She has said that at best she will pay half, even though it may cause a little hardship. He certainly should pay. The thing is uncle that the timeframe on this seems totally excessive, nobody would be expected to keep records for 17 years, and their letter stinks of Big Brother. I am annoyed to say the least.

Thank you all for the replies. The wife is going to see the council tomorrow, and first and foremost she is going to contest the debt. That should hopefully put a stop to any further action, temporarily. I am annoyed that they can come up with a debt from so long ago, and just assume that the OP will get it paid. All the points about keeping records I have noted. In the meantime I intend to call the National Debtline tomorrow, and seek advice from them. I would not want to fire off letters that contain untruths or misinformation. Another thing that is narking me is that the only way they could have located her is via Electoral Roll, or NI number. She (and I) have always been on electoral roll, not trying to hide. So if that is the case then why have they not found her ex via the same means? Certainly he is working so will be paying NI. Maybe they would like his address as well. At the time of the alleged debt she was a housewife, dependant on him, and he took care of any bills. It seems as though they are just chasing whomever they find for some money. Thanks again.

OK, sorry. What it says is basically "Council Tax 14 Day Notice" Hin and Her Their adress On xx Oct 1998 the Court at _____ issued a liability Order against you under provisions of Reg 34 of Council Tax (adnin and enfocerment) regulation 1992. The amount of £423 remains outstanding. In accordance with reg 45A of CT(a &e)regs 1992, unless you make full payment in 14 days the authority will instruct enforcement agents to recover this debt. If you are in financial difficulties please contact the council etc...... Box at bottom with methods of payment. On rear of letter. "If it is necessary to refer your debt to an enforcement agency for debt collection, you will incur additional fees as detailed in the table below. Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Act 2007 Changes from 6th April 2014 The Taking Control of Godds (Fees)Regulations 2014 Fees recoverable under regulation 4 Fee stage Fixed Fee Compliance £75.00 Enforcement £225.00 Sale or Disposal £110 Additional fees may also be incurred if the enforcement agents have to use a locksmith, Removal Company, provide storage or make additional applications to the court" That is what it says, a few details I have left out, but that is the crux of it. The way I read it is this "We have looked at our old records from 17 years ago,, and we think you owe us. You now have 14 days to pay it, or we will send in the nasty boys to get some of your belongings so we can flog them and get some money in" What is annoying is they expect somebody to keep records from so long ago. She has had zero correspondance at all, ever. Also the letter is addressed to her ex and her, at this address, he has never lived here. Plus another letter with all the same details, dated 7 weeks later in the sum of £107.48 Hope this helps.

Local council are chasing. Proper Council headed paper. Sorry, on rear it states words to the effect of "if you don't pay we will get the baliffs in, who may have to do locksmiths act". It seems as though they are chasing wife, as the easy target. Her ex-husband is also named, but he does not register on electoral roll. So even though she has changed name she has been located, he has not.

The wife has received a Council Tax bill, for a previous address. Full of the usual "we made need a locksmith, which will cost extra" type threats. Apparently it went to court, although she was never notified, so could not make any representation. What is particularly annoying is that this is a debt from 1998, a whole 17 years later. I cannot see how they can be chasing a debt from that long ago, with a court order attatched to it. Any comments?

Hello, this is an interesting tale, and involves the wife, mobile phone company 3, and persons unknown. The wife had a mobile dongle that we used in a laptop, when going out for a day to car shows etc. It was only a fiver a month, so she did not notice when the payments stopped. She had a call from 3 a few weeks back, asking for her by name, and then asking to confirm postcode. She gave them the postcode, and they refused to speak to her, as it did not match their records. Another call next evening, and this time got the person at customer services who was custodian of the brain cell for the day. A sensible converstaion, where the wife pointed out her 3 mobile phone was registered to this address, and still paying the bill, so she could not live anywhere else. All straightforward so far. It appears that 3 had a call off a person unknown in London, asking for a change of address. They than asked for an Ipad, or Iphone or some such to be sent. We do not know if that happened. When the address was changed, the bill was sent to the new address, after a couple of months of not paying it, 3 suspended the account. Then they started to chase the wife for the unpaid debt. Now as stated, she was not aware it was not going out of her bank, so after many many hours of talking to various brick walls in a call centre, she just paid the bill to save getting agro. During one converstaion, 3 actually suggested that it must be one of the wifes' freinds that had done it, which we find incredulous. All of £15, to bring it up to date. She then decided to cancel her 3 mobile phone contract (due to expire anyway) and went to various mobile phone shops, where she failed credit checks. we did an online credit check, and 3 have put a black mark against the wife, for a £15 debt, that they cancelled the direct debit. It also appears from the check, that not only living in Birmingham (as we do), and having an address in London, s he has also lived in Leicester for some time, and had a Shop Direct Finance agreement, and owes them money as well. Gets about a bit, does my lady! So the big question is what is the best course of action to get these bad credit ratings off the systems, when they are there fraudulently? It also strikes me as very scary that a person can call a number, and get a change of address done, with absolutely zero checks done.

