Seeking Advice Regarding Unenforceable Debts and next steps

[echat11]

Did you appeal the Ombudsman's decision?

'PRA have sent me copies of past statements claiming this is the what I requested for my section 77-79. I assume this can't be used in place of an agreement even though it has a credit limit on it.'

They need to provide a compliant copy of the agreement under the CCA 1974.

[enforceme]

Unfortunately I was only given 1 week to appeal and it was just before Christmas so I missed the deadline.

This is the response I received: As I understand it, Stepchange contacted Lloyds on your behalf on xxxx, and made an offer of payments for both the accounts. For the account ending xxxx the offer was £xxxx. and for the account ending xxxx the offer was £xxxx They also provided details of your income and expenditure as part of the offer that was submitted. Lloyds explained to Stepchange that the offers were too low, and payment plans are designed to help in the short term, and they don’t’ consider them long term solutions if someone is in financial difficulties.

After this date, I can see the proposed payments were made until the accounts were both defaulted in xxxx and passed to recoveries.

In between this, Lloyds sent default notices in early xxxx and advised that in order to remedy the breach, payments of £xxxx and £xxxx were required, and if these weren’t made, then the default would be recorded, and the accounts closed.

Unfortunately, as the payments made didn’t cover the outstanding balance, Lloyds went ahead and recorded the defaults on both accounts. When they were reported in early xxxx, both accounts were currently three months behind on the contractual payments, and this balance was growing each month.

I can understand it would be disappointing to have a default registered, and I was sorry to hear that this was causing you problems in getting accommodation. I hope you have been able to resolve that particular issue. There is no set guidance around when a default could or should be reported, but generally speaking, it’s expected that a business like Lloyd would register a default when an account is between three and six months in arrears. The account at the point they were registered was three months in arrears, so I can’t fairly say that Lloyds have incorrectly reported this as they are obligated to report factually accurate information to credit reference agencies.

When considering the payment plan that Stepchange put forward, I think it’s fair to say that the payments were below the contractual amounts, and this would have caused the outstanding balance to grow considerably if it had been agreed to, and it’s likely that a default would have been registered at some point against the accounts in the future. I

I think Lloyds have acted correctly and fairly by registering the default when they did, as at this point, I think there were no reasonable prospects of the default being satisfied, and by putting this off, it would mean that the default is reported for longer on your credit report, and by delaying this process, it would have caused further detriment in the future.


As you can see, they didn't acknowledge the fact that the default notice showed arrears of £0.00 and instead focus on communications between StepChange and Lloyds, which I was not privy to.


Thanks for the advice, I will issue a complain to PRA for attempting to mislead.

[enforceme]

Also Link rejected my complaint regarding their misleading CCA response. Would you recommend appealing via ombudsman or waiting to see if they try to enforce?

[echat11]

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Also Link rejected my complaint regarding their misleading CCA response. Would you recommend appealing via ombudsman or waiting to see if they try to enforce?

What reason did they give for 'rejecting'?

[enforceme]

The response said:

"Investigation details
Having reviewed our records. I can see that you contacted our offices by email on DATE requesting documentation in line with section 77/78 of the Consumer Credits Act 1974. This request was passed to the relevant department and on the DATE, the relevant team wrote to you to advise that further to your request for account documentation under section 77/78, the consumer credit act 1974 the original creditor are unfortunately unable to comply with your request within 12 Day initial time frame.

On DATE, the department issues later to you advising that we are pleased to be able to enclose the requested documents with regards to section 77/78 request under the Consumer Credit Act 1974, which completes our obligations under Section 77/78 of the Act."

" Our investigation outcome
As per the above information, I'm unable to uphold your complaint as we did reply to your request and as the account is now enforceable, we kindly request contact in order to agree a fair and affordable monthly repayment plan if there is not one already in place."

My complain clearly referenced failure to comply - conc 13.1.6 (1,2&3) specifically noting they didn't respond to 2, in such cases, a firm should in no way, either by act or omission, misleading a customer as to the enforceability of the agreement.

I didn't however specify that the CCA was incomplete and was missing details.

[echat11]

The response said:

"Investigation details
Having reviewed our records. I can see that you contacted our offices by email on DATE requesting documentation in line with section 77/78 of the Consumer Credits Act 1974. This request was passed to the relevant department and on the DATE, the relevant team wrote to you to advise that further to your request for account documentation under section 77/78, the consumer credit act 1974 the original creditor are unfortunately unable to comply with your request within 12 Day initial time frame.

