Since my redundancy in July I have not been able to make any payments of any kind to my creditors. A few letters and explaining my situation, they all went quiet.
However i recieved a letter today saying i defaulted on an agreed payment of £54.82 with Natwests collection agency and i must now pay £4.30 immediatly to avoid legal proceedings. Firstly i dont remember setting that up and even if i did i dont know where they got the £4.30 from. So do i pay it? I cant pay anyone else yet and wont be able to until im sorted again.
In fairness, if you pay one you should really pay them all and if you cannot pay them all then you already have your answer.
Legal proceedings is such a woolly term anyway, a lot of the time it means nothing at all other than a default notice or the passing of an account to a different, possibly "harsher sounding" collections agency etc. When you are on a more sound footing financially, then it may be wise to make token payments before you re-instigate your IVA proposal or go down whatever route you decide to take at that point in time.
Regards.
Cert DR
23+ years in debt advice
I do not post for anyone other than myself
This is my experience, I tried to make token payments of £5 per month to my creditors until I found the correct solution. It so didnt shut them up, they wanted more and since the debts had been passed to one and then another debt collection agency, I got somewhat confused. Whatever I paid they always wanted more and the threats didnt stop. I kept them informed by letter of what I was trying to do about it, I dont think that information ever reached the letter or telephone departments. In the end I didnt pay anything for over 12 months, they never took out legal proceedings against me. I was threatened with BR by one and by this time I was way past caring and told them to bring in on. Then, a couple of weeks after the BR stat demand, they wrote saying that they had a rethink and would look at another offer.
It seemed to me that they only understand one language and even that is limited to one sentence, you make full payments or we will send out nasty letters and keep on phoning you. If you keep them informed by letter of your intentions and they do decide to take legal action, you can counter prove to the courts that youre a cant pay, not a wont pay and you have done and are doing your very best.
Last edited by freelili on Wed Nov 12, 2008 3:02 pm, edited 1 time in total.
I think I would just write to them and explain your position once again and tell them that you are trying to sort things out.
Ask them where they got this agreed payment from and tell them you have never set anything up.
Sharing from experiences of dealing with debt
The greatness of a man is not in how much wealth he acquires, but in his integrity and his ability to affect those around him positively.
Bob Marley. http://kallis3.blogs.iva.co.uk
If the payment of £4.30 shuts them up then I would pay it to be honest - but of course the professional answer would have to be as Size 5 has stated - treat all creditors equally.
thanks for your replies. Only just caught up with them. Lost the internet for a bit. I will just write to them all i think [if i can find an address for them all]and let them know what us going on.
