Advice needed

[Tessie2017]

I posted on the CCJ forum by mistake but basically I’ve received a letter from Advantis DCA stating that I owe their client British Gas over £7k for a debt accrued when I took over a public house temporarily ( from Dec 2012-July 2013)..even though it was a temporary tenancy I set up a Ltd Company to run it until the pub was sold by Punch Taverns. The previous tenant had got into financial difficulties, one of them being due to a faulty electricity meter that had run up a bill of 30k for British Gas. The first bill I had was £180 which was paid by the Ltd Company , the 2nd was for £3k which I queried .I wrote to them re the faulty meter & asked them to recalculate the bill. Despite several phone calls to try & sort it out,no engineer arrived & no further bill received from them. When the pub was due to close I wrote to all potential creditors telling them that the Company was being dissolved & to submit any final invoices for payment. The Company was then dissolved & struck off the register. I haven’t heard anything until now...6years later..Do they have a case?

[MIKE770]

Kati can you put the 2 to-gether

[Tessie2017]

Hi,
does anyone have any advice...I’m bricking it

[des8]

Hi and welcome
If your account was in the limited company name you have no problem.
Had my own run in with BG, so nothing now surprises me with them

Tagging our expert slainte caragh who has some in depth knowledge on these matters.
However she is a busy young lady and it might be a while before she picks up on this

[Tessie2017]

Thank you so much Des8 !! I thought so but some people say differently ..It was 2 months into the pub I went limited but had no dealings with BG beforehand nor did I ever sign anything for them so hopefully we’re ok...

[Tessie2017]

The DCA are addressing the letter to me T/A though .. not the limited company...they may be trying it on?

[des8]

Give SC a couple of days to answer, but if she fails you could either just ignore the DCA or write to them and explain they are chasing the wrong person.
Tell them the alleged debtor is XYZ co.Ltd, and as they are aware of the position they should stop contacting you.
This is in accordance with the Financial Conduct Authority's (FCA) Consumer Credit sourcebook which states the following.

"A firm must not ignore or disregard a customer's claim that a debt has been settled or is disputed and must not continue to make demands for payment without providing clear justification and/or evidence as to why the customer's claim is not valid." 7.5.3

"A firm must suspend any steps it takes or its agent takes in the recovery of a debt from a customer where the customer disputes the debt on valid grounds or what may be valid grounds." 7.14.1

"Where a customer disputes a debt on valid grounds or what may be valid grounds, the firm must investigate the dispute and provide details of the debt to the customer in a timely manner." 7.14.3

[slainte caragh]

Hi sorry I have been in and out of hospital for the last couple of days

As Des says, you have nothing to worry about, send a copy of the wind down papers to the DCA.

Write to BG and remind them that 1: The company is no longer in existence and 2 their own back billing rule applied and you cannot have anything added to a bill for over 12 months if you have requested accurate bills. Remind them that you had disputed the bill and that you heard nothing. If the CCJ is in your name ask them to remove this as the account was a business one.

[Tessie2017]

Thank you so much for your advice!! There has been no ccj issued & my credit ref is clear. I had another letter from Advantis today saying that If I don’t answer it will be passed back to BG & they will alert another DCA...

[des8]

Typical BG .. if one DCA can't put the frighteners on successfully they pass it to another who uses BIG RED CAPITALS all the time.
Still got no powers!

[Tessie2017]

I still haven’t answered them...The pub closed it’s doors in Aug 2012. ( got the original date wrong) & before these DCA letters I hadn’t spoken to BG since March 2012 when bill was disputed ( owing to it being 3k for 3 months & check meter on site by previous tenant) .. Apart from the fact it was a Ltd Company is this now statute barred anyway do you think? DCA has bill end date as 30/6/2017...it’s been a vets practise since 2013

[Amethyst]

They'll tell BG and pass it to another DCA ? Scary stuff there.... lol

It seems it might be pretty close to being SB so unless there is a serious thread of court judgment I wouldn't engage ….If you last had any contact with BG about this was in March 2012 and the business closed down in August 2012 then you're close.... and

. When the pub was due to close I wrote to all potential creditors telling them that the Company was being dissolved & to submit any final invoices for payment. The Company was then dissolved & struck off the register

was in what, July / Aug 2012 ? They have no claim. They still haven't sorted out the original dispute in any case.

Maybe wait until it is 6 years since sending the letter to creditors and then write to them/BG stating stat barred AND copies of the wind up docs etc. The DCA won't know any of the history, they'll just have your details and an amount to try and scrape some money in to recoup what they paid BG for the debt.

A DCA would be chucking money down the toilet taking this to court as it would have to be evidenced and go back to BG in any event. I hope the Vets got it all sorted out after they took over the premises.

[des8]

As you were in the pub until July 2013 (5 years ago) it couldn't be statute barred yet

[Amethyst]

Think date in first post was wrong Des

.The pub closed it’s doors in Aug 2012. ( got the original date wrong) & before these DCA letters I hadn’t spoken to BG since March 2012

[des8]

OOps!