'not Regulated' Hire Purchase - Please Help!!

[teddypompom]

Thank you sooo much for a fantastic website - found you through Martin's Money Tips. I have a Lloyds TSB account & mastercard - the mastercard wouldn't accept lower monthly payments & charges were completely out of control - it's been going on & on for months but every now & then they would help themselves out of my current account to make a payment on the mastercard!! Opened a co-op cashminder & have moved everything out. I'm in the process of getting my letter together & working out total they owe me.

 

Anyway, BLACK HORSE FINANCE. I purchased a motorhome for £29,950 now two years ago. Have been struggling terribly with the repayments which are £470.19 per month. The idea was to use it for family but also go to shows & country fairs & it would pay for itself. Attended a number of shows (lost money on everyone) was told by the 'pros' it was the worst trade they had seen for 30 years!!

 

Black Horse have hammered me with charges. I now owe nearer £40,000. I can't sell it, has depreciated so much, as have all motorhomes, the petrol prices, people still aren't happy parting with money. Have already had a visit from the heavy mob, 2 big men. I was told by customer services that I would get this visit, I was 6 weeks behind & it was an opportunity to make an arrangement & as long as I kept to it everything would be fine. Once they arrived I realised they were bailiffs. Wanted to use the toilet (to enter the property), wanted to check the mileage (need keys to do that). Anyway, stood my ground after an hour of being intimidated & lectured I got rid of them - said I needed a day or two to decide what to do & it was past my little boys bedtime. They said all arrears were due now + £1000 charge - it was about £2750 or they would take it back.

 

Contacted National Debtling & they said all I could do was try to plead with Black Horse directly as a last resort. I understand now that once Black Horse pass your account over to this company the BH customer services are not allowed to speak to you at all. I was very forceful (in a nice way) & he said I didn't owe £2750 - that I was only a month & a half behind. He then reset up my account & payment schedule with little fuss (nice man!). Thankfully he sent it out to me in writing. When I called the bailiffs they didn't believe me & went mad at Black Horse & then they denied it all, said that I was lying. I faxed them all a copy of the letter & they had to back off.

 

I have been told that because the debt is over £20,000 I have absolutely no rights at all & am not even covered with the Credit Consumer Act. National Debtline have told me that if I had been covered by CCA I could at least offer it back, & the difference owing would be halved, then that could be negotiated over monthly payments. I had no idea at the time I purchased & signed on the dotted line, I thought it was higher purchase.

 

I've been told I would be lucky to get £10,000 at auction for the motorhome in the current market & I would owe the remaining £30,000. I would be liable for all of it & this would be enforcable with bailiffs.

 

Any advice would be greatly appreciated as I just don't know what to do. It's causing so much stress.

 

Thank you

[Guest Lueeze]

Bless you, im sorry to hear of the troubles.

 

Im not an expert on this type of issue, but a few of the other Mod's and members are.

 

Im sure someone will be able to give you some advice shortly...

 

Take it easy

 

Lou x

[teddypompom]

Hello

Is there anyone who knows more about this kind of finance?

 

Many thanks

[teddypompom]

I really am desperate for any advice/information on a £39,709.35 HP agreement I entered into 2 years ago. Found out it is 'Not Regulated' which I'm being told means I have no rights. HP over £20k becomes Not Regulated.

 

If I return the goods where do I stand with the remaining amount owing? Will be £25 - £30K! I can't see them letting that go. But I can't find out anywhere what will happen. Does anyone know?

 

The situation is

a. Will be taken back - bailliffs, will put on more charges. They don't need to go to court they can just turn up & take it.

 

b. I can ask them to take the goods back. Will save myself a £1,000 charge but in both situations the motorhome will be sold at auction for whatever they can get that day. Have been told I'll be lucky if they get £10k.

 

I currently have £2,500 arrears which they have agreed to putting on the back end of the loan. But I'm being hammered with charges. My monthly repayment is £470.19 - I paid half yesterday & can pay the other half next Friday. Should have been paid on 28th April.

