Clamping

System

HO87 wrote: »

OK. But your account seems to suggest you had gone straight to an MCOL claim.


It could well be. Your description doesn't help work out whether it is the case or not. The local council should be able to help.

I agree with the others that something doesn't quite add up here. I can find absolutely no trace whatsoever of this company under the name you have suggested but a similarly initialled company - Crows Nest Security Ltd that was connected to an address in Meeting Street, Wednesbury have been involved in slightly odd clamping in the past.

I know that there is someting fishy as the clamper - Stephen Hill is a director of Crows Nest (so I found out on Pepipoo). He also mentioned the name of the other director to the CSO. This is why I asked whether I can include the clamper in any claim.
It sounds like a trading as name that could disappear before anything can be done

give_them_FA

You are wasting your time suing the clamper really, unless you can pin down the landowner it is a non starter as you will never get anything from a clamping firm. The upside is that if the clamper won't attend a hearing the landowner may find it impossible to defend your claim as he won't have any witness....

System

Finding the landowner shouldn't be a problem as he owns the building I was parked outside.

ManxRed

You need to establish if the landowner has hired the clamper. If not, then possibly a managing agent or similar? Its whoever actually hired the clamper that you need to target. They are the ones who are jointly and severally liable for the actions of the clamper.

You can include the clamper himself in any court claim, but without a home address to enforce on it might be a waste of time. However if you CAN find his home address then your chances of enforcement go up proportionately.

This is why you should be alert to things like reg numbers on any car or van he was in, and so on.

System

ManxRed wrote: »

You can include the clamper himself in any court claim, but without a home address to enforce on it might be a waste of time. However if you CAN find his home address then your chances of enforcement go up proportionately..

Thanks to Pepipoo and Companies House I have the clampers address that is why I thought that I could include him.

ManxRed

Oh good stuff. Yes, definitely include him then!

Coupon-mad

Aretnap wrote: »

The principles behind clamping are completely different to those behind PPC tickets, so those cases aren't really relevant. Clampers don't rely on contract law, or even on their rights over the land, assuming they're agents for the occupier, but on the (alleged) fact that the clampee knew full well that by parking there he might get clamped, so he can hardly complain that it happens. They then charge him a fee for the "service" of removing the clamp, which must be "reasonable" (whatever that means). The key case is Arthur v Anker - full judgement here, summaries here and here.

I tend to disagree, although I have no legal training. To my mind the HMRC decision in particular does help someone trying to reclaim a clamping fee.

- Clampers do rely on the 'contract' of the driver seeing the signs.

- And clampers are also agents of the landowner (or person with assigned rights like the managing agent/occupier).

To my mind, without specific assigned rights, neither clampers nor PPCs can rely on their signs to convey a contract offering parking. I still believe the main argument in most clamping fee refund claims should be the inadequacy of the signs - especially if the driver never saw them.

But IMHO there's no harm in also bunging into the mix, the HMRC -v- VCS case which blows the 'agent offering parking' thing out of the water doesn't it?

HO87

Coupon-mad wrote: »

I tend to disagree, although I have no legal training. To my mind the HMRC decision in particular does help someone trying to reclaim a clamping fee.

- Clampers do rely on the 'contract' of the driver seeing the signs.

- And clampers are also agents of the landowner (or person with assigned rights like the managing agent/occupier).

To my mind, without specific assigned rights, neither clampers nor PPCs can rely on their signs to convey a contract offering parking. I still believe the main argument in most clamping fee refund claims should be the inadequacy of the signs - especially if the driver never saw them.

But IMHO there's no harm in also bunging into the mix, the HMRC -v- VCS case which blows the 'agent offering parking' thing out of the water doesn't it?

I would rarely take issue with you C-M but on this subject I do. However, I can entirely understand where there might appear to be an overflow of contract-type detail.

Clamping relies almost exclusively upon the principal of consent or, in nicely legalese volenti non fit injuria - in other words no harm is suffered by he who consents. It is accepted law that if the motorist is given the opportunity to chose to park and run the risk of being clamped or not and choses to do so then the clamping is legal. This was refined in the case of Vine v LB Waltham Forest [2000] where it was held that the motorist must have both seen and understood warning signs.

The fact that a clamper must demonstrate that he has sufficient authority to act on the land has always formed part of the requirement and from that point of view VCS v HMRC [2012] (as opposed to VCS v HMRC [2011] - they are two separate cases even if it involved the same protagonists) is of no great consequence.

If the case of Arthur v Anker is going to be read it should always be read in conjunction with the case of Vine - which subtly but importantly refined the judgment, as I have said. This is all too frequently missed by clampers (and by such upstanding bodies as the BPA).