Tonight ` MUG SHATTERS Hey, hey, no need to get physical, mate. Pay me back, please. He thinks the courts are a joke, and I am beginning to believe him. MUG SHATTERS No one's got it right so far. Hi, there. Plain English. Not. I'm totally lost. That's ridiculous. And there must be a better way. Who doesn't? Who doesn't? My wife does. Who doesn't? My wife does. We all do. I just kept on buying gifts for the family, gifts for myself. Welcome to Fair Go. Unpaid civil debts and a system that just doesn't seem to work properly. Garth went up north to try and collect where the justice ministry couldn't. As well as the money, he very nearly collected a gumboot in the head. DOOR OPENS, MUG SHATTERS DOOR OPENS, MUG SHATTERS <BLEEP> off. > Hey, hey, no need to get physical, mate. <BLEEP> > <BLEEP> > Why don't you just talk about it, Andrew? Why throw insults and chuck stuff? Why throw insults and chuck stuff? It's none of your <BLEEP>ing business. > The man behind the door owes money. He's Andrew Dawson. You'll meet him shortly. Bet you can't wait (!) Don Levy knows all about waiting. He's the man who's owed. I said, 'Look, this is ridiculous. Just send me my money back.' Don lives on the West Coast near Buller. He needed a back-up generator. We get some horrific power cuts out here. The last power cut we had lasted seven days. Don bought a generator from Dawson, parted with $3000. It came with a promise Dawson would deliver despite the 1200km journey that would require. Waited and waited and waited. We'll spare you the excuses. The Disputes Tribunal agreed 18 months later, that Dawson should have delivered and Don was owed a full refund with costs and interest ` $3345. Dawson simply refused to pay and got nasty instead. He just says, 'Oh, I'd hoped you'd died by now.' Don was battling lung cancer the whole time. He'd told Andrew Dawson, who now seemed to be using it against him. Are you feeling all right in yourself at the moment? Are you feeling all right in yourself at the moment? I'm feeling damn good, yeah, yeah. He's been waiting for me to die so he doesn't have to pay me. Well, hell will freeze over first. (LAUGHS) Radical surgery seems to have caught it. He's looking after himself, blitzing a whole lemon every day ` skin and all. It's not the juice, but the injustice that leaves a sour taste. I think he thinks the courts are a joke, and I'm beginning to believe him. (LAUGHS) Don Levy assumed that the long arm of the law would stretch out to Andrew Dawson from here on the West Coast to here in Kaikohe. From the fact that we're here in Northland and here ourselves, you can probably work out that the court civil enforcement system has failed Don miserably so far. Don couldn't be in two places at once, though. So began an epic journey for a man fighting cancer. Pity you can't get him to go fetch Andrew Dawson, eh? Pity you can't get him to go fetch Andrew Dawson, eh? That'd be marvellous. Driving five hours across The Alps to Christchurch for a flight to Auckland ` full price, no Grabaseat ` then three hours in a rental car to Kaikohe for a financial assessment hearing. I travelled all the way up there for three minutes to be told 'case adjourned'. You could see that he just wasn't very well at all, and, yeah, I really felt for the guy. Steve Brock is a debt collector who'd offered to help Don and witnessed Dawson in full flight. 'Well, we're all effin dying. Every day you're closer to death.' He just saw it as a big joke. The registrar lady was absolutely shocked. So this was in court? > This was in the hearing room where you have it. Just the whole aggressive manner was just ill. Steve had urged Don to use the sledgehammer. I did want to run a bankruptcy petition on Mr Dawson. He didn't really wanna bankrupt him, did he? > I don't think so. He was just too much` Mr Levy's just too much of a gentleman. And a bankruptcy petition can cost $800 to get up. Don had already spent twice that chasing this debt. OK, maybe Don didn't need to go all the way to Kaikohe to be at court, and maybe we didn't need to come all the way here, although it is quite nice. No none of this would have been necessary if Andrew Dawson had simply paid what he owed, or if the court had enforced its judgement against him. Unfortunately, the civil rights of entry of a bailiff and the civil enforcement of the district court is very very weak. You could simply turn around and, 'Go away. I'm not talking to you,' and shut the door, but if it's was a fine, they'd break in and take your TV. Dawson later agreed to a repayment plan. He now owed Don $3500. He paid a thousand, then nothing more, so Don requested yet another hearing at court. He didn't even bother to turn up for that one, so there was an arrest warrant issued. Not as bad as that news might sound. It was never enforced by the bailiffs, yet how hard could that be? Like the sign says, this is Kaikohe district court. So this is where Andrew Dawson lives. It's about seven minutes walk, but two if you're driving, so not far for the long arm of the law to stretch out, and yet when the bailiffs tried to catch up with him, I'm told, they weren't lucky. We can't say how hard they tried, but it didn't work. We turned up just after 8 on a weekday morning. I'd had a couple of expletive-laden phone calls with Andrew Dawson previously. If you deal with me, I'll deal with you. What does that mean? You can take it whichever way you want. No, I'd like some clarity, please. What do you mean? No, I'd like some clarity, please. What do