Terms & Conditions

[Anonymous]

We are close to taking some of our Housing Benefit Overpayment debtors to court to obtain an enforcement order and are considering using Money Claim online to make such claims.

However, it will be difficult for me to obtain a work credit or debit card to make those payments. How does anyone else make payments to the courts for this service? And, what are people’s experiences with it?

Also, I have so many differing opinions as to whether making a claim is a county court judgment, and therefore, affects their credit rating. Or not. Any thoughts?

Thanks.

[Anselmo]

I have used this service previously to recover small amounts of rent arrears, when possession proceedings would not have been appropriate.

I found that it was fairly easy to use, the only problem was when the order came through there was a mistake on it and getting this corrected took some time due to long lines of communication, but it was sorted eventually. It was probably a one-off.

We paid using the company’s credit card- I’m afraid it’s the only way. I double-checked with the court and they confirmed that there is (at least currently) no alternative.

The end result is indeed a County Court Judgement, all claims are handled by a bulk centre at Northampton County Court. As far as I know it will therefore adversely affect someone’s credit rating.

Overall I would endorse it as a method- certainly much, much easier than the ‘paper’ route.

[i:fee76096b1][Edit: Congrats to the poster below for finding an alternative payment method!!][/i:fee76096b1]

[mcmahow]

Hi I work in the Benefit section as Overpayment Recovery Officer. I do apply for the “Award” and I have found it to be quite effective.

For the Court Fees: At first we just issued a cheque payment as we were unable to obtain a Company credit/debit card to enable us to complete the process online, even though this would save on paper usage!

Now the Court we use currently have a Suspense account in the name of CBC , funds are transferred to this account by our Legal Department. We have an in house agreement with our Legal Department whereby when I apply for the Awards I send a letter with the application asking the courts to deduct the fees from CBC suspense account. I then inform our Legal Department that an application has been sent & for whom.

It all works fine for us and I have always been lead to believe that an Award works in exactly the same way as a County Court Judgment.

Wendy 🙂

(thanks for the congrats!!)

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