A Warning to All

[Pe7e]

Did anyone catch 'Can't Pay, We'll Take It Away' tonight C5, o0ne of the cases was a DJ who turned up late for a wedding and ended up falling out with the B & G who subsequently sued him in the small claims court. They won and were awarded £600 damages, which he didn't pay. They then upgraded this to the High Court which they also won and he had the high court enforcement officers round with an active writ for £1600+ which he couldn't pay, his equipment was seized and was about to be removed for sale when his farther in law stumped up the cash and saved the day. Scary stuff eh? Lessons to be learnt here.

[Nakatomi]

You can see the programme here... the bit with the DJ starts about 30 minutes in:

http://www.channel5.com/shows/cant-p.../episode-5-630

[DJ Jules]

To be honest, the real lesson here is that when someone complains, don't bury your head in the sand and ignore them. Then if you fail to reach agreement and they take you to court, turn up to defend. And if they still win and need payment, take it seriously and agree a payment plan (or appeal!)

I've taken a few people through small claims before and a handful of them have just ignored the court notice (and not challenged it), then ignored the demand for payment and then suddenly decided they feel like talking when I've sent them the letter saying I'm going to send the bailiffs in. Usually they say "you can't do that!" And my response has always been, yup, I can. I won in court, pay up, because the time to argue your case happened 2 months ago...

Debt collection costs are frequently far more than the original debt. Never ignore it!!

Julian

[dicky]

Interesting program Pe7e but it does confuse me as I do know that there are some things a bailiff can not seize.


The main areas where items cannot be seized are:

Bedding, clothing, furniture and provisions that the debtor and their family need for a basic level of domestic life.
Perishable goods: refrigerated foodstuffs, fresh flowers etc.
Tools of the trade: those needed by the debtor to do their job or run their business, for example tools, books, vehicles etc.

However, these goods must be used solely by the debtor for the purposes of his or her work to fall under ‘tools of the trade’. For example, a commercial van that is also used by the debtor’s spouse is available for seizure.

The only exception I know regarding tools of trade is if the debt is rates/tax arrears in which case they can be seized (sneaky governement allowing themselves more poweres than any one else eh?)

The disco equipment clearly falls into this category, and there was no mention of who the registered driver(s) of the van are so there was no evidence that it that it was not a tool of trade.

Is this TV program giving honest facts or is it for dramatic effect?

Rich

[Nakatomi]

Ah but these guys weren't just bailiffs. They were sanctioned by the high court weren't they, so different rules may apply. Plus it looked like the numpty hadn't even locked his van. And did you see how carefully the stuff was loaded?

According to other places he's had it coming a while with a string of dissatisfied customers. Maybe now he'll up his game. The initial case was apparently about a disagreement over a starting time. Surely you'd have to be pretty lax to get done over on that kind of thing if it had to end up in court.

[DJ Jules]

I keep catching a program on tele about 10:30 or 11:00am while I'm in the Gym. "The Sheriffs are coming" on BBC... They're executing high court writ to collect debts and they appear to be able to collect pretty much anything they like (but do seem to exercise judgement in order to allow businesses to keep trading to be able to be to repay debts).

Loved it when they walked in and took £30k off Barclaycard (using various directors credit cards for payment!)

Julian

[Benny Smyth]

Just the positive exposure for our industry that I love to see.

And seriously, who the loads their van like that?

[Nakatomi]

Just the positive exposure for our industry that I love to see.

And seriously, who the loads their van like that?

I've recently seen a video that's doing the rounds where a DJ is arrogantly ignoring requests. Apparently it's supposed to be hilarious but the UK DJs sharing it don't fill me with confidence they think it's wrong. So much snobbery & bad attitude out there for all to see. One guy even put a list of DJ moans on his own website

Some people are doing the trade a very bad turn, but the good guys are likely doing well out of it.

[Benny Smyth]

Some people are doing the trade a very bad turn, but the good guys are likely doing well out of it.

But how many times do you see on national television "Uhmahgawd - My wedding DJ was the most fantastic thing on the earth! I annulled my marriage so I could marry the DJ, he was that good!"

This kind of national exposure of one man is, to the average Joe, probably an accurate representation (along with the fact that they still use the same disco setup in the Queen Vic since 1985) of the mobile disco industry as a whole so, just in case, we'll use an iPod at the wedding.

Oh...one more thing:

The Bailiff uttering the spine-shuddering phrase: "I'm a DJ too."

Of course you are, son. You're not though, are you? You've got two turntables and a bedroom.

[dicky]

Just the positive exposure for our industry that I love to see.

And seriously, who the loads their van like that?

Yeah I wondered that too