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Court summons

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rjt14 | 23:08 Wed 16th Feb 2011 | Law
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Hello guys and girls. My first question on this site.

I received a summons today through the post it reads :

You have not paid 140.00gbp which is owed on the above account number.
If you don't pay the full amount shown you must attend on 2nd March 2011.

Penalty is : Use/Install TV without licence Costs 60 pound
Fines 80 pound
This is dated back to Jan 2007.

This would be the first letter i have ever received. I Lived in Wolverhampton at this date, was only there on 6 month work contract and immediately moved away from the area when the contract finished. In this 6 months i never had any vists from the TVL people.
I did however receive a phone call from them. I declared over the phone that i did not have or use a t.v (This is true i worked 12-14 hour days and was only temp accommodation.) Im pretty sure i did not give my address either.

So my question is this : How can i receive a summons or fine without my knowledge of the incident occurring ?

Also would they not need evidence of my signature on some kind of paperwork to say they have caught me ?

One more. What exactly dose this summons mean, have they decided ( off their own backs ) that i owe them this money.
Thank you to anyone that reads this and can clear up some points for me.
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At factor30. You are right it really dose not add up at all. I will keep you all updated i shall do some digging tomorrow.
My guess is it went a bit like this. They sent a summons to your previous address which you did not reply to ( you may not have been at that address having moved on by then) You were found guilty in your abscence as you never attended. The fine was issued and now they have at last found where you are living and are persuing you for the money. DO NOT ignore it or they will issue a warrent for the bailifs Get in touch with the court and explain
ummmm is totally wrong on this! Whatever you do, don't ignore it. Now they have found you, it will not go away - only get worse..

As already said, it looks as if a Court decision was made in your absence (because you never got the documents - having moved) & the chasing now is for the payment. There should be a procedure to get the Court decision revoked or set aside on the grounds that you had no knowledge of it & that if you had known you would have defended the matter & the outcome would very likely have been different. The Court office should be able to advise you on this but - if you need to - try to get help from a money advice service such as the CAB.

Incidentally, were you living in a house at the time or in a flat? If the latter, it would presumably be much more difficult for TV Licensing to have any certainty about whether there was a TV in your flat, as there would be signals emanating from the other TVs in the block.
Things like this do happen. Personally I would go to court, see the duty solicitor (I am pretty sure this is free) and then go in and explain with the help of the solicitor if need be. If it is their error, costs with go against the TV authorities anyway. Anyone found guilty has a right of appeal. Write is all down, explain and leave it up to the magistrates. It won't be the first time something like this has happened. Do not just ignore it. If it is a summons it won't go away.

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