Help with Cabot Financial UK please

[TimmyDog]

Hi,
My issue has been ongoing for years but will try summarise the main points.
Irresponsibly lent credit card from 2008, many major issues; terms, policies, laws neglected throughout.
Debt sale to Cabot without notification from CC company. No notice of assignment received.
2017 letters from Cabot threatening Court action. Respond with CCA request, a template letter by post, nothing responded.
2018 CCJ obtained, 2019 Court summons - threat of prison sentence or complete an attachment of earnings form on the 8th day following.
Cabot proceed to take unaffordable money from my wages.
Speak to Cabot regarding my recent circumstances, the state of the original account and that I thought it had beeen a scam until Court - eventually agree to suspend AoE around 6 months later although they took a further payment following the cancellation.
Request SAR from Cabot, advise they have not responded to my prior dispute letter, somebody else's well kept statement is included and other major issues.
Cabot eventuallyaapologise for wrongfully taking Court action, offering £150 compensation. I reject this and raise with the financial ombudsman service as instructed.
They eventually send me the apparant CCA fulfillment (over 2 years late) with, as I know now a NoA using a CC company's headed letter arranged by Cabot through a 3rd party printing company along with the booklet from Cabot, supposedly sent together although show different dates.
My dealings with the fos were already in full swing at this stage with multiple complaints being 'investigated' relating to the original CC. I called out one too many of their accuracies/imbellishments in their communication leading them to refuse to deal with me and have now closed any remaining complaints including the one relating to Cabot admitting to wrongfully taking Court action. Their initial response on this matter suggested £750-£1000 compensation although as they had offered to clear the debt of £900 (I was taken to Court for £1800) and £150 then that would be adequate.
Get a solicitor to act on my behalf and they send CCA request January 2020 which is again ignored. Call Cabot to query and am given multiple excuses as to why they are not obligated; CCJ, no debt, no credit agreement in place amongst others. Push them on this asking for literature regarding and eventually speak to a manager who advises I can not have my money back, they did not respond to my solicitor request as it was a CCJ at that point, I ask when the CCJ was removed, she checks and advises February 2020, the Court confirmed January 2020.
The CCJ has now been removed in and the debt apparently cleared, although I still appear to have an account with Cabot.
There is much more to this as a whole, I was rejected for less than basic housing due to having a CCJ a
Any advice, signposting would be much appreciated thanks.

[Celestine]

Crikey, you have been on one hell of a journey, I'm sorry to hear how stressful this account has been.
Please correct me if I'm wrong - You've now managed to have the CCJ removed completely but you technically still have a debt with Cabot?
Your complaint to the FOS was primarily about the original CC but you managed to have the FOS decide that Cabot should not have sought enforcement via judgment while the CCA was outstanding?
Two technical points - it is very normal for the assignment notice to be two letters in one envelope, sent out by the new debt purchaser. The second is that a creditor does not have to comply with a CCA request post judgment. However your case was a bit more complex than that, given that there was already an outstanding CCA request from much earlier....

What would make you feel right about this now? The CCJ is gone and I very much doubt will reappear on the horizon? Do you want compensation from Cabot? Would you accept having the debt formally closed?

[TimmyDog]

Hi thanks for the reply, yes this has been ongoing for years.
Yes it appears they have completely removed the CCJ themselves and the apparent debt is now cleared although I still have an active account with them relating to the CC.
Yes I had numerous complaints regarding the original CC which were with the FOS, mostly farcically defending the banks and in my opinion breaking FCA rules to not even investigate certain ones.
Cabot had already admitted wrongfully taking Court action which I then raised with the FOS, they agreed I had not been treated fairly although the case was not raised to an actual ombudsman before they ceased all communication and investigations with myself.
The NOA letters do state they had been sent together although show 2 different dates.
They have still not satisfied my original CCA request from 2017, providing a fake statement noot relating to my account although I have previously commented this and they agreed it would be removed from my file, although they still produce it as their evidence.
I vehemently disagree with the original debt feeling that £4.31 was enforceable. The debt has apparently been cleared which I am obviously pleased with so yes it would be compensation at this stage. Cabot have bluntly told me I cannot have my money back which was taken from my wages in an AoE via an admitted wrongfully issued CCJ.

