A HEARTBROKEN mum has said she's being hounded by collectors to pay off her son's loan – just days after he hanged himself.
Devastated Christine Watkinson, 61, acted like a guarantor on her behalf son Sean's loan after he took it out from Amigo Loans this past year and started making repayments as he fell seriously ill at the outset of the entire year.
Dental surgeon Sean, who suffered a range of mental health problems too as Charcot Marie Tooth disease – a degenerative illness that affects nerve endings – took his own life on Friday.
Christine, from Manchester, then received messages from Amigo Loans this weekend to say a lb200 repayment was due around the remaining lb900.
Sean's sister, Faye Ferguson, said Christine phoned the organization to describe what happened while making a round of calls to let people know about the tragedy.
But astonishingly she says the company showed a total lack of compassion and instead threatened her with debt collectors and court summons.
She said: "These were monstrous. They just said 'Well, that's terrible. We'll provide you with fourteen days and you can make a repayment plan.'
"My mum also is affected with depression and is disabled – it's all too much on her to cope with at this time."
Faye says the household told Amigo Loans they don't wish to cope with them while her brother's death continues to be so raw – but says she was threatened with default notices and the litigation department if she refuses.
She said: "My mum is within this type of state right now, she just said: 'I don't care. Send me to prison. It's not going to bring my son back, could it be?'"
Faye says she spoke to Amigo Loans herself to describe her mum is in unfit state to become coping with this at such a traumatic time.
But she says the company's response was simply: "If you don't deal with this now, we've already issued a default notice and if you don't come to some arrangement we'll give it to litigation and start court proceedings."
The heartbroken 31-year-old said: "I can't accept is as true. We thought it would be an easy process, that they would just say they were sorry and show some compassion however they haven't.
"When we spoke to them it was like these were just reading off a script and generating responses down on paper in front of them.
"Whenever we got upset and said you need to pay attention to us, they jut got angry and repeated the threats of litigation."
Astonishingly Faye also says the company have demanded a death certificate – despite her explanation they have not were built with a post-mortem yet and are awaiting an inquest due to Sean's early age.
She said: "We can't even make funeral arrangements. We're waiting for the post-mortem and the inquest and they're just threatening us with litigation.
"All I'm able to think about at this time is his poor girlfriend. It's just awful."
Faye described the organization as "monsters" and said she was disgusted by their behaviour just days after her "kind, loving and generous" brother's death.
She says her mum has always been on time with payments, apart from once earlier this year when she called well ahead of time to warn them and offered to pay extra the following month to create up for this.
She said: "Obviously she would like to clear the debt up too, it's a terrible thing to have hanging over her. However is just not the time of these calls, she can't think about anything else at this time."
Faye's brother Michael Ferguson described the company as "like the mafia coming after them and kicking down our door".
She added: "There's just no compassion there. They don't care about us whatsoever, all they care about is the money."
Faye says there's around lb900 left on the loan, which she describes as "not that much within the great scheme of things".
She added: "I can't imagine the amount of people that go to them for loans and I just keep thinking let's say they do it to a person else?
"I have a strong and loving family around me who are all very supportive. If someone doesn't obtain that support I can't imagine what must it do in order to them.
"It must terrify them, it frightens me they could do that to someone else."
A spokesperson for Amigo Loans said: "Firstly our condolences visit Mrs Watkinson, Ms Ferguson and the whole family. This can be a tragic situation and we're deeply sorry for his or her loss. It is clearly a really emotional here we are at the household and we're sorry when the situation has been misunderstood.
"Mrs Watkinson decided to be guarantor on her son Mr Ferguson in January 2014. Unfortunately the loan fell into arrears in Jan 2016.
"We initially worked to attempt to come to a solution with Mr Ferguson and capped the interest so that the repayment from the loan would never are more expensive than the originally agreed amount. Consistent with our standard policies, we tried to extend the repayment term of the loan to lessen the repayments to a manageable amount.
"After we had revealed that Mr Ferguson would not be able to make even a drastically reduced repayment, we begun emailing Mrs Watkinson arrive at a suitable arrangement.
"Mrs Watkinson made full repayments around the loan from Jan to June. Having missed the payment in July she decided to a payment plan in August that was maintained until last Friday.
"Sadly, i was informed of Mr Ferguson’s death yesterday. It is important to understand the death of Mr Ferguson did not in any way increase Mrs Watkinson’s obligation to Amigo nor made it happen by any means escalate our management of the account.
"When we are informed of the family death, we immediately place a 2 week pause around the account during which time no communication is going to be sent and there will be no requests for payment.
"Unfortunately throughout the call which Mrs Watkinson designed to us, communication became difficult as Mrs Watkinson understandably became very emotional. We apologise if our explanation in our processes was misunderstood during this time.
"We've the deepest sympathy for her situation and do not wish by any means to increase her concerns at this time.
"We have extended the breathing space to 1 month and can evaluate the case at that time, and can happily give Mrs Watkinson additional time if needed.
"As interest was once frozen the debt is not growing. In line with our normal policies we will reduce repayments to whatever is a manageable amount for Mrs Watkinson."
If you have been affected by any of the issues in this story please contact the Samaritans on this free telephone number, 116 123 (UK) or email, [email protected].