IQ Consultants, Felicitas Solutions, ECS Trustees - loan repayment demands

[Superfly]

Out of interest, having looked at one of these letters/demands myself, I notice that it definitely doesn't list all the alleged loans that the individual had which is odd. It also only lists interest from 2015 > 2019, despite the person in question having used schemes before that period.

None of this makes any sense. The demands are so badly laid out that I fail to see how they would stand up to any legal challenge or scrutiny at all. If somebody genuinely owes a debt, then there's absolutely no sound legal reason to say "don't worry about previous interest owed, don't worry about the actual overall debt, just pay us a little bit and that'll be it".

Why haven't they listed all alleged loans and asked for 12% of that, instead of a subset ?

I'm interested to know what the next move by these people will be (if anything), or whether it's purely a cheap shakedown to see who coughs up straight away, and that's it. Remember in order for these people to start any meaningful action, they will need to get a court to agree that these are genuine debts, and that all the paperwork from start to finish was correct and in order. I'm not sure how keen they'll be to try that, as a single defeat means they loose every case. I suspect a bit more pushing on the letter front, however I'd be stunned to see a solicitor working from an office in a Golf course wanting to go toe to toe with barristers over this, which i'm sure is exactly what would happen if they tried it.

If it were me, I'd be disputing the debt, and asking for:

Original signed credit agreement
Original terms and conditions
Original repayment schedule
Also, I was under the impression that it was a legal requirement to provide Annual Loan Statements detailing loan amounts and interest accrued, and I'm pretty sure none were ever sent
I'd also be asking for full and explicit details of the GDPR policy and process which was followed both for Felicitas acquiring personal details in the first place from the scheme owners, and also for those details being passed to Gladstones.

The 'loan' figures on my letter are wrong by quite a bit

[MrO666]

The 'loan' figures on my letter are wrong by quite a bit

Wrong or not, does it cover all the years that you allegedly had loans ?

The letter I looked at doesn't cover all the years in question which is odd. Does anyone know how far back these people are trying to go ? For instance, were EBT's alleged loans in the same way ?

[Superfly]

Wrong or not, does it cover all the years that you allegedly had loans ?

The letter I looked at doesn't cover all the years in question which is odd. Does anyone know how far back these people are trying to go ? For instance, were EBT's alleged loans in the same way ?

All years are there, includes EBT period.

[neveragain]

Hello all, fascinating read for all the wrong reasons. Just got a letter myself this morning. No specific demand for payment, just that the "loan" has been transferred. I'm sure a demand is also in the post.

I only got through the first 16 pages of this post, so hopefully this isn't a repost, but I found this on the Citizen Advice's website: Check if you have to pay a debt - Citizens Advice

The two points I took away from it were:

You might not have to pay a debt if: it’s been six years or more since you made a payment or were in contact with the creditor

and

If you need to check the details of a debt, you can phone your creditor. It’s important you don’t contact a creditor in writing if you think the debt might be statute barred. This includes sending a text or an email, or talking to them on webchat.

Writing to them could make it look like you’re agreeing you owe the money. This might reset the time limit - this means it will be another 6 years before the debt is statute barred.

The last one is the most interesting to me.

Hope this helps a little, and I will be watching this thread with interest and I look forward to my next contact with them.

IOM have a Limitation Act 1984 has something in there about 'loans' in one of the sections, but don't understand it. Possibly similar to Stature Barred?

Grasping at straws now

[Nanas1]

Unfortunately a lot on here are getting mightily mixed up with what these letters actually are.

They are debt collection letters, a debt non of us knew or know about.

Treat them in the first instance as debts one does not know about, treat them exactly as if someone came to the front door asking for money one would simply ask for proof.

Dispute the debt, this is totally free you don't need expensive solicitors at this stage for that. You are covered by FCA guidelines on debt dispute.
IF and a big IF they come back with further letters claiming proof, the next step is to ask for;

A SIGNED credit agreement (original copy)
A SIGNED terms and conditions agreemnt
A SIGNED payment amount, payment terms, loan duration.

I see a lot of post about involving police, the police will have zero interest in theses cases these are civil disputes. Stick to financial authorities and legislators.

Finally if we do go to court for proof of loan, with WTT or any advising barrister, G**sto** will need to prove we took out loans, what better defence can we all have than the Crown? If the Crown and HMRC have proved in a Crown Court these are not loans, and indeed changed the law accordingly, then good luck to any legal team trying to overturn HMRC's decisions.

I am going to sign up to WTT for support, I too have excellent tax lawyers, however they are just that tax lawyers.

Remember all this is not a resurrection of the loan charge this is a debt collection dispute of a loan.

It looks as though we are all sticking together and sharing what we know. However, we are all in the same boat awaiting responses which I admit for some must be awful.

