Previous Resident's Debt

[Steevieb]

Hello,
Three years ago we bought our house. Since then, we've been receiving mail for a previous resident, usually 5-10 envelopes at a time. I started off by writing "no longer at this address, return to sender". This made no difference. I googled the address on the back of the envelope and found that the mail was from Cabot Financial so I gave them a call to explain that they were sending mail to my address and the person they wanted no loner lives here. They instructed me to open the letter and give them the account numbers. This made no difference, the mail kept coming. I kept calling and they kept telling me they would remove my address from their system.
A couple of weeks ago, I contacted the financial services ombudsman to complain about Cabot harassing me by sending mail to my address, they've contacted Cabot.
Today I received a more official looking envelope addressed to the previous resident, googling the address again, it appears to be a county court claim.
What should I do? Even though this doesn't involve me, I'm scared of coming home one day to see bailiffs in my property. I don't want this to affect me financially as I've always tried so hard to keep my rating the best I can. This worry really isn't doing my anxiety any good.
Does anyone have any advice? Please.
Steve

[Steevieb]

Re: Previous Resident's Debt

Ok, so I've read this post: http://www.legalbeagles.info/forums/...-Cabot-Restons

And have written a letter to the court explaining the situation, which I'll return along with the county claim form.

Fingers crossed this will sort it.

Steve

[FlamingParrot]

Re: Previous Resident's Debt

Hi Steevieb

I thought I had replied to your thread late last night, but somehow it doesn't seem to have gone through.

What I'd said was that you should just return the envelope to the senders' address saying that the addressee is unknown at that address.

In view of your communications with Cabot stating that the person in question does not live at that address, you'd have expected them to refrain from issuing a claim but they've done the exact opposite. Now they're sure the defendant won't receive the claim as he doesn't live there, they've gone and issued one in order to secure default judgment. :rant: :rant: :rant:

Underhand, yes, but technically not illegal as claimants are entitled to serve claims to the defendant's last known address. If they haven't got an updated address for that person, they can justify having sent the claim to an old address and, when the recipient fails to acknowledge service of the claim, Cr@pbot will request default judgment.

That should not affect you as the judgment will be in their name not yours.

[Steevieb]

Re: Previous Resident's Debt

Hi,
Thanks for your reply. I suspect they've done this as a response to my complaint to FOS, maybe just me being cynical...
What happens now? With regard to the judgement as it will be default? Am I to expect bailiffs as a result of this?
Steve

[FlamingParrot]

Re: Previous Resident's Debt

Hi,
Thanks for your reply. I suspect they've done this as a response to my complaint to FOS, maybe just me being cynical...

You're not! They are the cynical ones, not to mention this: http://www.legalbeagles.info/forums/...537#post581522

What happens now? With regard to the judgement as it will be default? Am I to expect bailiffs as a result of this?
Steve

They can request judgment once the 14 days are up. In many cases judgments are left unenforced for a long time without the debtor's knowledge, until one day they look at their credit file and up it pops. :eek2:

If they want to enforce with bailiffs, they have to apply to the court for a warrant and a notice of enforcement will be sent giving at least 7 days before anyone turns up.