Virgin asking for cash 3 years late???

FortyWinks

I've just received a letter from a credit management agency telling me I owe Virgin Media £69.97. Apparantly this is from 3 years ago at a previous address where I was with NTL. I know I paid all final bills. My house mate continued on in the house for a year after I left therefore any mail that didn't go to my new address was safe and everything was paid up. Can they come to me after 3 years as a different company and tell me I owe them money? I no longer have my old NTL bills but know that I would never leave somewhere and not pay the bills. What should I do??

A rather worried FortyWinks xx

Nile

Hello FortyWinks

Welcome to the MSE site.:wave:

I'll move your thread to 'The Consumer Vent' board.

Hi, Martin’s asked me to post this in these circumstances: I’ve asked Board Guides to move threads if they’ll receive a better response elsewhere(please see this rule) so this post/thread has been moved to another board, where it should get more replies. If you have any questions about this policy please email [EMAIL="abuse@moneysavingexpert.com"]!!!!!![/EMAIL].

Regards

Nile

custardy

FortyWinks wrote: »

I've just received a letter from a credit management agency telling me I owe Virgin Media £69.97. Apparantly this is from 3 years ago at a previous address where I was with NTL. I know I paid all final bills. My house mate continued on in the house for a year after I left therefore any mail that didn't go to my new address was safe and everything was paid up. Can they come to me after 3 years as a different company and tell me I owe them money? I no longer have my old NTL bills but know that I would never leave somewhere and not pay the bills. What should I do??

A rather worried FortyWinks xx

plenty of knowlegable people on here.for me i would be asking for full documentation on how the money is owed with a breakdown and dates

FortyWinks

Wasn't quite sure where to put this query. Thankyou

RadoJo

As far as I am aware, the limit on collecting outstanding debts is 6 years, but this is with full documentation etc. I agree with Custardy that you should get a breakdown of all the charges they claim you owe, so you at least know what they're dealing with. Was the account in your name? If so, did you contact them to let them know that you were moving out? If the account is in your name, then you are probably still liable, but if not, then they would have to prove that you were responsible for the charges before you would need to worry about it!

FortyWinks

RadoJo wrote: »

As far as I am aware, the limit on collecting outstanding debts is 6 years, but this is with full documentation etc. I agree with Custardy that you should get a breakdown of all the charges they claim you owe, so you at least know what they're dealing with. Was the account in your name? If so, did you contact them to let them know that you were moving out? If the account is in your name, then you are probably still liable, but if not, then they would have to prove that you were responsible for the charges before you would need to worry about it!

Thanks for your reply....Yes, the account was in my name and I did inform them I was moving out. Everything was paid up and my friend took over everything. I have been in contact with Virgin just now and they are having a problem accessing the account details as they have been archived!! They said they would call me back by the end of the day. The problem I have is that I no longer have the NTL bills and therefore cannot prove that I paid up!! Lessons to be learned there!!

KILL_BILL

FortyWinks wrote: »

Thanks for your reply....Yes, the account was in my name and I did inform them I was moving out. Everything was paid up and my friend took over everything. I have been in contact with Virgin just now and they are having a problem accessing the account details as they have been archived!! They said they would call me back by the end of the day. The problem I have is that I no longer have the NTL bills and therefore cannot prove that I paid up!! Lessons to be learned there!!

the onus is upon them to prove that you owe them any money if that be the case.

bearing in mind that alot of companies get debt management companies to recover debts and has been known to happen alot where people have paid the account in full already.

sit tight and let them contact you with the full details.

if it be the case you can prob get copies of your old bank statement

RadoJo

I agree with Kill Bill - they have to prove that you owe the money, and from the sounds of things that is proving too much for their crappy systems! Do you have a record of the letter you sent them on your computer or anything? Or if you bank online there will be a record of the payments made and if you paid by DD, then there might even be one which is labelled 'Final Payment'. You might be able to retrieve the instruction to cancel the DD as well if required.

I just realised that my last post came out a bit wrong - I meant that if you had left the account in your name you would still be liable, but it sounds as though you did everything you possibly could, it's just a shame that sometimes that's not enough for Virgin! With regard to switching the account to your other housemate's name, the housemate would have been unable to do anything on the account (eg change packages etc) if it was still in your name, so any changes on the account after you moved out could serve as proof that you were no longer the account holder.

However I suspect all of this is irrelevant as they will never be able to prove that you owe them the money - if they can't retrieve your file from archive when you call them, how did they mysteriously manage to get enough info to bill you?

FortyWinks

RadoJo wrote: »

I agree with Kill Bill - they have to prove that you owe the money, and from the sounds of things that is proving too much for their crappy systems! Do you have a record of the letter you sent them on your computer or anything? Or if you bank online there will be a record of the payments made and if you paid by DD, then there might even be one which is labelled 'Final Payment'. You might be able to retrieve the instruction to cancel the DD as well if required.

I just realised that my last post came out a bit wrong - I meant that if you had left the account in your name you would still be liable, but it sounds as though you did everything you possibly could, it's just a shame that sometimes that's not enough for Virgin! With regard to switching the account to your other housemate's name, the housemate would have been unable to do anything on the account (eg change packages etc) if it was still in your name, so any changes on the account after you moved out could serve as proof that you were no longer the account holder.

However I suspect all of this is irrelevant as they will never be able to prove that you owe them the money - if they can't retrieve your file from archive when you call them, how did they mysteriously manage to get enough info to bill you?

As Kill Bill and your good self suggested, I have requested bank statements from 3 years ago. The bank should be able to look at them for me shortly.
Thanks for your help on this guys. Very much appreciated. I know its not a massive bill but £69 is rather alot to me. Plus I don't like being accused of not paying my bills!!

FortyWinks

Virgin have got back to me and admitted they got it wrong and I don't owe them anything!! Many thanks for your help on this

A very happy FortyWinks!! xx :beer:

KILL_BILL

you better cancel your statments as banks now charge for obtaining duplicates unless your bank doesnt