And for todays exciting reply from the Vodafone Empire...... " Hello Andy, I understand your concern with regard to your account. I can see that the account number xxxxxx is not registered under your name and hence we woudl not be able to share any account specific details with you. As per your email I understand that someone has used your daughter’s Jade bank details and have opened an account with us. I would request you to ask the account holder to write back to us with the below detail so that we can verify the account and help better: Account holder full name (mandatory) Any one of the below detail: Payment method Date of birth Once I’ve received this, I’ll be more than happy to help. To know more about our privacy policy you may also click on the link below: http://www.vodafone.co.uk/vodafone-uk/about-this-site/privacy-policy/index.htm I’ll look forward to your reply" Why the chuff can these muppets not get it in to their grey matter that the daughter does not have a contract? If she has no contract, she has no details of it. It's not too hard to grasp, surely?

I attempted to report it to the police, they seemed reluctant to take any details. In effect a card was taken, by persons unknown, on a date unknown, at a location unknown, and no proof of anything. Arvato wanted a crime number, but I cannot get it. Even if I could get it, I would then have to get the permisission of the daughter to communicate with them, as they love the Data Protection Act.

Thanks, I had noticed him on here, and he certainly seems to be good at his job.

Hello good people of consumer land. Here follows a tale of stupidity, incompetance, and mis-information. I do hope you enjoy it, I am quite revelling in it to be honest, and the longer it drags on, the dafter it becomes. On the 23rd of June, my step-daughter had a letter off Vodafone, saying in effect, "we have tried to contact you, you ignored it, you owe us £265.20. Pay us now, or we will pass on to debt collectors" Now we were a little confused by this, as she does not have, and has never had a Vodafone. I rang the customer services people, and gleaned information about where the alleged contract was taken out. From the dates, it appears as though the girl had a debit card taken from her purse, and that was used to get a contract. We suspect we know who did it, but cannot prove. We headed to the shop, Phones 4 U in Merry Hill, and were met by the manager, and after we explained the details, he spent a good hour and a quarter trying to deal with Vodafone, and getting nowhere. He has no record of the daughters name, address, or the mobile number, or contract. Even though it was (allegedly) taken out in his shop.I have nothing but praise for him or his attitude to us. Then we got a letter of their debt collectors, Arvato Bertelsmann, who have increased the amount to £331.50. I started to play email ping pong with them, and they seem very hesitant to disclose any information at all. Amongst their most interesting quotes, "if money has come out of her account, that is good enough to say she has the contract". In between having the card stolen, and her next statement, a payment had come out of her bank, 20 quid or so. She had not noticed on her statement. She stopped the card, so the next month was defaulted. This is one of my emails to them. Hope you like it! "" Emailing Arvato requesting proof which Vodafone do not have to supply will not get this matter sorted." What kind of a stupid response is that? How the hell can she prove that she did not open a contract? Only Vodaphone may have some kind of proof, and I have better things to do with my life than spend hours on phone to a customer advisor, who's command of the Queen's English leaves a lot to be desired, and that person will not have a clue how to deal with it anyway. Vodaphone advertise an 0845 number for debt recovery, it doesn't work. No doubt you have better communications with Vodaphone, you ask them to prove it. I also disagree with your statement that as they took one payment, that is proof enough. Poppycock.A stolen debit card, where the assailant knows the PIN is good enough to open an account with Vodaphone, they really do need to improve their security. Evidently my previous email failed to register. We cannot get a crime number, the police are not interested. Jade has lost 20 quid, Vodaphone have lost considerably more. I would suggest the Vodaphone should be opening a fraud case, not us. So as it stands at present, you are trying to chase a debt, not actioned by my step daughter, that you have no intention of assisting with, it is down to us to prove (impossibly) that she was responsible, via a call centre in The Far East, on an 0845 number that doesn't work, talking to people that do not have a clue, aboout a contract that does not exist. Perhaps you can see my dilemma. To re-itterate. Get your client Vodaphone to provide proof." So Arvato don't want to talk to me, I try to deal with Vodafone. Vodafone won't deal with me, hiding behind the Data Protection Act,because I am not the account holder. Neither is my step-daughter. So the bottom line is this. Person unknown used a stolen card to get a phone. Vodafone send a bill, then two days later pass it on to thier chosen team of thugs to recover. Thugs don't understand basic requests, and Vodafone don't want to talk. And nobody can provide any proof of anything, but the daughter risks being blacklisted due to it. I did actually get to email Vf, and got a reply. "Hi Andy, This is a message from Vodafone with regards to your recent query for your daughter s account. We could not locate the account and tried to contact you to get more details however could not speak to you on the given contact number. We would request you to please get back to us with the more details of your daughter s account. You can provide us the Vodafone account or mobile number so we can investigate the matter further. Vodafone Customer Relation" . Notice the "we could not locate the account"? They could not contact me because the number I gave was 01234567890. I have no desire to call their number, 0870 or not. I will do communication only via email, where I can retain proof of correspondance. I would welcome comments Andy

