I am being pressured by a debt collection agency

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Dear Phil,

Sorry it has taken me a little longer than normal to respond but I have been doing some digging around about this company before responding to you.

I have worked in the debt resolution industry for many years and have never come across Universal Debt Collection before and furthermore, none of our clients have ever had a debt with this company.

You have explained that your debt was originally with Unicom Telecoms, which is in fact a trading name of Universal Utilities plc. Universal Debt Collection is also a trading name of Universal Utilities plc, so in truth your debt has not been passed to an external collection agency at all. Companies often create this pretence as a collection tactic to add pressure and intimidate the person concerned.

From the information you have posted, I am sorry to confirm that the creditors can continue to add charges to your account, as long as they are fair and reasonable. There are debt solutions available, such as an Individual Voluntary Arrangement (IVA) which can help in many ways such as, preventing creditors from adding further charges, prevent them from contacting you directly, taking any further legal action and reducucing the amount of money you repay, meaning you could be debt free sooner. You would need to meet certain criteria to be able to apply for an IVA but this could be the solution for your debt problems. The general rule of thumb to use is, that you have:

• £10,000 or more of debt
• 2 or more creditors
• A disposable income of £100 or more

If you would like to discuss an IVA or to speak to a trained advisor about the options you have available, please call Mike Morgan on 0161 905 8813 or Sarah Longsdale on 0161 905 8815. Mike and Sarah are two of our most experienced advisors and will be more than happy to help.

If an IVA isn’t an option then there are other routes you can take. It seems that you have already completed a financial statement and worked out how much you can afford to pay towards your debts. This is always the best place to start your negotiations from. You also sound like you are reasonably knowledgeable so apologises if I cover anything you are already aware of.

A debt collector isn’t a bailiff and you are right, you do not have to let them into your home and they have no powers to force entry. Companies may threaten to send door step collectors but more often than not, this is all it will ever be, a threat. Door step collection is a very costly and inefficient way to recoup money and is an option very few companies use, although they are more than happy to threaten it.

Some of the threats the collector has made seem to contravene the Administration of Justice Act 1970. Their threats could constitute harassment because their claim to declare you bankrupt if you do not agree to their demands is meant to intimidate and cause distress in order to obtain a payment. You should first of all make a written complaint to the debt collection firm and copy in the original creditor (albeit they are one of the same). Make sure you send the letter by recorded delivery. If you need help with this the Financial Ombudsman Service can give assistance in making complaints. Although the OFT do not generally act in respect of individual cases they set guidelines for companies regarding harassment and therefore would want to be made aware of this incident. You could also contact the Trading Standards Institute for further advice/to get action taken against the firm.

Creditors and collectors can apply to the courts for a county court judgement (CCJ) and the costs incurred for doing this would be added to your debt. The courts are not on anybody’s side and this is a ridiculous statement for the collection agent to make. The courts are fair; if you owe someone money they expect you to repay the debt but at a rate you can afford and the creditor/collector cannot change this.

If they do apply for a CCJ the first thing you will receive is a County Court Claim form which you will need to complete and return within 14 days of the date of the form. Return the form to the Court as detailed on the claim form. As you owe the money, you would admit the debt and complete the form with your income and expenditure details, explain who else you owe money to and make an offer of payment.

Once you have returned the form to the court, the creditor/collector will receive a copy of your offer. They might object to your offer of payment (they are not going to apply for a CCJ and then after all that accept your offer of payment) so in most cases you will receive a Judgment after Determination. If this is more than you can afford then you can apply for a redetermination.

I hope my response has helped but if you require any further information please drop me another post and I will do my very best to help.

All the best,

Kate

Hi Kate

I received today a letter from UNICOM not Universal debt collection a notice of court proceedings in Northampton submitted 13/7/11 they state i
"If judgement is entered against you we will apply for a warrant,which will incur fees to appoint a baliff to attend your premises to recover monies or sieze goods to the value of the debt"

Can they do this ?

