Sainsbury's Bank Plc(HBOS) And Four Debt Collection Companies Against An Individual

[Amethyst]

Re: Sainsbury's Bank Plc(HBOS) And Four Debt Collection Companies Against An Individu

This bit godzilla

Sainsbury's did not "Reject" this second offer of settlement payment, if the creditor "Rejects" the payment in settlement, then the creditor must say so.

Which case law are you basing this on?

[Godzilla]

Re: Sainsbury's Bank Plc(HBOS) And Four Debt Collection Companies Against An Individu

To Natweststaffmember,

Iwill send a pm to Amethyst tomorrow morning, RE: Sainsbury's response letters.


Many Thanks
Godzilla.

[Amethyst]

Re: Sainsbury's Bank Plc(HBOS) And Four Debt Collection Companies Against An Individu

Cool ta x

[Godzilla]

Re: Sainsbury's Bank Plc(HBOS) And Four Debt Collection Companies Against An Individu

Amethyst, that bit is not based on a particular case, having read through case law and articles on dispute and resolution, my conclusions are that the receiving party must state their intentions to the debtor/payer clearly and swiftly.


Many Thanks
Godzilla.

[Amethyst]

Re: Sainsbury's Bank Plc(HBOS) And Four Debt Collection Companies Against An Individu

See thats my sticky bit.

Within a 'reasonable time' they informed you the payment was accepted on the account and the outstanding balance stood at £1.7k. I do think that this letter, even entitled BALANCE REQUEST, would be seen in law to have made you reasonably aware that the F&F was not accepted. I believe the general legal term is 'reasonably' eg within reasonable time, was it reasonable you understood their intention etc. I think a court would side with Sainsbury's on the reasonableness of the acceptance of the payment against the account and their notification to you of their intention. HAD the letter accompanying the cheque stated if it was not acceptable to cash unless in F&F then I would agree with you. As it stands at the moment, I am still reading.

At this point was there further communication from you regarding that this was meant in F&F as per your letter.

Re the Third Party case law. In your case the offer came from yourself, the actual payment from the Third Party. Had your father-in-law written the letter (thus made the offer) accompanying the cheque and they had cashed the cheque then that would consitute acceptance as per Bracken / Billinghurst.

Look forward to the other letter, I know Nattie is interested in a couple of specific points of that.

Good night for now

Ame
xx

[Godzilla]

Re: Sainsbury's Bank Plc(HBOS) And Four Debt Collection Companies Against An Individu

OK,Amethyst, yes I do see your points,


However, Sainsbury's had no legal right to take the payment sent in as a settlement, and also I agree that there was no legal obligation on Sainsbury's to accept.


If my letter had of stated, "Only take the payment if accepted as a F+F, if not accepted please return the cheque". Then this would be seen as unreasonable of me, because, I am then forcing Sainsbury's to accept the payment, dangling the carrot in front of their noses', so to speak.


I was confused to have of received the "Balance Request" letter, I contacted Sainsbury's on the day I received it and asked them why are they sending me a "Balance Request" as they have obviously banked the said cheque in Full and Final Settlement.
Sainsbury's response to this was "Don't know what you are talking about, it's not company policy, we don't do settlements".


I did contest/dispute this on the telephone and sent them(Sainsbury's) two letters of complaint about their conduct in relation to my settlement payment, Sainsbury's disregarded my complaints/disputes.


The "Balance Request" letter is not rejecting the cheque payment as a settlement,- case law-"Paying-in and clearance of the cheque (is) a clear and uniquivocal acceptance".


The third party cheque, Sainsbury's knew that the offer was from me, but also knew that it was my father-in-law who was the only one willing and able to raise the money required to go with my offer of settlement payment, so the third party rule does apply to my case, as it is the promise of my father-in-law to raise the money to clear the account/debt.


There are many other aspects to my case that I cannot publish here for the obvious legal reasons, but I would like to add that I had a diologue of communications with Sainsbury's in relation to the settlement payment for a total of nearly seven months before the settlement was made with them, this communications was solely in relation to a settlement figure that they would accept and if they would provide me with what this figure is.


Sainsbury's need to overcome the acknowledgements that were made by them(Sainsbury's) as acc/ balance £0, settled, closed, cancelled.


Sainsbury's informed me on day two of their internal executive level investigation, that their area of F+F had made many, many mistakes and that new procedures had to be put in place to stop the mistakes, and that clearly these new procedures had failed in my case of full and final settlement with them(Sainsbury's).


Well it is late now, so I bid you all a good night, catch-up with you in the morning.

Many Thanks
Godzilla.

PS sorry about the length of my thread, again.

[Godzilla]

Re: Sainsbury's Bank Plc(HBOS) And Four Debt Collection Companies Against An Individu

Good morning to you all,


If I can just add something in relation to this "Balance Request" letter from Sainsbury's.


The said letter does not state that the said payment has been accepted on account only, this is not a technical point here that I am trying to make, It's a fact, Sainsbury's are not referencing the payment that was stated and enclosed in my letter dated 19th March 2007.

This "Balance Request" letter is only tangential to my letter mentioned above,
therefore, this letter remains as "A Receipt" for "A Payment", for what payment are Sainsbury's providing this "Receipt"?


Amethyst, may I kindly ask you to publish the other two letters, so that the viewer can see how Sainsbury's responded to my first offer of settlement payment.


The fact remains, Sainsbury's did not REJECT the said cheque payment sent into them(Sainsbury's) as a settlement or the terms of the said settlement.
Accord and Satisfaction had been achieved because of the vast amount of time that had elapsed and still no REJECTION given.


Hopefully this particular area of my case can be left now, and so the harassment, the DCA'S and the DPA remain, I would be very gratefull if any of you have any advice about these area's, I will post the Sainsbury's letters in a PM to Amethyst in a very short while.

Well I do hope all of you are having a good day so far, and may it continue that way.

Many thanks
Godzilla.

[Amethyst]

Re: Sainsbury's Bank Plc(HBOS) And Four Debt Collection Companies Against An Individu

This "Balance Request" letter is only tangential to my letter mentioned above,
therefore, this letter remains as "A Receipt" for "A Payment", for what payment are Sainsbury's providing this "Receipt"?

That is a good point. Will check my pms now

[Paule]

Re: Sainsbury's Bank Plc(HBOS) And Four Debt Collection Companies Against An Individu

Hopefully this particular area of my case can be left now, and so the harassment, the DCA'S and the DPA remain, I would be very gratefull if any of you have any advice about these area's,

Can you enlighten us as to what barrister has said on these matters too, as after all, he is a specialist in these areas, isnt he.

I have previously posted relevant case law on harassment, as well as a link to my case against a DCA.

Are you bringing all of these cases together, or as separate issues?
Is the one barrister dealing with all the issues or is it a law firm that is dealing with your case and specialists from each area are tackling each issue

I am just curious as to what advice you are after, if you have legal representation dealing with your case, they will/Should know how to deal with it.

PKea

[Godzilla]

Re: Sainsbury's Bank Plc(HBOS) And Four Debt Collection Companies Against An Individu

Good morning Pkea,


Yes I am sorry about the way I worded that last paragraph, what I should have said is that I am looking for a comparator and if any of you have or know of anything that is a comparable to my case or very close in similarities.

There is one barrister, and he has the ability to cover all of my case, I will not be separating any of the issues that relate to my case.

I don't know if any of you remember, but I have said that I am still waiting for some final outstanding documents from Sainsbury's, I was promised that I would have them by today and if not then Sainsbury's would provide a time scale in writing for when I will be in receipt of these documents, they(Documents) have not arrived in the post nor has the time scale.(This is personal info that I am entitled to under the DPA)


I have had a hard time with Sainsbury's in relation to my SAR, and at one point I received a letter from the CEO informing me that Sainsbury's were not going to comply with the DPA and provide me with the logic/reasons involved in disclosing my personal information to so many other organizesations. It took the threat of me going to court to obtain a court order that would legally enforce them(Sainsbury's) to comply with the DPA, to get them to release this information.


I am going t be typing-up the letter from Sainsbury's(First response letter) in a few moments and send it in a PM to Amethyst, this is going to take me about one hour, so I will not be able to view my thread and respond to any questions until I finish copying this letter.

Many Thanks
Godzilla.

[Godzilla]

Re: Sainsbury's Bank Plc(HBOS) And Four Debt Collection Companies Against An Individu

Hello again to you all,

I have sent a copy of the letter to Amethyst, I am logging out for a couple of hours and will be back on-line soon.

Many Thanks
Godzilla.

[Godzilla]

Re: Sainsbury's Bank Plc(HBOS) And Four Debt Collection Companies Against An Individu

Hello and good afternoon to you all,

This is just a short message to say I won't be back on-line now until about 8.30 or 9.00pm tonight, so hope you are all having a good day, and if anyone wants to talk then, I will see you at about that time.


Many Thanks
Godzilla.

[Budgie]

Re: Sainsbury's Bank Plc(HBOS) And Four Debt Collection Companies Against An Individu

OK, we will have a tidy up, hoover and dust whilst you are away. PMSL

[Amethyst]

Re: Sainsbury's Bank Plc(HBOS) And Four Debt Collection Companies Against An Individu

Sorry took me a while to post this up, had a distraction at lunch


This is the letter from Sainsburys offering compensation and write off remaining debt - dated 5th Sept

Dear Mr (Me)

Thank you for your letter dated 11 August 2008 addressed to Justin King. This has been passed to me to respond in the absence of Neil Chandler, Chief executive Officer, Sainsbury's Bank. Neil will review all correspondence on his return to the office.


I was extremely concerned to learn of the issues you have raised. It is my understanding that, due to your wife's illness, you were experiencing severe financial difficulties. You have stated that you discussed a final settlement figure with our collections area and sent a third party cheque for £9,959.83, which was credited to your account on 29 March 2007. In making this payment it was your understanding that the remaining account balance of £1,757.62 would be written off. The bank continued to try to collect the outstanding balance and the account was passed to an outside collection agency. Despite repeatedly advising the recovery agents that you felt your cheque represented full and final payment of the account you have continued to receive letters and telephone calls which you have stated have caused you and your family great distress. I asked my colleague, Dinah Chapman, of our Customer Relations team to investigate the matter on my behalf. I am aware that Dinah has discussed the matter with you at great length.


From the outset, please allow me, on behalf of Sainsbury's Bank, to offer my sincere apologies that you feel we have caused distress to you and your family as a result of our actions.


Dinah has concluded a full investigation into your complaint and I would now like to confirm our findings.

A payment for the sum of £9,959.83 was received on 29 March 2007 and credited to your account. You have advised that you attached a letter advising that, should this be cashed, you would regard the debt as settled. Although I appreciate your position when making the payment, we have evidence on file to suggest that our agents repeatedly advised that a reduced settlement was not acceptable at that point.

You asked the bank to accept a payment on account of a debt which was significantly less than that to which it is entitled under the agreement. There was no legal requirement for the bank to accept this.


As we cashed the 3rd party payment, pursuance of the debt should have automatically ceased. I can confirm that the outstanding balance of £1,757.62 has now been written off however, we are obligated to report factual account information and the write off amount will remain documented on our file.

The debt has been recalled from the recovery agents and I understand that you have received written confirmation of this from iqor. I have noted your request that Sainsbury's Bank should recall all data from the recovery agents. I would advise that the debt is, once again, owned by Sainsbury's however the agents are obliged to retain information on file as evidence of previous involvement. However, please be assured the details held will not actively be used by the agent.

Cont/(Page 2)


I futher confirm that the information sent to Credit Reference Agencies has been updated to show the debt as satisfied as of 1 March 2007, 28 days prior to receipt of the payment.




With regard to the number of telephone calls you have referred to, Dinah has reviewed the number of calls made to you by Blair, Oliver and Scott, EOS and iqor. Whislt I accept we may have made an error with the administration of your account and you were unhappy with our pusuance of the debt, your account was in arrears and we did require a payment from you. As we had a genuine reason to contact you I cannot accept your claims and srtrongly decline your allegation of harassment. I must apologise however for the fact that we did not investigate your concerns properly when you raised them with us on several occasions.



You have stated that unknown callers came to your home on two separate occasions and you suspect they were debt collection agents acting on our behalf. Dinah has consulted with all parties involved and can advise that no agents were instructed to call on you by Sainsbury's, iqor or their in-house solicitors Incasso LLP. For clarification, iqor issue initial correspondence on Incasso LLP letterhead when an account is in transition to their holding. Incasso LLP have had no involvement otherwise as the debt was recalled before it was fully transferred.