you mean? Get <BLEEP>ed. Why don't you <BLEEP> off? That call did something. The very next day, Dawson went to court and paid $2100. Amazing! I still want to ask him, 'Why drag it out for three years, putting a sick man through anguish?' Gidday, Andrew, how are you? It's Garth from Fair Go. Oh, close the door. Close the door on the <BLEEP>. Andrew? Andrew? Just <BLEEP> off! I don't think there's any need to swear. I've just come to give you that chance to have a chat. Come up to the window. MUG SHATTERS Andrew? Andrew, why did you take so long to give Don Levy his money back? It's none of your <BLEEP>ing business, you <BLEEP> stirrer! What was that? I can't hear you properly through the door. Do you mind opening the door so we can talk about this? MUG SHATTERS <BLEEP> off! > Hey, hey, no need to get physical, mate. Why don't you just talk about it, Andrew? Why throw insults and chuck stuff? It's none of your <BLEEP>ing business! > I think i heard you say we should leave, so of course, sir. I'll be right out on the road if you wanna come and have a chat though. I'll be right out on the road if you wanna come and have a chat though. <BLEEP> off, Garth! > Sorry? Well that's pretty much how every conversation I've had with Andrew Dawson goes. He sounds like an extremely angry man. It's not the last we hear from Andrew Dawson either. Hours after this, he goes back to court and pays about $130, clearing his debt to Don Levy at long last. He's clearly a hard case, but could even simple civil enforcement soon be a lot harder to carry out? Stick with us, the next bit is about how you could wind up waiting just like Don did. You see there's this by-election on in Northland ` a steady procession of politicians skiting about the roads and the broadband they're laying in, but until we asked, scant mention that change is coming to the justice system. The courts are going through a massive programme of addressing all of their issues across the operation of courts ` from the time it takes trials to go ahead, from the cost of those processes, to the enforcement of civil orders, to the collection of civil fines, so there's a big piece of work across all of that. If you ask me whether I'm happy, I think there's a lot more we can do and that's what we're working on. Sounds good, except Fair Go obtained a copy of what's planned for a crucial part of civil enforcement. There used to be five bailiffs working this patch. Now there'll be just two. Not two for Kaikohe, two for the entire Northland region from the cape to the edge of Auckland. Don Levy may not be the only person waiting a long time for justice. Those changes are mirrored nationwide. From April, we'll have half as many bailiffs working for the courts. In Otago, Taranaki and on the East Coast, the bailiff will be working solo, unless they're dealing with a potentially threatening case. Don't worry though ` law changes last year have made it... according to the general manager of collections, who adds,... Don Levy has grave doubts given how let down he feels by the system before it was cut in half. If it's a civil case, there's no interest. They're not interested in enforcing it. It's wrong. It really is wrong. There's something systemically wrong with this system. So, after a thousand days of aggro, Don plans to spend the money he's been repaid on a gift for his sister. The satisfaction is all the payback he needs. Now, do reckon you know good plain English when you see it? No one's got it right so far. No one's got it right so far. That's incredibly complicated. Can you turn this into this? Why didn't they say that in the first place? This bloke's story got you on the warpath over downsizing. It's got to be a rip-off in some shape or form. And later ` Christmas is hard. How much did you spend at Christmas? Welcome back. Shrinking product, same price. Why do companies think they can get away with it? To try and can keep them honest, we asked you to send us your pictures of original and downsized items. Dave Greg got in touch. His favourite ` Pams Light & Fruity has gone from 500g down to 450. priced just the same for 10% less, though the box grew bigger! Foodstuffs say they phased out that product and replaced it with higher quality cereal. A different mix of ingredients meant the cereal needed a larger box. Really? They also told us that following our enquiry they've picked up a North Island 'pricing glitch' and have now dropped the price for the 450g pack nationwide. Well, crikey, Pippa, that was lucky! Wasn't it? Jade says her nana would turn in her grave if she saw the new look Oxo Cubes ` a carved out cube with less product and harder to break. We contacted the Oxo people, but they didn't come back with an explanation. And Kay Smith's spotted one too. Her gripe ` Impulse body spray changed from 75g down to 57g with no reduction in price. Impulse tell us they reformulated the fragrances using higher quality ingredients ` sound familiar ` and the decrease in size means the product fits easily into handbags and is more portable. Thanks for those examples. Now for our quiz question of the week. You versus the bank cashpoint machine. Here's a tough one for you. We're back with another question for you ` if you withdraw money from an ATM, leave it behind by mistake and it's not stolen, the bank will give it back to you? False. False. Yeah, that's false. I say true. False. I would hope that's true. False. False. Sound too good to be true? Find out later in the show. That's our fourth quiz question