Hi all, I'll try and keep it brief and stick to the facts. Ordered a bed online via a company based in England, bed arrived, but was damaged and missing a bunch of parts I informed them of the damage and asked to return the bed, they offered to replace the missing and damaged parts, but I asked for a refund instead. They agreed, somewhat reluctantly and this is where I need advice, they told me to package up the bed and send it back myself. I Sent it back via Parcel2go (TNT express delivery), costing me around £37, they weren't in to sign for it, so the item was taken back to the delivery hub, they claim to have arranged delivery for a couple of days later, but TNT sent the bed back to me. Parcel2go won't give me a refund because the delivery was attempted It took nearly two weeks to get the 2nd part of the bed back from TNT and the parcel was basically wrecked, with gaping holes in it. I currently have a claim for damage with Parcel2go on that front So I sent the bed back AGAIN, via another courier and it was received (another £17) But, the bed company is only offering a refund of the bed and delivery cost (I've yet to see the refund(s) so far) My question is, shouln't they be liable for the costs of sending the bed back, for both occasions?

Hi there im just after some advice really.... a few months ago a friend of mine fell foul to consumer fraud he responded to an ad on facebook looking for people to earn money by running a business from home selling items for this person using an active ebay and paypal account that my friend had to cut a long story short the person who was selling them took the money via my friend and did a bunk and not sending out the goods my friend didnt relise that i had smelt a rat and told him to refund the money back instead he didnt do so as he was doing to support his family thinking that it was genuine. The person whom my friend tried to contact blocked my friend on facebook and didnt respond to questions my friend reported it all on the action fraud website and was advised to contact the buyers saying that they had all fallenforo consumer fraud and now he is getting calls and voicemails from paypal asking him to call them to collect and doesnt know what to do please help me to help him thanks

Hi I made myself bankrupt in December regarding other debts (not specifically council tax). In October, the council issued a summary warrant for council tax. My advisor stated that I would not have to pay 2014/2015 council tax as the summary warrant was issued prior to bankruptcy and the full year would be regarded as a debt. I received a letter from council stating I owed £181 for the above mentioned year and I questioned this and the said it was for council tax for after bankruptcy. Does anyone know what is correct? Should it all be written off for the full year or not? Thanks in advance

In 2010 I suffered some health problems. I'm self employed and as a result I fell behind with my mortgage payments. In October 2011 I had a had a possession order suspended. The judge ruled that the outstanding arrears should be spread over the remaining term of my mortgage. My payments and the extra arrears payments have been made on time every month since Oct 2011. I'm not one for credit but in January I was looking for a small loan to buy a car, I was declined and it was suggested that I check my Experian credit file. My credit file shows 4 late payments. I spoke with NRAM and made a complaint, my argument being that if the judge has ordered the arrears paid over the remaining term that should not be reflected on my credit file. Obviously, being NRAM they have refused to comply with my request. I have made a complaint to IOC as they are responsible for making sure the information on my credit file is accurate and fair. It would appear the ICO are stuck for an answer. They have told me that normally, if a lender decides to spread arrears over the remaining term of the mortgage, the payment history on the credit file should reflect this. The ICO say, as NRAM have been ordered by a judge to spread the arrears over the remaining term (in other words NRAM have not made the decision to do so), they are not sure if they can make them comply with this rule? The case handler at the ICO is not sure what to do? Can anyone please help me with an answer. My argument is that my credit file will be impaired for the remaining term of my mortgage which is 15 years. The ICO see this as a reasonable argument and agree it is unfair. My problem is the case handler has requested an answer from 'policy' so a positive decision remains in the balance. Surely there must be a legal president for this? Any help would be very much appreciated.

