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Hi all, really hoping you can help me. This is a bit of long story but it does get interesting so please do read it all.
I took out a personal unsecured loan with Zopa which I was merrily paying off when I had a change in circumstances and ended up moving abroad. During this time I had to reduce my payments which zopa agreed to for 6 months (I also told them I was moving overseas), once I was settled in NZ I contacted them again with my new contact details and increased the payment rates (before the end of the initial 6 months) but still not back to the full amount that the agreement was taken out in. Again this was agreed to for another 6 months, and I did this once again and it was extended for a further 6 months. All of this was communicated via email and all was well
Fast forward to beginning of the year and I am needing to return to the Uk and I checked my credit score to find out that the loan that I’m paying reduced payments on has been defaulted and passed to a DCA (Cabot). Now this is complete news to me as during my numerous email conversations they haven’t let me know. So I contacted them and it transpires that they sold the debt on in September last year and my account defaulted in April. I raised a complaint with them and they came back to me saying that they can’t send letters of default or sale of debt via email and they sent these to my previous uk address even though they have my nz address in their system (they confirmed they had this and read it to me when I called them to find out about the default).
Basically the whole situation is a complete shambles as I feel that they haven’t provided me with any prior correspondence re the default and especially not the sale of the debt, they just confirmed that they were happy to continue with reduced payments and that a default could or may occur. I have never missed a payment, I have been open about my situation and I have kept in contact.
Zopa on the other hand have often provided confused information or completely ignored emails leaving me in the dark. Most recently they said if I paid x amount to clear the arrears then they’d remove the default, I just needed to contact them to arrange it. I asked if it would come off the outstanding debt and how I could pay x amount and they changed their response saying that the arrears needed to be paid to Cabot and then the arrears amount needed to be confirmed with them, suggesting the figure they gave me isn’t correct. Then to add a cherry on the top they said the default would be removed from my credit file (yippee) but my missed payments will remain and it goes on to say something about reflecting an arrangement since 2017... it totally confuses me at that point.
I would like to reiterate that I haven’t missed a payment, ever on this loan but simply reduced the amount which they agreed to.
Is there anything I can do?
I’ve never once said I wouldn’t pay it, and I have done all I can to keep payments going. I feel that they’ve been unfair, unclear and inconsistent with their information, I’d go as far as to say they didn’t want to contact me abroad so that they could sell on the debt and make it someone else’s problem knowing full well I wouldn’t hear about it.
I took out a personal unsecured loan with Zopa which I was merrily paying off when I had a change in circumstances and ended up moving abroad. During this time I had to reduce my payments which zopa agreed to for 6 months (I also told them I was moving overseas), once I was settled in NZ I contacted them again with my new contact details and increased the payment rates (before the end of the initial 6 months) but still not back to the full amount that the agreement was taken out in. Again this was agreed to for another 6 months, and I did this once again and it was extended for a further 6 months. All of this was communicated via email and all was well
Fast forward to beginning of the year and I am needing to return to the Uk and I checked my credit score to find out that the loan that I’m paying reduced payments on has been defaulted and passed to a DCA (Cabot). Now this is complete news to me as during my numerous email conversations they haven’t let me know. So I contacted them and it transpires that they sold the debt on in September last year and my account defaulted in April. I raised a complaint with them and they came back to me saying that they can’t send letters of default or sale of debt via email and they sent these to my previous uk address even though they have my nz address in their system (they confirmed they had this and read it to me when I called them to find out about the default).
Basically the whole situation is a complete shambles as I feel that they haven’t provided me with any prior correspondence re the default and especially not the sale of the debt, they just confirmed that they were happy to continue with reduced payments and that a default could or may occur. I have never missed a payment, I have been open about my situation and I have kept in contact.
Zopa on the other hand have often provided confused information or completely ignored emails leaving me in the dark. Most recently they said if I paid x amount to clear the arrears then they’d remove the default, I just needed to contact them to arrange it. I asked if it would come off the outstanding debt and how I could pay x amount and they changed their response saying that the arrears needed to be paid to Cabot and then the arrears amount needed to be confirmed with them, suggesting the figure they gave me isn’t correct. Then to add a cherry on the top they said the default would be removed from my credit file (yippee) but my missed payments will remain and it goes on to say something about reflecting an arrangement since 2017... it totally confuses me at that point.
I would like to reiterate that I haven’t missed a payment, ever on this loan but simply reduced the amount which they agreed to.
Is there anything I can do?
I’ve never once said I wouldn’t pay it, and I have done all I can to keep payments going. I feel that they’ve been unfair, unclear and inconsistent with their information, I’d go as far as to say they didn’t want to contact me abroad so that they could sell on the debt and make it someone else’s problem knowing full well I wouldn’t hear about it.
