HELP! Received a court claim

[tallava]

Hi forum members first time in this lovely forum and I wonder if you can help me. I received a claim form from Northampton county court which is issued on 02 July 15, the claimant is cabot financial, the solicitors are Mortimer Clarke. I have responded to the claim online at MCOL and acknowledged the service of the claim on 09 July 15. One thing I'm not sure of is whether debt is statue barred...please see attachment below if you can work out as I can't remember if I have paid any money towards the debt ever since...
what are my next steps?
1. A CCA request to Cabot to get a copy of the agreement pertaining to the Alleged Debt, there is a £1 statutory fee to pay?
2. A request made under CPR31.14 to the solicitors this is for the documents mentioned on the statement of claim in this case the agreement and the Notice of Assignment?
your help is much appreciated.

[nemesis45]

Re: HELP! Received a court claim

Hi forum members first time in this lovely forum and I wonder if you can help me. I received a claim form from Northampton county court which is issued on 02 July 15, the claimant is cabot financial, the solicitors are Mortimer Clarke. I have responded to the claim online at MCOL and acknowledged the service of the claim on 09 July 15. One thing I'm not sure of is whether debt is statue barred...please see attachment below if you can work out as I can't remember if I have paid any money towards the debt ever since...
what are my next steps?
1. A CCA request to Cabot to get a copy of the agreement pertaining to the Alleged Debt, there is a £1 statutory fee to pay?
2. A request made under CPR31.14 to the solicitors this is for the documents mentioned on the statement of claim in this case the agreement and the Notice of Assignment?
your help is much appreciated.

Hi welcome to LB,

The Dates on a CRA file are not a reliable way of ascertaining if a debt is statute barred, however seeing a default end June 2010 and given that defaults are placed within 6 months of the cause of action it leads me to conclude that the final payment to the account would have been some time from Jan 2010 onwards, the time scale laid down in the Limitation Act is 6 years. So you would have to have 6 clears up to the date the claim was issued with no payment or unequivocal written acknowledgment of the debt. Meaning the debt would have become statute barred in 2016.
Cabot using Mortimer Clarke, who may decline the CPR31.14 on the ground that the claim will be allocated to the small claims track if this happens we chase it up.

You have done all you can at this stage, if Cabot does not comply with the CCA request within the 12 + 2 Working days time scale it renders the account unenforceable until the agreement of a compliant reconstituted agreement is provided.

Who was the original creditor please? What the amount claimed?

nem

[tallava]

Re: HELP! Received a court claim

hi nemesis45, thank you so much for a prompt reply. Though i'm responding much later than i should it was only because i wanted to first hear from both the solicitor and the claimant. To answer your questions...
The original creditor may be Natwest. The amount claimed is £3845 includes £185 court fee and £80 solicitor's costs.
However, Cabot financial has responded with..."i have been unable to to locate this account under the details you have provided. This is because on the Particulars of Claim box on the claim form there is no reference number stated i.e. cabot reference nor an account number. Now that i have found the reference no, i will re-send the s.78 letter tomorrow.
The solicitors have responded, and their client has agreed to an extension of 28 days for me to file my defence. Then says please notify the court in writing of the agreement. How to notify the court? Thanks again

[FlamingParrot]

Re: HELP! Received a court claim

hi nemesis45, thank you so much for a prompt reply. Though i'm responding much later than i should it was only because i wanted to first hear from both the solicitor and the claimant. To answer your questions...
The original creditor may be Natwest. The amount claimed is £3845 includes £185 court fee and £80 solicitor's costs.
However, Cabot financial has responded with..."i have been unable to to locate this account under the details you have provided. This is because on the Particulars of Claim box on the claim form there is no reference number stated i.e. cabot reference nor an account number. Now that i have found the reference no, i will re-send the s.78 letter tomorrow.
The solicitors have responded, and their client has agreed to an extension of 28 days for me to file my defence. Then says please notify the court in writing of the agreement. How to notify the court? Thanks again

Good news, at least they have agreed. :grin:

You may want to look at this thread: http://www.legalbeagles.info/forums/...filing-defence

[nemesis45]

