Default judgement for a debt against my old company

[annih]

Hello,

I am looking for some advice please.

4 months ago I was notified by my credit reporting that I had a CCJ against myself from Amex. When I looked into this it was for a debt for an old liquidated company (CVL). It took a while to figure out what was going and still to this day I do not have the claim form, however the long and short of it is that Amex believe they had a personal guarantee for the debt. Having taken advice and been in discussion with Amex's solicitors they obviously don't have enough evidence but I have this default judgement against me.

I have managed to negotiate with them that they will sign an order to set aside if I make a settlement payment. I am reluctant to do this but it is critical that I attack this with the highest chance of getting the judgement set aside.

The options I would like opinions on please are:
1) Agree to their order to set aside and make the payment and file with the courts
2) Persist with the Tomlin order version of the set aside where the payment will only be made once the court has sealed the order - They are resisting this, so I am discounting for now.
3) File a request to set aside with the court, with two witness statements; the first detailing how they sent the claim to the wrong address and that there has been no communications about this personal liability, and second one from a firm that has dealt with many of these cases where they detail how the evidence provided and on other such cases is always insufficient to stand up. I can then defend and/or negotiate from a position of equal rather than the one now where I have a judgement against me.

I am really interested in which of options 1 and 3 will likely have the highest chance of the judge agreeing to seal the order.

I have drafts of all the orders if that helps with offering opinions/advice.

Thank you in advance.

[R0b]

Hi there,

First and foremost, making a payment before filing your set aside would be deemed admission of liability so you should never pay first if you have no intention of accepting liability.

It would be helpful to see the contents of the draft order they are proposing so we understand what they are offering but in my view option 1 is an absolute no no although it is your choice. If you pay, you run the risk of the court potentially refusing to set aside because you are effectively trying to repair your credit - the court's have the ultimate say on this so tread carefully.

The bar for getting a set aside is not very high so as long as you can show a decent defence it should get set aside.

[annih]

Thank you Rob,

I agree and have been pushing for option 2, but they are being defiant.

I have attached three documents, one for the draft order they want to use and then the other two for my Tomlin order.

To your point about defence, it is pretty robust around failing to delivery both claim forms at all and one to the wrong address. The evidence supporting the claim is weak too and they have had no communication on the personal liability at all. As always though, at the mercy of the courts.

Really hope this helps with adding context.