To be wary of making any further payments?

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I've been very stupid by not keeping a log of everything and am now in a real pickle.

A friend allowed me to purchase items on a catalogue in her name. This was various items over 12 months. I was not the only person, which means the payments made monthly onto the catalogue were for various peoples orders.

I stupidly didn't keep a record of what was bought and what was paid back.

I've asked a few times now for her to send me information of the total cost, along with payments made towards that. She keeps saying she will do this, but never does.

She's not messaging me up to 10 times a day saying I need to pay at least 100 per month because I owe her over 2k.

Looking at my bank statements I have already paid back over 1k.

I ordered clothing, kids Xmas presents last year, a smart watch, laptop.

Am I Being a terrible person to not want to keep putting money into her bank without seeing proof of how much I owe at least?

I'm worried that I'll end up paying money back indefinitely even after clearing the balance.

I'm grateful that I had the opportunity to buy things on the catalogue, but I just want a statement or something to show where I'm up to.

I now feel harassed and stressed by the constant texts. Should I just put more money into her bank?

Why would there be no interest though? That how the catalogue makes money.
I think onus is on you to work out what you ordered. Not a £500 max, as that’s not really going to help the matter. I think you owe a lot more than you realise and she’s panicking.

This all sounds a bit odd letting several people buy stuff in her name. Is she a glorified loan shark?

It sounds like you probably orderd over 1k or stuff, so i'd pay this onje and then tell her you need to meet up to sort through what's left to pay so she was prewarning she won't get another months pay without seeing you and you have plenty of time to sort it. I think deciding right at the 24th hour that you're not paying this month is pretty bad.

So i'd pay and say before next month we need to meet up. I'm make a list of what i remember ordering, and you bring a copy of the order so we can tick it off and confirm prices and then we can work out how quickly i can get it paid off.

Presumably if its 12 months interest-free the interest is just kicking in so i'd try and get it paid off in a lump sum if possible with a months interest added on.

You were both really irresponsible tbh but it's gonig to take both of you to sort it out

You need to work out / find out:

• what you ordered and price
• when you ordered it
• what the payment terms were for it (e.g.you mention interest free, but are you sure some items weren’t but now pay later? Very - as an example - also do something called “Take 3” where you choose some items for interest free over a short period)
• what the interest rates have been. With Very, I believe they can give you 28 days notice and change them.
• whether your “friend” ordered on her account or had an official agent role separating your payments (I don’t know if Very do this)
• how your “friend” has been allocating payments

I’d then work out what you owe, assuming the payment allocation was done in the best way for you - her problem if it wasn’t. And don’t pay a penny more than that.

Why would there be no interest though? That how the catalogue makes money.

Interest-free periods are common, to suck people into buying. Many catalogues have a significant mark-up on pricing compared to the high street or online retailers, so interest rates are just one way of making money. They then rely on people not paying the debt off during the interest free period, and also on the sort of accounting explained by Ellisandra so that even if people intend to pay off items while they are interest-free, their money doesn't always go to that portion of the debt.

That's true - they came to your home address so she must be acting as an agent. Contact the catalogue company and explain that you are not being given information and can they tell you how much you owe.

@Freddiefox there’s no interest because it hooks people.
They still make money from people who pay it off without interest because:

• they got the sale in the first place, over a shop where you had to pay upfront or at least on a credit card
• they usually charge more in the first place, because they’ve got access to people who want things they can’t afford and this way they can get them
• many people DO end up with some interest charges, because they don’t understand the system, or the catalogues make it complicated so they don’t. One look at the Very page because of this thread, and I’m reading they have interest free, but now pay later, “take 3”... my friend has an account and she hasn’t 2 GCSEs to rub together. She has NO CLUE how to select the best repayment option.

Didn't prices used to vary depending on how many payments you chose to make?

My mum used to run a catalogue for the commission to earn herself a bit of money.

Obviously everyone had their own payment card though!

@diddl yeah! I remember that from my mum’s Kay’s catalogue in the 80s.

This sounds really dodgy but it's hard to tell if it's deliberately dodgy or if this is just disorganised chaos.

It would be extremely rare in this day and age for someone to not have an online account with an order history. It should be easily possible to go back through the account history and see the purchases, how much were paid at the time and how long the interest free period was for.

From then, you need to calculate what the outstanding balance was at the end of the interest free period and multiply this by how much interest is charged then add the two together. This will give you the final amount that you owe your friend.

It won't help you to go through catalogues yourself trying to guesstimate when you don't know exactly what you bought or what the interest payments are. Most catalogues have extremely high interest for anything not paid off before the end of the interest free period.

You and your friend need to sit down together and go through her account. It might be that she's in a panic now and has no idea who bought what and can't face going through it but she has to. If she really won't do that, then she's almost certainly hiding something.

On the vanishingly rare chance that she can't view her account history online, she can get past copies of paper statements and order history from the company.

There is absolutely no way that this information isn't readily obtainable and she needs to provide it or you'll just be sending money off into the ether.

I doubt the catalogue will deal with op direct, gdpr and she is not their customer.

