Newlyn Bailiffs

[Tariq2009]

Response from Council Dear Mr XXX,

 

You will already have a copy of the levy notice, showing the vehicle upon which the bailiff had levied, but I attach a copy.

 

You will see that the vehicle described on the notice is not a black, Skoda, Octavia.

 

The DVLA check that was mentioned previously relates to the Vauxhall Insignia and so the details listed with DVLA are not yours. Hence the decision to remove the Levy and Attendance fees.

 

I trust that this explains the position.

 

Regards

==================

 

Still no proof that they did the DVLA Check I asked Council to send me the proof or i will get the car driver involved as i know him .

 

The Levy i got from council is different that was left at my door step .

 

Council letter of levy :

 

 

 

Letter that was left at my door step

 

 

 

This is proof that the one council send me is made up

[Tariq2009]

another reply from Council

 

Dear Mr xxxx,

 

I have already explained that we will not release a copy of the DVLA record, as it shows details of the registered keeper, regardless of whether you know the person, and especially when you have confirmed that it is not even your vehicle.

 

If it helps to answer your query, I do know the name of the registered keeper, and I would not know this unless the DVLA request had been done.

 

The bailiff hand delivered a levy notice and the red Removal of Goods notice, so I do not know why you did not receive the levy notice. There is no logical reason why he would deliver one, but not the other.

 

Regardless of this, you are not being charged the levy or attendance fee, so there is no longer a dispute about whether or not you have to pay them. I think perhaps you should be concentrating on payment of the fees incurred during the first and second visits.

 

The bailiff that attended your property, and whose name is shown on the bottom of the notice that you have sent to me, is certificated by the court and has worked in our area for several years.

 

We have now spent a considerable amount of effort in dealing with your complaint, despite the matter already being through the council's complaints procedure.

 

At this stage, I would suggest that you either make payment of £42.50 to Newlyn Plc, or ask the Local Government Ombudsman to consider whether there has been any maladministration in dealing with your case.

 

Yours sincerely

[1Loretta]

They always send these 'snotty' arrogant sort of letters when they are in the wrong don't they?

[seanamarts]

They always get defensive when they are proved wrong.

 

They are reading this forum. I can see a few red faces on this one.

[caledfwlch]

Surely they can provide photocopies of the evidence and just blank out personal details?

 

Or get the owner of the car to make a SAR. It would be very interesting if your friend got his SAR and the DVLA check was not in it, since we know it supposedly exists.

[outlawla]

Surely they can provide photocopies of the evidence and just blank out personal details?

 

Or get the owner of the car to make a SAR. It would be very interesting if your friend got his SAR and the DVLA check was not in it, since we know it supposedly exists.

 

This could well be a sore point with Huntingdonshire District Council. It seems its reputation is taking somewhat of a battering at the moment.

[seanamarts]

This could well be a sore point with Huntingdonshire District Council. It seems its reputation is taking somewhat of a battering at the moment.

 

Have they responded yet outlawla

[outlawla]

Have they responded yet outlawla

 

I'd say they'll be using the maximum number of days to concoct a response to weasel their way out of it.

 

EDIT:

 

A similar request was made to NELC and escalated to the Information Commissioner. The decision notice was disapointing but expected.

Edited January 11, 2013 by outlawla

[outlawla]

Post #27

i was going through all the paper work and the recording of the calls none of the timing they told me that matches with the letters .

 

i paid the council tax full on 3rd of oct and which i also informed bailiff and council about it then why i got visited me on 9th oct and on 12th of oct well the question is now can bailiff legally charge me for those 2 visit after paying the Council TAX ???

 

I am also attaching the letter from the guy who claimed to be bailiff left with his name that i searched on http://certificatedbailiffs.justice.gov.uk/CertificatedBailiffs/ which he dont show on this site database .

 

do anyone think i got a strong case against them for claiming bailiff certified as he was not .Thanks

 

Who was paid, bailiff or council?

 

 

Attachment in post #27 removed

 

Did this attachment ever get amended and re-posted?

[Tariq2009]

Post #27

 

 

Who was paid, bailiff or council?

 

 

 

 

Did this attachment ever get amended and re-posted?

 

Paid online to council and informed both parties about the payment made .

 

That post was removed picture had the full name of bailiff it was the red letter which you can see it now in later posts

[outlawla]

....I have given proof to the council that full payment was made on the 3rd of October. The council failed to inform their agent that payment had been made.

You made a payment on 3rd October 2012, in response to the bailiff’s first visit on 1st October 2012. The fee of £24.50 was correctly incurred.

This incurred a further visit from the council's agent which a further fee of £18.00 was added unnecessarily.

The second visit fee was added due to your failure to pay the fee incurred during the first visit.

May I remind the council that once the debt has been satisfied all bailiff intervention should cease. This did not happen. please refer to The Council Tax (Administration and Enforcement) Regulations 1992 - Distress.

Bailiff action will cease once you pay the fees. The fees have increased because of your decision not to pay, and currently stand at £162.50.....

 

Visit Fee 1 £24.50 1st Oct 2012: which I offered to pay Newlyn.

Visit Fee 2 £18.00 9th Oct 2012: No reason for this visit as payment had already been accepted by the council.

levy Fees £20.00

Attendance to remove fee £100 :

Firstly, as I have already explained, no visit after the 3rd of October was necessary as the debt had already been satisfied.

The first visit fee has still not been paid. Methods of payment were provided to you at the time that the fee was incurred, but you chose not to make payment. This led to a second visit being made and a further fee (£18.00) being incurred. Your continued decision, not to make payment, has led to the additional fees being charged.....

 

OK, so the council's responses above would only be valid if you had paid the bailiff. After the 3rd October the bailiffs were enforcing for their fees, not the debt on the liability order as you'd cleared that.

