It is the summer of 2015, August to be precise. My wife and I have just ordered a top of the range Schreiber kitchen - £24,000 worth of all singing and dancing fittings from Homebase ( now Bunnings UK ) It was going to be a large contract and we were going to be out of the country whilst the work took place, hence we gratefully accepted Homebase`s offer to project manage the delivery of goods and installation. While we had the cash to pay for the whole thing upfront, we deliberately opted for the 12 month deferred interest free loan arrangement as this would enable us to "sign off" the work to our satisfaction before the loan was activated. So far so good. The small print on the Terms and Conditions of the loan- as laid down in the Consumer Credit Act 1974 - stated that; "After we have accepted and signed this agreement and you have received the goods or services, we will pay the loan amount to the retailer". Well, the kitchen fit s a disaster. Long delays, notifications to ourselves in Florida !! on our mobile phones of goods being delivered and, worst of all, the top end larder units which had swung our decision to go for the kitchen in the first place didn't actually exist ! Trying to co ordinate the snagging from the USA was a nightmare and when we returned home in early December 2015, the kitchen was still without the units which had to be specially manufactured in Italy. We had a succession of top level meetings with senior staff at Homebase ( up to and including Divisional and Regional Managers and the attention f the then CEO ) The final meeting with 4 Homebase personnel took place on 4th December 2015. On 7th December 2015, we received an e mail from Barclays Partnership Finance congratulating us on our purchase and notifying us that our loan agreement had been activated ! Surprised ? You bet we were ! Having to fight with Homebase to get the kitchen finished was bad enough but having the one bargaining chip I possessed being taken away was even worse. Cutting a very long, painful and tedious story short, our kitchen was finally finished and compensation agreed with Homebase on 1st July 2016. The explanation was that the sign off system is computer generated ( isn`t it always ? ) and that receipt of delivery notes - plus an allowance of time for the fitting process - triggers the loan activation. Fine, except the average time for activation bore no resemblance to the date on which my loan was activated. Basically, even though Homebase knew we were heavily into dispute over the kitchen delivery and fitting, someone, somewhere decided that it was tie they got their money. I took issue with both companies but mostly with Barclays because, at the end of the day, I had NOT received all the goods and I had most certainly NOT therefore received all of the services at the time they decided to activate the agreement. Going through Barclays byzantine complaints process ( around 15 letters from them and 8 from myself plus countless hours on the phone ) got me to the point where Barclays told me that they could activate the loan at any time and that I should read the terms and conditions more carefully. Nice. EXCEPT, they are and were wrong ( see the third paragraph above ) They can only activate the loan once the goods or services have been supplied. Finally, they acknowledged that their own wording and my interpretation of it were correct. At which point, they simply re interpreted the rules - or rather, invented a new one - by saying the following ( excuse the grammar, it is Barclays own exact words ) :- "As you had received some of your goods, we are allowed to release the funds to the retailer. As Homebase requested this and because some of your goods had been delivered, we were effectively allowed to do so which meant that your loan with us went live" Problem is that this wrinkle is NOT spelled out in the terms and conditions and was not made clear to me at the time signed the contract. I am awaiting a response to my request for Barclays to point out to me exactly where it says they can do this and to date ( one month on ) I have yet to receive a reply. Spoke yesterday with an employee who said that the person I had written or someone in her team would be responding to me. Still waiting. O yes, I did point out that I had left at least three messages on the lady`s ansaphone. Guess what he told me ? They are so busy dealing with all other aspects of customers complaints that it is their policy NOT to respond telephone messages or call back if you leave one ? Apparently all you can do is request a call back when you eventually speak to someone. Other buyers beware. If you are contemplating such a purchase, ensure that you demand a satisfaction sign off for the delivery of goods AND the fitting services otherwise Barclays will simply pay YOUR money to the retailer without any recourse to you the customer. If and when I hear from them next, I shall be asking for a deadlock letter and then it`s off to the Ombudsman we shall go. Wish me luck, share any similar experiences please and watch this space. "Activation"

BILLED DEFERRED FINANCE CHARGES What the heck is this? I have been checking my credit card to make sure everything is as it should be and found two of these entries. One is for £0.38 and the other is £1.76. it says merchant and gives a code, but the code means nothing to me, as I cannot identify the merchant. I buy from overseas at times and there is a transaction fee for this, so am at a loss to cross reference this. I am loathed to phone them tomorrow on the 0300 number supplied on the statement.

Some advice please. If I defer my state pension what is the income tax situation when I finally draw it out? Do HMRC assume that it is income earned in that one tax year that I draw it out or would the lump sum be spread over the number of years I deferred it for? Thank you.