Hi Phil,

It seems that Unicom are using every trick in the book to try and obtain an increase in payment. Unless the letter has a court stamp on it, it is not a court document and I suspect that this court form won’t have one. This is another collection tactic companies use to try and put pressure on you to increase your payment. Often when people receive an official looking document they are so worried they will do whatever they can to make payment to the debt. Most people don’t know the in’s and out’s of the court system and creditors use this to their advantage. What Unicom have stated isn’t an accurate account of what the courts will do and what they say is jumping the gun. Before a bailiff would be appointed a CCJ must be obtained, the court would set a repayment amount and only if you did not meet this amount could they then apply for a bailiff.

If Unicom do apply for a CCJ, the process I described in my first posting will occur and you would need to apply for the redetermination by completing a N245 form http://www.hmcourts-service.gov.uk/courtfinder/forms/n245_0204.pdf. This form is used to establish your income and expenditure as well as how much money you owe to other creditors. Make sure you include all relevant details (but remain realistic) as they will use these figures to determine your monthly repayment amount. I noticed you have given a weekly figure in your posting but the court will expect a monthly offer.

When completing this form, you must tick both the suspension of the warrant box AND the reduction in the instalment order box. By ticking both boxes it will stop a bailiff from being appointed and the court will also review the repayment of the debt, normally setting a monthly instalment amount.

There is a £40.00 fee charged by the court for processing the N245 form, although you may be exempt of paying this fee due to your circumstances. You can apply for fee remission by completing an EX160 form http://www.hmcourts-service.gov.uk/courtfinder/forms/ex160.pdf

If you maintain the instalment amount, set by the court, no further action will be taken. Further action will only be taken if you do not maintain repayments. In my experience the courts are fair and set the instalment amounts at a reasonable level so you should be able to maintain the payments. If your circumstances were to change and you were struggling to maintain the payments, then you can apply to the court to review the instalment amount.

Hopefully I have reassured you that if Unicom applies for the CCJ, and you take the necessary steps, that there won’t be a bailiff knocking at your door.

Keep me posted and I’ll do my best to help.

Thank you,

Kate

For anybody who's unsure about what a court stamp will look like, see this example:

HI

Firstly I would like to thank you so much Kate for making me feel a lot more at rest with this situation fortunately I don't let things affect me much at all but my problem with these people was I wasn't really sure where I stood so it did sew a few doubts and obviously made me feel uncomfortable . The county claim form is a draft this I did NOT notice until you stated what you have above.

But I would also like to point out Universal Debt Collection sent me a letter on 19th May saying my proposal of £2-50 a month was not acceptable even though I had offered £2-50 A WEEK this is a first mistake on their behalf in this letter they also ask for £529.33.

The notice of court proceedings letter sent 29th June by Unicom states the outstanding balance is £527.98 this is £1.35 less than they first asked for above plus on the 17th June I paid to them the one off payment of £12.81 I forgot to mention they added 31p after I agreed to pay £12.50 so this has not been deducted from the original figure would this support my case.

Also I would like to know if I do win my case when it goes to court can I get something done about not only this company conducting their business in a incorrect manner, but also I would like to see the people who rang and threatened me taken to task I have their names and to be honest I would like them to feel under pressure and have a little stress put their way if they knew their jobs were under threat this is totally against my nature but these people have made me feel this way thanks

Phil

Hello Phil

I occasionally keep an eye on what Unicom are up to following the distress they caused me when I was in dispute with them about a massive termination fee they were demanding at the end of my 3 year contract with them. They are absolutely the worst company I have ever dealt with in my 35 years of being in business.
I was sorry to read about the problems you are having and I have listed the following links that might be useful to you. You may have already seen them but if not, you will see that there are many others in similar situations and that Unicom have already been investigated by Ofcom

http://junkk.blogspot.com/2009/12/uni...

http://www.reviewcentre.com/reviews14...

http://www.unfaircontracts.info/Unive...

http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/1...

http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/enfo...

There are many more forums with complaints and information about this company but most negative comments tend to ‘disappear’.

