Can I go to prison for not paying my debts?

Last year 276 people in Ireland were jailed for unpaid debts, avoiding debt re-payments has resulted in these people being jailed against their will. Unfortunately this problem is still common in todays society, and has also added to jail inflation problems, with jail institutes such as 'Mountjoy' becoming overcrowded. 

The Law

Due to outdated laws in Ireland the public can still be issued court judgments for unpaid loans or finance arrangements condemming them to jail from orders of the high court. Debtors who do not make true attempts to keep up with their payments will have their case passed onto debt collecting agencies who will then take on the responsibilty of collecting that debt. If the Debt collecting agencies attempts are unsuccessful the debtor will be issued court proceedings to gain funds by legal means. This will have a damaging effect on a persons credit report and will prevent them later being able to gain loans from the bank or financial organisations.

When a court judgement is issued their is a high risk that it will appear and remain on your criminal record indefinately if the debt is never recovered. Court judgments are also published in the Experian All Ireland Gazette and Stubbs Gazzette, both of these weekly publications include list of all the judgments listed that week. These publications are accessible for the public and are highly popular with Bank Managers, finance houses and credit controllers.
      
Recent News

Between May 2003 and July 2008 a total of 1,138 people were imprisoned for non payment of their outstanding debt. This high number has lead to a test case challenge against imprisonment by Miss Caroline McCann an unemployed mother of 2 living in the Mullaghmatt council estate in Monaghan who borrowed money from Monaghan Credit Union to support her alcohol dependancy and new born baby's fruneral.

Although the result of this appeal is still in motions it has encouraged more people on this particular estate to appeal too, this has the potential to have a huge impact on hundreds of debtors who are imprisoned each year. This has already had an effect on the imprisonment of an unemployed mother of 4 with psychiatric problems who was jailed for a month over non payment of a 1,500 credit card debt has been freed by orders of the High Court. Which has promted Human Rights Commision to express their concerns to the High Courts about laws that allow people to be jailed when they are unable to pay their debts.

Free Advice

Although an urgent revise of the current Irish law is needed, the very worst a debtor can do is put their head in the sand, ignore their debt problems and hope that the issue will resolve itself. If your experiencing similar problems with debt please do not hesitate to call us on, Free Phone 01657 5602 and speak to our friendly solicitors, or follow this link to complete a short FORM and we will get back to you with your querie.