Default Dispute

radddogg

Hi, I have a long story so I'll condense it as much as possible.

I had a BT account which I closed in 2021 when I moved out of a house. They requested the return of the wifi and TV boxes which I did. I then got a letter saying I hadn't returned a Smart Hub 2 and there was a £50 charge. I phoned them and they said I had returned a Smart Hub 1 but not a Smart Hub 2. I questioned why I would have been issued with two Smart Hubs, and explained I'd returned everything I had received. After a protracted discussion, I recalled that an engineer had fixed a fault by replacing the Smart Hub and surmised that perhaps that was where the confusion lay. The BT agent then promised to look into it and call back.

This callback never happened and a few months later the new occupiers of my old address passed me a load of correspondence (I hadn't updated my address as I had closed my account) from BT and Lowell. BT had sold the "debt" to Lowell. I called Lowell and explained the situation. They were uninterested so for the sake of my sanity I paid the £50.

Six months later my credit score has tanked due to a default being added by Lowell. I have phoned them and they say I need to get BT to instruct them to remove it. I've phoned BT and they say I need to speak to Equifax. BT also claim that their call recordings are deleted after 12 months so they don't have a record other than the agent's notes which incorrectly state that I was told to provide proof of postage (the call was about 40 minutes long so this is simply untrue).

I submitted a Subject Access Request from BT, and raised a complaint with Equifax, but was hoping for any guidance from you lovely people on what steps I should be taking and anything to look out for. I would also like to know what you think about the legality of this default, given that the default applies to a charge that I had not agreed to and was in dispute.

If you got this far, many thanks for reading, and in anticipation of any comments.

MorningcoffeeIV

If you believe the default to be inaccurate, you need to dispute it with BT.

However, it's not clear from what you've said whether the charge was correctly levied or not.  You would have agreed to the charge in the contract, but the issue is around whether you have failed to return the right equipment.

radddogg

MorningcoffeeIV said:

If you believe the default to be inaccurate, you need to dispute it with BT.

However, it's not clear from what you've said whether the charge was correctly levied or not.  You would have agreed to the charge in the contract, but the issue is around whether you have failed to return the right equipment.

I did dispute with BT but they said I had to raise it with Equifax

I don't believe the charge was correctly levied. The contract is unavailable to refer to but the crux of this is that there was an open dispute on the charge levied.

MorningcoffeeIV

radddogg said:

MorningcoffeeIV said:

If you believe the default to be inaccurate, you need to dispute it with BT.

However, it's not clear from what you've said whether the charge was correctly levied or not.  You would have agreed to the charge in the contract, but the issue is around whether you have failed to return the right equipment.

I did dispute with BT but they said I had to raise it with Equifax

You need to go back and dispute with BT. Raise a formal complaint.