Water Company Debt Statute Barred

[Slow Al]

Hi there,

Trawled Google and this Forum seemed to have the most informed members, so here's my problem and any help would be very gratefully received.

Received letter out of the blue late November 2018 advising that Southern Water Services were now chasing me for an unpaid water bill of £1624.87 for the period 21/11/207 to 26/10/2013 for a previous property that I had lived in and were giving me until late December 2018 to reply. I looked into this and overwhelmingly the advice was not to admit the debt as I had left the property 12/12/2012 and the debt was clearly Statute Barred and so did not reply.

Then around 12/01/2019 received a claim from Shulmans LLP and the County Court in Northampton advising the the total claim was now £2273.73 (include interest, costs, etc.). I plan to send Acknowledgement of Service registered post on Monday and then forward document N9B within the further allowed time frame. But my first question is, any ideas, apart from trying to pursue this debt inside the Limitations Act, why they are claiming that the debt was until 26/10/2013, when I moved home and not only informed the Landlord of my move but Southern Water Services also who are ironically the water supplier in my new home and have been since 12/12/2012!.

The court documents also have my middle name as a surname, or maybe the document does not have enough space for my full name and it's been cut off!

So this debt, on the surface of it, is clearly Statute Barred, but I am struggling with how to word this defence, especially considering that the the debt runs until 10 months after I left the property and therefore would not be Statute Barred in their eyes. My gut feeling is saying that they are really going for me and believe the have something over me to claim this and are going to really fight it, so, as I mentioned, I really need to write a very careful defence and any help from you guys would be most welcome, thank you.

[Slow Al]

Hello, can anyone help?

[Amethyst]

Hi Slow Al, Apologies for not seeing your post over the weekend. You're going to acknowledge the claim today with the court, with intent to defend in full. Once you've done that it seems your defence date will be around 18th February but work it out from the date of issue printed on the claim form ( add 33 days -Check dates )

Then I would send a Subject Access Request to the water company to obtain everything they hold regarding your and your accounts - Subject Access Request Letter - I'd do that today if at all possible as they have up to 30 days to respond with the information.

It does sound like the Landlord didn't inform the water company of the change of tenant in December 2012 so they have continued to charge you until, possibly, they were finally informed about the new tenant. Presumably you paid Southern Water direct, rather than as part of your rent through your landlord ?

Could you type out the particulars of claim please so we can see what, if any, documents they mentioned/rely on. You'll need to ask a full breakdown of the amount being claimed - do you have any recollection of how you paid your water bill before you moved ? Did you deal with it on a monthly direct debit/standing order or pay the years bill as it came in ( were you metered ? ) or was it not paid at all ? ( 2007 - 2012 is 5 years so presumably some was paid to leave outstanding amount of £1624.87 but you'd expect that be be 3 years worth?)

[Slow Al]

Hi Amethyst,

Many thanks for your reply and no problems, I was wondering if maybe I hadn't fully completed some admin.

This may take a few hours for me to reply to your every question in detail (Slow Al), of which I appreciate your thoroughness, the first thing I note is that you are not recommending that I simply sit behind a Statute Barred reply and wait for them to prove otherwise, you seem to be advising a more pro-active response to this matter.

I will say, that we had big problems with this Landlord, we discovered an unpaid £2k+ Electric bill when we first moved in, which took ages to sort out and what he appears to do is try and shift utility debts to previous or current tenants for the long periods when the property has been empty, bills which legally are down to him!

I will collect the information you have asked and write again, thank you.

Can I just quickly confirm that all I need to do today is send the Acknowledgement back to 4th Floor, St Katherine's House?

Best wishes,
Al

[Kati]

Hi Amethyst,

Many thanks for your reply and no problems, I was wondering if maybe I hadn't fully completed some admin.

This may take a few hours for me to reply to your every question in detail (Slow Al), of which I appreciate your thoroughness, the first thing I note is that you are not recommending that I simply sit behind a Statute Barred reply and wait for them to prove otherwise, you seem to be advising a more pro-active response to this matter.

I will say, that we had big problems with this Landlord, we discovered an unpaid £2k+ Electric bill when we first moved in, which took ages to sort out and what he appears to do is try and shift utility debts to previous or current tenants for the long periods when the property has been empty, bills which legally are down to him!

I will collect the information you have asked and write again, thank you.

Can I just quickly confirm that all I need to do today is send the Acknowledgement back to 4th Floor, St Katherine's House?

Best wishes,
Al

If you're acknowledging service of the claim you should be able to do it online via MCOL (quicker and easier than sending back the form 9in the post) xx