Newlyn Plc....An ex-employee spilling the beans....MUST READ !!!!

[tomtubby]

The following article is featured in todays (February 5th 2011) Times Newspaper.

 

You will see at the end of the article that the journalist ( Mark Atherton) is asking for anyone with complaints against Newlyn Plc to contact him....

 

.A former employee speaks openly of the questionable practices of a company chasing unpaid fines and arrears for local authorities

 

A national debt collection agency that works for many local authorities and high street names has been accused of adding extra costs to debts, cutting corners and aggressively chasing people for money they say they do not owe.

 

The questionable practices of Newlyn Plc are revealed in a damning testimony by a former employee and follow complaints about the company from Times Money readers.

 

A part of Newlyn’s work is chasing unpaid parking fines levied on customers who are alleged to have overstayed their welcome in private car parks. Steve Williams (not his real name), an ex-employee of Newlyn, says that when an unpaid parking debt is passed to Newlyn, it will add an extra sum — often about £80.

 

He says: “It is difficult to justify this substantial extra sum when all it has done is send out an extra demand letter. Often you would require a court hearing and application for a warrant of execution to add extra fees to a debt.”

 

Several Times Money readers report having fees added to disputed debts. Henri Cash, a businessman from West Sussex, ended up facing what he considered a totally unjustified demand for £236.25 from Newlyn for a disputed parking offence in 2009.

 

Mr Cash says he received an initial “penalty” of £75 from a company called Civil Enforcement, which he strongly objected to on the grounds that he was not the driver at the time of the alleged contravention.

 

The fine then increased to £150 before the debt was passed to Newlyn, which then increased the amount claimed to £236.25 — more than three times the initial penalty.

 

Mr Cash says: “I have had two threatening letters from Newlyn. These debt collection agencies attempt to extract money from the public through fear. Had I been the driver I would have paid the penalty — but I wasn’t.

 

“I have asked for evidence that I was the driver at the time of the contravention and they have been unable to supply me with any. After receiving several threatening letters I have now not heard from Newlyn for six or seven months. I think they have grasped that pursuing me for money I do not owe is a waste of time.”

 

Sarah Austin, of Austins, a firm of solicitors, has been shown examples of Newlyn’s letters demanding payment of private parking debts. She says: “The letter should make clear who the original parking contract was between and what the terms were, what the alleged parking contravention was and on whose authority Newlyn is contacting the individual concerned.

“It should also state the basis on which the fees are claimed. But Newlyn’s letter does none of these things. For all the recipient of the letter knows, it might appear that he or she is being targeted by a team of fraudsters.”

 

David Smith, a director of Newlyn, says: “We don’t automatically add money to files, but in the case of Civil Enforcement we add £75 plus VAT to the file as an administration charge with their agreement.”

 

Newlyn also carries out work for local authorities, recovering council tax arrears and parking fines. But here, too, it does not always appear to operate entirely correctly, Mr Williams says.

 

“For a properly conducted levy of goods, Newlyn is supposed to have an accurate description of both the property concerned and the goods being levied, but often there can be very little, if any, detail on the file.”

 

Bailiffs usually visit in vans so that they can carry away goods to auction in settlement of the debt, but sometimes Newlyn’s go out on scooters and the cost of a van has been disputed.

 

Times Money has discovered that, in one case, a Newlyn employee was challenged by a local authority that the company worked for after a debtor had raised a query. The client asked to know who the bailiff was and what items Newlyn had levied on. The employee had no option but to remove the fees as she could not provide answers. She told colleagues that it was hard to explain matters when there were no notes on the file.

 

Mr Smith says: “It is always open to the debtor to respond to correspondence.” He adds: “Newlyn has looked at how we can reduce our carbon footprint and may use scooters for a number of operations carried out by our bailiffs to achieve that aim.

“The charges which may be made by bailiff companies (such as Newlyn) are set by statute up to the stage of the levy. Thereafter our fees and charges are agreed with our clients.”

