Defence against ParkingEye sent; Landowner just replied now but not very helpful.

jsmcardiac

My husband was sent a Northampton Claim Form by ParkingEye for overstaying at a retail park where we had been a customer. Following advice from here and at Pepipoo I sent a complaint letter to the retailer (in my husband's name) and also to the landowner. The retailer said ParkingEye told them they are unable to cancel the court claim as it is already in court. Previously they have cancelled parking charges for customers before it went to court.

Due to the deadline fast approaching I sent my defence to Northampton court last week. Then the landowner replied to my husband this morning stating:

I have been advised by Parking Eye that court action has been issued due to an overstay in the car park of 21 minutes. The time limit for the car park is 3 hours as you have correctly stated in your complaint letter attached.
Parking Eye have advised that five letters have been sent with no correspondence / appeal received and that the PCN cannot be cancelled at this stage as costs have been incurred.
Signs displaying ‘3 hour max stay’ are highly visible on site as per your attached photographs that evidence this.
We employ Parking Eye to control the car park management on site and I would therefore ask that you direct your appeal to them directly. I am sorry I could not be of any further assistance.

I am now stuck and need further advice please. I don't know what to do next. I really do not want to end up in court as we've not been to court before and anxious that we will get a ccj. Please please help.

Stroma

You won't ever get a ccj providing you follow the procedures even if you lose, you will be given 28 days to pay the judgement.

But you've submitted a defence, what was that? Did you get help? You won't win on mitigation alone, you need strong legal arguments.

Who was the retailer and landowner? Their replies are rubbish they as the principle do have the power to cancel this, I would be tempted to send them a notice before claim for this harassment you are getting. Maybe someone can advice if this is feasible ??

By the way have you got receipts for the day?

James_N

While others will advise on what to do about this can I tell you how the court works, if it gets that far. It quite probably won't, if you take the advice you are offered.

The small claims court is informal It's like a conversation. it can be just you, the other party and a judge in a small room.

Any civil case that goes to court has to pass through various stages, including the offer of alternative dispute Resolution (ADR) - and a judge should view a party refusing this in a bad light

At court the judge will award what she or he considers fair, even if you lose the case. It's perfectly possible to LOSE the case and end up paying FAR less than the other party was claiming. I know of a case (not parking) where the other party had claimed in excess of £1750 and won - but was awarded only £650 - and had to pay all the court fees because of lack of attention to ADR. After costs they were only marginally in pocket. Paid immediately - there was no question of a CCJ being issued to the losing party. No record - nothing for anyone to find out.

Let me say that again. Even if you lose you can pay LESS and if you pay immediately (30 days) there is no prospect of a CCJ or ANY record spoiling your financial future.

So do not get stressed about court.

jsmcardiac

Yes I submitted a defence based on threads / advice from here and pepipoo. I could post it here or pm it to you if you want. I thought I raised valid points. It is due on the 5th of Oct so I thought we better get a move on and submit it to court. I sent it last week.

Whilst I was preparing the defence, I also sent a complaint letter to the retailer, who initially said they would send it forward to the landowner. What he actually did was got in touch with parkingeye, who said it was too late to cancel the court claim. He then gave me the name of the landowner and he did not have any more details about them. I found their email address on google and sent a complaint letter to them -- hoping they would ask parkingeye to cancel the court claim.

I have not got receipts as they were in March. But I have bank statements to prove we bought a load of stuff from 3 out 4 retailers at the park.

The signs were small and up high. Of course when you come back and investigate you would realise that there are a lot of them but if you are unfamiliar with the place and have 2 children in tow, the signs will not catch your attention.

I don't know how to go forward from this. This past month has been so stressfull along with other issues. We've come this far and would like to fight this. But now it is just so tempting to just pay off the claim to get rid of the problems and sleepless nights. Please please can someone advise what to do next?

jsmcardiac

Yes I submitted a defence based on threads / advice from here and pepipoo. I could post it here or pm it to you if you want. I thought I raised valid points. It is due on the 5th of Oct so I thought we better get a move on and submit it to court. I sent it last week.

Whilst I was preparing the defence, I also sent a complaint letter to the retailer, who initially said they would send it forward to the landowner. What he actually did was got in touch with parkingeye, who said it was too late to cancel the court claim. He then gave me the name of the landowner and he did not have any more details about them. I found their email address on google and sent a complaint letter to them -- hoping they would ask parkingeye to cancel the court claim.

