Only 5 points, for all that!!

Its a bit long winded but these posts seem to summarise:

POST 1

This has been a long road to go down, with constant harassment by phone at home and work when they are not getting their own way.

Only go down this road if you are strong and believe in what you are doing. There have been times when the tension it was causing my wife almost made me give up.

It all started in 2003, whne because of illness our income dropped, the vultures started circling, The Bank of Scotland being one of them. Despite the CCCS being involved the soon passed the account onto Blair et al and defaulted me. Not that they told me about the latter, but thats another story.

When we got back on our feet, after selling our house, to pay some of the vultures off, I got into a repaymnet scheme, eventually paying £270 per month, it was crippling, not that they cared.

In June of this year I stumbled on this site, and thought in for a penny, in for a pound. I read the instructions and sent off this letter.

Blair Oliver and Scott
PO Box 66
Rosyth
KY11 2WG
(Via recorded delivery)

Dear Sir,

Re: Agreement reference

I am presently striving to organise my personal information and can find no reference to the above agreement that I am presently paying money into.

Could I ask that you supply me with a true copy of the agreement? I understand that this is my right under the legislation contained within section 77 (1) and section 78 (1) of the Consumer Credit Act 1974. I also understand that it is your obligation to provide me with a statement of account. I enclose a £1 postal order in payment of the statutory fee.

Since you are a Debt Collection Agency could I ask that you supply a signed true copy of the deed of assignment of the above referenced agreement? This is, I understand, an obligation, whether you are the original creditor or not, under section 189 of the Consumer Credit Act 1974.

I hope to hear from you within the statutory time limit.

Yours faithfully,

POST 3

Well I waited the statutory time, never heard a dicky bird, most unusual because they are like a dog with a bone.

So I grabbed the bull by the horns and stopped payment.

POST 4

Then I started to get phone calls and quite alot of them, I must admit to have the red mist falling when I wrote this letter

Blair Oliver and Scott
PO Box 66
Rosyth
KY11 2WG
(Via recorded delivery)

Dear Sir,

Re: Agreement reference

This letter has also been sent to the Company Secretary, Blair Oliver & Scott Ltd, 8 North Bank Street, Edinburgh, EH1 2LP
Before I continue I wish to establish that I am not seeking to avoid responsibility for any debt that I may have or had, I am seeking to redress a wrong. I also offer my apologies for not following up my initial contact until now.


I wrote to you on the 26th June 2006 requesting a copy of the executed agreement under the Consumer Credit Act (1974). I also asked for a statement of account. A ‘*****’ at your address received the letter on the 27th June 2006. I also requested an executed deed of assignment documenting Blair Oliver & Scott’s involvement; this too has not been supplied.
In three months you have been unable to supply an agreement because no such agreement exists, indeed a ‘phone conversation with your call centre manager, *****, on the 22nd September 2006 confirmed that the Bank of Scotland cannot provide any documentation.
Consequently I do not acknowledge any debt to your company

As you will know your non-compliance with my request means that your company has committed an offence under Section 77 (4) of the Consumer Credit Act 1974, summarily punishable by a Level 4 fine on the standard scale.
A credit agreement that is not properly documented and signed by the customer is totally unenforceable under the Consumer Credit Act and is therefore a complete defence to any court claim that is issued. Please take note that any legal action you may contemplate will be vigorously defended and contested.
I also contend that the money that you have obtained from me has been unlawful since you have not provided me with any documentation to prove the contrary, and under common law you may not profit from an unlawful act.
Furthermore your actions arguably do not comply with the Office of Fair Trading’s (OFT) Debt Collection Guidelines of July 2003, in that you have ‘communicated with [me] in an inaccurate or misleading manner (section 2.1) by ‘presenting information in that it creates a false or misleading impression’ and ‘failing to provide [me] with information on the status of debts’.


Notwithstanding the above your operatives have sought to contact me on a number of occasions (approximately ten times) over the last few days, I would imagine regarding your Company’s viewpoint on the above now disputed agreement. I know of these attempts because of the recording received when using British Telcom’s 1471 facility. This intrusion into my privacy has caused a great deal of distress to my wife and myself, since because of The Data Protection Act (Data Protection Act) your operatives say they are not allowed to discuss matters with her, (more of the Data Protection Act later).
We now consider that you ‘phone calls constitute harassment and so from this date any further calls to me will be reported to the Police. In addition you are in breech of the OFT’s July 2003 guidelines in that you are wrongly pursing me contrary to Section 2.8(i). Incidentally, when Ms ***** was asked whether your company had been striving to contact me she said ‘no’ but she was going to place a note on my file that no ‘phone contact would be made until the matter was concluded’. Clearly she told me an untruth or the computerised call logger that she was examining was inaccurate. Since within an hour my wife had received two further calls from you, and I received another at 8.40pm, from a lady who said she represented Blair Oliver & Scott.


