Credit management and debt collection company Daniels Silverman urges councils to rethink their policy on employing bailiffs and adopt a more proactive form of engagement.
Civil liberties organisation Big Brother Watch’s new report has revealed that between 2007 and 2010, local councils passed a total of almost six million cases to third-party debt recovery agencies such as bailiffs for the late payment of council taxes and parking fines.
Carole Hughes, managing director, Daniels Silverman, says: “Councils need to take action to recover unpaid taxes and fines to protect revenues, however we question the policy of using bailiffs for such matters. Typically such debts are low in value and the prospect of someone turning up on your doorstep threatening to remove your goods to sell is extremely intimidating and not in the spirit of the Office of Fair Trading’s guidelines on debt collection.
“The use of such heavy handed actions should be restricted to a minority hard core of debtors who refuse to pay despite being given every opportunity to do so. We urge councils employing such tactics to exhaust all other methods of recovery first. An ethical, professional pre-legal debt collection agency would make contact with debtors by using more friendly means such as by letter or telephone. This approach offers debtors the opportunity to dispute monies owed and arrange repayment based on their ability to pay, and is far more likely to secure payment.”
For further information please contact:
Nicolle Farthing / Emma Murphy / Lianne Robinson
Broadgate Mainland
Tel: 020 7726 6111
DanielsSilverman@broadgatemainland.com
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