Parking Eye - Court Claim

Tandon · 20 October 2013 at 12:52PM

At the end of February 2013 I parked in what turned out to be a Parking Eye controlled car park for more than the 2 hour "limit". In March I received one of their Parking Charge Notices. Foloowing the advice here, I ignored it and the reminder. At the beginning of July I received a Letter Before Action from Parking Eye. The advice here still seemed to be to ignore so I did not respond to it.

I have now received a Claim Form for Northampton County Court. What do I do now, can I defend?

Umkomaas · 20 October 2013 at 1:14PM

Tandon wrote: »

At the end of February 2013 I parked in what turned out to be a Parking Eye controlled car park for more than the 2 hour "limit". In March I received one of their Parking Charge Notices. Foloowing the advice here, I ignored it and the reminder. At the beginning of July I received a Letter Before Action from Parking Eye. The advice here still seemed to be to ignore so I did not respond to it.

I have now received a Claim Form for Northampton County Court. What do I do now, can I defend?

I'm afraid there is no way that any advice from this forum would be to ignore a Letter Before Action, so please, unless you can provide us with the specific link that gave that information, do not level that suggestion at the forum. In actual fact in July of this year none of the advice given by this forum was to ignore ANYTHING.

I'm surprised that as you seem to think that previous forum advice has been so incorrect why you are seeking our help now?

All that aside you must now acknowledge service of the papers (via the MCOL website), state you will be defending and ask for the extended time (14 extra days to the standard) to give you 28 days to prepare your defence. If you don't acknowledge, PE will apply for a default judgment and you will have costs awarded against you; failure to pay these will result in a CCJ recorded against your credit rating - not a good place to be!

You will need to spend a good deal of your time researching how to prepare your defence, so use the search engine on here to put in some keywords around 'defence', 'outline defence', 'court appearance' etc.

Others more experienced than me in preparing court defences might be along later to make other suggestions.

You might also want to post this on PePiPoo where there are more 'court' experts, but, do yourself a favour and leave out any unfounded accusations about any previous forum advice.

http://forums.pepipoo.com/index.php?act=SF&s=&f=60

Half_way · 20 October 2013 at 1:59PM

in whos car park was this?
was it a retailer such as a supermarket? or a retail park with multiple retail outlets?
a Hospital? a stand alone car park?

In alomost all cases parking eye are nothing more than contractors (agents) acting on behalf of someone else (the principal )
If a well made complaint is made to the principal ( ie car park owner) then they will be able to cancel any action by their agents.

You still need to start working on your defence etc as above, however going after the principal/car aprk owner with a well written complaint as well may help things somewhat.

Tandon · 20 October 2013 at 2:42PM

I don't know who owns the car park, it is the Arches at B&Q, Watford. I wrote a letter of complaint to B&Q but didn't get a reply. A follow up letter resulted in a reply claiming not to have received my original letter. I replied, sending copies and got a response, in which they stating they did not own the car park and that I should contact the owner (who ever that is).

martmonk · 20 October 2013 at 2:52PM

Tandon wrote: »

I don't know who owns the car park, it is the Arches at B&Q, Watford. I wrote a letter of complaint to B&Q but didn't get a reply. A follow up letter resulted in a reply claiming not to have received my original letter. I replied, sending copies and got a response, in which they stating they did not own the car park and that I should contact the owner (who ever that is).

If you were a genuine customer at the park see here http://forums.pepipoo.com/lofiversion/index.php/t73896.html

Maybe mothercare manager will be more helpful if you happened to also visit that store?

Regardless I would go to b&q and complain in person to the manager, not by letter.

Coupon-mad · 20 October 2013 at 2:54PM

As I just posted on the other thread you posted on, I think you just need to practise how to search effectively (sorry if I am stating the obvious).

On any forum if you use the 'search this forum' facility and put in a single unusual keyword you can find cases like your own in two seconds. It's the same on this forum as on any forum (the MSE search facility is explained on the other thread you posted on).