Another worrying facet of this whole case is the unlawful dissemination of my data by your company to a third party. Under the Data Protection Act I have principled rights in that


(Schedule I)
1. Personal data shall be processed fairly and lawfully.
2. Personal data shall be obtained only for one or more specified and lawful purposes, and shall not be further processed in any manner incompatible with that purpose or those purposes.

(Schedule II)
1. The subject has given his consent.
2. The processing is necessary –
a. For the performance of a contract to which the data subject is a party.

I have recently conducted an audit of my personal credit reports supplied by Experian and Equifax. Within both files, an entry referenced as “Bank of Scotland” is lodged indicating a loan. This is recorded as “In Default” on the 27th February 2004. However, I note that files have been updated continually since then. Since I have had no contact with The Bank of Scotland I can only deduce that it is Blair Oliver & Scott that is updating my credit file without my consent or that your company is disseminating my information to a third party without my consent

The fact that you cannot provide me with a copy of the agreement negates any Notice of Default being served on me, as required by the conditions of the Consumer Credit Act 1974. Incidentally, I cannot recollect receipt of the said documentation. If the documentation were to be produced as you are aware the default notice cancels any original terms and conditions and as such cancels any right to share my information without my consent.

What I require.
1. I require you with immediate effect to ensure that all data held by you regarding the alleged agreement is removed from any and all Credit Reference Agency database.
2. Ensure that all data held by you regarding me and my family is destroyed.
3. Refund all monies paid to you by me since August 2004.
4. Ensure that no further telephone calls are made to me or my place of work.
5. Ensure that all correspondence is made in writing.
6. I require written confirmation of the above together with a quarterly statement that no data has been processed regarding me by you.

Failure to comply

• Failure to comply with my request under the Data Protection Act 1998 will result in the matter being referred to the Information Commissioner.
• Failure to comply with the requirements of the Consumer Credit Act will cause me to refer the matter to the Office of Fair Trading, and Trading Standards.
• Failure to comply with the requirements Office of Fair Trading guidelines will lead to a report being submitted.
• Continued telephone contact will generate a complaint to the police.
• Failure to repay the paid sums shall cause me to report you to the OFT, Trading Standards and the Financial Services Authority.
• If you fail to comply with any or all of the above I reserve the right to offer the experience to Consumer Interest media, I have just enrolled with BBC TV’s consumer watchdog database.
• If you fail to comply with any or all of the above I reserve the right to take action against you without further contact.

I hope to hear from you within 12 working days from the date of this letter, failure to do so will be taken that you failed to comply with my request.

Yours faithfully,
POST 7

Then the phone calls started again followed by this reminder

(24th October)
Dear Sir/Madam

Bank of ScotlandAcc. No. x Balance due £2592.16dr
We are a professional Debt Collection Agency instructed by our above client to obtain payment of the balance owed by you. You will appreciate that our client requires payment of the full balance as soon as possible.

What Action is Required by You

(1) Make payment in full to the account. Payment can be made by using a credit or debit card by contacting our Helpline or by sending a cheque or postal order to our address quoting the above reference number.
Or
(2) Contact this office to discuss this matter further quoting our above reference number. Our hours of business are 8.30am to 7.30pm Monday to Friday and 8.30am to 12.30pm on Saturday.

What will happen if you do not take the above action

(1) We may instruct one of our local door to door agents to call on you to discuss the matter further.
And/or
(2) We may commence legal action against you.

Yours faithfully,


Well I got on the blower and told the woman that I had had enough of them and was going to report them to the OFT and TS and the Information Commissioner, which I did, but again that's another story, and hopefully, when all comes to pass I'll post that on here too.

The calls then stopped for another monthPOST 9I couldn't afford to take them on or anyone else for that matter at the time, with Xmas coming up, So I thought that I would just wait and see until after the new year, then out of the blue came this

(9th December)
Dear Sir/Madam

Bank of ScotlandAcc. No. x Balance due £2592.16dr
FINAL NOTICE

No further reminder will be issued prior to further action being instructed. As you have failed to respond to our previous letter by making full payment or contact this office with repayment proposal your debt will be prepared for further action in five days time from the date of this letter.

What action will be taken?

One of our local door to door collectors may call on you to discuss the repayment of your debt with our clients

And/or

We may commence legal proceedings against you. We would advise that you may be liable for legal expenses should action be taken against you in addition to repaying your debt to our clients.

