CCJ set aside

[Sonic17]

Hi, I have a CCJ which I have applied to have set aside - with a hearing date set for 3 weeks time. Basically the original judgment was for National Ins contributions.

The correspondence was sent to my previous flat earlier this year and the judgment issued in april of this year (which i only recently discovered). But I sold my flat in 2004 and can prove this to be so. I have read that a summons being sent to wrong address is a good reason to have a judgment set aside by right. But I have also read that this is only the case if I think I don't owe the money. I have contacted NI contributions and am happy to bring my payments up to date but am worried that by doing so I am admitting that I 'do' owe the money to which the original judgment relates, and therefore compromise having it set aside. I am quite happy to turn up at the hearing, hopefully have the judgment set aside but then pay what I owe. Would I be better not to pay anything yet and say at the hearing that i am not sure I owe the money.??

I am also worried that NI contributions will argue that the judgment should stand as I should have informed them of my new address legally and so they had no option to serve communication at the only address they had - which I suppose is fair enough. But it still doesn't change thae fact that I was unable to respond to a summons that I knew nothing about.

I would very much appreciate any advice in this matter. Thanks

[themas]

It appears you accept you do owe the money. It's therefore pretty unlikely your application to set aside will succeed - this normally only happens if there is evidence that the outcome of the case would have been different if you had been able to respond to the claim.

Were you aware you owed the money before you found out about the CCJ? If not, you could argue (and you would have to produce good reasons to back it up) that you did not know, but that you would have paid on getting the Court claim so the CCJ would never have been necessary. You would also need evidence that you could have raised the money at the time. I don't know whether this approach would succeed, but it might be worth a shot.

In my view it would be helped if you pay the money before the hearing (and take evidence of payment to Court) or take the money to the Court (cash or bankers draft - not an ordinary cheque).

[Sonic17]

Okay thanks for your help. Paying off the debt prior to the hearing was my initial approach and indeed I do want to bring my NI contributions payments up to date anyway. It's just that I wondered if I would be compromising the chance of having it set aside by paying as I am admitting that I owe it.
But as I would find it difficult to prove that I do not owe it, perhaps I should try the approach that I could have paid it off immediately had I received the summons. The fact is, I sold my flat where the summons and reminders etc were sent t, 2 years ago now, so have not been able to respond to correspondence sent prior to the summons either. Although I accept the arguement that I should have given them an updated address.

[Sonic17]

Hi,
I have some more to add to this post. My court date for the set aside is this coming Fri 29th Sept. I have discovered after a break-down of the original bill for the summons and subsequent judgement that the period for NI contributions for which I was billed includes a period of over a year when I was claiming job seekers allowance. I have received a letter from the benefit archive office confirming this and that I was awarded tax credits for this period.

I have called NI contributions about this and they say that as I was registered self employed prior to this I should have contacted them to say that I was no longer self employed when I was claiming JS allowance. However, I was unaware that I needed to do this as I believed that the very fact that I was getting NI tax credits for being unemployed was self explanatory that I could not be self employed at the same time as being unemployed. (Basically my work at the time completely dried up until I had no other option but to sign on).

Does the fact that my judgement amount for NI contributions includes a period for when I was claiming JS allowance become an additional defence for having the original judgment set aside??? Because even if I do still owe contributions it will certainly be less than the original summons claimed I owed.

Thanks for any further help here.

[themas]

You say you were getting JSA and have confirmation that you were awarded "tax credits" for that period. Later you refer to "NI tax credits". I'm a little confused. Tax credits are nothing to do with JSA or NI. They are a quite separate matter, administered by HMRC (previously Inland Revenue).

Do you mean you have confirmation you were getting NI contributions credited? If so, then clearly the outcome of any Court case would have been different from what occurred because you would have been able to prove that you did not owe all of the money being claimed. In this case, it seems there could well be a good case for set aside, but there are no guarantees about how a judge will see it.