Need some advice big time, I received a letter from the job centre earlier stating they will be taking money out of my ESA for child support, I have never herd off the CSA, my two daughters are 18 and nearly 20 although I haven't seen them for a few years through no fault of mine I used to regularly give my ex money for my children she'd never got the CSA involved and she's always worked so never got the CSA involved, naturally I thought she had got them involved this time as I have not spoke to her in a few years either, I phoned job centre plus they told me I need to speak to the CSA as it was them who told job centre plus to take money from me, I phoned CSA add some right arrogant bloke on the other end telling me my ex had not contacted them and that it doesn't matter how old my children are as I have never paid through the CSA I must pay something back, surely this is not right due to the age of my children I told him I used to pay my ex money he told me it doesn't matter because it's not on their records! Please advise if they can do this or not, He also told me it doesn't matter if my children was working full-time when I told him I would take this further and see citizens advice he put the phone down on me.

Hi everyone, I made a mistake, I know I was wrong and I feel bad for that. First of all, allow me introduce myself. I am from Spain and I went to a little city called Newquay in order to look for job and improve my english level. That was in November 2013. In December 2013, I rented some surf stuff (surf board, gloves, wetsuit and slippers). As deposit, I provided my English number phone, email address and English address. That day, I went back to Spain, so I had just enough time to give back the surf kit and I decided not to give back. Days later, my friends told me that police had gone to the house a few times looking for me. Although I already am not in England, I am nervous and I do not know what to do. My doubts are the following: 1. What should I do after this? 2. Do I have to pay a fine (It seems it would be RLP - Retail Loss Prevention)? 3. Having my email address, Why have not police made contact with me? 4. What I did is reason to arrest me? 5. What would be the period of limitation? 6. I anticipate going to England in the future. Can police catch me in airport passport control?. I mean, What I did is a reason to be in the "blacklist" of passports?. I know what I have done is bad and I will never do it again. I feel embarrassed. Please, help me with my doubts, I am really worried with this situation. Thank you very much.

Hi People, hope somebody can give me some advice what to do. I used to live in the Uk for 3 years. Now I'm back in my home country since 5 months in the EU. My old flatmate has send me a Letter from Marston over. Were they claim I owe HMCTS ..... more than 600BPF! He hasn't informed them where I live and will not do so. Only 2 Client ref. Numbers are on the letter nothing more! Not for what they charge me! (what could that be any thoughts?) I'm normal the sort of guy who always payed his bills. I never received a warning or any thing for a missing payment. Letter says: We are in possession of a Magistrates Court Order as a consequence of non payment of the above fine. Your residence at the above address has been identified by Marston Groups... That i have failed to pay the previous fine... (never got any letter befor) They can take my belongings and may increase the costs... (I got nothing left in the UK^^) So they've got no clue where I live. I'm not sure if i should contact them. But it buggers me because I want to know what they claim "I haven't paid". Other wise I don't want to raise the bill higher and higher and maby need to pay the high amount in the end! Contact them or let them think I got no clue about all this. I really don't know what to do, every advice or any thoughts I'm very thankful for.

I have posted on here many times and had some good advice and stopped getting Hassel from credit card companies but all of a sudden I have received can forms I have buried my head due to health issues now feel I want to sort once and for all I need some peace of mind it's so bad I don't answer the phone hide mail really no way to live my OH works so hard he unaware of just how bad the situation is I could afford now to pay a decent (well I think decent ) amount back if I could get it all in one amount also I see there are ways you can get a certain amount of debt written off how does that work please

Hello all... I'm after some advice from my brother (I have no idea about the CSA, but have heard some horror stories) so I am very worried for him. I am going to try to get to that facts and keep the emotion out of this post... My brother has a son by his estranged wife (8 years old). They split even before my brother knew she was pregnant (not that that makes a difference of course). They have had an informal arrangement for years, which seemed to work. But a few years ago (not sure how long, I can get the information if needed) my brother was contacted by the CSA making demands. To cut a long story short, they are now demanding £63 a week. It's the amount of letters that is distressing his partner (my brother doesn't get his post until he's home at the weekends and on one occasion he got 18 letters in ONE day). My brother has a new family and a 6 month old baby and works away all week. He is really struggling with making ends meet for his family. My brother relies on his family to help him with his admin as he works away and doesn't have much time. What can I do to help him or what advice can I give him on what to do? He has some debts which he's trying to pay off too - I think the best way is for him to declare himself bankrupt to start things fresh (but I'm not sure where that fits with the CSA). Any help would be so much appreciated.