in our series. The answer in a little bit. We offered $10 to the person who got the most right on the day we filmed those, so we will have a winner in coming weeks. All right, I'll admit it. I am a bit of stickler for grammar, punctuation, and correct word usage. Yes, we know, but, seriously, if you don't understand the language you are reading, how do you know what you are signing up to? Here's a test I did. The first step in making sure a contract is fair, is understanding what you're agreeing too. We put it to the test on a beautiful Auckland morning on the Devonport ferry. Lynda Harris from Write Ltd, a company that specialises in taking complicated language like this... and turning it into this ` plain English, kindly lent us this example. The clause simply says what to do if you want to reverse a direct debit that you've organised to try and get your money back. Hi there. I wondered if you might read that for me, and let me know if you can make sense of it. I'm totally lost. That's ridiculous. Gobbledegook, quite frankly. It's annoying, and you don't want to read it. You're halfway through and your completely lost. No one's got it right so far. Um, it's incredibly complicated. Then we stumbled upon someone who knows a bit about the law ` definitely wanted to hear what she had to say. Oh-la-la. This will test my legal skills. Just have a read through and give me your thoughts on it. Just have a read through and give me your thoughts on it. (LAUGHS) I'm gonna stop reading half way and say, as a lawyer, I think that's outrageous. Um, it's almost unintelligible. Sums it up in a nutshell. We asked her how important the language used in contracts really is. Critical ` I mean it's the only point in a contract I think to ensure both parties understand it, otherwise you haven't got one, right? So I don't think most people would have a chance of understanding what that's about. People did understand Lynda from Write Ltd's easier version, though. Yeah, I kinda get that. That's kinda useful. Much easier to understand. Says what it means. I understand it. Most people would understand it Why didn't they say that in the first place? (LAUGHS) 'Why didn't they say that in the first place' indeed. As we told you last week, the new unfair contracts law means unfair fine print can now be ruled unlawful. But it only applies to new contracts signed from last Tuesday onwards, and you have to refer the fine print to the Commerce Commission, who may or may not decide to take action. And we are still looking for some contracts from you with outrageously unfair fine print that we think should be looked at. There's the address ` We've run out of time for our call challenge this week. My call to Vodafone was two hours, 18 minutes. That got absolutely smashed. We think we've got a winner. It is an astonishing time, actually, but keep sending us screen shots of your call and we'll definitely run that next week. OK, you didn't mean to. This time it was going to be different. You even agreed not to buy expensive presents for each other. That's what Christmas is about, though, isn't it? Cheers. But still you blew the budget. I just kept on buying gifts for the family, gifts for myself. There must be a better way. Usually, I make a budget. I had my little list. I buy early. You've always got to plan ahead. How much did you spend at Christmas? Welcome back. Do you know the correct answer to the quiz question we asked earlier? In case you missed it earlier, this week's true-false quiz question is` If you withdraw money from an ATM, leave it behind by mistake, and it's not stolen, the bank will give it back to you? My bank actually did this recently to me, and I thank them for that. He's right. Here's how it works ` if no one takes the funds, the machine swallows it after a short time, but doesn't give it back to you automatically. In fact, it doesn't even tell you its got it, but don't panic; if they have it and everything checks out, you'll get it back. You just have to lodge an ATM refund claim with your bank. Next week ` towies. Now, towies. You've got a towie story next week? Yes, about the precise question you ask, actually. Yes, about the precise question you ask, actually. Ah. Only 274 days till Christmas. You're pretty excited already. I love Christmas. I love Christmas. What music were you listening to yesterday, Pippa? Christmas carols. But` In March? There is never a wrong time to listen to Christmas carols. But you will be thinking why on earth are we talking about it? For many the household finances are still suffering after the holiday spending season. So start early. Join a Christmas club. But do they actually save you money, how can you get ahead? Hannah does the maths. A chorus of yums ran round the table ` yum, yum, yum, yum, yum. Yum, yum, yum, yum, this is Christmas ` food, friends, family and fortune ` spending a fortune that is. Who doesn't? My wife does. We all do. I just keep on buying gifts for the family, gifts for myself. A little bit over the budget, yeah. That's what Christmas is about, though, isn't it. Cheers. But for many ` Christmas is hard. Hard on our wallets. That last minute spend on Christmas Eve alone came to a record $263,000,000. So just how do you keep a lid on spending? Actually, I stuck to my budget. I had my little list. You've always got to plan ahead, always. How much did you spend at Christmas? How much did you spend at Christmas? It was too much. (LAUGHS) Definitely more than I should of. Definitely more than I should