# Help - Sheriff on the way



## GreenIgirl (4 Oct 2007)

We have been working with MABS to sort out finances and due to our own stupidity let slip one cc with €4000.00 balance. Leading debt collector has decided to sick the sheriff on us.

We contacted the Sheriff (who was very kind/professional) and he indicated that he "may" have to come to house to inventory our possessions (cue "the scream")

We have explained our circumstances and that we are keeping all other repayments up to date.

Anyone else had this happen? Are they going to take away all our worldly goods? Our dogs??

G.


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## Vanilla (4 Oct 2007)

Sheriff is fairly limited in what he can take. Goods that are exempted from seizure are those which are the means of earning your livelihood and the minimum necessities of life- so they won't take your beds, oven, sofa etc. In practice they rarely seize goods in a private home. ARe your dogs valuable?


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## GreenIgirl (4 Oct 2007)

*Re: Help! - Sheriff on the way*

Dogs are not valuable - they are well loved! We rent furnished accom and really only have clothes on our back (btw: we are non Irish).


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## Vanilla (4 Oct 2007)

It's fairly unlikely that the Sheriff will take anything at all. They may come with a view to assessing your goods and seeing that you are telling the truth and don't have fantastically valuable easily sold goods lying around the place. 

PS I was joking about the dogs...


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## GreenIgirl (4 Oct 2007)

Thanks Vanilla - I think I feel better


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## bond-007 (4 Oct 2007)

All the sheriff will do is mark the decree "No Goods" and return it to the banks solicitor. 

The bank will most likely proceed to issue a summons for the attendance of the debtor at the district court where your means will be examined with a view to making an instalment order against you.


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## davidoco (4 Oct 2007)

GreenIgirl said:


> Leading debt collector has decided to sick the sheriff on us.



I assume there is a Court Order in place as a debt collector can't take it upon himself to just look for the sheriff to contact you.

When a creditor *obtains a judgement* against a debtor for monies which are due, and if the debtor does not pay the monies within a reasonable period of time it is open to the creditor to employ the services of a sheriff to carry out "execution" of the judgement.

see here [broken link removed]


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## FredBloggs (4 Oct 2007)

This isn't something that can happen overnight.  As has been said above a debt collector just can't summon the sherriff.  If it has reached the stage where the sherriff arrives (and there will have been a court date first which you will have received notice of even if you didn't attend) he will as bond has said most likely mark no goods on the decree.  Sherriffs rarely take goods.  The best they're hoping for is a cheque for some of the money and an agreement to pay the rest to them which they can then pass on.  If payment is not forthcoming the creditor will seek an instalment order and if after a reasonable time you don't keep up with your paymnents a committal order - but you're a long way from that and the instalment order will be for an amount you should be able to manage (the court will look at your finances and having Mabs involved will most likely mean this is miniscule)


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## csirl (5 Oct 2007)

> When a creditor *obtains a judgement* against a debtor for monies which are due, and if the debtor does not pay the monies within a reasonable period of time it is open to the creditor to employ the services of a sheriff to carry out "execution" of the judgement.


 
This is a bit misleading. A Sheriff is not employed i.e. hired by the debt collection agency.

A Sheriff (County Registrar) is a public servant - there is 1 appointed for every county in Ireland. Among their statutory duties is that they can enforce the collection of debts for which a Court Order has been issued. This enforcement can include the seizing of money/property/valuables. 

A Sheriff is not like some sort of private sector debt collection agency that you can palm off. If the County Sheriff is after you for some reason, then the issue is very serious and already has been subject of a Court appearance. The Sheriff is usually only used when all other avenues have been exhausted.

You must have ignored previous summonses to appear in Court? Plus whatever correspondence you received from your creditor?

The best way to deal with a Sheriff is to cooperate with them, and if you do not have any valuables, come to some sort of agreement on payment. If you ignore the Sheriff or dont abide by agreements, you can go to jail.


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## xxx (5 Oct 2007)

Give him loads of tea and biscuits (cheap ones) and be really nice to him.  These boys are usually alright


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## 5Times (19 Oct 2007)

Sorry but if your renting a house why not move on, the sherrif will not really care esp if its only 4k!? you've nothing to worry about dear. 

"IF" you some day meet the sheriff, in your rented house just tell him everything in the house is rented, that way he cant take anything. 

Any other questions.


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## mo3art (20 Oct 2007)

5Times said:


> Sorry but if your renting a house why not move on, the sherrif will not really care esp if its only 4k!? you've nothing to worry about dear.
> 
> "IF" you some day meet the sheriff, in your rented house just tell him everything in the house is rented, that way he cant take anything.
> 
> Any other questions.



Extremely irresponsible!


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## bond-007 (20 Oct 2007)

Indeed! Bad advice.

The thing is sheriffs will not seize items in a private home. Generally he is only interested in getting cash out of the debtor. 99% of decrees are returned to solicitors because there are no goods to seize. The matter will then move on to the installment order stage. 

As far the banks are concerned sending the sheriff is always a long shot but it only costs them €9 and worth the risk.


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