Wednesday 7 April 2010

Time waits for no man

Swiss is shocked.

No really, he is. he heard words spoken to a Judge that he never thought he would ever hear.

Swiss, being an amenable chap with good intentions coursing through his veins was asked to go to Court with a friend of a friend who we shall call Dave, who was owed some dosh, having lent some to a work colleague, Derek, in 2002. The money was due to be returned in full by 2004, and when requested by Dave, who seemed a decent enough bloke, Derek told him to *&£% OFF. At this point, Derek seems like a twat and Dave is a good guy, and thats how the story unfolds.

Dave resigns himself to never getting his £3000 back, and time was a healer, and in the end it seemed like too much trouble to bother with.

Time moves on.

In 2010, Derek bumped into Dave, who asked if the money would ever be forthcoming. Derek not only repeated the previous comment, but threw in a few threats.

Dave became a tad irritated at this naughty behaviour, so made an application to the Court for the return of his £3000 plus interest. Fortunately, there was a written agreement concerning the loan, in which the amount, mention of interest and a pay back date were the only terms.

Derek made a counterclaim which amounted to £3,500 for some reason which however you read the words did not make sense. Something about being let down, spending money trying to find Dave to give him the money, and general expenses incurred as a result of the item purchased with the loan being stolen. Little Derek felt that he shouldn't have had to suffer the loss.

Dave and Swiss turn up at Court and in walks Derek, who you could tell was a cocky bastard that needed to be taught a lesson, and Swiss was the man to do it.

The Judge opened up with the agreement and Derek admitted the loan, admitted that he owed the money and waved a cheque for £3000. Then Derek asked for one in return for £3,500. The Judge then, in Swiss's opinion, spent too much time discussing the theft of the item, the steps taken to find Dave and exploring the Counterclaim. As far as Swiss was concerned, it was irrelevant.

Eventually, with Derek interrupting every 2 minutes, talking the Judge down, and glaring quite a bit, the Judge decided that she had heard enough and would pass Judgment. And then the words were spoken. Swiss was shocked. The Judge was flustered. The Court room was silent and all eyes were on the Judge to see what she would do. (OK, so there were only 3 of us in there, but you could have heard a pin drop) The words? Well.....

'Can you get a move on, I wanna get back to work'

Blimey

The Judge began to give Judgment which basically revolved around the written agreement, money was owed, interest accrued, and if anything else had been important to the parties it would have been written down. As nothing else was, the agreement was the deciding factor.

Derek let out a HUUUUGE sigh, looked at his watch, wriggled in his seat and said.....

'Come on for God sake, I have got a job to get back to'

Pindrop time again.

Judge decided that the £3000 was due and had to be paid. Derek threw the cheque across the Court and stood up. The Judge said, AND NOW IF YOU WILL SIT DOWN WE CAN WORK OUT THE INTEREST YOU NEED TO PAY.'

'Oh for God's sake, can you hurry up'

Have you ever sat in class with a calculator in hand trying to work out the interest rate over a period of time, without a great deal of success? Well Swiss has done it in Court! So has the Judge! While Derek huffed and puffed, Swiss and the Judge were finding ever more ingenious methods of working out how many days there had been in the last 8 years, leap years, bank holidays and dirty weekends in Hastings, until eventually a figure was agreed upon, despite the huffing and puffing of Derek, and the Judge pronounced the interest that had accrued.

£3200!

Derek wrote out another cheque amidst scenes of dramatic arm flailing, pen writing, huffing, flourishing cheque book, ripping cheque out quite dramatically, and then launching it in the general direction of Dave.

Lessons learned that day.

1. The Limitation Act works. 6 years worth of interest is handy.
2. Judges don't like to be hassled.
3. If the hearing is listed for 3 hours, be prepared for 3 hours.
4. Be polite and courteous to Judges.
5. If you are owed money, use the Courts.
6. If you lend money, get a written agreement.
7. If someone is in a rush, you can create delay by punching a calculator and giving the Judge a different figure to the one they have worked out, resulting in a 'Lets start again shall we' comment.
7. Swiss is a bloody good bloke, despite his inability to use a calculator.
8. If you owe money, pay it back.

