Is it against the law not to pay my debts ?

[CockneyMafia 10]

Regardless of how it would affect my credit, etc, I don't think I would be able to sleep at night knowing I was running out on my debts. It is stealing, in my opinion, and I couldn't live with myself.

 

There is debt and there is debt though.

 

If banks turn round to their customers and triple the interest rate on loan repayments overnight, or start charging extortiante and (frankly illegal) charges for payment defaults, then I would argue that the banks deserve everything they get.

[DaFoot 10]

I have often thought about trying to get my debt written off/running from it.

 

Then again I know I'd be annoyed at others causing my costs to go up (eg. fraudulent insurance claims pushing premiums up). So I decided that I'll stick it out and go through the long/painful process of paying it back, after all, I generated the debt through my own stupidity/naivety.

 

Ask yourself if you would feel at all guilty about the effects of 'escaping' your debt would be on others.

 

If you can live with that I guess it's an easy decision.

[Crayfish 10]

So this is the bloke responsible for the global economic meltdown!

[punk 10]

No it wouldn't. It would be theft. Theft is the act of 'intending to permantly deprive ...... '. Fraud is misrepresentation.

 

Don't be ridiculous, it's pure and simple fraud. If you arrange a loan without intending to pay it back you ARE misrepresenting to the creditor. It's not theft as the person is consenting to give you the money (albeit under false-pretences).

 

Intent has nothing to do with classing it as theft or fraud. If you deceive someone into giving you money it's fraud. If you take it from them without their consent it's theft.

 

Not that any of this has anything to do with the OPs problem/question.

[Ouija 10]

pay £1 per month to each creditor mate. it's a loophole and will go on for time evermore, until your creditors decide to make you bankrupt. it delays the inevitable for a good few years, gives you breathing space, but bankruptcy will probably be forced on you... if they can find you.

 

Would they do that, though, if you had nothing worth taking? I thought that was only a route they go down for businesses to get a share of any assets left. If it's just a person with no assets to speak of, it would just wipe the debt and they'd end up worse off as they'd get nothing, surely?

[happyhippy 11]

Don't be ridiculous, it's pure and simple fraud. If you arrange a loan without intending to pay it back you ARE misrepresenting to the creditor. It's not theft as the person is consenting to give you the money (albeit under false-pretences).

 

Intent has nothing to do with classing it as theft or fraud. If you deceive someone into giving you money it's fraud. If you take it from them without their consent it's theft.

 

Not that any of this has anything to do with the OPs problem/question.

 

No, it's not mate.

 

Fraud means things like pretending to be someone you aren't, like taking a loan out in a false name.

 

Obtaining a pecuniary advantage by deception means using a real identity for your own devices (like using someone else's credit card), OR things like selling someone goods which you know are defective.

 

Theft, very specifically is the act of "intending to permanently deprive someone of property belonging to another".

 

If you enter into a loan, and have no intention of paying it back, it most definitely is theft, and not fraud.

 

Proving that would be a hell of a different matter though!

[upinwath 10]

I don't know if this is helpful but a bloke who worked in the industry once told me that they never take people to court as the terms of so many loans are unenforcible in law.

The reason that he gave was that the interest rates were so high that no court would uphold the contract. All they did was sell on the debt to other credit companies until it had done the rounds and then it was written off.

This applied to catalog credit and doorstep loans only.

 

If he wasn't fibbing or just wrong.

 

I do know that the quid a week bit is correct from mates who have been in that position.

[Ouija 10]

I don't know if this is helpful but a bloke who worked in the industry once told me that they never take people to court as the terms of so many loans are unenforcible in law.

The reason that he gave was that the interest rates were so high that no court would uphold the contract. All they did was sell on the debt to other credit companies until it had done the rounds and then it was written off.

This applied to catalog credit and doorstep loans only.

 

If he wasn't fibbing or just wrong.

 

I do know that the quid a week bit is correct from mates who have been in that position.

 

Interesting. I had a car loan years ago, that I ended up not paying off. Although I was willing to pay the balance according to the contract, which was around £300. But they wanted over £4,000. So I argued with them for a while (via various debt collectors) until deciding to ignore them and let it go to court, so I could present my side of the story there. That's nearly 8 years ago and no court summons has appeared. I still get the occasional letter offering me a "substantial discount" if I "pay with X days" I just ignore them as I know the statute of limitations has passed so they can't take it to court.

 

Yet I saw a documentary about the same company that went bust for their bad business practices a few years ago, and other people did end up paying out a fortune for cars in poor condition that in some cases they no longer had. It makes me wonder if I "slipped through the net" somehow.

[punk 10]

Obtaining [...] by deception [...] most definitely is theft, and not fraud.

 

Proving that would be a hell of a different matter though!

 

I can see why you might think that to be true, but huge parts of the Theft Act were repealed and replaced with the Fraud Act 2006 (even before this happened the sections on deception were subheaded under "Fraud and blackmail").

 

http://www.statutelaw.gov.uk/content.aspx?LegType=All+Legislation&searchEnacted=0&extentMatchOnly=0&confersPower=0&blanketAmendment=0&sortAlpha=0&PageNumber=0&NavFrom=0&parentActiveTextDocId=0&activetextdocid=1204262

 

But yeah, you're probably right. You'd need a photo of the dude sat in the bank taking out the loan whilst wearing a flashing neon sign stating "I DO NOT INTEND TO REPAY THIS LOAN" to prove it.

[melthebell 865]

If you deliberately fail to pay your debts, you are a thief!

and who are the biggest (legal) thieves???

banks, government, big business

 

edit - somebody at work a while back was telling me if you owe money (say poll tax) and it goes past 10 years without them finding you whatever, they cant do you????

not sure if thats true or not tbh