I don't know how the NI contributions system keeps its records but what you say seems perfectly logical to me. Presumably NI Contributions Record Centre will have been sent information via the Job Centre system that you were being credited with contributions, and this should have gone onto your record. If it did, they should not have billed you for that period; if it did not, then there appears to have been a fault in their records system somewhere.

As I said before, either pay what you owe before the Court hearing, or take the money to Court.

[Sonic17]

Yes it was NI contributions credits being paid.

I have faxed to both the court and NI debt recovery a copy of the letter from Social Security of the period some 6 years ago when I was claiming. I have also stated that I would like to sort out what I owe and am happy to bring cash with me to the court to settle what I owe, taking into consideration this period when i credits had already been paid by social security.

Thankyou for your advice !!

[Sonic17]

Just an update on the result of the court verdict on this matter. I faxed copies of the documents to the court and HM revenue 3 days prior to the hearing. The documents were a letter from social security stating I was claiming JS allowance and being awarded NI contribution credits for some of the period I was billed and also a letter from my solicitor stating that my flat where summons was sent was sold 18 months prior.

My main hope was that, had I received the summons and therefore been able to defend myself, then it would have altered the amount of the original judgement because I did not owe all the money.

Prior to the hearing, which was delayed by half an hour, I had the opportunity to chat to the HM revenue guy. It was all very amiable and I stated that the purpose of the set aside hearing for me was not to avoid payment at all but simply to pay the correct amount that I owe and have a new judgment if necessary to reflect this. And that by having the judgment set aside i was able to maintain a good credit record as I wanted to apply for finance to build a house. And by having it set aside it would not alter my resolve to pay and clear what I owed.

He even told me that he felt that the judge would 95% decide im my favour. I explained that whatever happened i wanted to settle my account there and then as I had brought cash with me.

However, he was hoping to adjourn the hearing as he was unsure how much I actually owed in light of the period when I was claiming JS allowance and said that Newcastle (where it is calculated) can take 2 or 3 months to do so. I explained to him that I was hoping to settle it all today and was even happy to pay some money on account even if he was unsure of how much I owed.

In court however, the judge didn't seem interested in the amount or whether the amount of the original judgment was incorrect. He said that this would have been a matter for appeal.

[Sonic17]

Cont.. All he was concerned with was this - was the original summons served correctly.?? I had to admit that although it was served at the wrong address, the Nat Ins were unaware of my correct address because I had not informed them. I explained that this was not done on purpose, merely something that did not occur to me.


As it was therefore served at last known address he could find no fault with the service and could consequently find no grounds to set aside. i even explained that had I been able to defend myself it would have altered the amount and result of the verdict. But this did not seem to matter.


I began to to realise that I was not going to achieve the set aside. But in hind-sight I was very thank-ful for my chat with the HM revenue guy before-hand. I don't think it was going how he had 'expected' either. He scribbled a note to me asking if I had the full amount in cash on me of the original summons. I nodded and he scribbled that I should offer that amount.

So I did. The judge then allowed to adjourn for a few minutes for us to agree terms and amount. I agreed to pay the original amount on the grounds that when they had re-calculated what I owed minus the period I was claiming JS allowance, they would then refund me the over-payment or if I wished the amount would be a credit for future payments. On this basis the HM revenue was happy to allow the set aside. The judge accepted and set aside the judgment.

This was all I was hoping to achieve. I never wanted to get out of paying what I really owed. Neither was HM revenue wanting to over-charge me. I paid and achieved the set aside. Any over-payment will be refunded or credited.

This has been worth it. My mortgage broker says that A CCJ that is satisfied is not regarded as highly as a CCJ that is not there at all.

Finally I am very grateful to the HM revenue guy as he seemed to genuinely wish to

[Sonic17]

Finally I am very grateful to the HM revenue guy as he seemed to genuinely wish to be helpful to me at the same time as not compromising the HM revenue's interests.