My son received a letter from Lending Stream for a payment for a loan that was so say opened up in 2011 that he knew nothing about it seems someone had opened a bank account in his name then this company loaned them cash on line. We were told to report this to the police and give them a crime number which we did.In 2014 he received a letter for this loan now from a Mackenzie Hall we then contacted Action Fraud and gave Mackenzie Hall the number and again thought it was all over. He now has received a letter from PRA Group demanding this cash we are doing all we are asked to do but this debt is continuing to be sold on surely this is not right.

Hi, This is my first post but I have been looking around on here recently as have been seeking some advice. I haven't been able to find a post similar enough to mine to get an answer so I'm going to tell you about my troubles in hope someone can steer me right! I took out a Barclays Career Development Loan back in 2007. The company I took it out to train with then soon went out of business - I'm sure some of you would've heard of them. 'Connectivity IT Training' based in Docklands, London. I telephoned Barclays after I'd found out to then be told, Ok that's fine, we will take today as your course end date and you can start paying it back. How considerate of them. I made a few payments but seeing as I was on a CDL course, I obviously had no job or low pay. I stopped being able to make payments and the letters stopped coming through. Fast forward to the present day. I moved away from my Mums (I've lived at 7 addresses since then, my most recent has been just under 5 months). At the end of Dec I received a phone call from Westcot asking me if I was me. I was surprised as I have no other outstanding debt (none that would be referred to a collection agency) and as I do get a lot of junk calls I said no. The lady said she would remove my number from their system, end of. I didn't have that number when I signed for the CDL so no idea how they had gotten it. On the 2nd of Jan I received a lovely letter from them to my NEW address. Sent to my name, telling me they are attempting to contact me and that I need to confirm if it's me or not living here before the 12th of Jan or else they will assume the contact information they hold for me is correct. Now if I didn't indeed live here then I would have gotten this letter addressed for someone other than myself and not opened it just binned it and they couldn't assume that I live here etc. I have switched EVERYTHING to this address as I have moved away from the area I used to live in and it's not convenient to pick up post from my parents anymore. I did switch to other addresses I've lived at recently too and they are all previous addresses showing on my Noddle credit report. I could be on the wrong track here and thinking that this is for the Barclays CDL when it isn't however theres nothing else it can be in my opinion. Everything else is paid up to date and I've never missed a payment on anything, ever either. I am also aware that by the middle of this coming November, the loan will be 6 years with no payment or contact so will be 'Statute Barred'. The date of default displays Nov 2009. I'm guessing they are aware of this and trying to get me now before the deadline. Total outstanding is around £8600. I am not in a position to repay this as my girlfriend isn't working (on SMP as we have just had a baby and I am covering all the bills and trying to repay an old credit card which was at £8500 and now down to £5500). Is there anything I can do or anything you can suggest to me? I have no experience with Debt Collection agencies and I also don't want to have any experiences with them! Thank's a lot for reading.

I am sending an invoice for £800 to a travel company for some work I done on a holiday brochure. It is actually the first invoice with the completion invoice to be sent in the new year. I am full-time employed now, but just done some work on the side. I have used a template from online to make a quick invoice, but do I need to add anything for VAT?

Hi, as someone who's used this forum again and again,and gained such useful advice and confidence from it's content, may I just offer some quick advice to anyone struggling to repay Swift Sterling, who according to some have a reputation for being less than sympathetic. I have a loan I am struggling to repay and recently defaulted on the full repayment. I had no reply to a week of emails to their customer services proposing a repayment plan, just regular sms and emails informing me of the arrears and possible charges of £59.00. I then emailed them via the complaints link on their website, which seems to fast-track through to Customer Support, with the same proposal for payment and within a few hours had confirmation of their acceptance of my proposed plan, all their banking details for repayment and happily confirmation too that there would be no phone contact. Their reply was fair and straightforward which was pleasantly surprising. A result as they say. Hope this help somebody out somewhere.

