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Good evening everybody, my name is Matt, I'm 35 from Leicestershire, and I've come across this forum after doing some reading up after receiving a County Court Claim form with Lowell as the claimant.
I work away, and today (26/2/16) returned home to find this claim, issued on 24/2/16. This is the first time I've ever received anything like this, so it's all very new to me. Naturally, at first I was extremely anxious, but after spending a couple of hours scanning the internet, and these forums in particular, I've calmed down and rationalised the information I've got, so I'd like to start by saying this forum and community is an amazing source of information already, so thankyou for that.
A few specifics about the claim:
The claim states 'The Defendant entered into an agreement with O2 (UK) Ltd under account ref ****** ('the Agreement')', 'The Defendant failed to maintain the required payments and a default notice was served and not complied with', 'The agreement was later assigned to the claimant on 23/12/2011'
The amount oweing before any further charges is £503.00, which becomes £673.24 after court fees etc are applied, this is the total amount in the claim.
I'll try not to get into a novel of a story here, but please bare with me. In 2010 I entered into a pay monthly mobile phone contract with O2, after receiving my phone through the post the phone was damaged, so I sent it back, I received a replacement which was of a lesser spec than I'd signed up for, so I sent this back, eventually I got the right phone in working condition, but by this point over a month had passed since I'd signed up to the contract, so I disputed with O2 to have something taken off my bill to reflect this, we'd come to a verbal agreement that was never acted upon, nearly 3 months had passed with the promise of a reduction off my bill that had never materialised, so the younger, more arrogant me decided to basically stick two fingers up at O2, send my phone back (which to this day I still have the postage proof of) and effectively boycott the bill. Now I accept this is the wrong way to go about things, I appreciate this fully, but what's done is done and I cannot change that,
Ofcourse, payment demands came through, and they were brushed off, and angry calls to the complaints dept. were made that fell on deaf ears on both sides. Eventually, my account was defaulted, and eventually, as things were back then, the 'debt' was purchased by a DCA.... Lowell (although they may have been calling themselves something else back in 2011?!)
I received the first string of letters from Lowell, to which I offered a one off response stating in writing that I didn't acknowledge ANY debt, and asked for them to send me any credit agreement which states I owe anything, which ofcourse.... they didn't, nor did they respond in any way, shape or form to my letter either. Over the next few years I get a letter every few months or so from various different companies, all of which I assume are them with a different name. Lowell Legal, Lowell Portfolio, Red financial etc, etc, all relating to the debt, all of them with different levals of severity to them, ranging from special 'half price' offers to clear the debt and 'friendly' repayment packages, to pretty blunt 'You're going to court, this is your last chance' threats. Then there'd be 4/5 months of nothing, then the process would start again. I'll be honest I used to laugh them off and tear them up, thinking and assuming if they could have done anything, they would have done by now.
As you can probably tell, the fact it's gone this far has come as a bit of a shock to me!
I'm not condoning for one second that my 'sweep this under the rug' attitude is acceptable, nor am I expressing any arrogance or am I proud to dodge any debt that is rightfully my burden to carry, so please be under no illusions that is my stance on this, it is not.
I've given plenty of thought to simply paying the debt off. My financial situation is best described as average. I'd struggle to simply pay £500 or £600 straight off without selling a possession to account for it, but it isn't inconceivable that I could pay a 12 month debt payment plan off without it seriously undermining my financial wellbeing. I say that as I'm being honest, and I've read enough cases on these forums to know that a lot of people seeking advice really ARE in financial turmoil, and under a LOT of stress given the circumstances, so I don't say this, and I don't seek your advice lightly, however....
What does leave a bitter taste in my mouth is having to be a consumer that has been forced to pay the full stated value for a seriously sub standard service. I hate that I was forced to be an insignificant complaint, an annoyance even, whilst O2 helped themselves to the full direct debit amount for periods of time when I was receiving a fraction of the service I was paying for. So to that end, if I have any chance of having a leg to stand on with this, I wish to fight it as much as I can.
So what I've done so far
I've read up on Amethyst's basic first steps post here, which has duly brought me to start this new post.
I've also registered online at the MCOL moneyclaim.gov website and submitted my 'Acknowledgement of service' online, which I believe gives me 28 days if I've been reading correctly to send my letters and organise my defence. beyond this, I'm asking kindly if I could have your support on the matter.
And again, please understand, I'm very humble about this situation, the way I dealt with it 6 years ago is very different to the way I'd deal with the same situation now. I understand, and fully respect that my attitude and stance to a consumer quibble was, and is the completely wrong way to appraoch it, but I cannot change the past. I accept that my actions are what's brought me to this point, but I also believe that there is still a moral case that the little guy shouldn't just get s**t on, and it's on this notion that I want to fight my corner.
