BWLEGAL court claim help needed

[Anialee13]

Apparently they filled for CCJ on the 5th of May. I was away and behind with my post so haven't acknowledged it yet. After claim letter they sent me another letter saying I can still set up instalment plan that I can afford to avoid CCJ. Today before going online to acknowledge I went to their online account to see options for this installment plan and it say there that only if I agree to pay £75 a month I will avoid CCJ of its less they will still go ahead and obtain it even with payment plan in place.
first of all I don't know what to do. I have not communicated with them at all since the letters started. I haven't requested CCa or anything. I don't know if I shod.ignore them and go through portal. AOS and file defence or try to set something up with them?
I want to add that it's a payday loan from 2019ish, at the time my mental health hasn't been great and my memory is all over the place. If I remember correctly it was £1500 they want just over £2600 now.
I really hope someone can help as I really don't know what I'm doing

[ostell]

If you haven't acked the claim you could already have the CCJ against you. Login using the details and password on the form. Nothing in defence. See what the status of the claim us.

[Anialee13]

Not yet I don't think, I just logged in and acknowledged.
what now though, do I stand a chance at contacting them directly to negotiate this £75 instalments or do I have to take my chances with the court?

[ostell]

You have about 2 days to submit a defence!

You send your defence as an attachment to an email to the court. I don't have the details to hand but the email address and instructions are on the courts web pages.

Defence as a PDF, not forgetting to sign the statement of truth.

[Anialee13]

ostell so no point contacting them to set up this payment plan and hopefully avoid getting CCJ?
I'm also confused about submitting defence, I thought I was meant to be doing it via this online portal? I'm not sure how to do it as a PDF?

[ostell]

You can submit it online but it loses any formatting you create. There is also a limit on the number of characters.

You can write it with a word processor such as Microsoft Word and save it in PDF format. You can even paste in a scanned copy of your signature.

But online is possibly more expedient at the moment. You should have been preparing your defence as soon as you received the claim.

I doubt if they will be amenable to a payment plan now but you can try. Head your letters, emails "without prejudice save as to costs".