On 12 November Ofgem issued notice of our proposal to revoke some of the provisions of the confirmed Provisional Order against Economy Energy following improvements in compliance. Read More Here: https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/publications-and-updates/economy-energy-provisional-order

I was quite disturbed this morning when I wondered whether certain Insurance Companies are [problem]ming the public via computer systems which ask you to pay more money than you should be. I am a landlord and insured my first house in early July via Bedford Insurance and a company 'e-unlimited'. I paid £315.13 for the whole year. I was told that when occupied this would fall to £178.13. Due to extensive renovation, a tenant walked into my house on Wednesday ie. exactly 5 months from the date of insurance cover. I contacted 'Bedford Insurance' and after having done some basic sums beforehand was surprised to discover that the money due back to me was less than I expected. I spoke to two insurance brokers who immediately got defensive when I questioned this figure stating they were simply doing what the computer had told them. Given there was a discrepancy of £7.28 in my favour, I asked whether I could speak to a manager. Credit to the manager, he did phone me back this morning, much to my surprise, and he bothered to go through the sums in detail with me. He suggested that insurance quotes go up and down and therefore wondered whether the £178.13 quoted to me in early July was now higher. On checking, and much to his embarrassment, it was a little lower! He agreed with my sums and then, almost flippantly, said he would offer an additional £10 on to the quote the computer gave me the previous day. This leads to a disturbing question: How many people are paying more than they should be because the computer has got the sums wrong? Or more conspiratorially, are some companies purposefully manipulating the computer system to achieve financial figures very much more in their favour?

Hi Everyone Can you please advise me. Currently I am in receipt of Contribution based ESA and in the support group. My wife has been ill for a while and has now had to leave work. If she makes a claim for ESA will that immediately stop my claim? How will it affect the payments I currently receive, will they stop or be changed in any way? Will I be reassessed for Universal Credit etc? Thank you.

Was surfing today found a bit of info that maybe of interest quoted below in regards to making a debtor pay in full without allowing them time to pay. If the company are "directed to accept" then this MUST be allowed then rather than take full payment only! Sorry in advance for the long read of the link, but I think it may help others in the future not to struggle in finding all of the money for all of the debt in one go. "Increasingly under the TCE regulations, the fact that HCEOs are directed to accept instalment arrangements over a longer period, has led to the life of the writ being changed." I have used bold to highlight the parts I think are relevant and would the quote apply to the more standard EA This was taken from a well known EA site look here So why do the HCEO's continue to DEMAND full payment then? see page 61 under the heading of Extensions from the link called "look here" above this is the original link to this information

I split from my partner in July and have since started claiming income support, he's currently classed as homeless although he does stay between his mums and his nans house, he has notified the council of were he is staying and to my knowledge has only just made an application for job seekers allowance. My problem is this, he has not changed the address of his bank account yet, I have contacted Barclays on numerous occasions telling the he does not live here and have given them the forwarding address yet they still send letters. His car is still registered to my house, I have informed the DVLA that he does not live here so I am unsure whether they have rectified that. A few debt collection letters come here, but every time I receive a letter I call them up and tell them he does not live here, All the bills are in my name, he doesn't give me any money, every thing is above board, he see's his son a few times a week which is fine. I have only been claiming income support for 4 months, do they job centre give you time to sort all these things out? Obviously it doesn't look good that his letters are coming here but there's only so much I can do and I am literally PETRIFIED that one day I will get a letter to say they are stopping my benefits pending an investigation into my single claim, does this happen?? Should I arrange an appointment with the jobcentre to tell them of my concerns?

There is no date on this, so I don't know how long the information has been available.. http://www.which.co.uk/money/credit-cards-and-loans/guides/how-to-deal-with-debt/debt-management-companies-why-to-avoid-them/

Hi I seriously need help!! In 2003, I took out a secured business loan against my property for the amount of £43k with Lloyds TSB. What should have been a secured loan, instead was given to me as an overdraft facility, which should have been caped at £33k as per agreement by TSB. This happened at the time when the business was seriously struggling. They did no assessments of affordability checks. Instead allowed the overdraft to exceed its limit to £53k By this time the business had shut down and they then decided to convert the overdraft to a loan. Since 2005, I have been paying back in instalments, but on several occasions have informed them that this was clearly irresponsible lending and the bank took an advantage of my secured home position. I have been trying to fight my corner with them since then,with no joy. Reading similar situations on the forum, has given me the confidence to write. I just want to know if I am right in asking them to write off the access borrowing, as I am now out of work and have a medical condition. Please can someone advice me. Thank you Salma