Sorry, just re-read my original post. I am owed 7 days holiday pay, not 7 days carried over holidays. Hope this clarifies. Thanks for the speedy reply. You are correct in holiday entitlements, 20 plus 8. For the past 4 years since I have been with the firm, we have been paid for untaken holidays. Due to the nature of the business, we all tend to work as much as possible, knowing that untaken holidays are paid for, which tends to make a nice little wage packet in time to clear the Christmas bills. Last year for example, I ended up with 13 days holiday pay. But I digress. It would be very difficult to plan holidays so that none can be left at the end of the year, due to the nature of the job. The way it has been has beneffitted all parties, and we don't have a problem with it. I don't really like the idea of taking it on the chin, (I was actually thinking of another part of the anatomy). In effect, I would be loosing about £375, which I cannot afford to do. There is another point, I have been called out 6 times over the week. If we are called out at weekends, we get a bung, plus pay. Surely if I am on holiday, I should expect the same rates? It seems like the boss is winning both ways. Sitting at home waiting for a call out is non productive, I could be out doing foreigners earning a lot more than I do at work. Surely, I am either on holiday, or not. Thanks In previous years, any lay-off time has been paid at normal rate, with no loss of holiday entitlement.

Sorry for posting here, I realise that CAG doesn't generally do wages problems, but I am hoping that it will be allowed in, and somebody can assist, so in advance I thank you. The small firm I work for (two bosses, 4 workers) has a policy that the 20 days annual holiday entitlement per annum runs January to December. It has always been the practice that any holidays not taken are paid at the end of the year. We cannot carry them over. I am owed 7 days holiday, but the boss has been dragging his feet, and not paid yet. Two colleagues are owed 8 each. The past week has been very quiet, with little work on, so I was instructed to stay at home and wait for a phone call if any jobs came in (re-active maintenance stuff). I have been out on 4 days to various jobs, in the region of 20 hours. Here is the problem, I have been told by a colleague who spoke to the boss today on the phone, that he intends to use our accrued holiday pay for last year to pay us for the days off we have had this week. This I find very strange, it is as though I am paying myself for not being at work. I wonder how I stand, legally. BTW, there is no contract of employment, company handbook etc. Thanks.

As breif as I can. I bought a machine from Comet 31st December 2008. Paid for 5 year warranty cover. February 2011 Bearings went, called service centre. They agreed, man turned up and fixed it, bringing with him parts to repair, following on the phone diagnosis. September 20th 2011, bearings gone again. Tried on phone diagnosis, girl agreed. Engineer called, (his jobsheet said suspect bearings). He ordered parts, and expected date for fitting is 3/10/2011. So Comet and their insurance company/ repair people expect my family, me, wife, two teenage, two under 2 years old, to live without a washing machine for 2 weeks. I think that is both unreasonable, and unacceptable. Given that I took out extended cover to give piece of mind, I now am very angry, and feel that they have my money, and couldn't care less. I would welcome peoples thoughts, and can I insist on a replacement machine, given its ability to break within 6 months, same fault. Andy

Thanks for your replies folks. There was no inventory taken at the start of tenancy. However I took photos of the place, I work for a firm that refurbishes properties for a large landlord, ie Church of England, and I have seen their assessors at work, it made me think and I decided to cover myself, in the event of a dispute later. The damage to the door was minimal. The bottom panel was kicked in, which is held in place by plastic beads. The beads sprang out, and the panel then fell in. I simply cleaned everything up, and used a rubber hammer to re-attatch, which is the way they are fitted from new. Whilst I am not a qualified UPVC door fitter, if there is such a qualification, I tend to do this sort of task on a daily basis, so am qualified by experience, so to speak. There is no damage to the structure of the door, frame or hinges. Security is only as strong as the weakest point, and in the case of plastic doors, that is the beads. Incidentally, to clarify, the door is half glazed, double glazed unit at top, laminated panel about 25mm thick at bottom. Thanks

• Whether the tenancy was granted verbally or in writing.Writing, via letting agency • If it was granted in writing, state the date on which the tenancy began, and the length of the initial term if any.October 29th ish, 6 months • State the amount of the original rent and how often the rent is payable (e.g. per week, per calendar month, per quarter, etc). If the rent has been increased, for each increase state the date on which this occured and the new rent.£495 per calendar month, in advance. No increases • If the tenancy has ended, state how it was ended (e.g. notice by the landlord, notice by the tenant, agreement of both parties, etc), and state the date on which the tenant moved out. One months notice by daughter, as per rental agreement, and then two months notice by landlord. Tenancy agreement ends this Saturday coming, 28th of May • If the tenancy has not ended, but a notice to end it has been given, state who gave the notice, the date the notice was received, the amount of notice given (e.g. two weeks, two months), and the reasons the notice gives for ending the tenancy. Property is in England, and deposit is held in safeguarded scheme via latting agents. Hope this info helps. As far as I am aware, there was no inventory, as it was an unfurnished property. Only thing that could be classed as furnishings are 3 carpets, which we are having cleaned tomorrow evening, and curtains, similarly.