A frugal life is an easy life!

If you have an unpaid debt, then it maybe purchased by a "company" called equidebt, be prepared for some telephone calls from a "company" called EQL.

The telephone call will consist of asking for the person named on the debt, followed by repeated requests for the person named on the debt, wether they are present or not.
Their advisor will give their name and state they are from a company called "EQL"

Of course, equidebt ltd and EQL are the same company.
The advisor will then completely ignore any verbal request to remove your telephone number from their records and to contact you in writing ONLY.

The equidebt or EQL advisor will then instruct you that they will simply ring you up again at another time and terminate the call.
These telephone calls could come at any time, more often than not they will come around tea time and early evening.
Equidebt's actions are standard, fair game, for a debt collection company right? WRONG!

What equidebt/EQL are doing is illegal:

• Telephone calls at unsociable hours
• Refusing continuous requests to remove your telephone number from their records - even when that telephone number belongs to someone else!
• With holding clear information about who they are working for (any written contact is made by "equidebt limited" when asked who they represent they say "EQL" - the advisor has to be asked again who EQL are, only then do they reveal they are infact equidebt)
• Refusing continuous requests to have contact made in writing only

How are equidebt/EQL breaking the law?

Administration of Justice Act 1970;
s 40 - "harassment of a would be debtor"

When notified in writing, equidebt/EQL should remove a debtor's telephone number from their records (This should not be completely ignored when equidebt rephrase their company name to "EQL").
Any telephone calls should not be at a time of unsociable hours.
When making contact via telephone or written letter, equidebt/EQL should make clear exactly who they are with immediate effect. (It is against the law to misrepresent who they are by quoting more than one company name)
At no point, should correspondence cause "duress" to the would be debtor (Telephoning when written request has been made for contact in writing only, is bad enough, but to add to the duress, by making remarks to the effect that telephone calls will carry on regardless of the would be debtor's legitimate requests to cease.

Other laws that will also be applicable:
* Consumer Credit Act 1974 - If a company do not comply with the law regarding harassment of a would be debtor, they may also be in breach of this act, as regards their suitability to hold a consumer credit license (which they will need to be able to operate as a business).
* Data Protection Act - Often, account notes from debt collection companies are not updated correctly and accurately. Which is why all correspondence should be in writing only.

For the purposes of saving time, this dad diary entry will be done in bullet format.

• Stormy night, bird feeder blew off the washing post and smashed 3 panes of glass on the greenhouse. Don't mind that, but getting glass out of grass is impossible
• A quarter of the kitchen is sat in the front room still, waiting for me to finish pipework before it can go back. Job made more difficult as I have a walking sprog to keep an eye on most of the day.
• Plumbing work to do so far - 2 radiators to move, 1 to install, and pipework up to the boiler jig to put in. Normally wouldn't take too long, but with sprog on the scene I have to be careful.
• Storms here mean tonights athletics class should be fun!
• Family visiting at the weekend, lots of housework still to do

Have  a wonderful Wednesday, where ever you get blown!

Just a quick heads up - received an email from fedex today saying my parcel had "been returned due to incorrect address"
Instructions to print off attached file and contact my nearest depot to arrange collection of said fantasy parcel.

Of course there are lots of these emails trying to catch people out - as always, do not open, simply delete.

Traditions are passed on to children around the world by their families, but here in the UK traditions are being watered down and allowed to disappear.
It is not very thrifty, to pay out for the ever increasing costs of fireworks, but the costs of losing traditions or watering down events that have took place for hundreds of years, is a process that desperately needs reversing.

Take our bonfire night celebrations.
In my area, many of the children I converse with think that the thing to do at this time, is to visit a travelling funfair, paying over the odds for rides and stalls, eating candyfloss, etc, whilst watching fireworks being let off on a hill almost a mile away and if they are lucky, seeing a bonfire being lit.

They expect to get wet (as it always rains), stand in queues for attractions, walk for miles as all the areas where the funfairs are, have no parking and public transport laid on is poor, packed out and expensive. They expect mum and dad to pay £5 to get in then £2 for a 2 minute ride on a waltzer.
Black peas, toffee apples, bonfire toffee and baked potatoes can only be found from a travelling stall, at extortionate prices, after they have queued up for 20 minutes of course. Often it is now named the bonfire night "weekend" - a misleading fact that irks me considerably - designed to part people with more money by visiting the same fair in a different local location.
Not very frugal is it!
Nor does it uphold traditions that millions of British children have been lucky enough to experience over the decades.

