Particulars Of Claim

A document which explains the reason for taking legal action and gives details. 

Payment Holiday

A payment holiday is when a creditor agrees to let you stop making repayments on a debt for a fixed period of time.

Payment On Account

A payment of housing benefit that the council make if it is unable to assess a claim within 14 days, and all the necessary information and documents have been provided. They are sometimes known as an ‘interim payment’. 

Pension

A pension is a long-term investment plan that provides a lump sum or monthly income when you retire.

Pension Credit

Pension credit is a means-tested benefit available to people who are over state pension age & have a low income.

Policy Document

A policy is a legal document issued to you by an insurance company. It states the terms & conditions of the insurance.

Possession Order

A court order that tells an occupier to leave a property by a certain date and gives the landlord or lender the right to use the property as they wish. Possession orders can be suspended or postponed. 

Postponed Possession Order

A court order which allows someone to stay in their home as long as they keep to certain conditions agreed and detailed on the court order. For example payment of the contractual monthly rent or mortgage plus a regular amount towards the arrears. If these conditions are not met then the landlord or lender can apply to the court for a warrant of eviction. The PPO largely replaced the SPO from 2006, following the decision in Harlow DC v Hall to prevent tenants from losing their security of tenure once the order was made. Following the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008, which restored security of tenure to all tenants, the PPO fell out of use. There is currently no difference between a PPO and an SPO. 

PPI

PPI or payment protection insurance is a type of insurance that’s sold alongside loans, credit cards or mortgages. It covers repayments for a set period of time if you can’t pay because of an accident, illness or unemployment.

Practise Direction

A supplement to rules of civil and criminal procedure in the Courts which give practical advice on how to interpret the rules themselves 

Pre-action Protocol

The steps that must be followed before court action can be started. Pre-action protocols only exist for certain types of cases, including mortgage arrears cases, and disrepair cases. If a pre-action protocol exists but is not followed, it may be possible to ask for an adjournment.  

Preference

Creating a preference is an action or inaction by a debtor which has the effect of putting a creditor (or guarantor of a debt) in a position which, would be better than the position if that action had not been taken. This directly contravenes the overriding principle of insolvency proceedings which is that, once commenced all creditors are treated equally and fairly. 

Preferential Creditor

A creditor in bankruptcy proceedings who is entitled to receive certain payments from a bankrupt's estate in priority to other unsecured creditors. These creditors include secured creditors, employee's wages and occupational pension schemes. 

Premium

A premium is a single or regular payment made to a company for a product.

Priority Debts

Priority debts are ones where, if you don’t make a payment, the consequences can be serious, for example loss of your home or imprisonment.

Private Pension

A private pension is a type of pension that you pay & doesn’t include any additional contribution by employers or the Government.

Pro-rata

Meaning in proportion to; pro-rata payment proposals are exactly proportionate to the size of each debt 

Proxy

Instead of attending a meeting, a person can appoint someone to go and vote in their place – a ‘proxy’.