Being contacted by your creditors is stressful and it can often be difficult to tell what’s harassment and what’s acceptable debt collection activity. This section will give you information on what is normally classed as harassment and how to deal with it.
Your creditors are allowed to contact you if you aren’t making your contractual payments, but it's important to be aware that some forms of contact are outlawed by industry rules or codes of practice, and some of them are illegal.
Here are some of the things your creditors shouldn't do:
- Call you at unreasonable times
- Call you at work without permission or after you’ve told them to stop
- Discuss your debts with a family member or employer
- Take payments without your permission
- Refuse to deal with advice agencies like us, or not giving you a fair ‘breathing space’ after you’ve contacted an advice agency for help
- Pressure you to pay off a debt by borrowing more money
- Use legal or technical language to confuse you
- Send letters that look like court forms
- Refuse to give you information about your account when you ask for it
- Pretend to have legal powers they don’t have
- Add unreasonable charges which are higher than the actual costs of collecting the debt
- Continue to contact you for payment when the debt is being disputed
- Continue to demand payment when a debt is statute barred – meaning the law says the debt is too old to chase through the courts
If you feel you’re being harassed, or a creditor or debt collector isn’t treating you fairly, find out how you can make a complaint to your creditor.