PCS Notice to Keeper Millenium Parking Services

Fruitcake · 9 February 2017 at 5:43PM

Coupon-mad wrote: »

This is OK, she doesn't name you so that's fine.

Accuse them of failure then it's their burden to prove.

Yes, but people need to get into the habit of not revealing too much information otherwise they say things like, I parked, in their very next post.

Coupon-mad · 9 February 2017 at 5:45PM

Agreed but she can say 'he parked' which is safe!

SR06 · 9 February 2017 at 6:08PM

Fruitcake wrote: »

You now need to amend the post I have just corrected, as well as the one I have already mentioned.

The Driver parked in the Keeper's bay with the Keeper's permission in accordance with the terms of the Keeper's lease/AST, or similar wording.

Do NOT reveal the driver's identity. The POFA is one of the strongest appeal points there is, but not as strong as own bay. However, use as many appeal points as available to beat the scammers.

Just to clarify the driver parked in the driver's bay, the registered keeper is the driver's mother. That's still OK? Will do the changes now.

SR06 · 9 February 2017 at 6:30PM

Thank you Fruitcake and Coupon-mad for your time.

Here's the amended defence. Any other thoughts please?
I'm conscious that I haven't made any distinction between the two fines, for two different reasons, apart from in 2.
Can I keep 6.a) given the response BPA gave me on #21 of this thread?
Should I claim compensation for the number of days I've had to take off?
What about data protection and DVLA?

1. It is admitted that the Defendant is the registered keeper of the vehicle in question.

2. The registered keeper was not the driver on both dates that the PCNs were given. The driver was my son and was parking the car in his own bay that comes with the flat that he rents. He has the right to park in this bay in accordance witht he terms of the lease. The car was moved to the visitors spot only after being harassed for parking in his own bay.

3. The Particulars of the Claim submitted to the Defendant provide no statement to the nature of the claim and the Defendant does not believe these particulars to be compliant with Civil Procedure Rules 16.4 nor Practice Direction 16 7.3-7.5 inhibiting the ability of the Defendant to provide a comprehensive and conclusive defence.

4. The Defendant has prepared the defence on the presumption that the alleged parking contravention is in reference to an occasion whereby the Defendant’s vehicle was parked in an allocated leasehold residential parking space at the home address of the Defendant's son.

5. The Defendant denies that the Claimant has the authority to bring a claim. The Claimant does not own the land where the vehicle was parked, nor does he have any interest in the land. He therefore lacks the capacity to offer parking.

a) The Claimant has failed to provide strict proof of a chain of contracts leading from the landowner to the Claimant which show that they have a right to unilaterally remove or interfere with the overriding rights conferred in the Lease.

b) Alternatively, even if a contract could be established, the provision requiring payment of £150.00 is an unenforceable penalty clause and an unfair term contrary to the Consumer Rights Act 2015.

6. The signage was inadequate to form a contract with the motorist.

a) The sign fails because it clearly shows the BPA Approved Operator logo, when in fact the BPA have confirmed the claimant is not a BPA Approved Operator.
(CAN I ADD THIS?)

b) In the absence of ‘adequate notice’ of the terms and the charge (which must be in
large prominent letters such as the brief, clear and multiple signs in the Beavis case)
this fails to meet the requirements of Schedule 4 of the POFA.

c) The driver did not enter into any 'agreement on the charge', no consideration flowed
between the parties and no contract was established.
The Defendant denies that the driver would have agreed to pay the original demand
of £100 to agree to the alleged contract had the terms and conditions of the contract
been properly displayed and legible, because the residents have primacy of contract at this location so any signs elsewhere on site are of no consequence.

7. The Defendant has no liability as they are the keeper of the vehicle and the Claimant has failed to comply with the strict provisions of POFA 2012 to hold anyone other than the driver liable for the charges.

a) The driver has not been evidenced on any occasion.

b) There is no presumption in law that the keeper was the driver and nor is the keeper obliged to name the driver to a private parking firm. This was confirmed in the POPLA Annual Report 2015 by the POPLA Lead Adjudicator and the barrister, Henry Gleenslade, when explaining the POFA 2012 principles of ‘keeper liability’ as set out in Schedule 4.

8. The presence of the Claimant on the land will have supposedly been to purely endure that all residents have the ability to parking in their own allotted car parking space without being impeded by residents or non-residents parking in the wrong places prevent parking by uninvited persons. Instead a predatory operation has been carried out on those very people whose interests the Claimant was purportedly there to uphold.

a) The vehicle was parked on land in accordance with the terms of the Lease.

9. In the case of Saeed v Plustrade Limited [2001] EWCA Civ 2011 parking restrictions and a change which caused detriment to tenants and their visitors were held to be in breach of the well-known and well established principle that ‘a grantor shall not derogate from his grant’

10. This case can be distinguished from ParkingEye v Beavis [2015] UKSC 67 (the Beavis case) which was dependent upon an undenied contract, formed by unusually prominent signage forming a clear offer and which turned on unique facts regarding the location and interests of the landowner. Strict compliance with the BPA(CoP) was paramount and Mr Beavis was the driver who saw the signs and entered into a contract to pay £85 after exceeding a licence to park free. None of this applies in this material case.

a) In Beavis it was held that the purpose of a parking charge must not be to penalise drivers. Justification must depend on some other ‘legitimate interest in performance extending beyond the prospect of pecuniary compensation flowing directly from the breach in question’. The true test was held to be ‘whether the impugned provision is a secondary obligation which imposes detriment on the contract-breaker out of all proportion to any legitimate interest […..] in enforcement of the primary obligation’

b) There can be no ‘legitimate interest’ in penalising residents or their visitors for using parking spaces, under the excuse of a scheme where ostensibly and as far as the landowner is concerned, the parking firm is contracted for the benefit of the residents. It is unconscionable, contrary to the requirement of good faith and ‘out of all proportion to any legitimate interest’ to fine residents or their visitors for using allocated parking spaces.

