Help with a full and final settlement

Rob5342

A CCJ is always a possibility as long as there is a balance outstanding. You can never know exactly what they'll do but they tend to prefer easy money and go for a CCJ if they think you can afford to pay more. If they do you then you will get sn LBA and you will be able to make an offer of a monthly payment or a settlement amount before it got to a CCJ being issued. These companies tend to use the threat of legal action much more than they actually take it because they know it will scare people. It doesn't necessarily have to be £1 thst you pay them, but I'd set it low enough that you will have loads of chances to make settlement offers before the debt gets anywhere near settled. 

I just told them that I wasn't going to supply income and expenditure details. They grumbled a bit and said they could only accept it on a concessionary basis and then kept quiet. 

SeeTheDoughnut

Thank you all for your advice.  It seems then that I’m safe for the moment from a ccj and in the event that I get an LBA I’ll hopefully have a bit more in my emergency fund by then and be able to settle before it goes any further. 

fatbelly

Remember a ccj doesn't just happen.

There has to be a court claim, which you can defend.

Just making a defence slows the whole process down. You should always do a cpr request anyway, to ask for documents referred to in the particulars of claim. They won't be able to respond in the timescale so there's something

If it's a consumer credit Act debt you do a cca request. Comments as above

Often the balance can be disputed. Or the legal costs. I have a defence in at the moment on a water claim against a blind guy. Found it was based on an estimated bill. Lazy bu99ers. At least come and read the meters cos the client can't.

Before the court claim, there has to be a preaction letter that is compliant with protocol. If it isn't, defend. Even if it is, follow Debt Camel guidance and make them work for it.

Too many people just get frozen into inaction and get a ccj in default. If more people engaged and fought back, companies that do take court action would have to do it less.

bcs7

I have several debts with Link and one is about £1600 so similar to yours. I offered 25% of the full debt and they countered with 55% to pay.
I'm paying £8 a month on it which means it'll take about 16 years to pay off at this rate.
They've asked for SOAs in the past but I've just ignored and pay what I can each month.
I also removed the Direct Debits and dropped the amount I was paying per month on all the debts a few months ago and just make the payments myself each month with a debit card so it isn't automated.
I have made offers on all but one of the debts now so I have an idea of how much they're willing to discount and noted it all down. The counter offers (55%, 60%, 60%, 77%, 90%) aren't low enough for me to take up but I'll try again in 6 months starting with the debt they gave me the biggest discount (55%) on and see if it'll come down further.
I'm hoping the combination of the lower monthly payments and how long it will take to pay off will gradually pull their offers down.

SeeTheDoughnut

Update! I logged in and offered £10 per month. I had an email back declining my offer. I emailed them to say that the most I could offer was either a settlement of £400 or £10 per month.  They emailed back to accept it! I’ll pay it for a while and then try again for a settlement. Thank you all for your advice. It’s much appreciated.

Rob5342

It's good you have got it sorted but remember they don't have to agree to anything as much as they'd like you to believe that they do. You just pay what you can afford and that's it. 

bcs7

I've had counters back on all my offers now:

Debt - % To Pay
£800 - 60%
£1,150 - 90%
£1,550 - 55%
£4,600 - 77%
£9,800 - 60%
£16,700 - 90%

As you can see, the offers vary quite a bit and a I think this is down to a lot of different things like how long they've had the debt, if it can be CCAed, how much is being paid monthly, how large the debt is, how much they paid for it.
At the end of the day they want to get as much out of you as possible. I'm going to wait 6 months now, paying minimal amounts and then make some other offers and see if the counters come down. The ones already at 55-60% would hopefully go below 50% and then I'd consider.

ManyWays

why not ask for the CCAs?

bcs7

ManyWays said:

why not ask for the CCAs?

I have and they had them.
I was just mentioning that in general it can be one of the reasons for them not being too generous with offers.
For example, an overdraft debt can't be CCAed so they'd know you wouldn't be able to stop it being enforceable and so they'd be more hardball in the offers.

RAS

I'd suggest you pay what you can afford, making sure things like emergency and fighting funds are adequately covered. 

Then ignore. Wait for them to make offers to you. Ideally you want those debts sold on a couple of times as well. Making F&F offers at interval just encourages them to play hardball.