Good luck and please don’t hesitate to ask if I can be of any further help.

Best wishes
Mary

Thanks a lot Mary I will look at these

HI Kate

Can I just ask is my first move still to make a written complaint to the debt collection firm and copy in the original creditor, In Unicoms letter it states they have attached a copy of a county court claim to be submitted 13th July, do I ignore this until I actually get a real one? Should I send them another expenditure form?

Thanks
Phil

Hi Phil,

I’m glad that I’ve been able to help and Mary I think your links really bring home the type of company we are dealing with here.

Phil I would still start by putting your complaint in writing, pointing out Unicom’s mistake in rejecting your weekly offer of £2.50 as being a monthly one and ask for them to reconsider this offer of payment. Be sure to include your financial statement with the letter. Explain that some of the claims their collection agents have made contravene the Administration of Justice Act 1970, as their threats constitute as harassment. Also ask for a copy of your original agreement and a copy of their complaints procedure. Advise them that you will allow them 21 days to respond to your complaint and if you do not receive a response in this time frame you will have little option other than to escalate your complaint to OFCOM and Trading Standards. I don’t expect Unicom to suddenly back down in response to your letter but by sending your complaint in writing you have given them the opportunity to rectify the situation and this will mean OFCOM and Trading Standards can take things further.

It is good to hear that you are prepared to fight Unicom but unfortunately it is unlikely you will get your day in court. If they do apply for a CCJ the debt will be treated separately to your complaint against Unicom for unreasonable behaviour and harassment. The court will make a judgement based on whether you owe the money to Unicom and not take into account their behaviour. You will need to challenge this through other channels.

Unicom are still applying interest to your account and this will be why your balance has only reduced by a marginal amount. By doing this they are making it near impossible for you to clear the debt. It can be hard to force a company to freeze interest other than using formal debt solutions such as IVAs and Bankruptcy, which I appreciate, may not be an option available to you.

Mary you sound like you are very knowledgeable about this company and are possibly a campaigner in this area? It’s always hard for one person to make headway but if there are others experiencing similar collection tactics and intimidation, you could unite your complaints and escalate them through OFCOM and Trading Standards.

Kind regards,

Kate

HI Kate

Thanks once again can I just ask please my wife receives disability payment do I have to put this in our income expenditure I have previously, but the Housing benefit we receive and other people I have spoken to state that disability income is not counted when they work our Housing benefit.

Hi Phil & Kate
Hope the info was helpful.
Yes – I was a bit of a campaigner during my dispute with them and I spent many hours researching and seeking advice. I had a lot of help from http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk but negative comments about Unicom were ‘removed’ as quickly as they were being posted so the full issues were never available for all to see. This was also the case with other forums making it almost impossible to unite with others in a similar situation.

From experience, it is very likely that this thread will also be challenged very soon.

After battling with them for some time, Unicom eventually decided to withdraw their ‘termination charges’ and I was able to leave them penalty free but the stress involved was unbelievable.

Phil, if Kate agrees, I would also ask Unicom to provide you with recordings of all the telephone conversations you have had with them.

Best wishes
Mary

Hi Phil,

You will need to include everything on your income and expenditure including your wife’s disability payment and your housing benefit. I think the people you have previously spoken to may be referring to an IVA because disability payments cannot be included on this because the money can only be used to pay for additional costs incurred from being disabled and the money cannot be used to repay debts. Normally on a financial statement for an IVA the disability payment will show on the income and then the full amount will show both on the income and expenditure sides, so in effect they cancel each other out.

You should include both the disability payment and housing benefit on your financial statement so the creditor can gain a full understanding of your financial position.

Mary, your suggestion of asking for call recordings is a good one. As part of the Data Protection Act 1998 you can request a copy of all personal information a organisation holds on you. You need to put your request in writing and detail what information you require, I would suggest, a copy of all the notes on your account and all calls recordings. They are allowed to charge a fee of up to £10.00 to supply this information but I would wait and see if they request the fee rather than offering to pay it. They have 40 calendar days from the date of receiving your letter to get this information to you. If they do not supply you with this information you can make a complaint through the Information Commissioners Office (ICO).