On DATE, the department issues later to you advising that we are pleased to be able to enclose the requested documents with regards to section 77/78 request under the Consumer Credit Act 1974, which completes our obligations under Section 77/78 of the Act."

" Our investigation outcome
As per the above information, I'm unable to uphold your complaint as we did reply to your request and as the account is now enforceable, we kindly request contact in order to agree a fair and affordable monthly repayment plan if there is not one already in place."

My complain clearly referenced failure to comply - conc 13.1.6 (1,2&3) specifically noting they didn't respond to 2, in such cases, a firm should in no way, either by act or omission, misleading a customer as to the enforceability of the agreement.

I didn't however specify that the CCA was incomplete and was missing details.

'Complaining to the Ombudsman' and' waiting to see if they enforce' are two separate issues.

If they try to enforce, you believe that they haven't complied with your request as the documents aren't compliant, so you will defend the claim.

There will be a claim with the Ombudsman, so I'm not sure they can try to enforce whilst that's being investigated.

[enforceme]

Hi Echat, sorry there has been some confusion on my side.

I will launch complaints with the ombudsman as both Link and PRA keep readding what I think are unenforceable debts back to my DMP.

[enforceme]

Latest update. Link offered £100 for the confusion, and the ombudsman agreed that it was fair. I rejected the decision. Since then, Link has threatened me with solicitors unless I respond to them within 7 days. I have not responded, and I have not heard anything since. It has been 3 weeks since that letter. I anticipate that they will be taking me to court, and I will need to demonstrate why the debt is unenforceable.

[echat11]

Latest update. Link offered £100 for the confusion, and the ombudsman agreed that it was fair. I rejected the decision. Since then, Link has threatened me with solicitors unless I respond to them within 7 days. I have not responded, and I have not heard anything since. It has been 3 weeks since that letter. I anticipate that they will be taking me to court, and I will need to demonstrate why the debt is unenforceable.

Before they make a claim against you through the Courts, they will have to send you a Letter Before Action.
Update if you get an LBA.

[enforceme]

Hi Echat11, they have sent a Letter of Claim from their in-house solicitors. They have only included one of the accounts they hold on the letter (despite me raising this with the ombudsman and them apologising). I assume this isn't the same as a LBA and a scare tactic?

[echat11]

Hi Echat11, they have sent a Letter of Claim from their in-house solicitors. They have only included one of the accounts they hold on the letter (despite me raising this with the ombudsman and them apologising). I assume this isn't the same as a LBA and a scare tactic?

It's a Letter Before Action, so if you don't respond to it, they lodge a claim with the Court.

You can decide how you want to proceed pay or defend the claim. If you believe you have a good case, defend the claim.

[enforceme]

I think the CCA is incomplete but I don't know where I would be able to find other cases to compare with previous verdicts. There is no credit limit as required by schedule 1 of the Consumer Credit Agreement Regulation 2010.

[echat11]

I think the CCA is incomplete but I don't know where I would be able to find other cases to compare with previous verdicts. There is no credit limit as required by schedule 1 of the Consumer Credit Agreement Regulation 2010.

Send the original Creditors a Subject Access Request for each account.
You want copies of CCA's, default notices and letters of assignment.
You are collecting evidence to see what they've got.

https://legalbeagles.info/library/gu...ccess-request/

[enforceme]

Hi Echat11,

So I already have these for my accounts, I requested them a while ago.

They do not contain default notices (these were posted, but they aren't present in the SAR) or letters of assignment (this was sent to me from the DCA but isn't present in the SAR). Also the CCA within the SAR doesn't contain all of the prescribed terms.

Should I submit another SAR to see if the letters have since been added?

[echat11]

Hi Echat11,

So I already have these for my accounts, I requested them a while ago.

They do not contain default notices (these were posted, but they aren't present in the SAR) or letters of assignment (this was sent to me from the DCA but isn't present in the SAR). Also the CCA within the SAR doesn't contain all of the prescribed terms.

Should I submit another SAR to see if the letters have since been added?

If that's the information that they hold, then that's great.
No point in sending another SAR.
So you know that there are anomalies with the documentation received.
So you can defend the claim, when and if they lodge a claim with the Court,
they will no doubt check, what documents they have before filing a claim.