Ruddy Halifax

rushnowt

To say i'm livid is an understatement, especially as it's Saturday and I can't do sod all about it till Monday :mad:

To cut the story short, I've been on a monthly payment plan in which i've been paying a set amount each month for 3 months which the Halifax agreed to and arranged.

The reason for this is that the property was empty and being improved to be put on the market for sale. I contacted Halifax and explained the full circumstances and they appeared to be sympathetic and agreed to this payment plan, which would give me time to get the work done and the house for sale. These payments have been made in full every month without fail.

The work has now been completed and the house put on the market, last week we had an offer made and things looked promising, anyway the payment plan ended on the 30th June, so i immediately called Halifax and updated them. I asked if it would be possible to extend the payment plan for another month or two till the sale was completed then all monies due to them would be payed in full.

I was informed by the rather obnoxious girl on the other end that there had been a change in the rules and that payment plans were no longer offered unless a debt councellor visited me and we drew up a plan with all my paper work of income and outgoings. We had done this originally granted over the telephone not in person and I was informed then that I had no money to make the payments but offered to pay £100 a month regardless as I felt I couldn't just pay nothing, the mortgage payment should have been £236 a month.

I agreed to the visit but explained that by the time the councellor had contacted me there may be a change in circumstances, i.e the money would be available to make the full mortgage payment due on the 30th July or that the sale may have been completed. (She said that it would be at least 3 weeks before the councellor would be in touch) at which point she said that no charge would be made ? what charge ? aparently to have the councellor come out to me there was a charge of £100 :eek: The conversation was left there.

I have received a letter from them this morning :

Dear Mrs ********

Despite attempts to contact you we have been unable to ascertain the reasons for your payment shortfall of £683.15 and have had no proposals from you regarding this payment.

Please be assured that we wish to help you through any difficulties you may be experiencing at present but, in the absence of any contact to help us understand your current position, we now need to consider what steps are appropriate to your situation.

As a result, I have today instructed a debt councellor to call on you, the councellor will be in touch with you shortly and I urge you to make every effort to meet them.

Because it has been necessary to arrange this visit an administration fee of £100 has today been debited from your account.

I am very disapointed that it has been necessary to contact you again regarding this matter and you should be aware that an administration fee of £25 has been charged for this and for each subsequent letter or telephone call.



What the hell, they've never contacted me before, I have been in constant communication with them throughout keeping them fully updated with the situation, and had no knowledge or any arrears.

Surely this is complete madness, Please tell me theres something I can do, they can't possibly be allowed to get away with these lies. As I said earlier my mortgage isn't even due to be paid till the end of July so what right do they have to threaten me with these measures if I've not even missed a payment

Xbigman

Did you get the original arrangement confirmed in writing?

If you did then see the debt counsellor and show it to them. Simply ask for an extention. If not you are in a tricky position.

Whatever payment they want I'd simply bang it on a credit card. Not advice I'd generally give, but £50 or £60 in CC charges vrs the potential mortgage default charges and interest (and a default on your credit history) is small change.

Sorry but;
They won, you lost, move on...
Regards



X

rushnowt

Xbigman wrote:

Did you get the original arrangement confirmed in writing?

If you did then see the debt counsellor and show it to them. Simply ask for an extention. If not you are in a tricky position.

Whatever payment they want I'd simply bang it on a credit card. Not advice I'd generally give, but £50 or £60 in CC charges vrs the potential mortgage default charges and interest (and a default on your credit history) is small change.

Sorry but;
They won, you lost, move on...
Regards



X

Yes I did get the confirmation in writing, which i still have.

and I'm not suggesting that someone should win or lose, what I'm saying is theyre lying, they have not tried to contact me in the past, I have not defaulted on anything, I have payed every month on the dot without fail. I am not suggesting that I will not pay this months mortgage, the end of the month isn't here yet.

What I'm p!***ed off about is the fact that they appear to have sent out some pathetic standard letter in which they suggest they have tried on numerous times to contact me and they have heard nothing from me, which is totally untrue, they have my address my telephone number, my mobile number and my email address how on earth have they tried to contact me, when ? I only spoke to them on the 1st July, the letter is dated 6th July that they have sent, when where these numerous attempts made.

The fact is even if the debt councellor comes to see me he will clearly see that I don't have the money, I'm not trying to avoid paying I made the suggestion to pay something in the first place, my argument is that they see fit to charge £100 to say I can't afford to pay and the lies that they seem able to tell. It's ludicrous.

Bossyboots

Use the time over the weekend to set out the position clearly on paper as you have done on here. Set out your responses to their points in the order they have put them in their letter and when you speak to them, deal with the issues one at a time. This will help you to remain calm and hopefully prevent them from getting you flustered. Make sure you get the name of the person you speak to.

In response to their first statement that they have made attempts to contact you, ask them for the date and method of every communication to which they refer. Don't let them go off track without giving you that answer. In view of what you have said, you should be able to respond to anything they say with a reason why you dispute what they are saying. Stay firm with them and you should be able to persuade them to send the counsellor round free of charge.

Xbigman

If you have it all in writing then you should be OK. It looks like you have recieved a standard letter. Don't forget that if you agreed an underpayment with them you are still deemed to be in arrears, so technically they are correct on that point. You should see the debt counsellor ASAP and arrange another underpayment. Also ask what their complaints procedure is and put in a complaint regarding the wording of the letter you recieved. Apart from that this is annoying but nothing more.
At the point where they start trying to put on charges or mess up your credit rating the best course of action is to pay the arrears.
Regards



X

IvanOpinion

Look on the bright side Rush, you have had a couple of days to count to 10, set out your arguments and go in battling with them all guns blazing. As others have suggested it is possible that the computerised systems has sent out an inappropriate letter - or an operator has selected the wrong standard letter.

It is incredible in this day and age that many CS staff are not allowed to send out a personalised letter. All many can do is simply pick a standard form letter (that picks up a few pieces of data such as your name, address and balance etc.) or, some places may allow them to pick pre-written paragraphs so that all they have to do is add 'Dear xxx' and 'yours faithfully'. This is done for fear of litigation, the wording of many letters must be pre-approved by legal departments before being used (and given the 1000's that have to be sent out each day they just do not have time to review each one individually).

In situations like this I pretty much ignore the text of the letter and just look at the underlying meaning. I trust that once you get talking to a CS person this will quickly resolve itself. Oh, and make sure you get them to refund all the fees.

Ivan

rushnowt

Thanks very much for your support and advice and special thanks for the pm's giving tips and inside info

Well over the weekend I sat down and wrote a letter to Halifax explaining my dismay at the way I have been treated and sent it through howtocomplain.com, and this afternoon I received a phone call from the manager at the customer services centre.

She apologised for the "standard letter" which had been sent to me which did not take into account anything about my situation and recredited the £100 + £25 charges for the debt counsellor and letter which was sent.

I have now arranged to pay my mortgage in full till the house sale is fully completed which hopefully shall only be a few weeks, however she could not explain where the arrears had come from, when looking back through my account she went back to Feb 04 and there wern't any, so she is instructing someone to look into that further.

So all in all, not a bad day :money:

Bossyboots

Really glad to hear it worked out okay.

mrcow

Sorry to hear that you were left stewing over the weekend though

rushnowt

mrcow wrote:

Sorry to hear that you were left stewing over the weekend though

Just glad I had my friends on here to get me through it