You have one final opportunity to prevent further action being taken by

(1) Make payment in full to the account. Payment can be made by using a credit or debit card by contacting our Helpline or by sending a cheque or postal order to our address quoting the above reference number.
Or
(2) Contact this office to discuss this matter further quoting our above reference number. Our hours of business are 8.30am to 7.30pm Monday to Friday and 8.30am to 12.30pm on Saturday.


Yours faithfully

POST 11

I got a call at work from my wife who was scared stiff, I was really scared too, so I rang Blair up from work during my lunch hour. The girld didn't really know why I was ringing but took the time to read all that was on the monitor in front of her. Apprantly they had asked for the copy of the agreement seven times, she then went to her manager who was the same girl that I had spoken to in September.

She said that the account would be closed and I could disregard the letter.

I was numb but took them at their word.

Then the following arrived

(15th December)
Dear Sir/Madam

Acc. No. x Balance due £2592.16dr

We refer to the above account.

Please could you telephone within the next seven days to discuss this matter further. Failure to comply with this request may result in further action being taken against you.

Please note that this matter require your urgent attention.

Yours faithfully,

This arrived two days before Xmas, but I managed to keep it away from my wife, because it would have ruined it for her. And then on the 28th December we recived this

(21st December)
Dear Sir/Madam

Acc. No. x Balance due £2592.16dr

We write to you in connection with the above account number and with regards to the problems you have been experiencing, please accept our sincere apologise.

We can confirm that we have passed the account for closure and the remaining balance, noted above for write off. Again please accept our apologise for any inconvenience caused.

Yours faithfully,


That was it just like that, it was gone, all that worry, in a letter that had the syntax and spelling qualities of a seven year old. And sorry for the inconvenience! your having a laugh.

I realise that some of you may think that I have been rather immoral in getting the loan written off, but really what was written off was half the interest, interest that shouldn't have been added in the first place because they didn't get their paperwork right in the first place.

This won't be the end of the matter because of the oFT, TS and Information Commissioner, but what I hope is is that if you know that you are in the right, and believe it, and you know the law is on your side, you will win.

Its a bit of a long read but should serve as an inspiration to all who are suffering at the hands of these people.

S

I couldn't find it-got as far as legal successes, then.....Can you give us the gist please?

Hi Graeme,

Just trying to pass info without much copy/pasting.

I understand what you are saying and will comply in future.

Thanks for allowing the post.

Regards

Stubie_One

Hi Stubie-One,

I'm more than happy to allow the link in this case as it's obviously helpful and part of the wider discussion and finding out further information. For obvious reasons, I'd prefer to see the discussion continue here if possible, though! If you could distill the information for our community, I think that would be helpful to a great many people. Thanks.

Hi Everyone,

You might want to take a look at this thread from CAG.

It might give a few pointers (hope they allow the link as it is relevant, if not then I will post excerpts.)

http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/dca-legal-successes/56001-mike220359-blair-oliver-scott-3.html

S

Hi Capt,

Just read your post. Apart from requesting the original agreements, did you write them any other letters? Did you let them know you considered the account in dispute, or that you did not acknowlege any debt to them. From what I've read on the forum, you need to do these things. These letters also remind the company that thyer can't file a credit report, or pass it on to a third party whilst it is indispute.

There are template letters you can send to the Credit ref companies, and to the OFT/Financial Ombudban, but you'll probably need to provide further detail here, so someone in hte know can come on and help you out. I am just a novice, learning from what I read here.

Nix

If my experience with Barclaycard is anything to go by, they will just carry on issuing default notices and charging interest as if the law doesn't apply to them. They just seem to ignore all communication. I've sent them all the stuff about needing the info before taking it to court(Conmankiller post). I think they think they can just wear you down. I've now sent the case to the financial ombudsman but I still got a letter from Mercers DEbt Collection today. It seems they will push it to the limit. Tactics!

There's a lot of really good info already on these threads, it just takes time.

Good luck

Hi Guys,

Ive been reading through the threads and found them very enlightening, I wondered weather you could offer any advice. I requested a true copy from certain CCC's back in september 2008 needless to say all I got sent was a generic copy of T's & C's not a signed true copy. I have since written to them explaining that I am stopping payments as they are in default and the debt is unenforceable. The thing is all I was led to believe they couldnt do they have done i.e. reported late payments on my credit file, passed the debt on to a third party collection agent, made late payment charges and sent me default notices and threats to pay me a visit(send round the heavys). What in your opinion should be my next move??

Hope you can help

Capt