Park Motor Finance

[nickd911]

Hi All,

 

I'm not sure if I have anything here, but I have a car on finance with Park Motor Finance and whilst unemployed for 5 months I never missed a payment although I did start paying at the end of the month instead of the beginning as this gave me more time to accumulate the necessary payment (£233). I started work again in Oct and asked to carry on paying at the end of the month. Now what i didn't realise is that every time this has happened they have charged me £10 + interest approx £4.53. I complained and have received a response telling me the charges will continue to accrue every time an instalment is missed (no payments are missed I merely pay them at the end of the month rather than the beginning). Can they do this? or do I carry on paying the charges until I have a spare £233 so I can pay at the end of the month and the beginning of the next? The agreement ends in June 2013!

 

Point 2 with these ****ers is when I do call to pay they are keeping a note of the number I called from and then a week later once the instalment date is missed the calls and texts start. I use a work phone and at no time have I given them permission to store the number yet the calls start coming. The first time this happened I complained and the response was human error. The second time this happened I was told tough - bring your account up to date and we won't contact you! Is this a breach of the Data Protection Act because a) the phone I called from could have belonged to anybody b) they are storing and using my personal information without my permission albeit to contact me or c) when they do call / text / leave voicemails they say they are calling from Park Motor I have been told as they don't say 'Park Motor Finance' this is fine. They still ask for me by name.

 

Lastly I'm paying £233 per month for 5 years for a car which cost £7,500. Unfortunately they were the only ones offering me credit at the time I needed the car so to get anything back from them would be a bonus!

 

Please help...

[buzby]

Sadly, it is true. YOu are their customer and they can contact you at any number you provided, and with ICT systems getting cleverer, they capture ALL phone numbers you call from will add to your customer log - so they could argue this is designed to best serve their customer and you'd be hard pressed to argue otherwise.

 

You are in the position of always tripping into a default situation, and this kind of brinkmanship can easily lead to defaults. The computer doesn't look at the month, but the due date, and then adds +1 +2 +3 for each day the payment doesn't show up as being paid, helpfully adding the interest so they can tell you the new increased figure of your indebtedness.

 

The way out of it is to pay them in ADVANCE, yes I know - but this is the only way to protect yourself, and ensures they cannot ever say you are operating your account contrary to the agreed terms. It also stops the automated collection calls and texts.

[nickd911]

uuummm