[TimmyDog]

Dear Mr RE: Capital One Credit Card ending - Closed I am writing further to your complaint with the Financial Ombudsman Service (“ FOS”) and your recent telephone calls. Firstly, I am very concerned by the comments you made to our Customer Consultants today. I accept this is a very difficult time for you and although you may or may not be aware, there are organisations that can offer you support. For your ease, I have listed them below: The Samaritans www.samaritans.org 116 123 Mind www.mind.org.uk 0300 123 3393 However, if you require urgent medical assistance and cannot keep yourself safe, please visit your local Accident & Emergency (A&E) or arrange an Emergency GP appointment. In the most serious instance, please dial 999. If you are able, try and reach a safe place, such a family member or friends house and speak to someone you trust. You have contacted us further because you wish to be provided with an answer to the following; • Why has the account been closed, instead of refunding you? • Why have you not received a response to your dispute letter sent in 2017 • Why has Consumer Rights Solicitors not been provided with a response, following their CCA request? You wrote to us on 23 October 2017 and told us the account was in dispute, until we could evidence our claim. Upon receipt of this letter, we referred it to Mortimer Clark Solicitors (MCS) to action, regrettably, no response was sent by MCS. MCS informed us there is no record of this letter being received by them. This error was reviewed by the FOS when we provided them with details of the account history, following your referral to their service. We concluded our position in the final response issued on 02 July 2019. In reply to your correspondence, we also issued responses on 27 August 2019 and 15 November 2019. These concerns were referred to the FOS as you remained unhappy with the outcome. When we completed the review and supplied the information to the FOS, the Complaint Handler confirmed the following; • An application was sent to the Court to set aside the CCJ (the Court has now approved our application) • The Attachment of Earnings (AOE) was suspended. • We agreed to close the account. • We are not asking you to repay £1,427.68 (The outstanding balance assigned to us by Capital One was £1,658.48, We received payments totalling, £230.00 this bring this balance down to £1,427.68. The legal fees applied have been reversed) • We have amended our entry on your credit file to reflect the account as partially satisfied • In addition to closing the account, we offered a further £150.00 to apologise for any distress or upset caused. I have received a copy of the response sent to you by the FOS on 04 March 2020 and note they did not uphold your complaint as they felt the action taken was fair to put things right for the trouble and upset caused. I have enclosed a copy for your reference. I am aware following your notification, you have now withdrawn your complaint from their service. A CCA request was received in January 2020 from Consumer Rights Solicitors. As a CCJ had been obtained, we were not obligated to comply with this request. I am aware the CCJ has now been set aside, as confirmed in our telephone call on 19 May, MCS received confirmation of this by post on 13 February. The account is closed and as such we are not obliged to comply with this request. These aspects have been reviewed, considered and the FOS have provided us with their view, as explained above. You have recently requested a copy of the telephone calls and information we hold on the account. This has been referred to our dedicated team who will deal with this for you. Please note, this can take one calendar month. Please note, as they have already completed a Subject Access Request ( SAR) in September 2019, the information included in their response will be from the date the information was supplied previously until the date they complete the newest request. We intend to provide your SAR to your email address of. Please let us know whether this method is not suitable in the next 30 days. We will send you an email containing a link to obtain your documents, these will be available for you to obtain for a period of 7 days. Following my further review, whilst we maintain our position as set out in our previous letters, in order to bring this matter to an amicable resolution, we would like to offer you a final payment of £500.00. This represents a refund of the payments you made towards the account which total £230.80 and the remaining amount of £269.20 which represents the trouble and upset caused. Please note this offer is not in addition to our previous offer of £150.00. In addition, the account will remain closed. Please provide us with your bank details at your earliest convenience and we will arrange a BACS transfer for a total of £500.00. This is our final response to this matter and the complaint has therefore been closed, we will not reopen the complaint or investigate the same concerns any further.

[Celestine]

Good evening

Thanks for providing this further information. I just need to understand, in your second post you said: "

Cabot have bluntly told me I cannot have my money back which was taken from my wages in an AoE via an admitted wrongfully issued CCJ."

But in your last post, a letter from Cabot, they say: "Following my further review, whilst we maintain our position as set out in our previous letters, in order to bring this matter to an amicable resolution, we would like to offer you a final payment of £500.00. This represents a refund of the payments you made towards the account which total £230.80 and the remaining amount of £269.20 which represents the trouble and upset caused. Please note this offer is not in addition to our previous offer of £150.00. In addition, the account will remain closed. Please provide us with your bank details at your earliest convenience and we will arrange a BACS transfer for a total of £500.00."

I'm reading that as they are offering to refund the payments and compensate you? If that is the case, then this would be a very good opportunity to get this settled and move on, especially as it is impacting your mental health. Please fire any more questions my way, very happy to explain any points of confusion. Take care.

[TimmyDog]

Yes that was their recent response where they are now offering my payments back and compensation for £500.

I have not accepted or declined their offer advising I would need to receive my SAR and get further legal advice.

There is much more to this case which I am trying to fully understand before agreeing to anything.

[Celestine]

Hi Timmy
Great to hear this confirmed, sounds like a big step in the right direction.
When did you send the SAR and what further documents are you seeking?
Keep us informed of progress.