Thankyou for your time, and I apologise for what by now must be an extremely exhausting read!
Matt.
I work away, and today (26/2/16) returned home to find this claim, issued on 24/2/16. This is the first time I've ever received anything like this, so it's all very new to me. Naturally, at first I was extremely anxious, but after spending a couple of hours scanning the internet, and these forums in particular, I've calmed down and rationalised the information I've got, so I'd like to start by saying this forum and community is an amazing source of information already, so thankyou for that.
A few specifics about the claim:
The claim states 'The Defendant entered into an agreement with O2 (UK) Ltd under account ref ****** ('the Agreement')', 'The Defendant failed to maintain the required payments and a default notice was served and not complied with', 'The agreement was later assigned to the claimant on 23/12/2011'
The amount oweing before any further charges is £503.00, which becomes £673.24 after court fees etc are applied, this is the total amount in the claim.
I'll try not to get into a novel of a story here, but please bare with me. In 2010 I entered into a pay monthly mobile phone contract with O2, after receiving my phone through the post the phone was damaged, so I sent it back, I received a replacement which was of a lesser spec than I'd signed up for, so I sent this back, eventually I got the right phone in working condition, but by this point over a month had passed since I'd signed up to the contract, so I disputed with O2 to have something taken off my bill to reflect this, we'd come to a verbal agreement that was never acted upon, nearly 3 months had passed with the promise of a reduction off my bill that had never materialised, so the younger, more arrogant me decided to basically stick two fingers up at O2, send my phone back (which to this day I still have the postage proof of) and effectively boycott the bill. Now I accept this is the wrong way to go about things, I appreciate this fully, but what's done is done and I cannot change that,
Ofcourse, payment demands came through, and they were brushed off, and angry calls to the complaints dept. were made that fell on deaf ears on both sides. Eventually, my account was defaulted, and eventually, as things were back then, the 'debt' was purchased by a DCA.... Lowell (although they may have been calling themselves something else back in 2011?!)
I received the first string of letters from Lowell, to which I offered a one off response stating in writing that I didn't acknowledge ANY debt, and asked for them to send me any credit agreement which states I owe anything, which ofcourse.... they didn't, nor did they respond in any way, shape or form to my letter either. Over the next few years I get a letter every few months or so from various different companies, all of which I assume are them with a different name. Lowell Legal, Lowell Portfolio, Red financial etc, etc, all relating to the debt, all of them with different levals of severity to them, ranging from special 'half price' offers to clear the debt and 'friendly' repayment packages, to pretty blunt 'You're going to court, this is your last chance' threats. Then there'd be 4/5 months of nothing, then the process would start again. I'll be honest I used to laugh them off and tear them up, thinking and assuming if they could have done anything, they would have done by now.
As you can probably tell, the fact it's gone this far has come as a bit of a shock to me!
I'm not condoning for one second that my 'sweep this under the rug' attitude is acceptable, nor am I expressing any arrogance or am I proud to dodge any debt that is rightfully my burden to carry, so please be under no illusions that is my stance on this, it is not.
I've given plenty of thought to simply paying the debt off. My financial situation is best described as average. I'd struggle to simply pay £500 or £600 straight off without selling a possession to account for it, but it isn't inconceivable that I could pay a 12 month debt payment plan off without it seriously undermining my financial wellbeing. I say that as I'm being honest, and I've read enough cases on these forums to know that a lot of people seeking advice really ARE in financial turmoil, and under a LOT of stress given the circumstances, so I don't say this, and I don't seek your advice lightly, however....
What does leave a bitter taste in my mouth is having to be a consumer that has been forced to pay the full stated value for a seriously sub standard service. I hate that I was forced to be an insignificant complaint, an annoyance even, whilst O2 helped themselves to the full direct debit amount for periods of time when I was receiving a fraction of the service I was paying for. So to that end, if I have any chance of having a leg to stand on with this, I wish to fight it as much as I can.
So what I've done so far
I've read up on Amethyst's basic first steps post here, which has duly brought me to start this new post.
I've also registered online at the MCOL moneyclaim.gov website and submitted my 'Acknowledgement of service' online, which I believe gives me 28 days if I've been reading correctly to send my letters and organise my defence. beyond this, I'm asking kindly if I could have your support on the matter.
And again, please understand, I'm very humble about this situation, the way I dealt with it 6 years ago is very different to the way I'd deal with the same situation now. I understand, and fully respect that my attitude and stance to a consumer quibble was, and is the completely wrong way to appraoch it, but I cannot change the past. I accept that my actions are what's brought me to this point, but I also believe that there is still a moral case that the little guy shouldn't just get s**t on, and it's on this notion that I want to fight my corner.
Thankyou for your time, and I apologise for what by now must be an extremely exhausting read!
Matt.
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