But you now say you have no idea who owns (or runs) this Retail Park, yet you have named it...so what happened when you searched Google for that name? I just did and found a facebook page (complain on it) and some retail results which have an address to write to (write to them) and other results including kswiss' thread about the place on pepipoo forum:

http://forums.pepipoo.com/index.php?showtopic=73896

Well worth a read because it has been recently updated on page 3 where he has persuaded a Store Manager to get it cancelled even though he had ignored the charge and got court papers. Same car park as you only he ignored the fake PCN in 2012 - hence why you can see we now say in 2013 'do not ignore'!

I think you simply need to learn to search effectively (forums or Google) when you want to find anything! Perhaps it's about the keywords used; I know at work at a school, I find Google searches much easier than some colleagues because I use one or two words, not sentences.

Sorry if that sounds obvious but I have found stuff for you in minutes...

Tandon · 21 October 2013 at 12:22AM

Coupon-mad wrote: »

As I just posted on the other thread you posted on, I think you just need to practise how to search effectively (sorry if I am stating the obvious).

But you now say you have no idea who owns (or runs) this Retail Park, yet you have named it...so what happened when you searched Google for that name? I just did and found a facebook page (complain on it) and some retail results which have an address to write to (write to them) and other results including kswiss' thread about the place on pepipoo forum:

Unfortunately I can't find the other thread I posted on, despite following your advice.

When I search for the The Arches car park all I get are the retailers at the park and the adjacent parks or maps of how to find it. Nothing on who owns it.

Coupon-mad · 21 October 2013 at 12:29AM

Forum tip (works on every forum I post on):

Click on your own username if you want to find your previous posts quickly. I am amazed how many people join forums and don't know how to find their way around...should it be down to other posters to explain (surely there's some FAQs when you registered, or a 'forum tips/how to use the forum' summary)?

Why would you search for the words 'car park' as part of your keywords on Google? That's the point I am making, do not include generic words. I searched for 'The Arches Watford' on Google and found a retail result (number two on my results) which gave the address to write to.

You DO NOT ever need to know who OWNS a retail park, only an address or email or facebook page regarding the place. Google shows 2 out of 3 of those ( I couldn't see an email addy). You are complaining to the management company who run the place and you have an address and a facebook page - that will do.

zzzLazyDaisy · 21 October 2013 at 12:31AM

Umkomaas wrote: »

you must now acknowledge service of the papers (via the MCOL website), state you will be defending and ask for the extended time (14 extra days to the standard) to give you 28 days to prepare your defence. If you don't acknowledge, PE will apply for a default judgment and you will have costs awarded against you; failure to pay these will result in a CCJ recorded against your credit rating - not a good place to be!

Just quoting the above post by way of a reminder that the defence clock is ticking.

By all means try and get this knocked on the head by COMPLAINING to the stores and retail park (ie doing something about it rather than prevaricating)

But at the moment your priority needs to be to go to MCOL and file the acknowledgment of service and get time extended to 28 days for filing the defence. Missing the court deadlines is not an option unless you want a CCJ against you.

Tandon · 21 October 2013 at 11:48PM

Coupon-mad wrote: »

But you now say you have no idea who owns (or runs) this Retail Park, yet you have named it...so what happened when you searched Google for that name? I just did and found a facebook page (complain on it) and some retail results which have an address to write to (write to them)
Sorry if that sounds obvious but I have found stuff for you in minutes...

I initially searched for "The Arches, Watford" and all I got were lists of the various retailers at The Arches retail Park and the several surrounding retail parks plus parking information sites that give directions to find the place and fees charged. The Facebook page is an automatically generated page and has nothing to speak of on it. It certainly isn't a page relating to the land owners, retailers or park management company. If you found something useful perhaps you could post it.

Tandon · 22 October 2013 at 8:19PM

zzzLazyDaisy wrote: »

J
But at the moment your priority needs to be to go to MCOL and file the acknowledgment of service and get time extended to 28 days for filing the defence. Missing the court deadlines is not an option unless you want a CCJ against you.

I have indeed acknowledged the court papers so now I need to construct a defence.

Parking Eye - Court Claim

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