 

I was told last night that I'm on dangerous ground! I need to make sure all of May's payment is paid on 28th. How they talk to you is just awful. I wish I'd never bought it - it's been a nightmare - but I can't see how I can get out of it - with as little damage as possible. I don't want to go bankrupt - not sure if they can make me.

 

I live with my mum so technically they (bailiffs) can't enter the property however, I understand that bailiffs aren't keen on getting the facts. Had it been a regulated agreement I could have made an agreement through the courts to make monthly repayments - with Not Regulated I 'm told this isn't the case.

The company I bought it from went into receivership las year - so they can't take it back either. I don't think I would get permission from Black Horse to sell it - plus the market isn't good.

 

Anyway, would really appreciate any advice. Has anyone got the same problem? Is it really true I have no rights with this agreement? Damage limitation - what would you do in this situation?

Please Help!

 

 

Moderated - THREADS MERGED

30/04/06

[mahala]

I can't help I'm afraid, but don't you have another thread about this already? It might be worth sticking to one thread to make it easier for everyone - if everyone's like me, their brains will be slightly frazzled!

[BotB]

I have been told that because the debt is over £20,000 I have absolutely no rights at all & am not even covered with the Credit Consumer Act

 

The cut off figure is £25,000. Anything over this amount is not a regulated agreement.

 

He then reset up my account & payment schedule with little fuss (nice man!).

 

If they have rescheduled the payments, doesn't that solve your problem? Or is the real problem that you can't afford to keep this motorhome because the repayments are simply beyond your means?

 

Have you had the vehicle properly valued? You can't know what the true situation is if you're only guessing what its worth.

 

As you have already been in contact with National Debtline, then I would hope they have given you advice on the best way of resolving your financial difficulties. If you were hoping for an answer here that would somehow enable you to not have to pay the debt that you're left with, I doubt anyone will be able to suggest anything. The hp agreement will be subject to the terms and conditions you signed up for - sorry, I know this isn't helping you and it must be horrible having to deal with it day to day. All the more reason to get to grips with it and start repairing the damage to your finances. I can recommend that you have a look at this website which has some excellent advice and links to other organisations that can help you tackle the debt problems constructively rather than the day to day firefighting you seem to be caught up in at the moment.

http://kronos.moonfruit.com/

 

Please keep in touch as to how things go.

[teddypompom]

Sorry BotB, are you in cahoots with Black Horse?

 

"If they have rescheduled the payments, doesn't that solve your problem?"

No - the problem is the astrinomical amount of charges being put on the account.

 

"Or is the real problem that you can't afford to keep this motorhome because the repayments are simply beyond your means?"

Meow!! The charges are such that I can't ever clear them. Am I on the wrong board? - I thought we were here to discuss charges & the implications of them.

 

"Have you had the vehicle properly valued?"

Well this of course would be an obvious thing to do, wouldn't it? £10k on a bad day maybe £15k on a good day, in the current market. £22K through a dealer.

 

"As you have already been in contact with National Debtline, then I would hope they have given you advice on the best way of resolving your financial difficulties."

To unravel the legalities of the unregulated agreement as you maybe can imagine BH weren't keen to enlighten.

 

"If you were hoping for an answer here that would somehow enable you to not have to pay the debt that you're left with, I doubt anyone will be able to suggest anything."

Just to clarify - my query is regards to the charges & the rights I have/do not have under this particular agreement. As under regulated HP you are liable for only half the remaining debt, once the item is sold off. It goes to court & you are able to make an arrangement to pay the remaining half. Under my agreement I am liable for all of it - I'm trying to ascertain whether it is demanded in full & what action can be taken.

Is this a consumer action group? To assist people who are struggling with these finance companies? My hope in joining this forum was to get information that would help me, as the consumer, who is being ripped off. I am offended at your comments that imply I'm looking to get out of paying the debt. How rude.

