PCM Ticket whilst parked outside a friends house visiting, do i pay?

Quentin wrote: »

You can't get a ruling on other people's court claims as part of your hearing if that's what you mean

Yes thats what i meant, as it seems a waste of court time to hear the same case 4 times!

part 2

18. The Court of Appeal concluded that the defendant had not promised to not play football again and the amount was therefore recoverable because there was no breach of contract. The use of the term, ‘Penalty’, was not therefore definitive of the legal nature of the sum payable. As Lord Justice Sellers observed,
“The sole concern of the underwriters, for whose protection the document alone came into existence, was not to stop the defendant from playing professional football again but to recover their £500 if he did so and thereby established conclusively that he had never at any time been permanently totally disabled from doing so.

It seems to me quite unrealistic to construe the document as imposing a contractual ban upon the defendant from playing professional football again. I should have thought that the underwriters would welcome his doing so, since that was their only hope of recovering their £500. They certainly not recover it, however fit the defendant became to play professional football again, if he retired from playing it or if he played football again but confined himself to the amateur game.”
The Court held that;
“notwithstanding the word "penalty" used in the declaration, the obligation imposed on the defendant was to reimburse the underwriters that which they had paid on a basis proved to be false by events; the payment was neither an imposition of a fine nor a penal payment and, accordingly, was recoverable from the defendant”.
19. The court concluded that one should consider the obligations imposed by the agreement, not the terminology used i.e. the agreement’s substance, not form.
20. The principles in this case are the same as in the Parking Eye case, save that in the Parking Eye case, as the particular parking rules were different, the rule breached was that motorists must leave the site within 2 hours, whereas here, as set out above, the rule was to display a valid permit.
21. The Court may conclude that the Land is managed as follows; the Claimant grants a contractual license to all; this license allows anyone permission to be on the Land. This is inferred by the nature of the land and the lack of any general prohibition of entry on the signage. In this regard, the Defendant (as were all the motorists) was offered to comply with the normal conditions (as clear on the sign), or park otherwise than in accordance with the normal conditions and incur a £100 charge. The acceptance was at the point the Defendant decided to park, having read the sign, and his consideration was the promise to pay £100 for the privilege of parking outside the normal conditions. The Claimant’s consideration is the provision of parking services.
22. I refer to the Court to Judge Hegarty’s comments in ParkingEye v Somerfield (2011) that “If this is the price payable for the privilege, it does not seem to me that it can be regarded as a penalty, even though it is substantial and obviously intended to discourage motorists from leaving their cars on the car park”.
23. Alternatively; it could be concluded that, any person can use the Land provided they do not exceed the licensed activity as set out on the sign and in failing to comply with the license granted to them, they in turn agree to the Claimant’s entirely distinct offer from that license which is ‘to park otherwise than in accordance with the license for a charge of £100’.
No authority to enforce charges
24. As the contract is between my Company and the Defendant, my Company does have the authority to enforce parking charges. However, both VCS v HM Revenue & Customs (2013) and Parking Eye v Beavis (CA 2015) made it clear that a contracting party need not show they have a right to do what they have promised in the performance of a contract, nor is (in the case of a parking operator) the agreement between Operator and Landowner of any relevance. In any event, and without concession, the Agreement exhibited to this Witness Statement evidences

my Company’s authorisation to operate / manage the Relevant Land on behalf of the Landowner.
25. Lord Justice Lewison commented in VCS v HM Revenue & Customs [2013] EWCA Civ 186
1. “The Upper Tribunal’s reasoning on this part of the case was that since VCS did not have the right under its contract with the car park owner to grant a licence to park, it could not have contracted with the motorist to grant such a right. In my judgment there is a serious flaw in this reasoning.
2. The flaw in the reasoning is that it confuses the making of a contract with the power to perform it. There is no legal impediment to my contracting to sell you Buckingham Palace. If (inevitably) I fail to honour my contract then I can be sued for damages. On the stock market it is commonplace for traders to sell short; in other words to sell shares that they do not own in the hope of buying them later at a lower price. In order to perform the contract the trader will have to acquire the required number of shares after the contract of sale is made. Moreover, in some cases a contracting party may not only be able to contract to confer rights over property that he does not own, but may also be able to perform the contract without acquiring any such right. Thus in Bruton v London and Quadrant Housing Trust [2000] 1 AC 406 a housing trust with no interest in land was held to have validly granted a tenancy of the land to a residential occupier. The tenancy would not have been binding on the landowner, but bound the two contracting parties in precisely the same way as it would have done if the grantor had had an interest in the land.
Thus in my judgment the Upper Tribunal were wrong to reverse the decision of the FTT on the question whether VCS had the power to enter into a contract. Having the power to enter into a contract does not, of course, mean that VCS necessarily did enter into a contract with the motorist to permit parking”
The Current Debt
26. In view of the Defendant not paying the charge within the 28 days allowed they are in breach of the contract. Breach of contract entitles the innocent party to damages as of right in addition to the parking charge incurred.
27. In view of the Defendant not paying the charge the matter was passed to my Company’s legal representatives, Gladstones Solicitors Ltd. The debt has, as a result of this referral risen as my Company’s staff have spent time and material in facilitating the recovery of this debt. This time could have been better spent on other elements of my Company’s business. My Company believes the costs associated with such time spent were incurred naturally as a direct result of the Defendant’s breach and as such asks that this element of the claim be awarded as a damage. The costs claimed are a pre-determined and nominal contribution to the actual losses. Alternatively, my Company does have a right to costs pursuant to the sign (i.e. the contract).