From a £3000 loan, Dave secured payment of £6200. Not bad for an hour in Court.

Swiss was shocked, really he was.

14 comments:

Anonymous said...

Well done swizz.

Althoug you must be quite hairless now with all these months of shocks.

Barmaid said...

I do hope you put a jockey on those cheques!!

Asp said...

Come on swiss - didn't you, after interest, spend another 30 minutes trying to figure out costs? ;)

Swiss Tony said...

Ginge, Swiss is often mistaken for Harry Hill. The row of pens in the top pocket and outsize shirt collar looks impressive, but the shiney head is but a result of a shocking life.

BM, right over my head I am afraid. It must be some form of rhyming slang, but buggered if Swiss can think of anything that rhymes with Red Rum or Dick Francis. Unless its that famous jockey, 'express clearance'?

Asp, bloody good point, however, costs don't get awarded in the Small Claims Court. Nevertheless, Dave did get all of his Court application Costs, which amounted to almost £500! It was £300 to request a hearing FFS. Worth every penny in the end, but a lot of money to have to gamble on. Swiss could maybe work out a percentage, but as you know, his calculator skills are not what they should be. Less than 20%, more than 10% will have to do.

Barmaid said...

Putting a jockey on a cheque means banking it through the express service - you pay a few quid to the bank for them to clear it by the next working day.

Swiss Tony said...

Blimey BM, you don't arf learn a lot of good stuff at BPP.

Swiss is feeling slightly cheated at the lack of a decent educashun from CofL, although, when push comes to shove, and the Pupillage Portal is assessing candidates, I bet you can't do advanced potato printing, or Play-doh.

Barmaid said...

hate to admit it, but learnt about putting jockeys on cheques through the university of life!

Ooh er - the word verification is 'women'.

barboy said...

Cripes, I also know what a jockey is. The joys of being self employed, I guess. To which end, I have also done today my very first Part 71 application. Probably still won't recover monies owed, but I like the idea of inconvniencing the judgment debtor.

BK said...

Hey Swiss, was the interest calculated at the statutory judgment debt rate or was commercial rate of interest awarded on the amount borrowed?

Swiss Tony said...

Bazza, interesting point which caused a heck of a lot of confusion in the hearing.

The agreement said the money was to be paid back with interest. No rate specifiec. Dave said it was at his credit card rate because the money was taken off his card. When the Judge asked Derek what he understood the rate to be, his obvious answer should have been 1%, but being a complete twat he said he didn't care, actual words were 'I don't care, 8%, 16%, 30%, I don't care because the oitem was stolen so I shouldn't have to pay any, and I couldn't pay it earlier because I was broke so its not my fault'

The Judge worked on the principle of 16% until the 2004 date, and then 8% after that. Oh the fun and games trying to work out how many days had passed at each rate.

Anonymous said...

SWIZZ

I love you hunkey dunkey.

KATIE






(PS Its actually Ginge - I couldn't resist having popped over here from BMs blog - i think its cos you don't allow anon comments)

Barmaid said...

Oh God LG, don't encourage him - he'll be too liberal with the Old Spice again and his poor old classmates at CoL will be gasping for air.

Swiss Tony said...

I get the impression that people are just taking the micky out of me now. How can anonymous Katie really be Ginge? Thats not anonymous at all. Ginge is Ginge.

All I need now is for Bar Boy to go telling me that he is really a tough bloke and not the big girls blouse that I thought.

BM, Old Spice ha, not me, I is young, trendy and up with the times. Blue Stratos for me don't you know.

barboy said...

Swiss, no fear, I confirm I am a big girl's blouse. I also confirm that Katie is, in fact, a hairy arsed lorry driver.