County Court Judgements Explained

Having a County Court Judgement or CCJ issued against you will have a severe impact on your credit rating, as it signifies that you have had critical issues paying back a loan or other form of credit, to the extent where your creditor has had to take court action against you to try and recover the debt.

If you get into arrears and fail to come to a repayment agreement, your creditor might make a decision that pursuing a CCJ is the only alternative. The 1st you are going to hear about it is when you obtain a 'Claim Form' through the post, sent to you by the county court. This form will set out the particulars of the claim, which includes who the creditor is and how significantly they say you owe them.

If you have been unaware of the debt, for instance if you'd moved residence and lost contact with the creditor, then repaying the complete debt now will cease proceedings going any additional. If however you cannot clear the debt, then you ought to fill out an 'Admissions Form' which will also have been sent to you.

This type asks for info about your revenue and expenses, which the court will take into account when hearing your case. The Admissions Form ought to be returned inside 16 days of the postmark it holds, although if you intend to dispute or defend the claim then you can apply to have the hearing delayed an additional 14 days in order to prepare your defence.

When you have filled in these types and returned them to the court, there will be a straightforward hearing carried out in private. You never have to attend the hearing so lengthy as you've fully filled in the needed forms, or unless you want to dispute aspects of the claim.

At the hearing, the court will objectively evaluation the claim and the details you have provided, and come to a choice about the quantity of money (if any) you owe, and how it ought to be repaid. It's important to note that no 1 is becoming located 'guilty' or 'innocent' right here, the court is basically attempting to pretty resolve a civil economic dispute.

If the choice upholds the claim against you, then the court order or CCJ is issued. Even at this stage you can quit the harm to your credit record, as you are going to have a single month from the date of the court hearing to repay the debt in complete to cease the CCJ being place on record.

Right after a month, the CCJ will be entered on to the Register of County Court Judgements, and from there it will make its way onto your credit files held by the various credit reference agencies.

The presence of one or far more CCJs on your credit file will efficiently close off most sorts of finance to you, as most lenders will be very reluctant to advance credit to people in these situations. As soon as, even so, you have cleared the debt, then the judgement will be marked as 'satisfied', and whilst this will not take away it from your record it is a lot much less harmful to your credit worthiness than an uncleared CCJ.

If you have a CCJ on your record, you may well be tempted by organizations promising to take away it and clean up your rating. However, this is only feasible in a few circumstances. At times, the CCJ is entered on to your record by mistake even though you cleared the debt inside the a single month time limit. If this has happened then you have the proper to have it removed from your records.

The only other ways to have a CCJ removed is to show that there was anything wrong with the way in which the judgement was awarded. If, for example, you didn't get the initial Claim Form, and you were unaware of the proceedings, then you didn't have the likelihood to defend yourself and so the judgement is invalid.

In these situations, you can apply to the court to 'set aside' the judgement and it will be removed from your file, with the entire process beginning once more with a new claim and hearing. Any attempt to gain a 'set aside' without having a reasonable argument could be observed as wasting the court's time, with all the legal penalties that would entail.

If you receive a Claim Form by way of the post, it's crucial not to panic. Despite the fact that a CCJ against your name is dangerous to your credit rating, it isn't a criminal matter and will not lead to additional action such as repossession of your property or bankruptcy. The CCJ process is there so that the court can aid to resolve your debt in a way that is fair to each you and your creditor. lawyers in san diego