Urgent advice required

Radio_01

I have just had an argument on the phone with 1st credit . My son owes them £900 and they keep ringing demanding the whole to be paid at once. We have been paying then £20 a month and they now say they want it by dd or they will not agree to it. I told them that as long as they were getting thier money on a regular basis I didn't see how it mattered how they got it. I told them that I did not want to do it by dd as I pay it and not my son. The real reason is that if I can afford to pay them more one month I want the freedom to be able to do it. The man says that the conversation is now terminated and that they will take my son to court for the full amount. Can they do this if we are paying.

dubsey

My mum has a company chasing her and when she gave them her DD details they took more money from her account, so I think you are right not to do that. Years ago I was issued a CCJ even though I was regularly sending as much as I could afford, so unless something has changed I would think they could.

Try not to panic, someone will be along shortly that has a lot more information.

RAS

Hi

We need to know what the debt is for, what your son's situation is, why you are paying this any way rather than him and When the debt was incurred.

The basic is that many of these guys are bullies. They have got the parent paying a debt they do not owe! And so they think there is a chance that they can push you into paying more., particularly give the problems with the credit crunch when they need to get as much in as possible. Have they stopped charging interest on the debt?

It would probably be better if you stopped paying, your son sent them a proper statement of affairs and paid them what he can afford, even if it is only one pound a month.

If that is all that he can afford and they did take him to court, then the court would order him to pay £1 per month and the judgement would be wholly binding on 1st credit; they would be breaking the law if they asked for more. they know this and are very unlikely to spend good money getting a bad result.

Do NOT set up a DD as they could simply take the whole lot off your account next month.

Radio_01

This debt was passed to 1st credit from another debt company. It's for HFC bank .We have already sent an SOA to them. The man my son spoke to 3 weeks ago didn't say anything about a dd. He just tried to bully us into paying the whole lot. He even droped it down to £ 780 if we would pay but he still couldn't afford it. It seemed ok with him that we pay the £20 per month. I'm afraid I was a bit shirty with him in the end and told him that as far as I could see it didn't matter how they got the money , it could come by pidgeon post as long as they got it.I am so angry, we are doing our best and they still have to bully you. I told him that if he kept ringing bullying us I would get in touch with the trading standards about it.

Radio_01

Sorry, also, I am paying it each month but my son gives me £100 which I spread as far as I can. That is really all he can afford.

RAS

Radio

Thanks for that.

How old is the debt?

Also if you son has lots of other debts, what you are effectively doing is organising a Debt Management Plan for him (even if it is not what you would call it). You might find it useful to search for threads started by Gemmzie; she is a rather stunning 19 year old who is managing her dad's DMP very well indeed.

Your son could get the same service from CCCS or one of the other debt charities. I would recommend that he does the debt remedy on-line with them if nothing else and maybe even has a telephone interview. that would identify what would be considered an acceptable total monthly surplus to pay his creditors

The absolute fundementals with this are

1. You do not talk to this mob or any of the other creditors on the phone. There is a letter telling them to write to you which I will post up. Likewise you write and send everything recorded delivery.

2. You should pay each of the creditors pro rata. So if he have £10K of debt and half is with one creditor, they get half the surplus, whilst the creditor to whom he owes £1K only gets a tenner.

Hang around and you will get more help shortly.

RAS

Soory, I was thrown out of the site (locked and died) and had trouble logging back on. Here it is raided from monkey.


Send this letter if a company/bank is calling you repeatedly - just replace the red bits with your information, or change to suit your needs. Make sure you do this by recorded delivery

Your Address
Town
City
Postcode


DATE

Company Name
Address
Town
City / County
Postcode

Re: Harassment by telephone


ACCOUNT NUMBER: XXXXXXX

Dear Sirs

I am writing in relation to the quantity and frequency of telephone calls that I have received from your company, which I consider to be personally harassing.

Please note that I have asked on numerous occasions not to be contacted by phone. Your company and the agencies you have subsequently appointed to act in your regard have consistently ignored this request. If this is not adhered to, I will be forced to follow legal steps.

I now require all further correspondence from your company to be made in writing only.

I have stated that due to the inordinate number of phone calls that I was receiving daily (on occasion these have numbered more than xx calls per day) even though I instructed your office not to call me, you were in breach of Section 40 of the Administration of Justice Act 1970 and would be reported to the Office of Fair Trading for the same. As these phone calls have now started again, in addition to the breach above, I will also be filing criminal charges under Section 2 of The Protection from Harassment Act 1997, if you or your representatives call me ONE more time.

Yours faithfully,



Your Name

Radio_01

Sorry I too got locked out. I had just written a long thread too.The debt is about 5 years old. They don't seem to have a problem with the £20 a month , just with the fact that I won't sign a DD.My son has 3 debts left out of 8 and I have cleared the rest. You can see in my old thread " sons debts " if they still exist.If I knew how to put the SOA on here I would. I am going to send 1st credit another SOA and this letter.
Dear 1st credit,
With reference to your phone call dated 10-1-2008 in which you accepted my offer of £20 a month , but only if it was by DD. When I refused to sign a DD you terminated the call.
I have since got financial advice and have been told not to set up a DD as you could take the whole debt in one and put me in serious debt.
I have enclosed my son's SOA and feel I should tell you that another company tried to take my son to court and the court said they could not act upon it as my son earned less that he needed to live on.
Our offer of £20 a month still stands and the next payment will be on 28th Jan 2008 by cheque as usual. yours etc.....

What do you think.

Radio_01

I cannot send that letter you so kindly put on here for me as they only ring about once a week and I haven't asked them not to ring . Just told them that they can't have all the money at once and it will have to be paid monthly.

RAS

Radio_01 wrote: »

I cannot send that letter you so kindly put on here for me as they only ring about once a week and I haven't asked them not to ring . Just told them that they can't have all the money at once and it will have to be paid monthly.

Hi

Edit the letter up to suit your situation. You may not get multiple calls a day or think you are harressed but under OFT Guidelines, you are entitled to contacted in the manner that you want, not the way the DCA wants.

Here is the link for the SOA http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=107280

Radio_01

My son's SOA. Incoming £1,300.00
OUTGOINGS
rent £390.00
counciltax £105.00
Electric £30.00
Gas £30.00
Water £29.00
Mobile phone £20.00
Groceries £400.00 includes lunches for work and baby food and milk
clothing £30.00
petrol £200.00
car tax £20.00
car insurance £146.34
MOT £10.00
car maintenance £10.00
Dental £16.00
birthdays etc £10.00
TOTAL OUT £1,446.34

Debts
Lloyds blackhorse £1,871.94 £30.00 per month
HFC £983.81 £20.00 per month
NDR £200.00 £20.00 per month

Assets - none

I havent included his partners money and benifits as they are in her name and I refuse to involve her. She pays for the chidcare,tv,childs clothing etc. which I haven't included on here.