Can they charge me for this?

[holidayhelpp]

Booked a week in this country (England) in January in a holiday barn. Wasn’t clear at time of booking that a larger deposit was going to be requested at the end of this month, which is not refundable even in case of cancellation.

I need to cancel for a few reasons.

Thinking of cancelling the card they have on file and ignoring the letters I know they’ll send to my home address

They’ll want around £250. Is this something they’d pursue vigorously do you think? Anyone any experience of these kinds of things?

Pay what you owe and in future confirm any terms and conditions you aren't sure of.

A lot of these holiday lets etc in the countryside support rural economies and are diversification's of farms so chances are you are just going to take incomings from a small business or family and cause them an awful lot of hassle.

How can anyone tell you what they are likely to do, unless they work for them and even then, it might depends on circumstances.

Your dilemma is whether to ignore it and hope that they don't chase, and tell yourself that it is absolutely fine to not pay a debt because it's not money owed to an invididual so can't hurt, can it. That of course means taking the risk that they do take it to court and you end up with paying 5 times what it was in the first place, with no defence whatsoever, so that debt will never go away after court.

Or just pay, accept you made an error, and move on.

Some really crap financial advice on this thread. If you didn’t pay, it isn’t going to go from nothing to owing thousands and having the bailiffs at the door overnight. You’d have numerous opportunities to cut your losses prior to that point. And what the hell has insurance got to do with it? That wouldn’t cover this.

Would suggest appealing to the company to make some arrangement or change dates etc.

As opposed to the OP’s genius plan of cutting up cards and hiding under the bed

Pay it and then sell the booking on FB.

Why should anyone be suddenly out of pocket because you change your mind?

If you've authorised the payment already then cancelling the card won't guarantee that the further payment won't go through.

Oh OP if its in the t&c you would have ticked it to say you had read them

Of course you have to pay Im afraid.

You signed a contract and are legally obliged to pay it.

They can issue you with a money claim - for the debt, plus their fee and interest charges.

If you fail to pay that you’ll be issued a CCJ and they can pursue you for the debt (bailiff or attachment to earnings - money is forcibly taken from your wages).

Don’t bury your head in the sand and ignore it. Talk to the company.

Yeah don't default on the debt, that's a really dumb idea.

Your best bet is to call them, explain the circumstances. They may waive the deposit - or at least let you defer it to another future booking.

Deposits are there for a reason and it's unfair for you to try and wriggle out of this.

Credit Manager checking in.

If I was their Credit Manager, I would happily have a CCJ issued against you.

If on the other hand you offered to pay in instalments, I would be prepared to listen to what you had to offer.

Phone them. It's better than hiding and finding out you've got a ccj years down the line

Me too. Because guess who'll end up paying if you default? Other customers, that's who.

So true.

Oh and meant to say a firm of that size will have an arrangement with solicitors and will pay a lump sum every year for any CCS's they need issuing.

So basically they are not going to look at your debt and think nah lets not bother. They will bother.

This is the reason everyone else’s holidays are so expensive!

Why are you cancelling? Because if it isn’t severe health/ death I think you are very unethical!

Op.they just sell the debt on and could owe £1000s. Just ignore letters not pay. Phone them and talk to them. Explain the situation. However as stands you owe the £250

Don’t be a fool, op. Of course they won’t just not bother chasing it because it’s only £250. You aren’t the only one booking their holidays and you won’t be the only one with dubious morals trying this on either.
Pay up and don’t be a dick.

Call and explain your reasons for cancelling as they may have had other customers enquire about those dates and be happy to let you cancel free of charge

Or if they insist you pay the larger amount due to T&C's, they might be able to give you credit towards a future stay

Speak to them either way. I've worked in the industry and it's very frustrating when customers don't pay and ignore our efforts to reach them. There's usually some flexibility in the T&C's and if a customer has the decency to at least call and cancel, we'd always do what we could to make sure they got something in return (credit for future stay, partial refund on deposit etc.)

Some really crap financial advice on this thread. If you didn’t pay, it isn’t going to go from nothing to owing thousands and having the bailiffs at the door overnight. You’d have numerous opportunities to cut your losses prior to that point. And what the hell has insurance got to do with it? That wouldn’t cover this.

Would suggest appealing to the company to make some arrangement or change dates etc.

One of the few sensible comments and bits of advice on this thread !!

Credit Manager checking in.

If I was their Credit Manager, I would happily have a CCJ issued against you

Except CCJs don't just get issues. At the least, there would be a couple of chasing letters / a letter before claim before you even get to a court claim!

Well that's unanimous OP. You need to pay or talk to them. Don't bury your head in the sand.

If you didn’t pay, it isn’t going to go from nothing to owing thousands and having the bailiffs at the door overnight

Can you show me just one post that says it would?

You MUST phone them and tell them the truth. Expect to pay what you owe in full by the due date. If their cashflow can afford it, they might be open to a delayed payment, instalments or changing the date or location of your holiday - but they don’t have to.
You must consider the fact that behind your holiday booking process, that company has a lot of outgoings which they have to honour (advertising, wages, everything). You committed to pay X amount by such a date and you must do it. It is not worth the sleepless nights wondering what they might do to you. All they want is the money you owe them.
I can tell you for a fact that most companies are currently keeping a very tight hold on their cashflow because of the uncertainty with Brexit, the very big boys have started doing so and all the sensible medium and small companies are doing it as we speak chasing their clients for prompt payment on the agreed due date. Yes, lots of clients still don’t pay on time but they are on their case constantly. Your case might be seen as negligible in terms of amount of money, but it will not be ignored if you simply don’t pay.
Do the decent thing and honour your commitment even if you end up out of pocket.

Surely asking for advice on how to scam a company breaks the talk guidelines?

Companies like HomeAway (Experian) etc gold the property owners money until you check in. If you don't pay the only person who gets screwed is the property owner. You've prevented the owner rebooking and you've prevented them being paid.