A traditional bonfire night, is a fantastic feast of seasonal colours, smells, all enjoyed with friends and family. It can also provide a valuable thrifty service.
In today's world, we are forever being charged more of our hard earned money for basic refuse disposal - landfill costs are a record levels - bonfire night gives us all a perfect opporunity to get rid of rubbish, broken furniture, old sheds, etc.
Our small bonfire night celebrations with a fire, fireworks, traditional bonfire night fayre (which all takes places, rain or not, on November 5th) is now a regular "burn bin" occasion - whereby all the important letters that need to be shredded, are saved in bags and boxes and thrown on to the fire once its established.

Bonfire night used to be great fun for children, collecting bonfire material from neighbours for days, building the fire itself, eaten red hot potatoes that have been wrapped in tinfoil and thrown into the hot embers, dripping with butter and cheese, parents letting off all kinds of fireworks, all being shared around the fire as all the local families come together for a night of fun.

Sprog 1 has always had the full bonfire night tradition at our house.
A fire, fireworks, toffee apples, baked spuds cooked in the fire, etc.
Now with sprog 2, it is very important that this tradition continues.
It is my job as a parent - one that I enjoy of course - to pass on traditions to my kids, in the hope that they too, will pass them on to their children.

A funfair is not part of bonfire night tradition - as the neighbourhood children told us a couple of years ago, as they sat on wooden crates, around our small bonfire, watching the wife let off fireworks in the street and writing their names with sparklers, then scoffing piping hot baked spuds, dripping with butter and cheese, even eating the skins - the funfair was expensive and packed out, full of mud, we saw only a few fireworks in the distance as we had to walk half a mile to get there because there was no parking... we didn't even see a fire!
We only got on two rides and had to queue for an hour and we got wet. This is miles better!

Twenty seven phone calls over 24 hours and STILL I haven't been able to cancel my AA membership!

Each time I ring up, "We are very busy dealing with breakdown calls, please try again later" - then I am cut off.

I have tried afternoons, evenings, after midnight, early morning and dinner time.
I have tried all five of the options allowed by the AA
The one occasion I did manage to get through, They promised to call me back, they left a message saying they would call me back again in 30 minutes, that was over an hour ago!

Why would I want to cancel my AA membership?
New customers get my level of cover at £150 a year - the same price as I got it for last year. The problem is, my AA membership will renew soon for the value price of £235 - £85 MORE than I and new customers get it for!

Now if only I could cancel it....

UPDATE:
After ringing up on the "breakdown number" - I was transferred over to the correct department, who then transferred me to the AA's "cancellation department"

They asked why I was cancelling, (Because of the £85 INCREASE in price, for "Free" legal advice and two "Free" extra call outs) the advisor offered to discount the price down, from £235 to £164 - still an increase of almost £15, but I can live with that.

A letter came confirming the renewal and stating that £235 would be taken from my account in the coming month!

Once again I was back on the membership phone number, which once again cut me off, on all the options given, after making me listen to all the options each time.
This time I tried the membership complaints number - kindly left on this post via a comment, posted by an AA member of staff - after 10 minutes on hold, I got through to Hayden.
Hayden informed me that the previous advisor had "issued a credit" on my account so that "the system" (isn't it always the system?) would see the credit, then would deduct this from the payment it takes for the renewal... leaving me just the £164 to pay.

The reason I got a letter telling me they were taking £235 for the renewal, is because the AA is currently using "an old system" (there's the system again) that could not adjust to quote the actual amount it was taking for a renewal.
I was assured that "the system" will only take £164 - if not, I was to ring him back personally and the overcharge would be credited back to my account.
I was told not to worry though, as next year their "new system" would be up and running - adding that he could see why "customers got confused"
If it works, then we shall see later this month.

Whatever the AA are paying the top brass who oversee their systems, I'd sack them off as they are not doing their job!

• Sort out your membership phone number and options - if the only way to discuss membership or cancel, is to pretend to have a breakdown, then it will cause more delays to your breakdown staff?
• When a customer reports a problem, don't ignore it! - DO something about it, then it won't be a problem for other customers?
• Sort out your "system" so that customers are not sent out the wrong price for renewal - you'll then find that you won't have thousands of customers ringing back, increasing the workload and burden on your call centre advisors, to try and correct and rectify mistakes your system is making?
• Stop cutting membership number callers off - It's hardly a good advertisement for your company and you may find that posts like this won't appear on websites?

A little bit of common sense, makes life easier for your customers, your staff and may even allow you the financial flexibility to reduce your prices, attracting more business?

UPDATE 2:
The farce continues - now the AA send me a letter saying they couldn't get the funds to pay for new membership from the exact same account details they took the membership money from 12 months ago.

Have the AA ever heard of their legal responsibility, under the Data Protection Act, to maintain customer accounts in an accurate manner?
It would appear not....