Next steps for a part admittance

[Lhart86]

I recently made a claim against someone for money owed - £2700. I received a part admittance in response for £1250.

The defendant (my ex partner) lived with me for a period of 9 months and paid 50% of all bills but was not put on the tenancy agreement for the rented property. He regularly paid money for rent into my bank account every month but owes money for something else. He has included bank statements showing payments into my account. On his defence form he has stated that he only paid £250 rent a month when in fact he paid £340 (total rent was £680/month). He has then claimed that this extra £90 a month was to pay off the debt I refer too - it wasn’t. That amounts to £810 which he says was for this debt when in fact it was to cover rent.

He has also miscalculated his own figures on the form:

total claim was for 2508
claims to have paid 1105
Admits to owing 1253
Discrepancy of £150

He also refuses to pay the court fee as says he wasn’t aware of the debt despite me having text messages and email responses from him saying either he would pay the money owed or telling me ‘it’s not important enough’.

i am unsure as to what to do. If I continue this as a defended claim and take it to court am I guaranteed to at least still get what he has admitted too? Or is there the potential for that figure to be lowered further?

thanks in advance

[R0b]

Hello

If you are successful in your claim then you should be entitled to, as a general rule, the cost of your application fees. As the claim would likely fall within the small claims track if it went to court you wouldn't be able to recover any legal fees as recovery of costs are strictly limited.

In terms of the part admission, you can request judgment on that amount and I believe the correct form to send to the court is N255A (click here for link). The rest of the disputed amount will have to be decided by court should you wish to proceed. Of course it will fall on the evidence and up to the judge to decide what weight he/she should attached to the text messages and emails.

If you are going to use text messages as evidence it might be worthwhile using some software which is capable of downloading the text messages in a transcript form so you can print them out as part of your evidence pack to show the court. Bear in mind you can't be selective about which messages you wish to use in court, you should print off the whole of the relevant conversation if possible.

How long ago did he submit his defence?

[Lhart86]

Hi Rob,

Thanks for your reply. I received his defence last week and I have until the 4/2/18 to respond.

I am unsure as to whether I will always be entitled to his the amount he has admitted or, if I reject his defence, whether the whole amount comes under dispute in court.

I am able to screenshot all messages and send them as evidence and would be happy to show the full conversations as they clearly show his character in a negative light.

I am also unsure as to how to prove his rental costs - this was never a written agreement as we were due to get married and he moved into my rented property for a period of 9 months whilst we were waiting for another house to become available. I can prove the cost of my rent and state it was a partnership so 50/50% split but he is disputing this. I was a student teacher at the time so to suggest I subsidised his rent by £90 per month is absurd anyway! Effectively, he has got himself out of £810 just by lying amount how much rent he paid per month to me.

[Lhart86]

The N255A form only allows me to accept or reject the admitted amount - which is where I am confused. Does this mean the whole amount I claimed for is then disputed in court or just the difference between our two figures?

[R0b]

I am not sure why you are confused as I think you've already answered your own question. As you say, the N225A form allows you to ask the court for judgment on the admitted amount only. So if you claimed £5,000 and he admitted £3,000 of it then you can only obtain judgment on the £3,000 and the £2,000 is in dispute so proceedings will continue in relation to that. You only input the admitted amount on the form, not the full amount.

You can file a reply to his defence but it is not a requirement to do so and you should only file a reply for clarification purposes or to respond to any points which were not raised initially in your particulars of claim. A reply to the defence should not be used to advance further allegations that you may have missed out when the claim was issued. Without seeing the contents of the particulars of claim and the defence, it is difficult to understand whether you really need to reply to his defence.

Anything agreed verbally is always going to be difficult to prove which is why it is always useful to ensure any agreements are in written form or at least confirmed in writing, especially if he wasn't named on the tenancy agreement. If, however, you have evidence that he transferred money into your bank account and it was the same amount on a regular basis, that would be evidence of a course of dealings and that there was some form of arrangement that he paid part of the rent.

You have to remember that the burden of proof rests with the claimant to persuade the court that you are telling the truth and he isn't. The scales need only be tipped 51% in your favour so you don't need a knockout blow. If there is evidence to suggest that he was making payments and he has nothing to offer up to dispute this, then that may be enough for the court to find in your favour, but you can never guarantee that you will win - it all depends on the how well you can persuade the court and the evidence to back up your story.

[Lhart86]

No, the N225A form only allows me to accept his admittance or refuse it and take the whole thing to court, as if it were a defended claim. There is no option to recover the amount admitted. I either tick option A or B, only by ticking option B does the defendant get served judgement to pay the amount admitted ( see attached image)


Part of me is thinking, just take the hit even though he has lied on a legal form and miscalculated his own figures

[Amethyst]

With a Partial admission the claimant has the option to either accept the part admission in settlement of the entire claim and get judgment, or decline the partial admission and proceed through court for the full amount as a defended claim and the court will decide how much he owes you, if anything.

Online the form is https://www.moneyclaimsuk.co.uk/PDFForms/N225A.pdf ( if it's easier to read)

Did he make an offer/proposal to pay as well?

[Lhart86]

Yes, he offered to pay £50 a month for the £1253 he offered (original claim was £2700)

Not sure what the chances of winning any more money are with no formal agreement for rental payments. i suppose I cannot prove that he has lied in his defence to make it look like he paid more of his debt off when in fact he was paying rent. I stupidly thought that being engaged to be married was enough of an agreement between two people - obviously never thought I would have been in this situation. Lesson learnt!

[R0b]

My apologies, you are right, I've clearly misread the N225A form! Aside from that I think the rest of my points still stand in so far as the risk is entirely up to you as to whether you proceed. You may also need to factor in whether or not he is capable of affording the sum (or any for that matter) should you continue to proceed down the legal proceedings route and ultimately obtain judgment in your favour.

It can be a difficult decision and sometimes it might be best to get what you can and take a hit on the rest. The amount admitted is not too far off half of what you were claiming and, if you were trying to be objective, do you think that there are any grounds that he could argue the rest of the other money alleged owed and do you honestly believe you have sufficient evidence to show that he did owe the money? if there are any gaps in your evidence or facts, you may wish to consider taking his part admittance as the full sum outstanding.