Who is the thief, shoplifter or debt recovery company?

I agree wiht the OP, the debt collecting compnay should not be allowed to just pull a figure out of thin air and demand payment for a service that you did not agree to receive. In any other debt recovery situation it is the person receiving the monies that pays the debt collector, not the person in debt. This should be illegal if it isnt.

The main problem here is that the store has just chosen an arbitrary amount £89.50 and supplied 0 justifications as to how they came up with that amount.

They say it is for staff time dealing with the incident etc but how can the cost of staff time dealing with an incident be calculated as being exactly the same in the thousands of separate cases where they have sent out letters demanding the same amount of money from people? It's completely senseless

For example trying to charge money for the time spent by the security guard catching the person That's what the security guard is in the shop and being paid for in the first place, it's not as if he gets paid per thief he catches

I don't think many people would have a problem with a company trying to recover actual losses that they get hit with through shop lifting, the problem is with they way the companies they choose to employ actually do it.

As stated earlier if people actually choose to go to court with these agencies then the agencies either A) don't turn up to the court case or B) lose the case. So the companies know full well when they send out the letters that they are not winnable cases within the UK law yet they persist in doing so on the off chance of scaring people.

It is simply a scam fishing for people that will be intimidated by the legal wording in the letters.

Originally posted by davespanners
The main problem here is that the store has just chosen an arbitrary amount £89.50 and supplied 0 justifications as to how they came up with that amount.

They say it is for staff time dealing with the incident etc but how can the cost of staff time dealing with an incident be calculated as being exactly the same in the thousands of separate cases where they have sent out letters demanding the same amount of money from people? It's completely senseless

For example trying to charge money for the time spent by the security guard catching the person

That's what the security guard is in the shop and being paid for in the first place, it's not as if he gets paid per thief he catches

I don't think many people would have a problem with a company trying to recover actual losses that they get hit with through shop lifting, the problem is with they way the companies they choose to employ actually do it.

As stated earlier if people actually choose to go to court with these agencies then the agencies either A) don't turn up to the court case or B) lose the case. So the companies know full well when they send out the letters that they are not winnable cases within the UK law yet they persist in doing so on the off chance of scaring people.

It is simply a scam fishing for people that will be intimidated by the legal wording in the letters.

I thought exactly the same as you mentioned here, I'm not loosing any sleep over it and I know she isn't either.

Originally posted by Destinyone
reply to post by glen200376

 

Cool. I think all us other countries, should send all our thieves to your country.....

Des

Most already do...

I'm not sure the shop company has a leg to stand on. It's like private car park that have attendants to make sure you pay, you don't buy a ticket they send you a letter saying you have a fine, but they can't enforce it because its not a law.