Re: HELP! Received a court claim

hi nemesis45, thank you so much for a prompt reply. Though i'm responding much later than i should it was only because i wanted to first hear from both the solicitor and the claimant. To answer your questions...
The original creditor may be Natwest. The amount claimed is £3845 includes £185 court fee and £80 solicitor's costs.
However, Cabot financial has responded with..."i have been unable to to locate this account under the details you have provided. This is because on the Particulars of Claim box on the claim form there is no reference number stated i.e. cabot reference nor an account number. Now that i have found the reference no, i will re-send the s.78 letter tomorrow.
The solicitors have responded, and their client has agreed to an extension of 28 days for me to file my defence. Then says please notify the court in writing of the agreement. How to notify the court? Thanks again

Hi Tallava.

e-mail the court that well be ok.
nem

[tallava]

Re: HELP! Received a court claim

Thank you both FlamingParrot and Nemesis45.
Before i notify the court for the agreed extension...
The response from Cabot on the letter is dated on 11/8/2015. Is this when the 28 days extension begins?
Thank you once again.

[Kati]

Re: HELP! Received a court claim

The 28 day extension is added on to the original time you had to put in a defence (33 days from date of issue on the claim form + 28 days = when your defence must be in by)

[Kati]

Re: HELP! Received a court claim

which should be the 1st September.

You might want to phone the court and ask them the status of the claim tho' ... as it looks like your original defence was due in on the 4th August (33 days from 2nd July) :tinysmile_hmm_t2:

[FlamingParrot]

Re: HELP! Received a court claim

Thank you both FlamingParrot and Nemesis45.
Before i notify the court for the agreed extension...
The response from Cabot on the letter is dated on 11/8/2015. Is this when the 28 days extension begins?
Thank you once again.

The 28 days are added on top of your previous 33 days from date printed on the claim, so they start to run when the previous 33 days ended if that makes any sense.

Or go to this site, enter the date printed on your claim and add 61 days: http://www.timeanddate.com/date/dateadded.html

[tallava]

Re: HELP! Received a court claim

Thank you guys for helping me in the first steps of this battle...

I have now have received an email from court to confirm that the 28 extension has been noted on the court file, so now according to your/mine calculations i have only 8 days to file my defence!
In mean time, having requested CPR 31.14 from Mortimer Clarke solicitors on 3 August and having received the confirmation letter/agreement for the 28 days extension from them which says "Further to your letter dated 3 August 2015, we are taking our clint's instructions in relation to your request and will come back to you as soon as we can."
what does this mean? what do i do next?

also, I have received a letter from Cabot Stating this...

Thank you for your request for information under sections 77-79 of the Consumer Credit Act 1974. We currently do not have this information on file. However, we have requested the relevant details, which will include a copy of the credit agreement, statement of account and original and varied terms and conditions from the original lender. I note that you have requested the Deed of Assignment. This document is confidential between the original lender and us and as such, is not available for disclosure. However, the Notice of Assignment was originally sent to your postal address on xx xxx 2011, which is sufficient evidence to justify our ownership of this account. What happens next? We acknowledge the 12 day time limit to provide this information before the account becomes unenforceable, however as we have to request the details from the original lender we anticipate that we will be able to provide this within 40 days. In the unlikely event we are unable to obtain this information within those time limits, we will write to you again."

what to do next?, please help:tinysmile_hmm_t2:Thanks

[nemesis45]

Re: HELP! Received a court claim

Thank you guys for helping me in the first steps of this battle...

I have now have received an email from court to confirm that the 28 extension has been noted on the court file, so now according to your/mine calculations i have only 8 days to file my defence!
In mean time, having requested CPR 31.14 from Mortimer Clarke solicitors on 3 August and having received the confirmation letter/agreement for the 28 days extension from them which says "Further to your letter dated 3 August 2015, we are taking our clint's instructions in relation to your request and will come back to you as soon as we can."
what does this mean? what do i do next?

also, I have received a letter from Cabot Stating this...

Thank you for your request for information under sections 77-79 of the Consumer Credit Act 1974. We currently do not have this information on file. However, we have requested the relevant details, which will include a copy of the credit agreement, statement of account and original and varied terms and conditions from the original lender. I note that you have requested the Deed of Assignment. This document is confidential between the original lender and us and as such, is not available for disclosure. However, the Notice of Assignment was originally sent to your postal address on xx xxx 2011, which is sufficient evidence to justify our ownership of this account. What happens next? We acknowledge the 12 day time limit to provide this information before the account becomes unenforceable, however as we have to request the details from the original lender we anticipate that we will be able to provide this within 40 days. In the unlikely event we are unable to obtain this information within those time limits, we will write to you again."

what to do next?, please help:tinysmile_hmm_t2:Thanks

CPR request is likely to fail with the usual " small claims track" nonsense, this can be chased up if this happens.

