it's been over 4 years with no contact what so ever from the claimant

mnas786

LightFlare said:

As above.

What are they claiming for ?

Is this something you know/knew about ?

Was anything disputed/agreed/resolved originally?

I wasn't aware of it as I went abroad for 3 years due to my ex-wife and the divorce.  when I returned by then most of my accounts were closed. Now got a claim from county court.

lincroft1710

Are you saying you were not aware your account was overdrawn, as I think it would be easy for Cabot to prove your account was overdrawn and produce a list of charges which you would have accepted as part of the terms and conditions of having an account with them

mnas786

lincroft1710 said:

Are you saying you were not aware your account was overdrawn, as I think it would be easy for Cabot to prove your account was overdrawn and produce a list of charges which you would have accepted as part of the terms and conditions of having an account with them

As I wasn't in the country at the time due to stress I went abroad is there any way I can get around with this?

user1977

"I was abroad” isn’t any sort of defence. How did the account become overdrawn? Why didn’t you close it before you left?

lincroft1710

Saying you went abroad because of stress is effectively admitting you abrogated your responsibilities in the UK and is far from being a defence. 

RefluentBeans

I would call the bank and/or debt collection agency on Monday and explain you were not aware of the charges. They may allow you to pay back a portion, but I’m not sure if this is the case when it’s been sent to court already. 

Did they send you letters or correspondence to tell you were a) overdrawn and b) late paying? If they did then I don’t think there’s much of a case to defend yourself. The only way there is if you did tell them you were temporarily out of the UK and they still sent letters to the wrong address. But if they called (even if you didn’t answer) they may still say they attempted to contact you. 

I would post this in the money section too - they be able to give more advice specific to this, and what you can say to the bank to reduce the debt.

I can imagine it’s a tough time at the moment, and the instinct may be to bury your head. This is not a good idea and I would sincerely look to try and get it sorted sooner rather than later. At least you are now aware of the situation and can get a handle on it. Take a few deep breaths, it’ll all be okay in the long run. 

SiliconChip

As others have said, you don't really have a defense, so what you need to do is work out how to avoid getting a CCJ against you, as this is likely to cause problems for you for several years to come. The first question is how much is the claim? And the second is do you have enough money to pay it in full? If the answer to question 2 is 'no' then you need to try to come to an agreement with Cabot before the hearing to either pay an amount that will satisfy them fully now or a plan to pay over time, which may well need to be the full amount.

I think I've read on here that if the hearing does go ahead and finds against you then if you settle the claim within a month the CCJ is not issued, but hopefully somebody else can confirm this.