[Guest Lueeze]

Im sorry you feel that way.

 

We try to help everyone as much as we poosibly can.

 

Your situation is different from anyone elses, I will however ask around for you and try to get help for you to resolve this problem!

 

Lou x

[BankFodder]

Sorry BotB, are you in cahoots with Black Horse? .

 

I don't think that this question is at all warranted. BotB's questions and his other points are basic pragmatic commonsense. It is much better to try and look at the problem in a businesslike way. I'm sure that for you this must be difficult as you are the person under the stress of it all. However, these questions need to be asked.

 

Is this a consumer action group? To assist people who are struggling with these finance companies? My hope in joining this forum was to get information that would help me, as the consumer, who is being ripped off. I am offended at your comments that imply I'm looking to get out of paying the debt. How rude.

 

Once again you are very understandably in a very stressful position but the people on this site will do what they can to help within their own range of skills and experience.

If you want to attack the Group and the people on it you aren't like to get very far. Also you should remember that it is free. No one is asking you for money but it is paid for from someone's pocket - but clearly not your's - and no one made you come here.

 

Also, you do have to understand that Lueeze has maybe suggested, your's is an area in which we don't have any great experience at present. This means that we will have to brain storm and hopefully reach a solution and learn as we go along.

 

I think that BobT's point was reasonable enough. You clearly had dificulties with the basic repayment figure even before the charges were imposed. The charges have made things a lot worse.

So you have two problems - recovery of charges and getting rid of the van.

 

I'm surprsed that you say that they can prevent you from sellingthe van. This can't be true. They can take steps to make sure that their own interests are secure but I don't expect thatthey could do more than that. For instance if you could show conclusively that you had a buyer who was prepared to pay you a certain price and this proce was more than the bank could obtain at auction then they would be bound to allow you to sell it. Of course it is not straightforward with a shortsighted bank which just wants to blunder on regardless but this would have to be the correct approach. the bank is under an obligation to miotigate their losses and iof they don't then they can eventually be made repsonsible for any losses unreasonably incurred by them.

We would have to deal with this separately. However, I expect that what you mean is that you are not allowed to sell the van without the bannk's permissin. Fair enough but I can tell you thatwhether it is written into the agreement or not, that permission may not be unreasonably withheld.

******************

On to charges.

You haven't given much information at all. You haven't told us what the accumulated charges are so far, what the interest on those charges are etc.

Hve their been any default notices? have there been any judgments?

 

Come back and let us know about the charges.

 

Also, let us know if it is correct to compartmentalise it into two issues or whether there are other aspects which we haven't picked on.

[Bookworm]

B/F, I think that the problem is he if tries to sell it privately, a potential buyer would run through a credit search, and it will flag up that there is outstanding HP agreement on the motorhome, and the potential buyer will then run a mile. I think there have been problems in the past where new buyers found their car repossessed because of o/standing HP even though they had bought cars outright.

 

This from the AA site:

 

"If a loan or hire purchase agreement is still outstanding and you buy the car, the finance company will retain a legal interest in it until the loan is repaid in full – they may even repossess it."

 

Under those circumstances, no-one will buy the motorhome, so that's sadly not an option.

[BotB]

I think your response to my post speaks volumes for the pressure you are under. But even so, you do need to take on board that advice you don't want to hear isn't a criticism of you.

 

What's wrong with getting out of paying a debt if there's a legal way to do it? That's just what regulated HP agreements allow - pay half the total, as long as your up to date with the payments you can hand the goods back, rip up the agreement and pay nothing more. No reason for you to be offended at my suggestion that I couldn't see an alternative that would give you a similar let-out in your agreement.

 

You don't say what these charges are that are being applied to your agreement.

All these details are important to know because it makes a difference to the advice you will get. If the charges are interest charges applied for early settlement of the agreement, that is not comparable to penalty charges being applied to your bank account. Any advisor would need to see the actual agreement you signed. Hence my suggestion that it might be difficult to get advice informally on sites like this.