Hi, I am new to the forums. Thanks to anyone for some advice. My current situation is part time work 6.15 hours, in receipt of some JSA and a student studying an evening Level 3 course. back in 2008 I took out a hire purchase loan via welcome finance. After about a year or so I handed the car back due to unforeseen circumstances however was still paying the car off. I cannot remember exact date or times but I stopped paying for a while and remember it got taken over by a DCA which I had set up a payment plan with. I have been out of work for well over a year and have not paid into this debt however have received letters off Cabot Financial to say they have now taken over this account. They were trying to contact me from July. They had sent me a letter to say they would accept a final payment of half the balance. I have recently made contact with Cabot and sent them a call back request form and they contacted me on 28/10/2014. They went through my current situation, income and expenditure and offered me three options. The lowest option being £47.04 a month at £11.75 a week, over 5 years. I asked the guy on the phone if I could take some time to think about this but was told that I could not as it needed to go on the system. I agreed to pay this amount as I felt I had to make an on the spot decision. He advised me to set up a standing order. After the phone call I felt as though I could not afford this amount of money each month, it being more than my water bill. I also checked the figures they presented me and was a bit shocked. This is how I worked it out £11.75 times 52 weeks in a year is £611. Times that by 5 years it equals £3,055??? I called them back and was told by Louise that some months have more weeks? Yes but there are 52 weeks in a year no matter what. Am I being fed lies here? after this call I took to doing some investigating and realised Welcome Finance had gone bust and that Cabot would have brought this debt at a fraction of the cost. No wonder they were offering me the option to pay half. when typing in Welcome Finance I was welcomed with a whole ton of negative information and had noticed that a lot of people were incorrectly charged fees, insurance etc. I am not disputing the fact I have this debt but if I was incorrectly charged by Welcome and are now being done so by Cabot. With this I noticed I can apply to Welcome for a SAR. Which will allow me to see what information they have on me and to get all my account details. Also I noticed I can also claim back any charges on the account? Can you advice me on the best way to go about this as I have never done anything like this before. This is my only debt. I do not have any credit, debit cards etc and even if I did have the money to pay this off I would still be disputing this as it seems this has happened to the majority of their customers. Took me a bit of investigating to find out though. I want to get this sorted out as soon as possible as I want to start improving my credit rating in the future I have options available to me if I so choose. Thank you for any help you can provide me. Look forward to your response.

hello. i will give the short version of my problem, if you would like the full one, let me know okay, bought goods online from scan computers to build a complete gaming pc for my son. used finance company to buy them.(buy now pay 9 months) received everything on 8.10.2014 the motherboard was faulty, no usb ports would work, and that was the only problem. sent the motherboard back, told me it is damaged beyond repair, won't replace or refund, and literally told me to get stuffed. that's the short version. so who do i take to the county court, is it equal liability with the finance company and scan, just scan or the finance company. scan seem to think the sale of goods act don't apply to them, finance company said they will investigate it, which will probably take a while. with the evidence i have got, i believe i would stand a very good chance in court. for example, i have an email saying they were going to replace/refund and this had been authorised. i have one guy admitting in a email that he changed the reason for return to "no display" and said i did not tell them about the usb ports. saying it's irrelevant that he did that, well i think it is relevant. also i have proof the communication i sent them states that the only problem was the usb ports and that everything else worked fine. so, do i wait for the finance company to contact me before i issue a letter before action. they sent the board back, i was going to refuse it but thought better not, it actually might belong to the finance company. any advice would be appreciated on this matter, and thanks for reading.