 

Mr Williams says: “Bailiffs need their vans for most of their work because they can never be sure whether a visit will result in a payment or removal of goods. Many of Newlyn’s letters specify a visit by a bailiff with a van. None specify a bailiff visit on a scooter.”

 

Times Money has also obtained evidence suggesting that, when it came to adding van and levy fees to debtors’ files, Newlyn operated one set of rules for some local authority clients and a different set for others.

 

Mr Williams says: “Some local authorities for which Newlyn worked, such as the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, always wanted confirmation that a visit had been made. So extra care was taken with these authorities.”

 

Times Money has discovered that a Newlyn employee told other staff to ensure that they did not add van or levy fees on to Tower Hamlets or Waltham Forest cases unless there was evidence that these visits had actually taken place. The same applied to the boroughs of Barking, Ealing and Barnet.

 

But this apparent probity was not extended to debtors with other authorities. Times Money has found that one Newlyn staff member was angry when she discovered that van and levy fees had been taken off all debtors’ files where there was no evidence of a visit. She told staff that this was incorrect and that the only clients that this applied to were Waltham Forest, Tower Hamlets, Barking, Ealing and Barnet. She went through and added the fees back in to cases not involving these boroughs.

 

Mr Smith denies that more checks were made on visits to debtors from some local authorities than from others. He adds: “Our correspondence is in full compliance with the guidelines of the British Parking Association.”

 

But the associations guidelines on the process for recovering money due from unpaid parking tickets state: “You must tell them (the registered keepers of cars) how you deal with disputes in case they want to challenge the ticket.” Newlyn’s letters do not contain this information.

 

We would like to hear from other Times readers about their experiences with Newlyn. Contact mark.atherton@thetimes.co.uk.

 

Case study

 

‘The letters were very intimidating’

Pat Yates and her family have fought a long-running battle with Newlyn over a disputed parking charge, which Mrs Yates received in April last year.

 

She was asked to pay an initial “penalty” of £75 (increased after 14 days to £150) for a “contravention” involving her car at a shopping centre on the Isle of Wight.

 

Despite Mrs Yates’s repeated insistence that she was not the driver at the time, the alleged debt was passed on from Civil Enforcement to Newlyn. In Newlyn’s first letter it increased the sum demanded from £150 to £238.13, with no explanation for the hefty rise.

 

She continued to receive letters from Newlyn demanding payment, even though she had explained that she was not the driver when the “contravention” occurred.

 

Chris Day, Mrs Yates’s son-in-law, says: “The letters were very intimidating and threatened court action. The whole family was concerned that Newlyn’s harrassment of a recently widowed pensioner was having a detrimental effect on her health.”

He adds: “Eventually Newlyn passed the file back to Civil Enforcement, who again threatened to take court action but have not actually done so.

 

“The whole episode has been extremely unpleasant . I don’t think that debt recovery firms should be allowed to get away with this sort of behaviour.”

 

Despite being offered a chance to comment on Mrs Yates’s case, Newlyn has chosen not to comment.

[hallowitch]

Thanks very much for this was going to send hubby out to see if he could get yesterdays paper

 

 

An interesting article that i feel is very damming on local authority's as it basically confirms that some local authority's don't check what there bailiffs are up to

[Surfer01]

Interesting article and thanks for posting it.

[brassnecked]

Thanks TT extremely interesting

[wonkeydonkey]

Good read TT well done...am I alone in my thinking there are more and more of these disclosures being made in the Media ? are we on a roll getting attention for all the Councils reeling out nonsense "we can't take the debt back".."you must deal with the bailiff and all his false charges" "its out of our hands"?

 

tomtom has made a post I think every cagger should support as we all want to achieve the same end.

 

WD

[fork-it]

If this journalist has his facts right, then he could be kicking a hornets nest. It might be worth speaking to the parliamentary Ombudsman and asking the Serious Fraud Office to investigate, its well within their remit as its a complex fraud and involves specialist knowledge of civil enforcement legislation.