Dumb Previous House Owner... AIBU?

[zingally]

First of all, I am happy to be told I'm being a cowbag. :)

A bit of relevant background
We moved into this house in September 2024. We purchased the house from a single woman named *Jane (widowed) in probably her late 50s/early 60s.
About a month after moving in, we received a "final demand" in the post for a small amount she owed to O2.

She hadn't left a forwarding address, so I enquired with the estate agent who handled the sale, and Jane begrudgingly gave them "permission" to give me her new address (a house on the other side of our large town). I dutifully re-posted it and thought no more of it.
Then in about December we received another "final demand", still for O2 and the same amount. I put this one in the post to her as well.
I've also sent on Christmas cards, and various mailings from different animal charities.

Fast forward to about September this year, we received a credit card from a reputable bank in the post, for her. We kept hold of it for a couple of weeks, expecting her to get in touch when she realised her error (after all, she knows where we live!) But she never did.
At this point, I was getting fed up of being her forwarding service, cut the card in half, and posted it BACK to her bank, with a covering letter.

Fast forward again to this week. We received ANOTHER credit card for her (same bank)! We roll our eyes and put it to one side - how on earth has she not changed her address on her BANK?!
Then today we received a "PIN reminder". Her ACTUAL PIN NUMBER.

In all honesty, I feel disinclined to put her new address on it... I've done it enough times now.
Would I but a total cowbag if I just returned it "Not known at this address"? Solely because I think she's stupid?

It’s against the law to intentionally open someone else’s mail. It’s also an offence to dispose of it. Phone the company and tell them you opened a letter assuming it was for you. They need to stop sending mail until the account holder contacts them and confirms their address. If the company continues to send her mail to you then they are breaching data protection regulations which can be reported to the ICO.

this

Been in my house for 12!!! years. Every year without fail we get a television licence for the previous tenants. I have rung the licence people. They won't help as I'm not the person named on the licence. I've contacted the previous tenants....she just say's I will get my husband to sort it. Never does. I just bin the bloody things now.

Id say just leave them together in a press somewhere. If they're important enough to her, she'll start to notice and contact you. After you forwarding on her previous mail, it wouldn't take a rocket scientist to figure out where it is!

It is much better not to open if it is not to you. Simply return to sender and let them find her. Why would you have even opened the first letter? Very nosey, at that time you could not possibly know it was a final demand.

It makes no difference the content of the letter, debts are linked to people not addresses

For clarity: under the Postal Services Act 2000 it’s an offence to open someone else’s post without a reasonable excuse.

You’ve already forwarded multiple items as a courtesy, but there’s no legal obligation to do so.

From now on return everything via the post box. Scrub out with a pen or marker the current name and address, mark them “Not known at this address”, post. That’s the correct and lawful approach.

With financial post (especially a credit card and PIN reminder), returning it unopened is also the safest option for you, as handling or retaining it could expose you to risk if anything went wrong.

Do the above and just disengage, anything more is just living rent free in your head!

Call the bank
clear security questions
then advise you’re not their customer but you are receiving their customers mail.
It will not happen again.

How do you clear security if you aren't a customer?

And anyway, as we've discovered the bank won't stop all mail until there is am alternative address. Until that point they continue to use your address for some regulated post they have to send.

Because you have the name and address on the letter which are usually 2 of the questions asked & enough to make your point.
It worked with Lloyds.
They can change the address to the branch.

It’s illegal to open someone’s post and it seems like you’ve been doing it from one month after moving in

Send back Return to sender. Then they’ll review the address used

We had similar in our old property. For the previous tenant (we bought the home from her ex landlady). Loads of final demands, not just for one loan, but a few, a few unpaid credit cards too, I found her on Facebook and I kindly sent everything on to her parents address. That was my first mistake - because I didn’t “return to sender” like I should have done, and she was ignoring the forwarded post in her new property, I had the bailiffs turn up at my door! I had to prove to them, stood on my doorstep, that I wasn’t her!!! The cheek! I contacted her on Facebook to tell her this, and ask her nicely to tell the financial institutions that she didn’t live here as they kept calling, and she refused!!! Eventually we received a CCJ and summons to court for her. I told her on Facebook about the court summons but gave her no other details, telling her she had to give me her new address (so I could send it to her and tell the bailiffs next time they called!) or I wouldn’t forward it on. She refused. Again. So I binned the documents. From then on I just “returned to sender” all of her mail and eventually they stopped. Bailiffs stopped calling too eventually.
Moral of the story - always just return to sender! Don’t try and be kind and forward anything on.

Nevertheless, it’s illegal to open mail addressed to someone else. It should be returned to sender marked addressee moved away.

Return to sender. The person who lived in our house never changed their Santander account address either, didn't have forwarding address. The two-ing and fro-ing with Santander was ridiculous, they had to put a block on sending post and a note on the account.

Stuff being ‘linked to your address’ doesn’t matter - it’s not in your or your families names

It not unreasonable, but how do you know what’s in the letters? They aren’t addressed to you so you have no right to open them. Simply write return to sender on the envelope, pop in a post box, and let Royal Mail deal with it.

You are wrong. You have no justification. If you had just followed the correct process over 12 months ago and returned to sender you would no longer be dealing with any of this now.

"If you had just followed the correct process over 12 months ago and returned to sender you would no longer be dealing with any of this now."

Many people on this thread have stated they are still dealing with misdirected mail 5 or 10 years later despite following the " correct process".....