BW Legal/Excel Pre-Pofa advice please

Gold dust, thank you so much (and to keepswimming too!) I'll plagiarise their documents and post up my version of WS and SA tomorrow hopefully for any comments.

Thank you so much to all that have helped so far, it really is appreciated.

I've put together an initial draft of my Witness Statement which needs to be served by Monday, so any advice is hugely welcomed. I've based it mainly off keepswimming's documents from the thread linked above. (Paragraphs are numbered, 1.5x line space, and pages numbered, exhibit7 is the FOI letter from whatdotheyknow.com)

................................


In the xxxxxxx County Court Case Number XXXXXXX
______________________________________________________________________________

EXCEL PARKING SERVICES LTD Claimant
Parties
MR XXXXXXXXXX Defendant
______________________________________________________________________________

Witness statement of Mr XXXXXXXX

I am XXXXXXX the defendant in this matter and the facts in this Witness statement come from my personal knowledge. Where they are not within my own knowledge they are true to the best of my information and belief. I am unrepresented, with no experience of Court procedures. If I do not set out documents in the correct way, I trust the Court will excuse my inexperience.

Suddenly, around 20th March 2017 I received a letter from the current occupants of my previous residency. Contained in this letter was a letter from BW Legal dated 8th March 2017 which was a "Notice of County Court Claim Issued” along with the Court Claim Form (Exhibits 1 & 2). As this was the first correspondence I had received in relation to this matter, I called BW Legal to find out more. They advised me that this related to an alleged parking charge notice issued on 15/03/2011 against a registration mark that I was the registered keeper of at this time. I have no recollection of this incident. 


In June 2011 I moved house to another part of the country. The vehicle registration mark in question was also transferred to this address using section 6 of the DVLA V5C document. Although the registration mark is not currently assigned to a vehicle, the registration mark is still registered to the defendant and the defendant’s current address and held on a V778 Retention Document with the DVLA. Therefore the claimant has had every opportunity to contact me regarding this matter since 2011, but has not applied due care and diligence to locate the registered keeper of the registration mark in question.


Because no previous correspondence from the claimant was received by the defendant at his current residence, the defendant has had no opportunity to initially defend, dispute or appeal this allegation with the either Excel, their representatives or POPLA.


It is admitted that I was the registered keeper of the vehicle concerned on the date claimed, but the defendant denies being the driver at the time of the supposed event. To date I have not seen or been served any evidence of the vehicle concerned, or who the driver was and as this event has been resurrected from almost 6 years ago, it is impossible to expect a keeper to recall who might have been driving. In the last 6 years I have had several cars and changed insurers when the cars have changed, so no information that relates to that time can be found. I have had named drivers, but my cars have been used frequently over the years by friends and family as long as they had their own insurance.The defendant therefore puts Excel to strict proof that any contract can exist between the defendant and themselves.


This unwarranted harassment and baseless litigation has caused me significant alarm and distress, during my research I discovered that Excel are issuing robo-claims for archive 'parking charges' in their thousands. It is clear that no checks have been made as to the facts of the alleged contract, signs or parking charge, in their undue haste to issue these claims.

My data from the DVLA was supplied for the single strict purpose of enquiring who was driving, not for storing for 6 years then suing me as if I can now be held liable, in the hope I will not defend/will have lost the paperwork/will have moved house, or that I will be so scared that I will pay over £270 including the legal insult of 6 years' interest, for what was apparently an unproven £100 charge, allegedly incurred by another party, if incurred at all.

It is apparent from court records reported in the public domain that this Claimant has been obtaining payments from keepers under false pretences - using the court as a cheap form of debt collection from the wrong 'registered keeper' parties - and has obtained default CCJs in the hundreds, despite never complying with the POFA 2012 and even bringing pre-POFA cases to the Courts, as here.


In 2012, Excel were sanctioned by the DVLA for stating or implying in signs or documents that a registered keeper could be held 'liable for the payment of charges' and/or had 'legal responsibility' to name the driver. It is contended that this is exactly what Excel are now doing in this claim, even though the alleged act occurred before any POFA 2012 legislation came into force, conduct which was identified in 2012 as 'a significant breach' of their Trade Body Code of Practice with the British Parking Association. So serious a matter was this, Excel were banned from obtaining data by the DVLA for three months. (Exhibit 7)


As I have seen no copy of the contract the Claimant has with the landowner to assign the right to enter into contracts with the public,and to make claims and take civil action against drivers in their own name in 2011, the Claimant can have no locus standi at the time of this parking event, at best they were contractors of a principal, the landowner.


I believe that the facts stated in this Witness Statement are true.

Signed

Dated


I'll work on the SA and further evidence once I know this is good to go.