STAY STRONG

I too received a letter from these lot, as with the ones I received from Trusthelpline, i WILL IGNORE THEM until such time as they contact me again. On the Trusthelpline ones, I simply told them to naff off and never heard from them again. I have not settled with HMRC and don't really intend to either. They sent me a letter the other week, no details of how much i owe, just a regimented letter to the masses. I will await further correspondence from them too before I do anything.

[Nanas1]

Unfortunately a lot on here are getting mightily mixed up with what these letters actually are.

They are debt collection letters, a debt non of us knew or know about.

Treat them in the first instance as debts one does not know about, treat them exactly as if someone came to the front door asking for money one would simply ask for proof.

Dispute the debt, this is totally free you don't need expensive solicitors at this stage for that. You are covered by FCA guidelines on debt dispute.
IF and a big IF they come back with further letters claiming proof, the next step is to ask for;

A SIGNED credit agreement (original copy)
A SIGNED terms and conditions agreemnt
A SIGNED payment amount, payment terms, loan duration.

I see a lot of post about involving police, the police will have zero interest in theses cases these are civil disputes. Stick to financial authorities and legislators.

Finally if we do go to court for proof of loan, with WTT or any advising barrister, G**sto** will need to prove we took out loans, what better defence can we all have than the Crown? If the Crown and HMRC have proved in a Crown Court these are not loans, and indeed changed the law accordingly, then good luck to any legal team trying to overturn HMRC's decisions.

I am going to sign up to WTT for support, I too have excellent tax lawyers, however they are just that tax lawyers.

Remember all this is not a resurrection of the loan charge this is a debt collection dispute of a loan.

It looks as though we are all sticking together and sharing what we know. However, we are all in the same boat awaiting responses which I admit for some must be awful.

STAY STRONG

I received latter from Infinity Solutions Limited referring Felicitas Solutions as The Assignee of the load with a copy of letter from them demanding the full amount, and treathning with Debt collectors, what is going on can anyone please help with asking for 33K after settling HMRC for almost 25K

Really need help here please

What is the WTT Website??

[Smudge67er]

Hi everyone, I have received a similar letter. Currently stating that the 'debt' has been moved from Sanzar to the chasers.

They never mentioned the word ‘loan’ to me. I still have emails from Sanzar explaining how ‘the solution’ worked. Copy and pasted below.

**We at Sanzar can take you on as an employee and your agency or client is invoiced as your timesheets are submitted. Once your agency has paid for your services, Sanzar immediately pay you your 85% having deducted all tax and National Insurance.

The 85% that you receive consists of two payments. Both of these payments are received in conjunction with each other. One of these payments is your PAYE wage. This is based upon the UK national minimum wage of £5.76 per hour and you pay full Tax and NI on this wage, thereby fulfilling your legal obligations upon this wage.

The Second portion of your 85% is received by yourself via an off shore trust in the form of a payment on account. These payments on account are resolved at the end of the tax year through execution of documentation that ensures they are non taxable.

I have the same as PT101. I also have the email with all my joining documentation from Sanzar. No mention of 'loan' and certainly no loan agreement to sign. If this debt is over x years old can I not just tell them to take a hike? My period with Sanzar was thankfully brief, and over 10 years ago.

What did you think this was?

Did you see that documentation?

We have that document.

I can make an argument that it was not a loan.
.

What document do you have, that I don't have?

I've not engaged with them so far, and will wait out for further advice. I settled my debt with HMRC many moons ago.

[Wazza1882]

Sajid javid resigns!

Well! I wonder what impact this might have on loan charges or on IR35?

Interesting. Rishi Sunak to take over.

[Smudge67er]

Have just joined WTT, slick , easy, professional...
Advise to do same..

Can you please post/send details on how I do this? Happy to help chip in to fight this.

[MrO666]

IOM have a Limitation Act 1984 has something in there about 'loans' in one of the sections, but don't understand it. Possibly similar to Stature Barred?

Grasping at straws now

My understanding is that if in at least the last 6 years you have not acknowledged a debt in writing, have not made any payment and the lender has not issued a CCJ against you, then there are grounds to claim that the debt is statute barred. However, I'm not a legal expert and that's just what I've read.

The issue here is, these are not legitimate loans as we all know.

As I said previously, I'd be pretty surprised if the the mighty legal minds of Gladstones think they've got a strong enough case to take each and every letter recipient to court. Remember that all these schemes were more or less mirror images of each other, the paperwork was all the same give or take. So if they go to court and loose a single case, then by default it means they'll loose every other case, and they don't want that. I suspect they're just hoping that some will cave in and pay the smaller sums asked for.....it's cheap money for them. I really think they'll push and push on this but without going to the courts. Gladstone are in the business of chasing parking ticket fines for a couple of hundred quid, not coming after alleged debts for 10's of thousands. I don't think they're geared up to go to court against heavy hitting barristers...............and that's what would happen if push comes to shove.