Kind regards,

Kate

I to am having real problems with Unicom who are trying to charge me a cancellation fee. I took over a pub temporarily and Unicom provided the phone system I told them I would only be there on a short term so didnt want a contract and they said no problem when I left then that would be it and they would try and contact the new owner to transfer the phones. The new owner transferred back to BT and now Unicom are trying to get the cancellation charge from me as they say I signed a contract. I have told them till I am blue in the face that I didnt cancel it and I didnt sign a contract. Now they are threatening me with court action to which I have replied do whatever you want I am not paying.

This company is a nightmare and people be warned dont use them.....

HI Kate

Just to update you surprise surprise Unicom rang me yesterday and said I had been in touch with clear debt forum regarding my dispute so Mary was correct when she said they would find out this was being discussed elsewhere.

The biggest SURPRISE though was they agreed to accept my offer of £2-50 per week even though it did take a 10 minute exchange of words. They still thought I was offering £2-50 a month and it was only when she said we can't accept this it will take 17 years to pay it off that it became resolved.

I must admit though that the lady Nania I think she is called was a lot more responsive than the other people I spoke to and I did let her know what I thought of them and their tactics .

Anyway once again I would like to say thanks to Kate and Mary for all your help thank you.

Phil

Hello Lesley
This article from the pub trade magazine Morning Advertiser might be of interest to you and perhaps the reporter who wrote the article would be interested to hear your story?
http://www.morningadvertiser.co.uk/ne...

Glad you got sorted Phil

Best wishes
Mary

Phil,

That is brilliant news. I am really happy to hear that you have a payment arrangement set up and the collection activity will finally stop. Did they say if they would freeze the interest on the account?
Hopefully this will be the last you hear from them for a while but if anything changes please do keep us posted because hopefully we can help and by posting on this site you can also help others who find themselves in a similar situation.

Hi Mary,

Thanks again for your postings, you are certain the lady in the know.

And Lesley,

I would offer you similar advice to that I gave Phil and would recommend that you begin by putting your complaint in writing. It’s important that you take steps to rectify the situation because more often than not, making a complaint over the phone won’t resolve the problem. The people calling you are collections agents and are not managers or the people who make the decisions on whether they refund money/close accounts. I would suggest that in your complaint letter you explain you have been mis-sold the phone contract and exactly what you believe you agreed to. Ask that they listen to the original sales calls and ask for a copy of the notes on your account, a copy of the original agreement and call recordings. I know you say you have not signed anything but with the option to sign up over the internet or telephone you may have agreed to this without being fully aware that you had.

If you are not satisfied with their response to your complaint you have the option to escalate it through OFCOM and Trading Standards but you should always give Unicom the opportunity to resolve your complaint before taking further steps. As seen with Phil’s experience, it maybe that they resolve your complaint themselves.

Please keep me posted with how things go and I’ll do my best to help.

Thank you,

Kate

Hi I just recieved a threatening letter from universal stating I owe the balance of £451.15 + £45 court costs (i haven't been summoned to court yet). In April 2010 I left the company I was a partner in. My partner became a soletrader and took on the business. Unfortunatley this business closed Dec 2010. I haven't had any contact with my ex business partner who never told me the company had closed. She recently went bankrupt and Universal have found me some how and sent me a notice of legal proceedings.
The letter states i ignored repeated reminders from the client, unicom. Obviously I didn't as I had no dealings with the business or ex business partner. This notification is the first letter I have recieved regarding the matter.
I am aware that due to my ex business partner being bankrupt and never having notified unicom of my leaving the business I maybe liable for repayment. Obviously after reading these posts I can deduct that they are a rather dispicable entity. Do I have a case due to the debt occurring long after i had left the business, that when the shop closed I had no receipt of any bills or notices? I have no relevant information regarding the debt and have therefore requested all bills/paperwork regarding the debt and my responsibility to it.
I have also suggested that if the debt were proven mine i could afford a very small sum per month (though i would rather face the courts and pay them than unicom directly).
Can you offer me any ideas, please.
Many thanks, Dave.

