Claiming back Money loaned to a friend?

sbstab · 14 November 2012 at 11:29PM

Hi, I loaned a friend £2000 to help with publishing a book of thiers and I paid for a loan agreement contract off of the internet to be made up for us both to sign which stated the monthly amounts to be paid by my friend, the date, the amount and what would happen if non payments were made etc etc I received 3 months payments and now my friend is saying that he cannot pay me the remainder of the loan which is £1400. What can i do? i've looked at making a small claims case but it is going to cost me £80 just to fill in the initial N1 form! i'm worried that i will end up paying allot of court fees which will make the claim for the remainder of the loan pointless and thats if i win! (and my friend actually pays what is owed on demand of the court which i dont think will happen) and i would have to pay the court to appoint baylifts. Do I have any other options? I have the contract and all text messages saved between me and my friend as evidence along with bank transfer statements etc. Any advise would help. Thank you.

CAB_National_Representative · 16 November 2012 at 6:26PM

sbstab wrote: »

Hi, I loaned a friend £2000 to help with publishing a book of thiers and I paid for a loan agreement contract off of the internet to be made up for us both to sign which stated the monthly amounts to be paid by my friend, the date, the amount and what would happen if non payments were made etc etc I received 3 months payments and now my friend is saying that he cannot pay me the remainder of the loan which is £1400. What can i do? i've looked at making a small claims case but it is going to cost me £80 just to fill in the initial N1 form! i'm worried that i will end up paying allot of court fees which will make the claim for the remainder of the loan pointless and thats if i win! (and my friend actually pays what is owed on demand of the court which i dont think will happen) and i would have to pay the court to appoint baylifts. Do I have any other options? I have the contract and all text messages saved between me and my friend as evidence along with bank transfer statements etc. Any advise would help. Thank you.

Hi sbstab - we'd recommend that you get advice on this from your local bureau and/or a solicitor. And there are other options to consider - for example, mediation (there's brief details on the Gov.uk website about this).

agrinnall · 16 November 2012 at 8:26PM

I'm not convinced that mediation will get you anywhere given that the friend presuably acknowledges the debt but simply refuses to pay it, but it may be worth a try. However, I think in the end you will either have to give up on the money or use the small claims process. If you do the claim online it's a bit cheaper, £70 rather than £80 for £1400.

https://www.moneyclaim.gov.uk/web/mcol/welcome

Fire_Fox · 18 November 2012 at 1:03AM

Have you sent your friend a 'letter before action' by recorded delivery? If you include copies of all the evidence and a copy of the completed county court claims form that might frighten them into paying up. Text messages are poor evidence, have you any e-mails? There are not loads of legal fees involved in a small claims action, it is designed to be cheap and accessible.

Claiming back Money loaned to a friend?

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