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Wave of Invalid 86(10)s Sent

Capitec Bank say they accidentally sent a bunch of important emails to the wrong addresses but won’t be resending them.

It seems that a whole bunch of 86(10) “termination” letters were sent to invalid email addresses.

Capitec have noted that they are not planning to resend them to the correct email addresses. This will likely provide the affected consumers with a good defence if the bank later tries to start new legal action over such matters.

What is an 86(10) Termination Notice?

When a credit provider wants to get out of a consumer’s debt review process because of “reasons” they send the National Credit Regulator (NCR), the consumer and the consumer’s Debt Counsellor an official notice that they intend to do so.

This is called a “Termination” Notice or an 86(10) Notice.

This allows the consumer and Debt Counsellor quiery their decision or rectify any issue that has caused the credit provider to want to start new legal action elsewhere.

The courts do not like people wasting their time if other litigation is already going on or if another court has already ruled on a matter so once a debt review has started and the matter is at court there needs to be one legal process (one court hearing the matter).

If a consumer has begun debt review and their matter is before a court and the consumer is paying towards their debts credit providers have to argue any problems at court they cannot walk away from the process and start new parallel legal collections processes.

This protects the consumer from having to waste extra money defending two legal matters. 

If a credit provider messes up the notification process … a Judge can just tell them to go back and be part of the debt review 

If a credit provider messes up the notification process or if their is no valid reason for them wanting to get out of the existing legal process of debt review a Judge or Magistrate can just tell them to go back and be part of the debt review (this is in terms of NCA Section 86(11)). 

Interestingly, the judge in such a 86(11) matter has a lot of leeway in what they order in that case, as the National Credit Act is purposefully vague in Section 86(11). This means the Judge can really make life tricky for credit providers who are wasting the time of the courts.

Also in such cases the consumer can ask that the credit provider pay for all the legal work needed to defend the matter and wasting time.