TV Licence dispute
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OscarG2009
Posts: 1 Newbie
I missed 2 payments of TV licence direct debit. Long story short I upgraded with Halifax and assumed that same as when you switch accounts your direct debits follow you with the upgrade. Caused issues with other things but all sorted now.
I received a letter dated 19th of May around 5 or 6 days later, toward the end of the following week. It said I had a deadline to pay the outstanding amount by the 31/05/17. Given that the 31st was pay day and I wasn't exactly flush I thought I'd wait for the 31st.
On the 31st I went onto their site, completed their form and, entered my card and made payment. Now a few months ago I had issue with paying my council tax online where the council say I didn't and I didn't ask for the optional email receipt. I had to take bank statements up to the council and it was a pain so now when there isn't the option of an email receipt for bills etc paid on line, I screen shot.
So I entered my card details and was greeted with a screen saying:
'Payment status: Successful'. Leaving me with the impression that the payment had gone through.
Few days later Akinika, a debt recovery team called me about unpaid TV licence. Confused, I told them I'd already paid it. They agreed to go back to TV licencing. I emailed TV licencing explaining the situation myself. They responded yesterday and turns out that despite my letter saying I had a deadline of the 31st of May, the deadline was actually the 30th of May and that the debt was passed to the debt recovery agency on the 1st of June.
I replied outlining the above, adding the screen shot and pointing out that the letter indicates that 31st of May was the date to get the money to them and suggesting that if it wasn't passed to the debt recovery team until the 1st of June there's no reason why they couldn't have accepted payment on the 31st of May, also enclosing the screen shot of the 'Payment status: Successful', confirmation that I got and they just sent me a standard reply about how it'd been passed onto the debt recovery team.
Not sure if I have grounds for genuine grievance here but I'm not thrilled with how it's worked out, nor the fact they don't see to engage at all with the issues I'm raising at all. Nor am I happy that under these circumstances it has been passed on to a debt collections agency and the associated repercussions of that in terms of credit score, etc.
I received a letter dated 19th of May around 5 or 6 days later, toward the end of the following week. It said I had a deadline to pay the outstanding amount by the 31/05/17. Given that the 31st was pay day and I wasn't exactly flush I thought I'd wait for the 31st.
On the 31st I went onto their site, completed their form and, entered my card and made payment. Now a few months ago I had issue with paying my council tax online where the council say I didn't and I didn't ask for the optional email receipt. I had to take bank statements up to the council and it was a pain so now when there isn't the option of an email receipt for bills etc paid on line, I screen shot.
So I entered my card details and was greeted with a screen saying:
'Payment status: Successful'. Leaving me with the impression that the payment had gone through.
Few days later Akinika, a debt recovery team called me about unpaid TV licence. Confused, I told them I'd already paid it. They agreed to go back to TV licencing. I emailed TV licencing explaining the situation myself. They responded yesterday and turns out that despite my letter saying I had a deadline of the 31st of May, the deadline was actually the 30th of May and that the debt was passed to the debt recovery agency on the 1st of June.
I replied outlining the above, adding the screen shot and pointing out that the letter indicates that 31st of May was the date to get the money to them and suggesting that if it wasn't passed to the debt recovery team until the 1st of June there's no reason why they couldn't have accepted payment on the 31st of May, also enclosing the screen shot of the 'Payment status: Successful', confirmation that I got and they just sent me a standard reply about how it'd been passed onto the debt recovery team.
Not sure if I have grounds for genuine grievance here but I'm not thrilled with how it's worked out, nor the fact they don't see to engage at all with the issues I'm raising at all. Nor am I happy that under these circumstances it has been passed on to a debt collections agency and the associated repercussions of that in terms of credit score, etc.
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Comments
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You have grounds for a complaint. Use their complaints procedure.
As far as your " credit score" though, then that will have been already affected by your defaults
The debt collector won't affect it and can be ignored0 -
As far as your " credit score" though, then that will have been already affected by your defaults
It's worth raising a complaint with Halifax as well. The switch guarantee is supposed to protect you from things like this. The defaults may take a while to show up on your credit report, but you can still open a complaint as you know the DD failed.The debt collector won't affect it and can be ignored
I'd want to get it in writing from TV licensing that they have accepted the payment.
While the cut off was the 31st and you paid them on the 31st, it's possible they didn't receive the money until the 1st. That is probably why they said you would have had to pay on the 30th, for them to receive the payment by the 31st & why they passed the debt on.
I always try to avoid DD when picking a switch date and then keep an eye on the DD going out.0 -
Nor am I happy that under these circumstances it has been passed on to a debt collections agency and the associated repercussions of that in terms of credit score, etc.
If you go through the TV Licence complaints process, and the complaint is upheld in your favour, part of the resolution should involve them advising the relevant credit reference agencies to update your credit file accordingly0 -
A debt collections agency can do absolutely nothing to your credit record, that is for the creditor. If you've got a complaint, raise it with the organ grinder, not the monkey.0
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TV Licensing have a very itchy trigger-finger as regards appointing a DCA for prepayment accounts that are in default.
There isn't enough info in the OP's post to be sure whether it applies here, but it's worth bearing in mind that pre-payment accounts are typically 3-6 months in credit at all times. In other words, you'd need to miss at least 3 payments before there was any question of an actual debt being involved. I'd be interested to know whether it is lawful to engage a DCA to chase a non-existent debt.
There are a couple of other aspects to this:-
- There is a ready remedy for BBC-TVL, which is that when the credit is exhausted, the Licence is cancelled. I would imagine that they do not want to do this if it can be avoided for their own self-interested reasons.
- The pre-payment schemes are not CCA regulated credit arrangements, but statutory pre-payment schemes. As such, I'm not sure that they involve consumer debt at all.0
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