Argh! EON chasing me for previous tenant's debt. Now passed to debt collector.

[TeacherMa]

Any advice would be most welcome.

Moved here August. Phoned EON to advise I am now the account holder and of my meter readings, move in date etc. They asked about previous tenant and I said I have no idea. I gave them my landlord's details to chase up.

Kept getting letters from EON addressed to the previous tenant every 2-3 weeks. I dutifully sent them back along with several polite emails reminding them that person no longer lives here.

Today I have opened a letter from a legal company addressed to owner/occupier. Opened it to find that it's actually from EON who have now passed the previous tenant's debt (not my EON account number) to this debt recovery company who will be in touch shortly.

What can i do here? I don't want the hassle of contacting the debt recovery company because then they'll take all my details and I'm worried my name might somehow be associated with this debt and I'm trying really hard to get my own credit score up.

Any advice please for next steps? I'm feeling really stressed out. Landlord lives abroad and agency have said they don't have a forwarding address etc for previous tenant.

This happened to me. I contacted the debt collection agency, gave them my details and never heard anything else

You need to contact the debt company directly, pain in the ass I know, but they will sort it then and there as you are not the debtor. Last thing you want is an enforcement agent on your doorstep for a debt that isn’t yours.
Like PP said, you’ll likely never hear from them again after you phone and explain.

In my experience the debt collectors are often more sensible than their client! They’re not going to waste their time & energy on you once you explain, so I would be inclined to ring them & say what you said here.

EON did something similar to me - lost my payment, took ages to locate it in their systems and in the meantime a Debt Collection agency automatically instructed by them sent me several very upsetting letters.

I contacted the agency directly and it went away immediately - no more letters. A pain, but the most effective way to deal with it.

EON’s left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing. They are awful.

I've had this in two properties I've owned. In both cases each time a debt collection agency drew a blank, they passed it on to somebody else and it started again. Sometimes they'd turn up on the doorstep and I'd tell them the person moved out several years ago. Last letter two years ago was a summons and I phoned the court. Haven't heard anything since.

Likeothers have said contact the debt company. Although if an enforcement agent did turn up proof of ID and a copy of your tenancy agreement would be sufficient to demonstrate you're not the debtor and they'd go away.

Same happened to me, debt collector arrived at my door asking for Mrs X I said I'm Mrs Y, they asked if I had proof, I did I had my drivers licence, they saw it and left and I never heard from them again.

Honestly, if you just contact the debt recovery company, they'll go away. They're a lot more efficient than your average utility company

Having watched a lot of Episodes of Can't Pay We'll take it Away you just need to prove YOU are not the debtor and repeat that debtor is not still at the property when they contact you. It saves money for the debt collection agency if you do this before they send someone to your property -- so just have the details to hand for when they get in touch.

Good

Sorry! Totally wrong thread