My advice on how to deal with Buchanan Clark & Wells. This is how I did it and they went away…. Firstly establish that the money is NOT OWING, or YOU are NOT responsible for the money they are demanding. (If you DO owe the money you will have to pay the debt.) MAKE ABSOLUTELY CRETAIN that you don’t owe the money they are asking for by checking previous bills / cancellation dates etc. Do not phone B.C. & W on the 0870 number they give out. This costs you about 10.+VAT per minute and is further depleting your finances! Firstly check with the utilities company (The Pursuers) you are supposed to owe the money to, by phone (usually an 0800 FREE customer services call.) Get them to agree, or confirm that you do not owe the money. If they agree tell them that you have received a communication from Buchanan Clark & Wells and ask them to call the dogs off please, as you will be writing to B.C. &W to inform them that you have established that they are in error. So far this has cost you nothing. Don’t send B.C. & W reams of so called “proof” dates, times, addresses, etc.etc. Their machine is geared up to worry you into getting them off your back and they probably will file this in the shredder, or could sell your details on to database collators. Now for the letter…. It is important not to gabble on, most of what you say will be pretty irrelevant to the matter anyway, so keep the letter down to as few words and paragraphs as possible. Ideally done in wordprocessor and nicely printed out with a printed envelope (this shows you mean business) Put any reference numbers they give along with their address at the top, your address and phone number as well. DON’T FORGET to date the letter and Type Recorded delivery on the letter and the envelope Here is a sample of mine as a guide… 3rd. July XXXX BCW REF: XXXXXXXX RE: Yours 01.07.09 “FINAL NOTICE” Dear Sirs Further to your letter dated XXXXX “FORMAL DEMAND” and your “previous correspondence for gas used at (address) for the period XXXX2008 – XXXX 2009. With the principal sum of £XXX.xx I have been in touch with EDF Energy who have confirmed to me that I am not responsible for money owing as stated in your letter and they will shortly be informing you of this, as is their legal obligation. I suggest that you verify this with your “pursuers” before you consider proceeding with any threats made in your letter. In the meantime I will not be prepared to provide any further responses and look forward to hearing from you in confirmation. Yours sincerely FINALLY Post the letter recorded delivery – costs about £1.06 Keep the receipt and guard it with your life for a couple of days. During this time, or beforehand log into the POST OFFICE on the web http://www.postoffice.co.uk/portal/po/home You can go to “track & trace” link and enter the Post office reference number from the receipt and date of posting and it will confirm that your letter was delivered by their Glasgow Office on a certain day. Print out the P.O. confirmation and clip it to your copy of the correspondence along with the receipt and file it all safely. This way they cannot say it has not been received, you have the proof! BUT If you DO owe the money – pay up!