My father passed away on Tuesday last week and we are totally devastated as you can imagine. Mum is in care as she has althzhiemers. Dad left a will which said that he wished his half of the house to be divided between my brother and I and obviously the half my mother owned would go towards her care under the asset rules. (i believe anything over £14,000 is used to pay for her care) We have since learned that mum and dad owned the house under a joint tennancy which means that dads share of the house doesnt become part of dads estate and passes to my mums sole ownership. The house needs to be sold in order to fund mums care and as her daughter it falls to me to do that however in order to do it i have to apply for a "public guardianship" which means that I have to pay a bond to protect mums finances and this is something like £500 (annually i believe) so in effect the government are wanting me to pay for the right and privialige to sell my parents home and then give them the money! To be honest there was barely enough to pay for the funeral so my brother and i have had to use our savings to do that and at this moment I dont even have £500. So my questions are: 1. what would happen if i just refused to deal with the sale of the house, would someone be appointed by the government to deal with it? 2. If mum was in care due to being sectioned and currently funded under section 117 of the mental health act, does that mean that she will be continued to be funded by the government? I know that this is a sticky one but dont know where to turn, unable to get appt with cab for weeks and really at the end of my tether. Dealing with the grief and organising funeral is bad enough but having all this over my head at the moment is making me ill. i just hope someone on here can help. Thanks Monx

Hello, I realized that I have been in a very vicious payday hell cycle for a while now, and realising to my shock that I owe them all in total of nearly 6k left me quite disgusted.. Anyway, I decided to get out of this cycle and get back on track so I cancelled all my CPA and started contacting them all saying I owe too much etc. and that I would come back with a repayment plan offer. Some of them, put my loan on hold a freezed intrests. Other urged me to come back with a payment plan asap and some just ignored my emails (this was sent before the day was due) Anyway, I have a question how I should approach some of them particullary those who charge ridiculous fees. One is Bongaloans, orginal amount was 100£ + 30 in intrests. I contacted them nearly a week before it was due, nothing. When the date was due, I asked them again. And well and behold they respond. I said to them that I offer to pay 50£ a month and hoped they would agree on that. Too my shock (maybe I should have expected it). They said they could do that, but the total amount due then would be 310£!! This was because they had 4x charges being applied because of missing payment, 1x on the day, 1x 2 days, 1x 5days 1x 7days after. All 45£ each! I told them this was plain ridiculous, as the charges is just made up thing and I informed them WELL before the day was due, I said I would accept to pay in total 200 back. They came back saying they would remove one of the charges so it would be in total of 270£.. still ridiculous for 100£ loan. What should I do? Should I keep pushing them, saying it's unfair charges? I want to be done with them tbh within 3 months. Another one is Wage Day Advance, they want to see my bank statements before they are willing to offer a paymentplan, or I have to agree to their payment plan of 142£ a month. Which I cant afford anyway. I really don't want to part with my statements as It does not show all my expenses, and it's kind of personal. And I have loans outside my bank like Chequecentre and Moneyshop. But I have a feeling I will get nowhere if I do. I owe them (according to them) 584£. There is also Mr Lender and Cash Genie, I did send them email, but I heard noting. I have a feeling they will contact me soon though, as they did manage to get the roll over fee from my account but I got it refunded so once they realize I think they will start harassing me. The other ones that has been "fine" is Moneyshop (had to argue a bit to get the 50£ a month in), Chequecentre yet to contact them with a plan, as I said I would try 300£ a month, but that is not possible after I realized how much I owed. Access fast money wants a Standing order screenshot. Peachy is fine with 50£ MyMate I will reply to.

Hello Everyone, my history is in these threads: http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?431538-First-Plus-Mortgage-**PPI-WON** http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?431539-First-Plus-going-for-repo-**WON** Well I am back again and i need some advice and someone who can work out the payments that I have made. One again I find that I am being harassed into going to court but this time I am stronger and willing to put the fight in for all those poor souls who have had their life ripped apart by these sharks in the financial community. I have asked them continually to inform me of the interest rate I am on. I find that the PPI is still being included with in my loan. They have lodged a default on my account despite the fact that I have being paying by standing order every month. this looks like I have failed to pay. I am now trying to get another mortgage and I cant because of this unfair penalisation. I really want/need to fight this battle and I am prepared to put my all in sorting this dreading situation. 2me2u2