03 May 2016

A question about : Welcome Finance

Hi there,

to cut the long story of it, i will post the complaint i made to a debt recovery firm who are trying to retrieve Ј2,700 from me despite the return of the car.

Quote:

Dear to whom it ever may concern,

I am writing to you in regards to my account @@@@@@ at the request of the phone call I just had with one of the customer service team on the number 0800 678 1100 I am very displeased at Welcome Finance for their audacity for their debt recovery for the sum of Ј2,600.

I wish to lodge a complaint at about the service and negligence towards me, back in 2007 when I bought the car I couldn't really afford it at all and if any Sales rep worth their salt would have even said this at the time of sale with proper checks would have just refused a young naive 21 year old but in the case of the Sales Rep Paul Kasey he did not infact do that but saw pounds signs in his eyes and went through with a sale that had astronomical APR attached to it.

I part exchanged my Renault Clio I had at the time for Ј500 which was used a Deposit and I signed a bunch of forms, one form which I will attach later when I can scan it, had a check list of Payment Protection Insurance Mechanical Break Down insurance short fall sum which I believe is for insurances purposes if I had a crash, however the PPI I had which the check list box is ticked Y for was meant to cover me if I lost my job… that did happen and I could not afford the car at all, there was no way I could pay for the car and petrol was expensive, I had numerous phone calls to the manager of the branch who even offered me to come down to the Branch and to discuss to which I did, he then offered me a Citreon C1 but I explained to him that if I couldn't afford to pay the monthly fee's then no matter what the car, I still couldn't afford it and thus did not go through with an exchange.

There was a point in the original contract too which stated if I paid half the amount (I believe the sum was Ј4,000) then I could return the car to which no avail as I tried that many times and if Welcome Finance still have these phone calls recordings then I wish to retrieve them as it will state this…. I only had one more option according to them, I missed payments due to the only income at the time was jobseekers allowance which was Ј83 every 2 weeks and I had bank statements to prove all these payments, I went down to an office on St Albans Road, Watford to sign a new contract, they explained a lot of legal sayings and to a naпve 21 year old who had one hand behind his back over a barrel there wasn't a lot I could do in this situation faced with losing a car and + money I had to sign this, they removed a whole host of things from the original contract including adding MORE interest + charges and removing when I could return the car when you reach the half way amount of Ј4000 (see above), this was not actually explained to me as if I knew that I would of flagged this up and maybe not even had signed it.

So I agreed to pay Ј138 a month (from a Ј166 pm job seekers allowance) even when I had PPI attached to it and the inevitable missed payments happened when I couldn't afford to keep up the monthly repayments, I got fed up with the whole situation as it was taking over my life when I was trying to be focused on getting another job as you would at aged 21 who shouldn't have to had this burden on such a young persons shoulders I refused to keep on paying and returned the car which I thought was well within my rights to do so, I had enough, I paid well over the amount I should of paid (to my knowledge about Ј7,500 but this can be confirmed by bank statements) and I couldn't doit anymore, I had other things to pay for and a life to live and I couldn't deal with having all of this on me anymore, so Welcome Finance took the car back and decided they would then charge me extra money for that and to this day they are after me for Ј2,700 or so, I find this claim to be laughable and saddening especially what it has done to my credit report and the emotional stress of it all, I find it ridiculous that a company could try and take a young kid for a ride for all the money he had and the negligence of the company is just beyond absurd, the fact that I even seemed to have PPI in the first place makes this whole claim ridiculous.

I do not believe I have to pay the remaining balance, I have been caused a great deal of emotional stress from all of this and I even paid well over the amount I could afford to pay and to the point where I could just return the car back, I would of happily just left this but I am very angry and disappointed that they are pursuing me to the point of bailiffs if they don't receive the full amount, when I thought it couldn't get any worse, 5 years on they still prove me wrong. However the kind person of Empingham Limited Chloe Waters has sent me in the direction of lodging a Complaint with yourselves so I thank her for the help and sympathy I have received.

So I wish to lodge a complaint and an investigation into this and it's practices towards me and I look forward to hearing from you soon.

When I get home I will attached the scan/photo of the original letter where it stated I had PPI included.

Kind Regards,
Adam Williams

Now what gets my goat is that they are coming after me for the money, also it turns after all this time i was infact covered if i lost my job in the form of PPI that was blatantly mis-sold to me if they wasn't going to keep their end of the bargain, they made me renew/amend a contract as i lost my job, this is completely unfair and i find this even more distressing when they are STILL chasing me for money i do not owe them!!

what can i do, anything i can do?

Best answers:

  • Is the said debt collection agency Lowlife portfolio by any chance
  • I'm going to be honest. I don't really get this.
    If you believe that the insurances were mis sold then you should make a complaint. Had you been paying the premiums?
    I'm guessing that the finance company said that as you had defaulted, that you could not return the vehicle half way as the agreement had been breached.
    I don't even understand from what you've written if you had PPI or not. If you didn't why didn't you ring the insurer to claim? And why did you refinance the deal?
    To help people help you, you need to be less emotional - and put the facts concisely.
  • My Inlaws are going through a similar thing with the same company, (I posted another thread regarding it a few days ago) but Welcome Finance forged my father inlaws signature on a contract, it got to court proceedings but then Welcome Finance withdrew from the court proceedings (back in 2009) and stopped trying to claim for over Ј8k and then now my inlaws have received a final demand from a debt collector, Welcome Finance's attitude was literally and I quote 'we can chase you for this money as many times as we like'!
  • This debt is with Empingham Limited.
    Quote:
  • Ah, so they say you didn't have it, you say you did - got ya.
    So, did you have any info about the PPI with the documents when you got the car - do you have evidence that part of your monthly payment was going to the PPI payments?
    I take it welcome are saying it was an admin error for ticking the wrong box, and you weren't paying for the insurance, therefore have no right to claim?
  • yeah i do, infact i took a photo of it for the evidence i showed to Welcome that it came with the car >imageshack.us/photo/my-images/843/20121204210922147473734 you have to add the http and jpg at the end of the 734 as i cant post links at the moment
    that looks pretty clear to me that it ticked with a "Y" along with all the other stuff that i had which they admitted i had too, i remember the conversation with the sales guy saying "well you just never know what might happen" when i was talking about losing my job and that evidently did come in 2009.
    they said to me that i had no PPI on the policy form, i have only proof of the whole payment of Ј205 a month going out of my account so thats about it, the policy was for 48 months and the APR was something like 18%
  • Hi Wilcouk, that you for your query regarding Welcome Finance
    You have done the right thing by complaining to the company and if theydo not respond or you are unhappy with their response you can take the complaint to the Financial Ombudsman Service. I would suggest you consider taking the agreement to a specialist debt adviser to check them for you. You can find your local Citizens Advice Bureau at www.citizensadvice.org.uk and information about making a complaint to the Financial Ombudsman Service at www.adviceguide.org.uk.
    Hope this is of assistance.
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