Hi Dave

I note that you were originally in a partnership with an associate.

Was the Partnership ever officially dissolved when you went your separate ways in April 2010?

If not then you still could be liable for the debts incurred.

This would be dependent on what it said in the partnership agreement as usually debts incurred would be joint and several for each of the partners.

If the partnership was officially dissolved and if you can prove the debt was incurred after the date the partnership was dissolved then you should not be liable for the debt.

I hope that helps

Matt

I’m going through a similar thing with Unicom. except my contracted was up in April this year but Unicom did an unauthorised cancellation of my contracted on march 3rd 2011 a month early
Ever since then i have been harassed by Unicom threatened by Universal Debt Collectors offered a deal from Unicom and then threatened again up to now I’ve had 7 letters from Universal of legal proceedings.
Just wondering if anyone has got some advice on this and where do i sand?

john

Unicom are making me want to kill myself.
I cancelled the contract, within their terms, but they are now saying i did not. nearly two years after the contract should have ended and 17 months after my last contact with them, they have sent me a demand for £2397.70 and are threatening me with bankruptcy. I do not owe them this money.
I am at the end of my tether, I really, really can't take it any more, i cannot see a way out of this.

HI Michelle

Stick to your guns tell them you can only afford what you can afford I had a full blown argument with quite a few of their "phone staff" over a long period of time with all the usual threats until eventually I actually spoke to some one who knew what they were on about and after I told her I can afford £10 per month I explained they have had a balance sheet from me showing what I had coming in and what went out and if they wanted to take me to court I just said fine do it then because at the end of the day this is all you are going to get so basically take it or leave it and guess what they TOOK it I set up a d/d and I have never heard from them since and don't want to until the day they say you have paid up in full . They will threaten you with every trick in the book but can't do it they did the same to me but I didn't budge and neither should you so just let them know what you can afford they will keep threatening just keep telling them the same thing eventually someone with half a brain who works there will speak to you & accept it hope this helps and yes they are the biggest bunch of ***** I have ever come across.

Hi Michelle
Don't despair - there are lots of things that can be done and there are plenty of people who will be willing to help.
Firstly, have you kept a copy of the notification you sent to them when you cancelled your contract?

Keep in touch & I will try to help.
Regards
Mary

We have a similar situation with Unicom at one of our pubs. We the end of our 3 year year contract with Unicom, then gave them 3 months notice in writing that we wished to cancel the contract as we were selling the business. Unicom told ud that we could not do this as the date we were selling did not exactly match the anniversary of the contract. They told us that we had rolled over into a new 3 year contract even though we had received no notification of renewal. We were informed that we had to pay three worth of estimated bills (£1200) to cancel this or hand the contract over to the new buyer. The new buyer agreed to take over the contract and we paid our final bill of £72. A few months later after we had sold the business we notice a debit on our account of £1200 to Unicom which they had helped themselves to. Fortunately Barclays managed to recover the money.

When we queried this they said they could not deal with the new buyer as he was a limited comany and they do not deal with limited companies. We could not take a phone line with them at our new pub as that is a limited company too, so they were charging us for the 3 years.

Almost 2 years later having been bombarded with phone calls to my mobile and they have now tracked us down to our home address and are threatening to send the bailifs round.

This is a crazy situation. We have paid our final bill. They are relentless. I have no intention of paying this and will happily go to court. Do not give in to their bullying tactics they need to be stopped.

I want to warn all businesses never to use this company and would like to know who to make a complaint to.

I am sorry to hear about your experience with Unicom.

As you well know, this isn’t going to go away so I would suggest you take action to resolve the dispute and then you can put it behind you and move on. Hopefully you will find some of my earlier posts helpful but please let me know if you would like more detail on any particular part - I can’t promise I’ll know that answer but I’ll do my best.

Hope it all works out,

Kate