I met Mr Fisher of the Receivers (Fisher Hargreaves Proctor) at the offices of Bagshaws in Derby. Even though Barclays appointed them, officially the Receivers were supposed to be acting on my behalf. I asked Mr Fisher to tell me what his fees would be – his reply “fees had been agreed with the Bank and they are of no concern to you”.
In conversation I kept referring to my former home and my tenants, Mr Fisher suddenly rounded on me saying “Mr Stewart it is my house and they are my tenants”.
I was by now getting angry – it was obvious that Mr Fisher was acting for Barclays and not acting in my interests. Upset, I asked him about a golf tournament that he had organised that year – Why had he invited Barclays Regional Office to take part? I had hit a nerve! – he almost exploded with indignation ! – I left, but not before tape recording everything that had been said!
Eventually because of my complaints Bagshaws increased the asking price of Uttoxeter Rd to £125,000 (they subsequently received an offer of £122,000) proving that the Receivers were content to sell Uttoxeter Rd ‘on the cheap’
More bad news in September, again without notice, Barclays issued High Court Writs in the sum of £265,000 for myself and my wife.
My wife and I had no experience of this sort of action. The documents appeared to have taken too long to arrive, even the envelopes weren’t postmarked but we realised that we had to act quickly. We had to defend the writs and enter a counterclaim within the time allowed by the Court. With time running out I sent the defence and counterclaim to the High Court in Birmingham by first class recorded delivery. That was a Tuesday, the deadline was Thursday.
On the Saturday my wife and I each received a ‘Default Judgement’ in the sum of £265,000! it appeared that we had lost everything – panic – despair – had we been too late with the defence? Saturday – the Court was closed, solicitors closed, nowhere to turn.
I hardly slept at all that weekend, in the early hours of Monday morning I finally convinced myself that the defence must have been lodged in time.
Monday morning – my solicitor was away! a dash down to the post office in Midland Road, Derby and they confirmed that the defence documents had been delivered on time and even faxed a copy of the receipt to me!
I immediately telephoned the High Court myself, “they would look into it and phone back”. They rang back to say that, yes my ‘documents had been received but they had spoken to Barclays solicitors Edge & Ellison and they were insisting that the Judgement stand! I protested and was told that the court would consider the matter again. Within an hour I was told the Court would set aside the Judgement – relief!
Eventually the High Court wrote and said that as a result of what had happened to us procedures had been changed and staff retrained. My solicitor said that he had never heard of a Court writing such a letter!
Edge & Ellison made no apology telling me that they were simply “acting in their client’s best interests”. I took that to mean that they were prepared to do anything to win!
My defence and substantial counterclaim for damages was now lodged with the High Court. At this point the Bank seemed to have ‘shelved’ the High Court action, instead Barclays then proposed a meeting between its Inspector of Law Section, Head Office, Karl Davies and myself.
The Receivers continued however to take the rents from Uttoxeter Rd and were still trying to sell it despite my protests.