hobbes79

I worked with a Brit who received CCJs from the UK. They were even sent to his workplace and arrived on his desk some mornings, and I was nosey enough to notice a letter from the UK

Confident in the fact he was never going to return to the UK, he got laid off while on an L-1.

He accepted a job up in Canada and the same company had offices in the US. He was able to return to the US a couple of years later and is back on an L-1.

But it's clearly very tense for him should this one day not work out...

just_jenn

I'm an unintentional wanker...and I posted this not to gloat, but more to demonstrate how quickly this stuff can get out of hand!

Graduated 4 years ago and moved to the US right after with my American husband. I had a student loan and a bank overdraft of around 2000GBP. The student loan company was reasonably helpful, though still a pain in the arse to make payments. Back then, they didn't have a website to make repayments on or a facility to charge your card monthly, so I had to call them once a month and give them my cc details. Now they have a website that you can make 1x or set up a monthly charge. And yeah, you'll pay more than your UK buddies because the income threshold is 12,000 GBP rather than 15,000 in the UK.

Anyway, HSBC was another story. They constantly pestered me to pay more and more into my account. I made sure I paid at least something into the account monthly through wire transfers...


...and then I had a baby and all the expense that comes with it, including around $5,000 in medical bills. Unfortunately, I also had postpartum depression and I essentially shut down and let everything get behind. Stupidly, I didn't get in touch with the SLC or the bank until much later on when we were finally getting back on our feet and I was feeling better. By this time (this was probably around 6 months later) I was getting letters from both companies threatening to refer to my accounts to debt collectors and they did warn me that legal action could be pursued against me in my country of residence.

Fortunately, I did get everything back up-to-date. The SLC had amassed a huge arrears against my account but were able to write most of it off as i) they'd been assessing me the blanket overseas amount (196 GBP/month!!!) which I was able to reduce to 120GBP by sending them records of income for that period and ii) I hadn't worked for 4 months out of the 6 anyway so I wasn't eligible to make repayments. They were really very sympathetic to my situation and really wanted to help me get back on track.

Again, HSBC were another story. They were rude and pushy and I don't think I ever had a phone call with them that didn't make me feel completely humiliated. I made a repayment agreement with them, followed through on all my commitments (which involved paying off huge sums of $$$ one particular month...) and then they still referred my account to their bill collectors. I complained and threatened to go to the ombudsman with it and they reopened the account and sent a 3 page letter apologising for not "properly monitoring my account."

In my case I certainly paid for "running away" from it those few months, and they certainly did catch up with me. However, I was always forthright with them and kept my contact details up to date. In theory, I suppose it would be possible to just go off the map (I've heard the student loan company is having a lot of issues with this happening with EU students who are now allowed to apply for loans with them).

Ja5on

Haha, is that me? I left debts after telling my banks I was leaving and asking how to pay and they told me, "your not allowed to leave without paying" they also said they needed to be paid from a UK account......Not something I'm proud of but also not something I'm ashamed of.

tamms_1965

Hubs had a problem paying his final Sky bill. They wouldn't let him pay online or over the phone or send him a bill in the U.S or via email/internet. His son finally told them, here is the original $ that he owes...take it or leave it. He's in the U.S. and could have skipped out on this last bill. They took it and closed his account.

tonrob

Was it your intent here to demonstrate even a semi-valid reason for walking away from your debt?

Ja5on

Not what so ever. I don't need to validate my reasons. I did something that people don't agree with. Like I said it's not something I'm proud of, it's just something I don't care about.

tonrob

Ok - thanks for clarifying. It just looked like you were positioning what someone at the bank told you as some kind of mitigating factor. If it wasn't then I'm confused as to why you mentioned it at all though. A simple I left my debt behind but don't give a toss would have sufficed. Must eat you a bit though, otherwise why respond to dbj's post?

Ja5on

I just know people have given me a hard time for it in the past on this forum. I responded to that asking if it was me he was talking about.....I also wanted to let the op know that it's not something that is a huge deal.