If a debt collection agency contacts you and you write back saying you
dispute the debt or amount can they legally continue to send letters
demanding the money or do they have to go back to the company they are
acting on behalf of and tell them the debt is in dispute and they can go no
further until the dispute is settled?

As you can guess this is in relation to my previous thread about a debt
being claimed against my boss. He has had two letters since telling them
the debt is in dispute but they have ignored this.

Cullen Skink wrote:
If a debt collection agency contacts you and you write back saying you
dispute the debt or amount can they legally continue to send letters
demanding the money or do they have to go back to the company they are
acting on behalf of and tell them the debt is in dispute and they can go
no further until the dispute is settled?

In my experience they will continue to demand payment until you get the
organisation that set them on to you to call them off.

Some years ago I signed up for "Next Telecom". I then read the small
print and decided that the service was not as described by the salesman.
I wrote immediately canceling and received written confirmation that I
had canceled. Unfortunately my service was still transferred to Next. I
could not get Next to take the appropriate action to return me to BT and
then Next went bust (that got me back with BT fairly quickly). The next
I heard was a demand for payment from a debt collector on behalf of the
receiver (the demand did not name the receiver). Despite informing them
that I had no contract with Next, and giving them the reference of the
letter confirming that, the demands continued and became threatening.

Fortunately I had noted, from newspaper reports, the company and the
individuals who were the receiver. A letter to one of those individuals
stopped the demands. In fact I was moved from debtor to creditor, as I
claimed £100 from Next because they could not provide me with a cheaper
service that BT were doing. Over the ensuing years I have received much
paperwork and reports but no money.

It seems to me that debt collectors can claim payments with no
indication of how to contest their claims and ignore anything you may do
to refute their claims. I wrote to my MP at the time suggesting a need
for action to force debt collectors to provide facilities for alleged
debts to be challenged. Nice words in reply but AFAIAA no action.

--
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What matters in politics is not what happens, but what you can make
people believe has happened. [Janet Daley 27/8/2003]

On Feb 12, 1:45*pm, "Cullen Skink"
wrote:
If a debt collection agency contacts you and you write back saying you
dispute the debt or amount can they legally continue to send letters
demanding the money or do they have to go back to the company they are
acting on behalf of and tell them the debt is in dispute and they can go no
further until the dispute is settled?

As you can guess this is in relation to my previous thread about a debt
being claimed against my boss. *He has had two letters since telling them
the debt is in dispute but they have ignored this.

Legally they are not under an obligation to take instructions from
their principal. The solution is to ignore their letters; or write to
the principal direct

Old Codger wrote:

It seems to me that debt collectors can claim payments with no
indication of how to contest their claims and ignore anything you may do
to refute their claims. I wrote to my MP at the time suggesting a need
for action to force debt collectors to provide facilities for alleged
debts to be challenged. Nice words in reply but AFAIAA no action.

There is such a facility. It is called the Consumer Credit Act 1974. It
makes it an offence to continue to demand payment if you ask for details of
the debt and they don't provide them.

On Tue, 12 Feb 2008 23:40:12 +0000, Jonathan Bryce
wrote:

Old Codger wrote:

It seems to me that debt collectors can claim payments with no
indication of how to contest their claims and ignore anything you may do
to refute their claims. I wrote to my MP at the time suggesting a need
for action to force debt collectors to provide facilities for alleged
debts to be challenged. Nice words in reply but AFAIAA no action.

There is such a facility. It is called the Consumer Credit Act 1974. It
makes it an offence to continue to demand payment if you ask for details of
the debt and they don't provide them.

The difficulty is in enforcing that provision. I don't believe the
police would be interested, so what, in practice, can one do?

Mike.

In article ,
Jonathan Bryce wrote:
There is such a facility. It is called the Consumer Credit Act 1974. It
makes it an offence to continue to demand payment if you ask for details of
the debt and they don't provide them.

I assume you mean sections 77 and 78. Unfortunately those only apply
to regulated credit agreements, which doesn't include ordinary
contractual situations where one is given time to pay for provided
goods and services. So AIUI errant mobile phone companies, utility
suppliers, and so forth, don't need to comply.

--
Ian Jackson personal email:
These opinions are my own. http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~ijackson/
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Tommo wrote:


Legally they are not under an obligation to take instructions from
their principal. The solution is to ignore their letters; or write to
the principal direct


Sound just like TV Licensing when they decide that as you don't have a
TV licence you must therefore be guilty of evasion and bombard you with
letters (and the threat of an occassional visit.)

Personally I would write to the firm claiming that the debt is due by
Royal Mail Special Delivery (if company at their registered office)cc to
the debt collectors and tell them that you dispute the debt (you could
expand why)and invite them to sue you.

Other thing to do is to get a copy of your credit file from the credit
reference agencies - main ones are Experian and Equifax to check whether
any detrimental information has been registered against you by the
company concerned. I believe you may be able to attach an comment to any
entry advising that the debt is disputed.

Regards

A

Mike wrote:

There is such a facility. It is called the Consumer Credit Act 1974. It
makes it an offence to continue to demand payment if you ask for details
of the debt and they don't provide them.

The difficulty is in enforcing that provision. I don't believe the
police would be interested, so what, in practice, can one do?

Trading Standards are supposed to be responsible for enforcing it.

Ian Jackson wrote:

I assume you mean sections 77 and 78. Unfortunately those only apply
to regulated credit agreements, which doesn't include ordinary
contractual situations where one is given time to pay for provided
goods and services. So AIUI errant mobile phone companies, utility
suppliers, and so forth, don't need to comply.

Mobile phone contracts are consumer credit agreements. NTL/Virgin Media
phone and internet contracts are also consumer credit agreements, BT and
most other landline and broadband suppliers are not. Electricity, Gas and
Water are not.

In article ,
Jonathan Bryce wrote:
Mobile phone contracts are consumer credit agreements. NTL/Virgin Media
phone and internet contracts are also consumer credit agreements, BT and
most other landline and broadband suppliers are not. Electricity, Gas and
Water are not.

On what basis do you make these assertions ? I'm not saying they're
necessarily wrong and I don't have any of the contracts you say are
credit agreements, but your apparently arbitrary list is unconvincing.
I did have NTL broadband several years ago and that clearly wasn't a
consumer credit agreement.

--
Ian Jackson personal email:
These opinions are my own. http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~ijackson/
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