11. The exact question regarding terms in a lease was tested recently at Oxford County Court, JOPSON v HOME GUARD SERVICES, Appeal case number B9GF0A9E on 29/9/2016. I will include the transcript of that case at any hearing.

a) The Jopson Appeal case is a persuasive Appeal decision, where Senior Circuit Judge Charles Harris QC found that Home Guard Services had acted unreasonably when issuing a penalty charge notice to Miss Jopson, a resident of a block of flats.

12. The Defendant also relies upon the Croydon Court decision in Pace Recovery and Storage v Mr N C6GF14FO 16/9/2016, where District Judge Coonan dismissed the claim and refused leave to appeal, having found that a third party parking firm cannot unilaterally alter the terms of the tenancy agreement.

13. The Defendant disputes that the Claimant has incurred ‘Legal representative’s costs’ of £50 to prepare the claim. The Defendant refers the Court to the incompetent Particulars of Claim that disclose neither the basis for the claim nor a definite cause of action. I submit these ‘costs’ are artificially invented figures in an attempt to circumvent the Small Claims costs rules using double recovery. The Court is invited to report Gladstones to the Solicitors’ Regulation Authority for this deliberate attempt to mislead the Court, in contravention of their Code of Conduct.

14. The Claimant’s solicitors are known to be a serial issuer of generic claims similar to this one, with no due diligence, no scrutiny of details nor even checking for a true cause of action. HMCS have identified over 1000 similar poorly produced claims and the solicitor's conduct in many of these cases is believed to be currently the subject of an active investigation by the SRA.

15. I believe the term for such conduct is ‘robo-claims’ which is against the public interest, demonstrates a disregard for the dignity of the court and is unfair on unrepresented consumers. I have reason to believe that this is a claim that will proceed without any facts or evidence supplied until the last possible minute, to my significant detriment as an unrepresented Defendant.

16. I suggest that parking companies using the small claims track as a form of aggressive, automated debt collection is not something the courts should be seen to support.

17. It is denied that the Claimant has authority to bring this claim. The proper Claimant (if any debt exists, which is denied) would be the landowner.

18. I request the court strike out this claim for the reasons stated above, and for similar reasons cited by District Judge Cross of St Albans County Court on 20/09/16 where a similar claim was struck out without a hearing, due to Gladstones' template particulars for a private parking firm being 'incoherent', failing to comply with CPR16.4, and ''providing no facts that could give rise to any apparent claim in law''.

I believe the facts stated in this Defence Statement are true.

Loadsofchildren123 · 11 February 2017 at 3:07AM

OP where is your flat? I have a Millennium one going through at Copper Quarter and wonder if it is the same site as yours.
I think I have a good point to run - which is that MPS (which issues the tickets) is not a legal entity. The Copper Quarter parking contract was signed by MOS. It was not signed by the ltd company which is suing your mother (that is Millennium Door and Event Security Ltd - MDES). MPS has no legal personality of its own and therefore is incapable of entering into a contract. MPS is not the same as MDES. MDES has no right to sue your mum at all. The contract purporting to grant MPS the parking enforcement rights is void.
The NtD was also issued by MPS.
MDES has no locus standi to sue.
Even if your site is not Copper Quarter you will probably find that MPS has signed the contract so the same arguments apply.
If I am right you should include a para about this in your defence.
MPS is NOT the "trading as" name of the company as BPA claims. The t/a name is Millennium Group. It says this on their signs and company literature.
Have a look at the last post on my thread.
I have researched locus standing and legal personality today and will post on Monday with chapter and verse on this, with case law.

Loadsofchildren123 · 11 February 2017 at 9:48AM

The key to this is they will say MPS is a "division" of MDES. But this is meaningless. I've found authority to say that MDES cannot claim MPS's rights as its own.
This of course may not work. But if it does it means that all Millennium's "tickets" are unenforceable.

SR06 · 7 March 2017 at 9:58PM

Hi Loadsofchildren123,

I'm at Aurora. Thanks for sharing this with me. I've sent my defence off now and just about to fill the directions questionnaire.

Did you get any further with this?

SR06 · 7 March 2017 at 10:02PM

Help needed filling in the directions questionnaire please.

The reigstered keeper of the vehicle's son intends to give evidence on behalf of his Mother if possible. The son also is the one who rents the flat that the car was parked at. Should we put 2 witnesses down on the sheet?

Coupon-mad · 7 March 2017 at 10:54PM

Yes 2 witnesses (the defendant plus one).

Manney_T · 22 March 2017 at 11:17PM

Hi I have received a "notice to keeper" letter through the post on Sat 18.3.2017 from a private company Parking Solutions ltd.
They say I was issued a Parking Charge Notice on 9.1.17 .
I never received this plus I live on the land where they allegedly said I did this "contravention " of not displaying my permit.
Suddenly 69 days after this so called issue I have been asked to pay £100 before 28 days !!
Why am I paying when I have not received anything prior and that I have always had a permit and own the flat outside where my car was left .

Please help.

PCS Notice to Keeper Millenium Parking Services

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