CCA request do not chase while Cabot don't have the agreement they can't enforce.
nem

- - - Updated - - -

Thank you guys for helping me in the first steps of this battle...

I have now have received an email from court to confirm that the 28 extension has been noted on the court file, so now according to your/mine calculations i have only 8 days to file my defence!
In mean time, having requested CPR 31.14 from Mortimer Clarke solicitors on 3 August and having received the confirmation letter/agreement for the 28 days extension from them which says "Further to your letter dated 3 August 2015, we are taking our clint's instructions in relation to your request and will come back to you as soon as we can."
what does this mean? what do i do next?

also, I have received a letter from Cabot Stating this...

Thank you for your request for information under sections 77-79 of the Consumer Credit Act 1974. We currently do not have this information on file. However, we have requested the relevant details, which will include a copy of the credit agreement, statement of account and original and varied terms and conditions from the original lender. I note that you have requested the Deed of Assignment. This document is confidential between the original lender and us and as such, is not available for disclosure. However, the Notice of Assignment was originally sent to your postal address on xx xxx 2011, which is sufficient evidence to justify our ownership of this account. What happens next? We acknowledge the 12 day time limit to provide this information before the account becomes unenforceable, however as we have to request the details from the original lender we anticipate that we will be able to provide this within 40 days. In the unlikely event we are unable to obtain this information within those time limits, we will write to you again."

what to do next?, please help:tinysmile_hmm_t2:Thanks

CPR request is likely to fail with the usual " small claims track" nonsense, this can be chased up if this happens.

CCA request do not chase while Cabot don't have the agreement they can't enforce.
nem

[FlamingParrot]

Re: HELP! Received a court claim

Thank you guys for helping me in the first steps of this battle...

I have now have received an email from court to confirm that the 28 extension has been noted on the court file, so now according to your/mine calculations i have only 8 days to file my defence!

In mean time, having requested CPR 31.14 from Mortimer Clarke solicitors on 3 August and having received the confirmation letter/agreement for the 28 days extension from them which says "Further to your letter dated 3 August 2015, we are taking our clint's instructions in relation to your request and will come back to you as soon as we can."
what does this mean? what do i do next?

It means they can't find the documents. You still need to file a defence before the extension expires which is likely to be just the generic one to say you've received no documents.

also, I have received a letter from Cabot Stating this...

Thank you for your request for information under sections 77-79 of the Consumer Credit Act 1974. We currently do not have this information on file. However, we have requested the relevant details, which will include a copy of the credit agreement, statement of account and original and varied terms and conditions from the original lender. I note that you have requested the Deed of Assignment. This document is confidential between the original lender and us and as such, is not available for disclosure. However, the Notice of Assignment was originally sent to your postal address on xx xxx 2011, which is sufficient evidence to justify our ownership of this account. What happens next? We acknowledge the 12 day time limit to provide this information before the account becomes unenforceable, however as we have to request the details from the original lender we anticipate that we will be able to provide this within 40 days. In the unlikely event we are unable to obtain this information within those time limits, we will write to you again."

what to do next?, please help:tinysmile_hmm_t2:Thanks

That their generic template response to all CCA requests, with the added bit about the deed of assignment, which as they say, it's not usually supplied since it's a contract between parties that does not involve yourself.

As they so aptly pointed out, the account is unenforceable as long as the are in breach of your CCA request so you'll need to include this in your defence. :thumb:

There was a recent case on here where Cabot discontinued a claim because they couldn't get hold of the agreement, they may well have to do the same in your case. ray: ray:

[tallava]

Re: HELP! Received a court claim

Hi and thank you guys for your advice with regards to the letters received. Now i need your help so i can file a defence. Is there a template i can use? cause i have now idea where to start!ray:

[nemesis45]

Re: HELP! Received a court claim

Hi and thank you guys for your advice with regards to the letters received. Now i need your help so i can file a defence. Is there a template i can use? cause i have now idea where to start!ray:

Hi the easiest way to learn about defences is to look at some of the threads with defences posted it will give you an idea of format and wording, make a draft and post it here then we can go through it with you.

nem

[FlamingParrot]

Re: HELP! Received a court claim

Hi and thank you guys for your advice with regards to the letters received. Now i need your help so i can file a defence. Is there a template i can use? cause i have now idea where to start!ray:

Not exactly a template but you'll find an example generic defence based around not receiving documents here: http://www.legalbeagles.info/forums/...t-Court-Claims :thumb: