Blemain Finance repossession Unfair relationship Unfair charges

[figaro123]

Re: Blemain Finance repossession Unfair relationship Unfair charges

how do we prove in court monarch and blemain are one and the same. I like the idea of Blemain victims meeting up

[welshperson]

Re: Blemain Finance repossession Unfair relationship Unfair charges

Blem-ished you didn’t answer the question about whether you have court proceedings ongoing, the reason I ask is that if blemain are taking you to court then we need to deal with it as a priority, (I have a good get out of jail free card when it comes to CCA regulated blemain loans).


Now I like your idea about a group (strength in numbers) I also like the idea of putting all the information together (nice an neat)

There are some people that think information should be kept quiet so blemain wont know what we are doing, (SO WRONG ON SO MANY POINTS)

Before court you have to submit, defence, witness statement, saying exactly what you want to rely on in court, so blemain are going to be fully aware of what your arguments are before court.


If I say something on an open forum then it is open to everyone to comment on, and if I am wrong then hopefully someone will point out my error, on a private forum a limited amount of people to tell my I am wrong, I then go to court believing I am right, but it is not so and an expensive way to find I am wrong,


Private forum keeps all the bad things these sub prime lenders are doing out of public view, a lot of people read these forums with out ever joining, information out in public view helps these people.

　
Now if you are in no rush regarding court action, and you have shown an interest in monarch recoveries, then I will give you the information on monarch first.

　
I’m just going to state some facts first, as there are documents I need to scan and post up but if we only talk about monarch, then it wont get to confusing, then move on th the next point.
　
1 monarch recoveries only existed in name only ( had no employees )

How the above can help you then you need to read and understand the following.
Logbook loans lost their licence for doing exactly the same as blemain are doing by using monarch recoveries. (used to deceive, threaten, and add unfair costs to loans)

Google - oft v logbook loans
David Fisher, Director of the OFT's Consumer Credit Group said: 'The OFT welcomes the Tribunal's decision to strike out the companies' appeals. The decision confirms our view that these companies are unfit to hold their consumer credit licences. Intentionally deceiving debtors as part of a debt collection policy is an extremely serious matter, which calls into question a licensee's fitness. We expect businesses licensed by the OFT to treat all their customers, including those in arrears, fairly and transparently
　
　
　
2 monarch recoveries business is listed as a debt recovery firm

3 2009 monarch recoveries showed a profit of over £9 million pounds after tax.
The only business monarch supposedly carried out was debt collecting for the blemain group of companies,
Now charges added to your account for debt collecting are only supposed to cover costs of collecting the debt, so how can they make 9 million pounds profit in one year.
If the costs of them collecting debts was fair then the profits would be zero,
So anyone having trouble with blemain adding charges to the loan this would be the prove to show they make considerable profits from debt collecting.
　
You can use the above not only for the charges monarch added to your loan but also to show that all charges were in fact a penalty.
　
4 FSA fines Cheshire Mortgage Corporation Limited and two directors for mortgage sales and arrears failings and requires over 2,000 customers to be compensated
The Financial Services Authority (FSA) has fined Cheadle-based mortgage lender, Cheshire Mortgage Corporation Limited (CMCL), £1.225 million for failing to treat customers fairly in the sale of mortgages and arrears handling from October 2004 to the end of 2009.
The CEO of CMCL, Henry Moser, has been fined £70,000 and agreed to step down from his role within three to six months. Andrew Lawton, the firm’s compliance director, has been fined £13,500 and banned from holding a significant influence function.

　
Now the FSA has only fined Cheshire, why not blemain as they were doing the same thing.

The FSA regulate first charge loans and Cheshire supplied first charge moorages,
The OFT regulate second charge lenders (blemain) that is why blemain havent been fined, but the OFT are the ones that have to licence blemain and so far they haven’t renewed they licence, (2 years)
　
Now they have been found to be so unfair that the guy that started the companyHenry Moser) has agreed to stand down, it is my belief it was him or the licence,( monarch licence has gone)
5 Blemain are now editing all your accounts to remove the name monarch from all documents.
The reason that they are changing your documents, and removing any trace of monarch recoveries name is that when the OFT or any regulatory body fines then and tells them they have to compensate all affected customers, then your accounts wont have monarch on them so they wont have to compansate you. (dirty bas*** )
　
Find your old loan statements and then do a subject access request, and you will see your statements have been alterd to remove the name monarch, they havent removed any charges just who made the charge.
　
If I get time I will post up some documents tomorrow evening,
　
　
　
wp

[IanM]

Re: Blemain Finance repossession Unfair relationship Unfair charges

"""Countrywide relied on evidence given by Brian Pitt, an expert witness and director of Rockstead"""

I wouldn't trust a word that comes out of this man's mouth!

[jumper999]

Re: Blemain Finance repossession Unfair relationship Unfair charges

In Omega

Trust & Bank Finindus v. Wright, Son (1998), the Court made a similarly substantial deduction for contributory
negligence where the lender had failed to undertake proper checks into the borrowers’ financial position and
had failed to uncover a very poor credit history including a series of county court judgments. A deduction of
70% was made for contributory negligence.

In a speech in the House of Lords on 20 December 2005, Lord Goodhart QC expressed the view that 100% contributory
negligence was a logical impossibility on the basis the whole point of contributory negligence is that more than one party has
contributed to the damage. Lord Hunt disagreed with him, but one can certainly see Lord Goodhart’s point.

[jumper999]

Re: Blemain Finance repossession Unfair relationship Unfair charges

A judgment on the case was finally made on December 14 2011, in which his Honour Judge Keyser ruled that Countrywide had not been negligent.


But he added that if it had been found liable, the judge would also have found that GMAC-RFC was contributory negligent for not verifying the borrower’s income and other information on the mortgage application.



He claimed that if the lender had carried out the proper checks on the applicant it would probably not have advanced the loan.


A debate was also had in court as to whether the nature of GMAC-RFC’s sub-prime lending was in its itself contributory negligence, but the judge ruled it was not.



He did however rule that GMAC-RFC contributed to its own loss by not carrying out the proper checks and as a result he would have deducted 60% of any money awarded to it if the court had found Countrywide liable.



Ed Coulson, a consultant at law firm Mills & Reeve, says: “Sixty per cent is a significant reduction and should concentrate the minds of mortgage lenders when they are considering suing their own professional advisers.



“In this case the contributory negligence was not as gross as it has been in other cases I have seen with lenders – on that basis one can expect to see reductions for contributory negligence increase significantly in the future.”



One industry source has described the ruling as “landmark”, but Coulson says that he does not see it as a landmark ruling because it is in line with a number of earlier decisions with equally significant reductions for contributory negligence.



The case centred around a buy-to-let property Countrywide valued in 2004 at £185,000. The applicant had requested a 10-year interest-only mortgage of £166,500 – 90% LTV.



In 2007 the applicant defaulted on its repayments and GMAC-RFC repossessed the property, which was sold in September 2008 for £123,500. The net proceeds of the sale were £118,103.



GMAC-RFC claimed the property should only have been valued in the region of £154,000 in 2004.



The judge ruled that the correct valuation should have been £175,000 but the one given was within the acceptable range of value.
Countrywide also argued that because the deal had been securitised the lender had not suffered any loss as a result of the alleged overvaluation, but this was dismissed by the judge.



A spokesman for GMAC-RFC, which now trades as Paratus AMC, says: “In line with its usual practice, Paratus AMC pursued this case on a contingent fee basis with the benefit of after the event insurance. The case turned on the expert valuers’ evidence, based on which the judge found the valuation not to have been negligent.



“Paratus AMC do not accept the judge’s findings on contributory negligence which were in any event obiter. Paratus AMC welcomes the judge’s comments that lending on non-conforming criteria does not constitute contributory negligence per se.”



He adds: “The judgment also helpfully dismisses the suggestion that the securitisation of a mortgage loan somehow extinguishes a valuer’s liability for a negligent overvaluation”.



In its 2010 accounts Countrywide made provisions of £11.9m to guard against potential claims by lenders.



A spokeswoman for Countrywide says: “When we took the decision to make provision in our accounts for potential claims against our surveying business we made the point that we, like the rest of the industry, had seen a considerable increase in claims and that we would defend our position robustly. We are not surprised to see the courts supporting our position.



“We will continue to defend our position when we believe we have fulfilled our responsibilities, but if an error is made, then we seek to settle with claimants as soon as possible.”



Countrywide relied on evidence given by Brian Pitt, an expert witness and director of Rockstead, while Paratus AMC relied on evidence given by Adrian Bloomfield, also an expert witness and chief executive of the Association of Short-Term Lenders.



Fortress Investment Group bought GMAC-RFC in April 2010 and later changed its name to Paratus AMC.



The claim was made by Paratus AMC and RMAC 2005, the former lender’s special purchase vehicle.



The judgment in Paratus is not fundamentally diff erent, since
the judge rejected the defendants arguments of contributory
negligence so far as they “related to the business model rather
than the application of that model on the facts of this case”.
And the main contributory negligence factor in Paratus, was
precisely that their own lending criteria
had not been followed

[jumper999]

Re: Blemain Finance repossession Unfair relationship Unfair charges

Interesting points if it can be proved that Blemain loaned irresponsibly:


What defences might a Surveyor attempt to raise?

Even if a Surveyor’s valuation was negligent, that is not to say that it was the actual cause of any loss suffered by the Lender. Causation of loss is a very complex area of law (see, for example, our previous article Cause and Effect in Professional Negligence Claims), and for that reason the Surveyor may well argue that the losses were actually caused by reasons other than the negligent valuation (such as the property crash itself). In the July 2012 High Court case of Platform Funding Ltd v Anderson & Associates Ltd [2012] the Surveyor was found not liable for the losses suffered by the Lender (notwithstanding that his valuation had been negligent) because the entire loss suffered by the Lender had been caused by underlying fraud perpetrated by the vendor (with the assistance of others).

A Surveyor may also attempt to allege that the Lender was itself contributively negligent if, for example, it failed to follow correct underwriting procedures, it failed to take adequate steps to verify the borrower’s financial status (particularly relevant in relation to self-certification mortgages), or it failed to detect recognised fraud methodologies. These allegations are often grouped together under the umbrella term “careless lending”

[jumper999]

Re: Blemain Finance repossession Unfair relationship Unfair charges

Hello jumper999. If you are able to offer any advice on the questions in my post that would be very kind, thank you.

I am not sure about offering advice but can offer my opinions and views......which may or may not be of help to you. A lot of us fighting Blemain have gained a vast amount of knowledge but I am sure no one would say they were qualified to give advice...just what their own personal opinions are and what they think.

Apologies as I don't want to sound odd.....but you do not seem to answering the questions that WP3 or myself are asking you....as we would like to know what your situation is...whether you are personally involved with any legal proceedings with Blemain.....or not? but it is not the normal thing that people do on this forum as far as I know....to meet up and disclose information they have about their own personal cases...I maybe wrong......but have not heard of anything like this before that is why it would be nice to know how you are able to assist us?

I have personally a lot of info and gained a lot of knowledge about Blemain....so would not mind sharing.....but not too keen on meeting up...as WP3 said things are better in an open forum for all to see....and safer.

So please answer my questions before going any further....then we can go in to as much detail as you like and answer whatever questions you would like to know about.

[Blem-ished]

Re: Blemain Finance repossession Unfair relationship Unfair charges

Hello jumper999. If you are able to offer any advice on the questions in my post that would be very kind, thank you.

[jumper999]

Re: Blemain Finance repossession Unfair relationship Unfair charges

Hi Blem_mished are you currently involved in court proceedings with BLemain?

[Blem-ished]

Re: Blemain Finance repossession Unfair relationship Unfair charges

I have a battle with Blemain, and would love to be part of a group to share experiences, and to meet in London

Hi Figaro Thanks for your reply, great to hear from you. I'll PM you with my phone number and hope we can meet up as soon as. Looks like you and I both have Loans regulated under the CCA 1974, secured.... It would be great to have a small group of people in exactly this situation so we can focus on getting on top of exactly what resources and defences apply to us.

[figaro123]

Re: Blemain Finance repossession Unfair relationship Unfair charges

I have a battle with Blemain, and would love to be part of a group to share experiences, and to meet in London

[Blem-ished]

Re: Blemain Finance repossession Unfair relationship Unfair charges

Hi Welshperson

A) Thanks for your useful information.

re: Monarch Recoveries charges (ruled unfair by the FSA when charged by the Cheshire Mortgage Corporation and part of the FSA's case for heavily fining and banning various of the Blemain beasts) - just to quote our your very useful comment on my first post:
3. In Dec 2012 Cheshire Mortgage Corporatation (CMC) were fined by the FSA for, among other things, the unfair practice of charging their customers fees of £100- £200 to transfer the debt to agents - Monarch Recoveries - which were in fact an in house company of the same group, so they were just passing it to a different floor on the building. They then charge interest at 10% to 1?% plus per year on these fees. CMC have been ordered to pay these charges back. Monarch recoveries weren’t on a different floor, they only existed as a name, they had no employees,
Someone would phone you in the morning and say they were from blemain, same person phones you in the afternoon and says they are from monarch,
The accounts filed at company house for monarch recoveries state that they have no employees

That's useful - and explains my experience - I recall being rung by the same bloke, I thought he had moved companies! But you're saying Monarch Recoveries was essentially a front - they just created this company so staff of the lender companies could claim to be "Agents" of MR when they called and wrote to people, and used that as a pretext for charging extortionate charges which are listed on loan accounts as "Instruction to Agent". I have calculated that I am due a refund of nearing £1000 on MR fees. That point seems to be clear - anyone so treated should be entitled to refund of the MR fees plus interest charged. Does this not also mean that as this was unfair behaviour (ruled by the FSA to be so) it is grounds for a Judge to review any Blemain loan account subject to MR fees as an unfair relationship.
In addition, one has to wonder what the defence of Moser and the other Blemain beasts have, for not having written already to all Blemain customers, to inform them that these charges will be removed from their accounts? What excuse could they have?

B) Yes, my loans are Fixed Sum Loan Agreements regulated by the Consumer Credit Act 1974 secured on...

C) I would like to meet up with others whose lives are being ruined by Blemain, in the London area, because it would be very useful to pool resources and learn from each other. I also suspect that pooled knowledge about Blemain's venal practices will assist us all. I would like to see a Blemain pack with all the key info - about case law, legislation, regulatory bodies and their guidance and how this can be used, plus any rulings/sanctions against the Blemain beasts (directors) for similar practices in their capacities as directors/officers of other companies - in one place, since at the moment everyone trying to survive Blemain has to start and get all this together for themselves. There is useful info on this site but one has to hunt about all over to collate it and it also requires knowledge acquired elsewhere to make sense of what's on here. As you say, I am sure there is a lot I don't know, but the point is, I need to have that info readily accesible somewhere. Currently, I have to work out what question to ask, post it, and hope for a helpful person with the info, to reply. People under pressure from Blemain just can't deal with having to start and reinvent the wheel each time, there is very little legal advice available and a lot of us, by definition having borrowed from Blemain, certainly can't afford solicitors.

[welshperson]

Re: Blemain Finance repossession Unfair relationship Unfair charges

Blem-ished you have asked some big questions, the answers given will be different for different types of agreements you have said that this is a second charge so there are only two options Consumer Credit Act regulated, or unregulated.

As for the questions you asked below, they will require quite a lot of information so pick one point from below and I will try and give you the answers you are looking for.One at a time (not so confusing)
　
1. Is it true that Ocean Finance, broker, were or are a part of the Blemain Group? These are the people who referred me to BG saying they were the only co that would lend to me, and at no time was I told they were part of the same group. Ocean called themselves independent!
2. Are they likely to have taken a secret broker fee from my loan/s, in addition to the declared one added to the loan/s? Are there any actual cases of people having found that Blemain paid a secret broker fee? If so why haven't these cases been reported, as they would invalidate the relationship and the case would surely have been reported? I would be extremely grateful to hear from you if you have evidence that they did this.
3. In Dec 2012 Cheshire Mortgage Corporatation (CMC) were fined by the FSA for, among other things, the unfair practice of charging their customers fees of £100- £200 to transfer the debt to agents - Monarch Recoveries - which were in fact an in house company of the same group, so they were just passing it to a different floor on the building. They then charge interest at 10% to 1?% plus per year on these fees. CMC have been ordered to pay these charges back.
CMC is part of the same group as Blemain. Blemain has indulged in exactly the same practice. (Blemain CCA secured loans are not currently subject to FSA rules, but they are regulated by the OFT (Office of Fair Trading). A member company of the same group, with the same directors, housed in the same building, engaging in the same practice. So, surely, if the FSA has said the CMC charges were unfair, the identikit Blemain charges must also be unfair. Why have Blemain not refunded these charges to their loan holders? Every Blemain customer referred to Monarch must be entitled to a refund.
4. Arrears charges imposed while a payment arrangement is in place. If a suspended possession order is in place, and the Order says that payment shall be on the 28th of the month, how can Blemain keep imposing arrears fees (£46 per loan per month), on a date earlier in the month, which was the original due payment date? They did not oppose the payment date on the Order. I am sure that I have seen a statement from OFT saying that arrears fees should not be charged while a payment agreement is in place. Could anyone point me to that?
5. The following is the only case report that I can find of a case subject to a court judgement, in which someone who was obviously in a vulnerable position at the time, had a second charge secured loan held to be unfair:
Barons Finance v Olubisi (Mayor's and City of London Court) 26 April 2010 - see OFT website:
http://oft.gov.uk/about-the-oft/lega.../#.URQ3coW5khI. Does anyone know of other cases please?
6. There is also the Blemain v Bentley High Court example (Oct 2009)... there was no judgement in this case, it was settled out of court and the possession claim was dismissed, but the terms of the settlement were subject to an order of the court. According to the OFT website, "Bentley defended the claim on the grounds that the creditor had failed properly to assess his ability to repay the loan and had taken advantage of his situation". I suspect those conditions would apply to very many people who borrowed from Blemain, you wouldn't do it unless you were desperate,and they defiintely apply to myself. However I have read elsewhere that there were other grounds as well on which Peter Bentley's lawyers challenged the fairness of the loan. Does anyone have more information? And does anyone know what happened to the lawyers who fought this case please? At the time they were quoted as saying they were going to fight more cases against Blemain, then they disappear without trace? Very grateful for any help and very keen to meet up with others who are in debt slavery to Blemain Finance and already fighting repossession.
　

[jumper999]

Re: Blemain Finance repossession Unfair relationship Unfair charges

Hi Blem-ished I think you'll find that the OFT have not re-newed Blemain's CCA licence since May 2011....and already maybe under investigation.

You have posted up quite a lot of good information......and I was just wandering if you have any strong points that we could use against Blemain?

You also suggest meeting up in person......may I ask if this were to happen how you would be able to assist anyone fighting against Blemain?

Also I am sure that Blemain take many people to court outside the London area.....so is it just specifically people going to London courts that you want to assist?

[jumper999]

Re: Blemain Finance repossession Unfair relationship Unfair charges

What a lot of companies........