 

You seem to have got some breathing space by getting the payments re-scheduled but have I got the wrong impression? I read your post as saying that the real problem is you cannot afford to keep the vehicle as you were struggling to pay the installments anyway, and now you find that selling the vehicle is not the answer because (assuming you could find a buyer at, say, £15k) it will still leave you with a £25k debt according to BH depending on what these charges are that you feel have been wrongly applied.

 

If you can find a buyer at the best price you can get (bound to be better than what the bank will get at auction plus they'll deduct all the selling fees) and arrange the sale with BH's agreement and so that they receive the money direct - that gets the bailiffs or whatever they are off your back. Then you can see what's left to pay and what deal can be done with BH. If there's no judgement against you yet, they will have to apply to the Court, they can't just send bailiffs to you house to take goods to satisfy the debt without a judgement. At the moment, their focus is on repossessing the vehicle because its a depreciating asset, its the only security they have for the loan and they don't need a court order to repossess it.

 

I'm not sure if this will help or even be of any relevance to your case, you might recall a court case that got a lot of publicity last year or so about the couple who took a second mortgage on their home of a relatively small amount, went into arrears and ended upon owing about £350k with all the extra interest that was put on? Well, theirs was also an unregulated loan (because it was secured on property) in the sense they could not rely on consumer protection legislation. The creditor took them to Court and lost the case. I will try to find the case to see if there's anything in it to offer any comparison to your situation from which you might be able to benefit.

[BotB]

OP will you please advise the figures on your HP agreement as regards price of the goods, any deposit paid, any charges added, including any document fee or insurances.

 

Send me the info in a pm if you prefer.

[BankFodder]

B/F, I think that the problem is he if tries to sell it privately, a potential buyer would run through a credit search, and it will flag up that there is outstanding HP agreement on the motorhome, and the potential buyer will then run a mile. I think there have been problems in the past where new buyers found their car repossessed because of o/standing HP even though they had bought cars outright.

 

This from the AA site:

 

"If a loan or hire purchase agreement is still outstanding and you buy the car, the finance company will retain a legal interest in it until the loan is repaid in full – they may even repossess it."

 

Under those circumstances, no-one will buy the motorhome, so that's sadly not an option.

 

I appreciate this aspect but the fact remains that the bank cannot prevent the resale of the van. It would have to be done with their cooperation of course but if a purchaser was found at a proper value then there is nothing to stop the purchase price being paid directly to the lender.

This of course would have to be arranged by prior negotiation withe lender - but they would be unable to refuse - especially if they then repo'd the van and sold it off at a auction.

[JonCris]

Consumer Credit Act 2006

2006 Chapter 14

2

Removal of financial limits etc.

(1) In section 8 of the 1974 Act (which defines consumer credit agreements)-

(a) in subsection (1) for "personal" substitute "consumer";

(b) subsection (2) shall cease to have effect.

(2) In section 15(1) of that Act (which defines consumer hire agreements) paragraph © and the "and" immediately preceding it shall cease to have effect.

(3) In section 43(3) of that Act (financial and other limits relating to regulation of advertisements) paragraph (a) and the "or" immediately after it shall cease to have effect.

I understand this to mean that All agreements are regulated

[BotB]

I understand this to mean that All agreements are regulated

Not yet. The 2006 Act isn't in force and probably won't be until some time next year.

[dw190]

Not yet. The 2006 Act isn't in force and probably won't be until some time next year.

 

Are You Sure?

 

http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2006/20060014.htm

 

 

The text of this Internet version of the Act is published by the Queen's Printer of Acts of Parliament and has been prepared to reflect the text as it received Royal Assent. A print version is also available and is published by The Stationery Office Limited as the Consumer Credit Act 2006, ISBN 0 10 541406 9.

[fedupconsumer]

does this mean that i now have protection the same as a regulated contract?

[teddypompom]

This topic was closed on 09 March 2019.

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