You need a spreadsheet listing each item you've bought, find the price of each item, and what you've already paid out.

Didn't you receive a sales not in each package delivered?

Send her a text, today saying:

Hi, I want to get this sorted ASAP. Please could you give me a time/place we can meet up and work out a final payment. I dont want to leave you out of pocket, but I'm a bit worried that I might end up overpaying, so to be fair to us both, let's work out a final amount. I won't be transferring any more money until we have done this, as I've already given you 1400, and I believe I only borrowed x amount. As the interest free period was two years, I don't believe any interest will have been added. Hopefully see you soon.

How do you know this 'friend'

To add all items and add interest I guess. Though there should be no interest, how can I be fully certain there isn't?

You didnt agree to pay interest before 2 years, so there you will not pay any interest. You want to pay her back, not more, as that wasnt agreed.

If she wont agree a final payment, it does sound like shes a 'loan shark', i.e. she intends to make money from letting you buy things from her account, and will use threats/violence to keep you paying long after you should. In which case you should ring the (non emergency police as this is illegal.

You need to sit down and go through the catalogue or on line and write down everything you ordered and total it.

Then you need to go through your bank statements and work out how much you have paid her.

Then I would email it all to her and show how much you have left to pay if anything.

It may be that others are not paying her as regularly and she knows you will if she hassles you.

You need it all in writing and you both need to agree it.

If your friend has multiple customers then she is effectively running a little business, she will get commission on her orders. She didn't offer out of the goodness of her heart. She may have only been making minimum payments and has got herself into a mess. It's very worrying that you have no record of payments, it will be your word against hers. I know it's her catalogue but it depends on whether she ordered the goods in your name or hers.

If she wants to take legal action to get money back from you, then she clearly needs to lay out how much you owe her including interest. Ie she needs to work it out.
I still am not sure how the interest would work. If you buy 1 item for £1200 abd pay £100 per month, I assume that avoids interest. But in month 2 someone else buys something for £600. Now say they don't pay so only £100 covers the whole balance. Does £100 go against item 1? Is it pro rated across the 2 items?
Ie interest could accrue abd no one knows which item it belongs to (unless it's like someone said and each friend had their own sub account, but if it e we irked like that, there would be an easy statement to provide)
I'm an accountant and it would take me quite a few hours to try and work out what you owed plus interest and I'd only know I was correct if I was able to track the entire account from the start! Else it would just be a best guess!

User - it wont be Op's word against hers.

The friend took out the credit agreements, it is her responsibility to pay. The OP has a moral duty to pay for what she had, but legally the friend is liable for it all, unless she has a written agreement from the OP. Which should include amount, interest etc, which there isnt.

Loan sharking is illegal, anyway, so the friend wouldn't be able to go to the police anyway,

It's very worrying that you have no record of payments, it will be your word against hers.

From what the OP has said, she has been making the payments by bank transfer, which is something - she would be able to prove how much she has transferred to her 'friend'.

From the Money Advice Service:

Some loan sharks will threaten you by saying you will be prosecuted and even sent to prison if you don’t pay up.

This can’t happen – an unauthorised lender such as a loan shark has no legal right to recover the debt.

In fact, they have no legal right to make you pay the loan back at all – because the loan is illegal.

This happened to me many many years ago. I ordered stuff from a friends catalogue and paid it all off by giving her a cheque or cash once a month. She was paying the minimum and getting hit by interest.

I suggest you sit down with her and go through all her statements and your bank statements and show her that you have paid it off.

If you bought things that way because of the 0% interest for a year, and you have been paying £100/month for the entire year, starting from month 1 ... you need to immediately sit down and make a lust of what you bought with prices. See how much you've paid off, then tell her you will pay the balance of 'your' portion immediately, but only be paying interest from month 13 onward.

She needs to provide details of what is still in arrears for each and every person, not just demand whoever can pay should be paying to cover everybody.

And never, ever do something like this again. Just daft.

Right so what you were doing was wrong and I think you already know that.

Write her an EMAIL - have WRITTEN PROOF

To say you’ve paid her X amount on X dates and in order to pay her further you want to see the physical list of things that have been bought so that you can identify what’s yours and what’s not.

Do not meet up to do this, you need physical evidence.

It doesn’t matter if her credits being affected it matters that she’s being secretive to get people to probably pay off her own accounts.

ASK FOR PROOF

AstridAsterson The problem with this situation is that we don't know whether the OP's friend is:

a. A loan shark exploiting the OP
b. Acting legitimately as an agent for the catalogue (note that items were delivered directly to the OP which would support this)
c. A well-meaning friend who has got herself into a hopeless muddle with all sorts of purchases from different people on one catalogue account which are now attracting interest.

If it's B. the friend would in theory be able to pursue a civil claim against the OP, if the OP genuinely owes her money.

Why didn’t you keep note of the things you ordered and their price?
Why didn’t you just get credit out in your own name?

I think all you can do is demand proof of how much you owe and stop payments until it’s provided, tell her you will pay what you owe but you need proof of what you owe and what you have paid already.