of. More than you allowed for. We've asked for some tips from budget advisor Tania Clark. So, here's your total for your income coming in per week. Tania's first tip for client Ester Pakura, who's had a bit of a festive blowout ` start a Christmas-savings scheme right now. It might be enough that it takes care of your food shopping for the whole month, not just Christmas day and Christmas night. Yep, that sounds awesome. I think it's about planning and self control. And Consumer will help us sort through different Christmas-savings schemes. Which are crackers? Which are turkeys? Starting with Christmas hampers ` Chrisco and the Christmas Catalogue Company. Both offer a big range of food and gifts, and both are, well, expensive. I think the amounts of some of those hampers are just quite extraordinary. The companies say, 'Well, we do all the work for you ` 'pick the items, pack them and get them to your door at Christmas.' It's really the convenience of not having to go out and fuss with the crowds at Christmas time at a supermarket. Convenience ` you pay for it! For instance, Chrisco's $465 food hamper ` Consumer bought equivalent product online for $386, including delivery ` a 17% difference. And the Christmas catalogue company's $990 whopper hamper ` Consumer found similar goods online for $606 - that's a 39% saving. Really, how much is your time worth to pay 39% more? Supermarkets like Countdown, Fresh Choice, and SuperValue run a voucher Christmas savings scheme. You get 5% bonus if you don't spend them until December. New World, Four Square and Pak'nsave have savings cards. You like $10, ma'am, on your Christmas club card? You like $10, ma'am, on your Christmas club card? Yes, thank you. Also offering bonuses of between 2-7%. You're going to get a better return on the supermarket schemes than any of the others. And the earlier you can start saving, and the longer you can leave your money in, the better value they become. Consumer worked out that saving just $12.50 a week for 40 weeks that's $500, add the bonuses and discounts ` that's around $521-526. Now, that's what I'd call extra cream on the pav. We all like our food at my house (LAUGHS). And we like to have something special on Christmas Day. But Ester's Christmas blowout meant she struggled come the school year ` uniforms, books and so on. She says saving is good for her and her kids. Because they'll see I have certain places to put money; that I'm not just wilfully going down to the shop every second night to get chocolate and ice cream. (LAUGHS) So do you feel a real pressure at Christmas time? So do you feel a real pressure at Christmas time? Yeah, a little bit. In some ways I kinda think that I've put a little of that on myself by buying things for them and overspending other Christmases and just wanting to give them everything, but I think that's natural as a parent. If it's pressies blowing the budget, The Warehouse Christmas card offers a 5% discount, so consumer reckons saving $12.50 a week for 40 weeks ` $500 savings ` like the supermarkets, gets you $525. But ask yourself ` Am I going to do all my Christmas present shopping at The Warehouse? The Hampsta card works with a number of partner stores, but consumer warns ` before you join, check if any partnerships are about to expire. Last year, Countdown supermarket's partnership ended in September, but lots of Hampsta clients didn't find out until... People were turning up in the Countdown in December with their trolley loads at the checkout, and discovering, 'Oh, they're no longer a member.' I suggest that maybe we look at putting a small amount into a savings account every fortnight. For her pressies, Esther's started a bank account with no fees, which will pay bonus interest if she can keep her mitts off her savings till Christmas. And that is cash money to pay for the Christmas presents. There's no credit cards being ticked up or hire purchase's being done. There's no credit cards being ticked up or hire purchase's being done. Yeah, that would be awesome. In the bank, though, $12.50 a week for 40 weeks at say 2.75% interest, only brings in an extra $5.42 on $500 savings. But it's about starting the budget and savings habit. Are you thinking that next Christmas is going to be different? Are you thinking that next Christmas is going to be different? Yes, definitely, yep. Why? Why? Uh, because I won't be so stressed out come Christmas. I've got a plan in place now to be ready for Christmas, yeah. Really good, yep, really good, really positive. Every year I promise myself I'll do the shopping early, and I always fail. But you nail it, don't you? But you nail it, don't you? No, I wouldn't say that. I do start early, but I do carry on through. Now, Hannah's put some extra tips on our website and a link to Consumer NZ, keyword 'Christmas savings scheme'. So that's the show, but we will be on Facebook for the next half hour to answer your questions. Our programme is all about your problems, your thoughts, so do get in touch. We're on Facebook. Email us ` fairgo@tvnz.co.nz. Write to us ` Private Bag 92038, Auckland, 1142. Next week ` the story we didn't bring you this week. Mate, you are going to damage your car. Get away from it. Towie versus motorist. I'm so sorry. I think it is ridiculous. He was threatening her. He threatened me when I was here. Do you know what towies are legally allowed to do? My favourite bit of obscure law. Don't touch my equipment. That's next week. <BLEEP>. You going to sort this out? Goodnight.