Having reviewed your request for compensation, we are prepared to offer you the sum of £1000.00 which is considered to be fair and reasonable under the circumstances. This offer is made in full and final settlement of your complaint and without admission of liability. This is in addition to the sum of £1,757.62, which we have written off.

Should you wish to accept this offer, please sign and return the enclosed form in the prepaid envelope provided.


Clearly you feel that we have caused you and your family much distress over the past sixteen months and I offer no excuses for the poor service you have undoubtedly received. I can. however, offer my unreserved apologies on behalf of Sainsbury's Bank and assure you that you experience will help us to drive improvements to avoid recurrence.


Please accept my apologies for the service you received when you telephoned Sainsbury's Head Office at Holborn. Justin King is aware of your experience and he will be responding to you personally under separate cover.


This letter represents the Bank's final decision on the matter. To comply with legislation I would like to let you know that if you remain unhappy you can refer your concerns to the Financial Ombudsman Service. They can be contacted by telephone on 0845 080 1800, or by post at:

The Financial Ombudsman Service
South Quay Plaza
183 Marsh Wall
London
E14 9SR

Email complaint.info@financial-ombudsman.org.uk
Website www.financial-ombudsman.or.uk


You will find enclosed a leaflet providing full details of the Ombudsman service. If you wish to refer this matter to the Ombudsman you must do so within 6 months of the date of this letter.


Yours sincerely

[Guest]

Re: Sainsbury's Bank Plc(HBOS) And Four Debt Collection Companies Against An Individu

OK,Amethyst, yes I do see your points,


However, Sainsbury's had no legal right to take the payment sent in as a settlement, and also I agree that there was no legal obligation on Sainsbury's to accept.


If my letter had of stated, "Only take the payment if accepted as a F+F, if not accepted please return the cheque". Then this would be seen as unreasonable of me, because, I am then forcing Sainsbury's to accept the payment, dangling the carrot in front of their noses', so to speak.


I was confused to have of received the "Balance Request" letter, I contacted Sainsbury's on the day I received it and asked them why are they sending me a "Balance Request" as they have obviously banked the said cheque in Full and Final Settlement.
Sainsbury's response to this was "Don't know what you are talking about, it's not company policy, we don't do settlements".


I did contest/dispute this on the telephone and sent them(Sainsbury's) two letters of complaint about their conduct in relation to my settlement payment, Sainsbury's disregarded my complaints/disputes.


The "Balance Request" letter is not rejecting the cheque payment as a settlement,- case law-"Paying-in and clearance of the cheque (is) a clear and uniquivocal acceptance".


The third party cheque, Sainsbury's knew that the offer was from me, but also knew that it was my father-in-law who was the only one willing and able to raise the money required to go with my offer of settlement payment, so the third party rule does apply to my case, as it is the promise of my father-in-law to raise the money to clear the account/debt.


There are many other aspects to my case that I cannot publish here for the obvious legal reasons, but I would like to add that I had a diologue of communications with Sainsbury's in relation to the settlement payment for a total of nearly seven months before the settlement was made with them, this communications was solely in relation to a settlement figure that they would accept and if they would provide me with what this figure is.


Sainsbury's need to overcome the acknowledgements that were made by them(Sainsbury's) as acc/ balance £0, settled, closed, cancelled.


Sainsbury's informed me on day two of their internal executive level investigation, that their area of F+F had made many, many mistakes and that new procedures had to be put in place to stop the mistakes, and that clearly these new procedures had failed in my case of full and final settlement with them(Sainsbury's).


Well it is late now, so I bid you all a good night, catch-up with you in the morning.

Many Thanks
Godzilla.

PS sorry about the length of my thread, again.

This is simply not true and you need to understand that very little in civil litigation is as black and white as you seem to believe.

The case law you are referring to is Ferguson v Davies [1996] '...paying in and clearance of the cheque [is] a clear and unequivocal acceptance...' but certain conditions need to be met in order for this case to be relevant.You do not appear to have met those conditions.

You mention a "third party rule" but again you have failed to meet the conditions required to make this apply.

In addition, Sainsbury's pointed out to you; "Don't know what you are talking about, it's not company policy, we don't do settlements."

In short, there is no hard and fast rule but rather each case is decided on its facts and if you are offering a lower figure, it is for you to prove that there was accord and satisfaction.