Can my creditor insist on coming to house?

kenlyn

Hi, grateful for any advice please.
Have a loan with Citifinancial and payments £278 montn. OH sick for last 6 months so our income down to half now. Contacted by phone and letter to ask them if we could pay say £130 per month until things improve. They keep telling me that I either have to go to their office to discuss (50 mls away) or they will visit me. State they can't do anything unless it is face to face. Can't travel to them & they say they have to see the both of us. Also they are insisting on a complete list of my income & expenditure.
Should I just go to CCCS now re this issue as I seem to be getting nowhere on my own. My other creditors have given me some leeway but not this company who say tough basically.
Many thanks.

poorandindenial

They are being unreasonable, you can ask to only deal in writing if you want. I would definitely give CCCS a call and get some advice and template letters from them (or NationalDebtline, they are meant to be very good too and have lots of template letters on their site)

zzzLazyDaisy

Have a look through the office of fair trading guidance to debt collectors. You will find enough to throw at them. Then write a stern letter saying they are in breach of OFT guidelines and quote the paragraphs, and tell them you will take further action if they persist. Oh, and a doctor's letter saying that you and/or OH are ill and not to be contacted would be good too.

http://www.oft.gov.uk/shared_oft/business_leaflets/consumer_credit/oft664.pdf

kenlyn

Thanks both for advice. Will look to OFT site as suggested - when you are trying to do your best and these people keep insisting on things like meeting face to face it gets you down. I feel like swearing at them! Have been polite to them but just worn out with them now. Thanks again.

excel1

Send them both of these, that should get them dealing with you properly
Re: Harassment by telephone

REFERENCE NUMBER:

Dear Sirs

I am writing in relation to the quantity and frequency of telephone calls that I have received from your company, which I deem to be personally harassing.
I now require all further correspondence from your company to be made in writing only.

I am of the view that your continued harassment of me by telephone puts you in breach of Section 40 of the Administration of Justice Act1970, and the Protection from Harassment Act 1997.
If you continue to harass me by telephone, you will also be in breach of the WirelessTelegraphyAct(1949) and I will report you to both Trading Standards and The Office of Fair Trading, meaning that you will be liable to a substantial fine.Be advised that any further telephone calls from your company will be recorded.

Yours faithfully,





Dear Sir/Madam

Account Ref

Please be advised that I will only communicate with you in writing. I have noted your repeated attempts to contact me by telephone over the past few weeks/months and these have been duly logged by time and date.
Furthermore, should it be your intention to arrange a “doorstep call”, please be advised that under OFT rules, you can only visit me at my home if you make an appointment and I have no wish to make an appointment with you.

There is only an implied license under English Common Law for people to be able to visit me on my property without express permission; the postman and people asking for directions etc (Armstrong v. Sheppard and Short Ltd [1959] 2 Q.B. per Lord Evershed M.R.). Therefore take note that I revoke license under Common Law for you, or your representatives to visit me at my property and if you do so, then you will be liable to damages for a tort of trespass and action will be taken, including but not limited to, police attendance.

Yours faithfully

chez000

excel1 wrote: »

Send them both of these, that should get them dealing with you properly
Re: Harassment by telephone

Why send these letters? the OP hasnt mentioned harassment

CCCS or one of the other charities may be able to be more persuasive.

Are you still paying Citi the full amount? if you are im not surprised they wont let you pay half, once youve missed a payment they may be more open to negotiating.

Not suggesting you miss a payment but the next time one is due, if you pay a reduced one that you can afford theyll be quick to get in touch and you can explain why you can only pay less

10past6

chez000 wrote: »

Why send these letters? the OP hasnt mentioned harassment

The OP said this:

kenlyn wrote: »

They keep telling me that I either have to go to their office to discuss (50 mls away) or they will visit me. State they can't do anything unless it is face to face.

From the OP comments, that does constitute as harassment, the company will be well aware of the OFT guidelines, just because they choose to ignore them, is no fault of the OP.

OP, as advised, send the letters.

excel1

Why?
simple the mere fact they say they can only deal face to face suggest that they plan to intimidate people, nothing in the world cant be legally done in writing so are you suggesting that there is a good reason to want them to visit? cause i cant think of one...........

chez000

10past6 wrote: »

The OP said this:



From the OP comments, that does constitute as harassment, the company will be well aware of the OFT guidelines, just because they choose to ignore them, is no fault of the OP.

OP, as advised, send the letters.

No I dont think thats harassment, they are being difficult and refusing to deal with the OP, I think the banking code is the source to quote from,

banking code sec 14.1

We will consider cases of financial difficultysympathetically and positively. You will usually spotproblems first and should let us know as soon as
possible. If we become aware of problems, we will let you know in writing. If speed seems to be important,we may try to contact you by phone, fax or e-mail.

sec 14.3

We will do all we can to help you overcome yourdifficulties. With your co-operation, we will develop a plan with you for dealing with your financial difficulties and we will tell you, in writing, what we have agreed.

chez000

excel1 wrote: »

Why?
simple the mere fact they say they can only deal face to face suggest that they plan to intimidate people, nothing in the world cant be legally done in writing so are you suggesting that there is a good reason to want them to visit? cause i cant think of one...........

Firstly Im not trying to be disagreeable (I know no one has suggested this)
The harrassment letters are a fine tool when someone is recieving a large number of phonecalls.

Unless Ive misread the thread the OP is not recieving a large number of phonecalls, the creditor is just being awkward.

I dont think compalining about harrassmnt, when someone is being difficult is really going to lead anywhere.

and of course I dont think the OP should have the creditor visit her, and I think it is a good idea to only deal with them in writng, and I would agree that she send s a letter requesting that she only be dealt with in writing, but I just disagree that the part about harrassment needs to be included

excel1

Chez,
You may be a calm collected person who can deal with these things no problem, however i detect from the OP posts that this is getting to them, so why put up with it? If these companies dont start talking positivly to their customers they are going to find alot this year will file bankruptcy and i cant wait to see how many DRO's are issued in the first year largely due to unhelpful creditors