I have not got receipts as they were in March. But I have bank statements to prove we bought a load of stuff from 3 out 4 retailers at the park.

The signs were small and up high. Of course when you come back and investigate you would realise that there are a lot of them but if you are unfamiliar with the place and have 2 children in tow, the signs will not catch your attention.

I don't know how to go forward from this. This past month has been so stressfull along with other issues. We've come this far and would like to fight this. But now it is just so tempting to just pay off the claim to get rid of the problems and sleepless nights. Please please can someone advise what to do next?

Stroma

Daisy will post on here on what to do specifically , she will ask what you have used in defence and will add to it if needed. You need to get the statements together proving you were shopping there, if there is no loss you have a strong case.

The important thing is not to stress on this, you can pay the judgment if you lose and you will NOT get a ccj at all, the small claims is very informal, parking eye lose hundreds every time they go there even if they win.

Coupon-mad

jsmcardiac wrote: »

Yes I submitted a defence based on threads / advice from here and pepipoo. I could post it here or pm it to you if you want. I thought I raised valid points. It is due on the 5th of Oct so I thought we better get a move on and submit it to court. I sent it last week.

Whilst I was preparing the defence, I also sent a complaint letter to the retailer, who initially said they would send it forward to the landowner. What he actually did was got in touch with parkingeye, who said it was too late to cancel the court claim. He then gave me the name of the landowner and he did not have any more details about them. I found their email address on google and sent a complaint letter to them -- hoping they would ask parkingeye to cancel the court claim.

I have not got receipts as they were in March. But I have bank statements to prove we bought a load of stuff from 3 out 4 retailers at the park.

The signs were small and up high. Of course when you come back and investigate you would realise that there are a lot of them but if you are unfamiliar with the place and have 2 children in tow, the signs will not catch your attention.

I don't know how to go forward from this. This past month has been so stressfull along with other issues. We've come this far and would like to fight this. But now it is just so tempting to just pay off the claim to get rid of the problems and sleepless nights. Please please can someone advise what to do next?

As here, this must be you I assume? I said as SRM on pepipoo:

http://forums.pepipoo.com/index.php?showtopic=82961&st=20&start=20

''So now send complaints like this to the CEO of each of the 3 or 4 big national retailers there:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4762460 see post #15

It will only take ONE of those retailer CEOs to cancel this for you. So go for it in a very assertive way as in that example - this will simply mean a few emails, all similar!! If you do not have any 'protected characteristics' under the Equality Act (age, disability, medical condition) then remove those bits but do not dumb that complaint down otherwise. Of course if you wish to write your own version do so but not written in a begging/appeal way. This is the time for an assertive complaint to the CEOs of the stores where you spent your money that day.

As far as PE are concerned you've sent your defence so there's no appeal or contact to be made to PE for now unless a Retailer says they want it cancelled - in which case you should forward the confirmation to PE and suggest in view of the official complaints made, you suggest they drop the case without cost to you.

Guys_Dad

I do hope you are including the pre-estimate of loss/liquidated damages point and possibly majoring on it.

2 reasons. The first is that People have been spanked at POPLA on this point so many times they might not turn up to court .

The second is a bit more selfish. POPLA's future is under discussion and it would be good for us to get another judge's opinion on this point.

kirkbyinfurnesslad_2

If you are not confident of winning in court and are not sure about the whole thing you may wish to offer to pay their costs.

However on this occasion i wouldn't send this to parking eye, i would actually go back to the landowner and say you will pay PE's costs (its around £60 they normally state).

This is only the case if are you are not certain of the fight, its a bit or a curates egg

--Q--

Don't Give Up!

I'm not an expert but have been through the exact same thing with PE and it has taken over 12 months to come to an end. We didn't go to court in the end, I wrote to the landowner and they got PE to cancel the court case.

In your case, how many retail units on the retail park? Was the parking free? Who is the landowner?

Try not to get too stressed or upset - easily said but hard to do I know!

Coupon-mad

--Q-- wrote: »

Don't Give Up!

I'm not an expert but have been through the exact same thing with PE and it has taken over 12 months to come to an end. We didn't go to court in the end, I wrote to the landowner and they got PE to cancel the court case.

In your case, how many retail units on the retail park? Was the parking free? Who is the landowner?

Try not to get too stressed or upset - easily said but hard to do I know!

Could you go to page one and post a new thread telling us how you got this cancelled please so I can add your success to our 'complaints about PPCs' sticky thread?

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4766249

Don't post it here as this is jsmcardiac's own thread.