 

Enforcement should have ended before the second visit because you paid the council on the 3rd.

 

If you had paid the bailiff they would have been entitled to take their fees first leaving you with an amount of council tax outstanding.

 

Huntingdonshire District council are unlikely to have forwarded payment to Newlyns in respect of the fees, unless the amount you paid was over and above the council tax outstanding, as this would be misuse of taxpayer's money.

Edited January 16, 2013 by outlawla

[outlawla]

Here's proof the council have not deducted bailiff fees from your payment:

 

 

another reply from Council

 

Dear Mr xxxx,

 

.......I think perhaps you should be concentrating on payment of the fees incurred during the first and second visits.......

 

At this stage, I would suggest that you either make payment of £42.50 to Newlyn Plc, or ask the Local Government Ombudsman to consider whether there has been any maladministration in dealing with your case.

 

Yours sincerely

[Tariq2009]

Here's proof the council have not deducted bailiff fees from your payment:

 

That's why I did not pay bailiff and paid online and informed both parties never trust bailiffs now will wait and see what LGO will investigation lees to as after all this hassle I been through and the time I waisted to put the things right I should send them my to council .thanks

[outlawla]

Yet another fiasco, caused this time by Huntingdonshire District Council's stubbornness to admit their bailiff contractor uses unlawful enforcement methods. This case is a perfect example of the way in which councils favour concluding grievances as unfounded than upholding the complaint.

 

It seems obvious to me, for two reasons, why councils would want to keep their upheld complaints to a minimum. All councils are required to submit details each year to the LGO relating to the number of formal complaints they receive, the complaints are categorised and split into the number unfounded/upheld etc. The number of complaints upheld determines whether or not the respective councils would require any investigation by the LGO to identify failings in the running of the authority. So, this intransigence everyone experiences when dealing with their councils, really functions to save the hide of the over-paid heads of departments and executives at the expense of those who pay their wages and into their gold plated pensions.

 

The other reason, especially in the case of bailiff malpractice, is there would be greater pressure on the head of department to submit a form 5 complaint about the bailiff to the certificating court. This would hardly cement working relations between the enforcement firm and the council.

 

I've sent a PM for permission to use some quotes taken from Huntingdonshire District Council's replies on this thread. These would support examples of four other cases including my own, those from another active thread on CAG and a case documented in an LGO report. The details are in the email.

Edited January 20, 2013 by outlawla

[brassnecked]

Exactly so outlawla. The information on bailiff malpractice is becoming a rather large albatross around their necks

[Tariq2009]

LGO reply any ideas what to do now .

 

 

 

[seanamarts]

This is a good result. It is fair what the LGO has said.

 

For the sake of £18.00 I would settle for that, however If you wish I would still push for the name of the bailiff. Be interesting to see if they are certificated.

[brassnecked]

£18 and they are off your back, they will have to name the bailiff if you ask them now.

[old bill]

There is a phrase i see being used a lot in legislation these days - "Know or ought to know". In other words, pleading ignorance or stupidity ain't going to get you out of the cattle slurry, pal. The council and the bailiff company are on a sticky wicket, as the LGO has correctly identified.

[tomtubby]

I would suggest that you pay the £18.

 

From my reading of the entire thread my PERSONAL opinion is that the local authority have themselves to blame for the time and money spend on this complaint. They appeared to have forgotten that the local authority are WHOLLY RESPONSIBLE for the levy and fees charged by their agents. Therefore THEY were responsible for ensuring straight away whether the levy was valid or not.

 

When enforcing for council tax DVLA require that all enquiries regarding vehicles have to be submitted to DVLA by PAPER and NOT electronic. Such requests with be responded to within 15 days.

 

On the matter of keeping the bailiff identity SECRET....I am frankly horrified that the LA can consider this acceptable. Without knowing the identity the public would not know whether the bailiff was certificated or whether his certificate has expired. Dreadful.....

 

Vehicle owners are legally entitled to apply to DVLA for details of any searches undertaken by a bailiff company ( or any other company) and the dates of such searches. Such requests are made using form number V888 which is available to access on the DVLA website. There is a fee of £5 to pay.

[ploddertom]

 

When enforcing for council tax DVLA require that all enquiries regarding vehicles have to be submitted to DVLA by PAPER and NOT electronic. Such requests with be responded to within 15 days. I was under the impression most of this type of work was done by Shercar - or are they still under suspicion?

On the matter of keeping the bailiff identity SECRET....I am frankly horrified that the LA can consider this acceptable. Without knowing the identity the public would not know whether the bailiff was certificated or whether his certificate has expired. Dreadful..... The original response from Newlyn was that thye viewed the request as "vexatious" - which appears to a stock reply they roll out.

 

 

PT

[wonkeydonkey]

Good result...that could prove very useful at a later date to assist others...well done and thank you for keeping us all in the loop:roll:.

 

WD

[brassnecked]

Yes a fair result, Tariq pay the £18 and all legitimate fees are paid, and remind the council that they must comply with the Ombudsman and supply the bailiffs name.

[Tariq2009]

Ring bailiff n*** 07****** ref overdue council tax payment. Urgent reply required to avoid enforcement.

 

This text came on my mobile today and he is refusing to give me his registration certificate number and demanding money for second visit also and also saying that he will come and clamp the car and possess items as he got court order which I told him rubbish .

[brassnecked]

Ring bailiff n*** 07****** ref overdue council tax payment. Urgent reply required to avoid enforcement.

 

This text came on my mobile today and he is refusing to give me his registration certificate number and demanding money for second visit also and also saying that he will come and clamp the car and possess items as he got court order which I told him rubbish .

Pay the £18, then text him back stating all lawful fees have been paid, and complain to council again.