Moriarty Law CCJ claim received

Now that a claims form has been sent you have a limited time to respond. Normally 14 days after its deemed served (which is the business day after the normal delivery time, so depends if sent recorded, 1st, or 2nd class).No response could result in a default judgement, with costs. Responding to the form with an amount you can afford (even if just £1 per month) will result in a judgement by Admission, with different costs. The costs are set by court based on the amount of the claim and can be found on the web. They have gone as far as the claims stage so if you are offering a small amount then I would assume they would still go ahead with the CCJ as it gives them more leverage to ensure you pay.
You can fill in the defence section if you want to dispute part/all the balance. I suppose you could simply ask them to prove it, but if they do so to the courts then your defence will be struck out and you get a judgement saying you are liable to pay the full balance within the month.
You can request for Acknowledgement of Service to give more time to mount a defence.
You may want to seek your own legal advice, e.g. CAB and take along as much details/proof you have

You need to respond to the claim. You mention Moriarty, but who is their client?

I would be tempted to respond with a defend all response and then send a CCA request (include the £1 fee), to their client and a CPR31.14 to Moriarty.

Once you get documents back from the CCA request, you can determine how to proceed.

At the mediation stage, if you decide to try & negotiate an arrangement to pay, it may be possible to agree a Tomlin Order, which will avoid the CCJ, provided you stick to the payment arrangement in the Tomlin Order.

Arleen wrote: »

Tomlin order is generally for other types of cases, not debt recovery, and most lenders will not even consider it, especially if it's not joined by very fast repayment plan which from the sound of OP is not an option.

That is patently untrue. A Tomlin order can definitely be applied to debt and debt recovery. In fact Stepchange even refer to it on their website https://www.stepchange.org/debt-info/debt-collection/tomlin-order.aspx

The Tomlin order will generally say something like the claim will remain in court until the full amount has been settled as agreed. If any of the payments as agreed in the Tomlin are missed, then a judgement for the full amount is applied automatically. Once you settle the full amount the claim is discontinued.

I know of cases where a Tomlin has been granted for debts under £1000 paid over 24 monthly payments.

Remember that when you defend a claim you may wind up with more costs to it, so unless you have a real defence to add, well, save yourself some money.

Additional fees will have already been added to the debt in the initial claim. Not defending and waiting doing nothing or admitting the debt now will guarantee a CCJ as the OP cannot afford to settle in full. By defending initially with the aim of reaching an agreed repayment plan, the OP will not have lost anything but may prevent a CCJ being recorded if a Tomlin order can be agreed. A Tomlin order can also be sealed if it is solely related to a debt. https://www.judiciary.gov.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/sealing-of-tomlin-orders-effective-3-oct-2016.pdf

It is also possible now without defending the claim initially the OP may be able to reach a payment arrangement with Moriarty, which could be an idea.

A CCJ can have long reaching consequences and can impact on jobs, property rentals and many other aspects of ones life. I personally would 100% try everything I could to reach an arrangement with Moriarty or their customer to avoid a CCJ.