Okay ended up having to pay my parasitic lowlife of a rental company UMS their 95% commission(avoid these bastards like the plague).

SO i popped to the local Betreibungsamt official office and paid them plus i had to pay 269chfs ("+ 10chfs more incase!!?") legal/collection fees.

Then i get a call from my local Mr Betreibungsamt who says thanks for the payment oh our computer now says you owe another 140chfs.
When I checked last week he said the same total+ 269chfs and confirmed this morning.
Now it's changed to 140 more. I told him i dont believe him and want some evidence. This is supposed to be an official office, all they scamming me?

Told him i didnt think i had to pay more than what was 'reasonable' to recover and you're being unreasonable now. Any idea what's going on?

One thing that gives me the gall about this country are these 3 friggin words: adminitrative Kosten verrechnen (administrative costs)...put all of them together in a letter heading my way and I get semi violent. That's probably what the 140 are for.

This is correct. I just learnt about it the hard way as the verwaltung has issued one without going through any reminder or whatever. Still learning in CH something new every day.

Seems to be a good thread to ask for some advice.
My other half recently received a Betreibungsamt from her Credit Card company.

The funny part is
a) The credit card company never sent us any bill to pay
b) We have not used the credit card in the last 2 months
c) the Last statement and invoice was raised in October which we had correctly settled.

We wrote an email to them asking for information on why they think this payment is due. It's been a day since and no response. Any advice on next steps would be greatly appreciated.

In parallel when I searched the forum I came across this thread and Richard's very informative albeit long thead to realize the CH has something called litigation insurance.
Having never heard of such an item before obviously I did not have any. I plan to purchase that first thing tomorrow

recommendations on a good insurer would be appreciated along with any info if the above case would be covered by the newly bought insurance in case it reaches litigation.

Most insurers would take a dim view of you trying to get them to cover an event that has already taken place, don't you think?

If you join the TCS you can enjoy cheaper legal insurance. Note that the insurance only becomes active about 3 months after you have paid the premium. You cannot back date the insurance.

http://www.tcs.ch/main/de/home/versi...htsschutz.html

On the credit card problem, you MUST react to letters from the Betreibungsamt, within a few days! And write "Rechtsvorschlag" on their certificate, sign and date it, and make a photocopy, and post it back within 3 days (I think)

Quick Update
We reached out to the company asking for clarification on the bill. Turns out it was a valid invoice, only the fact that they had never sent it to us for payment.

We sent them a registered letter saying that we are rejecting the Betreibung and are willing to pay the invoice value only and not any other associated delay fees / interest. This was because the delay in sending us the invoice was clearly on the companies side.

The company claims to have sent us 2 reminders to pay after sending the invoice, none of which have reached us.

After having paid them the original amount, we were naive to assume that things would be settled, but yesterday, we received a registered post with a last settlement bill of 170 odd CHF with 10 days to pay.

I am extremely pissed with company and needless to say would like to teach them a lesson. Would appreciate any advice, lawyer contact, similar experiences that could guide me.

Ahem.

Fact is that the debt becomes due without special proceedings required. The reminders are a "nice to have" - but legally the credit card company is not required to send them and could actually send you a "betreibung" notice as soon as the due date on the original bill expires.

You'll have a hard way proving you received none of the three letters they've sent you - especially if you recognise the charge is actually valid so in principle you should have been expecting an invoice...

+1

Agree with that. I don't think anyone would be inclined to believe that unless you have some proof that the company was sending mail to the wrong address...although the Betreibung found you, so they obviously had the correct address.

Does the Betriebungsamt contact you if someone has filed against you or does it sit there unknown until the time you go to check? I'd imagine if you were none the wiser someone had filed a claim those admin costs would inevitably rise, making the news even harder to digest. That could prove a real pain, especially if you had to set about contesting the claim; usually when you go for a credit reference certificate you're in a bit of a hurry, eg, when applying for an appartment etc.

Yes, it is pretty much an automated process with standard forms that are automatically sent by registered mail.

Or in smaller places where they have their own Betreibungsamt you have someone coming to knock on your door personally to deliver the paper (and try and get a good snoop at the same time...)

Let me give a broader context
The company in question is the SBB half price card combined with the prepaid card from Valartis
when we purchased the card, it was valid for two years but SBB had billed us only for 1 year. An invoice was expected to be sent at the end of the first year, which we never recieved.

At the end of two years we went to renew the half price card, and requested SBB to convert the prepaid to a credit card. At that time also we recieved no intimation that any payment was pending. We paid for the new half price card and recieved a new card.

we used the credit card in October, recieved an invoice for that which we promptly paid. We have a copy of that invoice which clearly states that there were no further dues.
I think the above might be adequate proof, or do you think I am just being an obstinate, overtly righteous ar*e as my better half is calling me?

Well if that is what your better half is calling you then I would take her cue...sound the retreat and make a dignified exit stating that you are convinced that you are in the right but that for the sake of favourable matrimonial relations and world peace you are prepared to compromise and give in...

So you also believe that I have no case against the company for harrasing me and unjustly fining me?

You can try being nice and admitting your mistake and seeing if they can do anything to help. I had a similar case (elsewhere here there is a thread) with an insurance company and they refused to withdraw the penalty but did reduce next years premium by the same amount to compensate. But I had to eat a little bit of humble pie and didn't go hard on the offensive or threaten them

Of course you didn't - it's not the SBB that would have issued the "intimation" but the card issuer.

How many letters have you actually received from them in the course of the two years that you have used the card?

In those 2 years we received no letters, however after we renewed the card we received a bill from them in October
This bill had no mention above any pending amount

I've read this 3 times and I think I've got it (but not really the bit about converting the Halb Tax into a credit card after 2 years when you had only paid for one).

I think you had a 2-year Halb Tax card and combined credit card, but paid for only one year. Then, a year later, when the Halb Tax was due for renewal they added it to you combine credit card.

This is actually the idea of combining the two cards. The credit card company send the bill and two reminders which you don't receive, but you did receive the Betreibungsamt correspondence - so you haven't moved and they have the correct address. In fact you had received and paid other bill for the credit card before October 2011.

Now you want to pay the bill dating back to before October, but not the additional cost of collecting the debt that the credit card company his incurred.

No chance...

Hi Abfab, probably because of my bantering I could not clearly put across the situation, but you have got the jist of the problem
May be you are right, this is a lost cause but I feel extremely cheated and bullied by this company. For my own satisfaction, I plan to talk to the Geminde as well as a lawyer today. I ll keep you all posted on further updates.

The situation in detail :-

We had a Halb Tax plus prepaid card from 2009 to 2011 due to having a L permit. We paid for one year and did not receive any invoice for the second year
In 2011 we renewed our Halb Tax and requested SBB / Valartis to convert our prepaid card to a credit card. Again at this point no update from either SBB or Valartis that there is a payment pending.

We use the credit card and get an an invoice for payment which again has no mention of any past dues.