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In February this year, Acting Judge Mogale from the Gauteng Division of the High Court handed down a judgment in Marajh v National Debt Intervention (Pty) Ltd (Case No. 187667/2025) to remove a consumer from debt review.

The judgment was given against the debt counselling practice (not the actual Debt Counsellor) and removed the consumer from debt review. The order was easily granted since there was no signed Form 16 and the consumer could show that they told the practice that they did not want to go into debt review.

The debt counselling practice, not only placed the person under debt review without them wanting to enter the process but then later charged them R8350 to leave the process.

This sort of behaviour is unfortunately pretty common among certain practices.

Interestingly, the matter was unopposed (meaning that the Debt Counsellor did not show up to argue or even send papers).

The Good Stuff

The good news is that the consumer in this case has been removed from a process they never really signed up for in the first place.

The debt review flag must be removed by the credit bureaus and the debt counselling practice must pay back the consumer.

The Bad Stuff

The ruling says some weird stuff about exactly when a consumer gets protection under the NCA as actually being in debt review, and when that info should appear on credit bureaus.

Some parts of the ruling don’t line up with the wording of the NCA; and some parts contradict other parts of the ruling (if the consumer was not already under debt review, how can that then be set aside?).

The NCR and credit bureaus were never parties to the matter but still get some notes from the Judge. These remarks might have been different if the parties had shown up to argue the matter and present the court with more info. Hopefully this weird stuff from the ruling does not get referenced in other court cases in the future.

Important Reminders

Debt counsellors must stop signing up people who do not understand what they are committing to or who do not really want to be in debt review.

Incentivising some staff to make “sales” as opposed to helping consumers can cause issues.

Debt Counsellors must ensure they get signed application forms from the client and that the client really wants to get out of debt.

Ethics and treating consumers fairly are crucial in maintaining a good reputation for not only your own brand but for the reputation of the entire debt restructuring process.