PPC Letter Chains & Court Papers (discussion & comments)

LincolnshireYokel

island2 wrote: »

I think the most colourable defence here is that the driver declined the offer of a licence to park for £80 and instead is trespassing. If that holds, the landowner could perhaps only recover the damages, but If the car park were completely full at any point, those damages could be the same as the parking fee he could have received from another driver.

Thanks for the citations, Coupon-mad; I'll go look them up.

Except if the car park was a free one, the damages are nil, and if its a retail park then there is arguably an implied invitation to enter the land anyway, so its unlikely to hold up as trespass.

Congratulations, you've arrived at the same conclusion this forum did about three years ago.

island2

Oops, you've made a bad assumption on your first point. If there is a parking charge for staying over three hours, then the car park wasn't free to start with.

I have no idea how well or badly the "I was trespassing, not accepting your offer" line would work in court though.

LincolnshireYokel

island2 wrote: »

I have no idea how well or badly the "I was trespassing, not accepting your offer" line would work in court though.

Either

a) you agreed to contract with the PPC
b) you refused to contract with the PPC and are trespassing, which is going to be hard to prove if its a retail park open to public access
c) you refused to contract because you accepted an implied offer to enter the land by the landowner, because its a retail park open to the public.

theres no other options.

I dont even know why this is being debated, we thrashed this out years ago.

island2

LincolnshireYokel wrote: »

Either

a) you agreed to contract with the PPC
b) you refused to contract with the PPC and are trespassing, which is going to be hard to prove if its a retail park open to public access
c) you refused to contract because you accepted an implied offer to enter the land by the landowner, because its a retail park open to the public.

theres no other options.

Is there an implied offer of a licence to remain on the land as well as one to enter, though? There is an implied offer to enter on my land for the purpose of putting documents or flyers through my letterbox, but not to remain.

bazster

island2 wrote: »

It absolutely can be done under the law of agency. In the estate agent case you might need to give a power of attorney because of extra legal requirements on the transfer of real estate. But a landowner can certainly empower an agent to offer drivers a licence to park their vehicles on his land, and will be bound by any contract the agent concludes. See any basic text on contract law or agency law.

Try reading what I said. That was exactly my point: the only way a PPC can make an offer to park (short of being granted a licence to occupy) is for the PPC to be the landowner's agent. That is precisely the situation as it stands now, and the wishy-washy definition of a "relevant contract" in the POFA adds nothing.

But this is absolutely not the way that PPC's behave. They behave as though they are principal to the contract (they are not) and they seem to believe that POFA legitimises this (it doesn't).

bazster

island2 wrote: »

Oops, you've made a bad assumption on your first point. If there is a parking charge for staying over three hours, then the car park wasn't free to start with.

If it's a parking charge at all. Courts can and do determine that it's actually a penalty and therefore unenforceable.

bazster

island2 wrote: »

Is there an implied offer of a licence to remain on the land as well as one to enter, though? There is an implied offer to enter on my land for the purpose of putting documents or flyers through my letterbox, but not to remain.

Of course there is an implied offer to remain. Bit difficult to do your shopping otherwise, eh?

Oopsadaisy

It's like deja vu.........all over again.

bazster

Oopsadaisy wrote: »

It's like deja vu.........all over again.

For once I agree with you, what a pointless discussion this is.

LincolnshireYokel

Oopsadaisy wrote: »

It's like deja vu.........all over again.

bazster wrote: »

For once I agree with you, what a pointless discussion this is.

Absolutely, why are we being forced to go over this all again just for the benefit of some upstart who comes on here and thinks hes smarter?

Weve thrashed all this out before you got here, island2, go and read a few threads. We're three years down the line on this one.

I decline to go though all of this yet again. I shall not be pointlessly increasing the nett entropy of the Universe any further by continuing to respond.