Old PCN resurfaced - need advice please

whitefeather

Hi,
Newbie here and this case has a bit of history so please bear with me.

I am the registered keeper of a car which received a windscreen PCN ticket in a car park in Nottingham in September 2012 for an overstay due to either human error or a faulty machine. The car park is administered by the Car Parking Partnership. I then had a 'Notice to Keeper/Driver' in October 2012 which stated that 'the driver now has 28 days to pay the charge. We understand you to be the driver. Failure to pay..etc..'
I looked at these forums at the time and decided to ignore it as that appeared to be the consensus advice back then. I then had a 'Final Reminder' in November 2012 asking the driver to pay in full, followed by a 'Notice of Legal Proceedings within 7 days' in Feb 2013. Both of which I ignored.
Then it went quiet, until the beginning of last month when I began to receive weekly letters from the Debt Collectors PS&P Ltd, the last one, dated Dec 31st, claims that they are starting legal action in the County Court unless payment made in 7 days.
This prompted me to check back here, to find that the advice (and legislation) has changed in the meantime! Having read the recent posts and advice I'm now concerned and confused as to what to do next.
I should state that I'm over 18, I live in England, it's not a hire or company car, I know who the driver was but have no intention of revealing that unless forced to, and I don't want to pay their exorbitant penalty charge, but would be happy to offer a small sum to cover the overstay.

My first question is: what legislation covers this case? The letters make no mention of POFA or POPLA even though the first one I received is dated after Oct 1st 2012 when POPLA became operational . Is the key date the one on the windscreen ticket? I can't find a start date for POFA at all. Is that irrelevant if they don't cite it? I believe that POFA changes the ability of PPCs to pursue the keeper rather than the driver, is that correct?

Please help!

Half_way

As far as im aware they cant apply the Protection of freedoms act to things that occurred prior to it coming into force.

As for the car park, do you know whos car park it is/was? it may be possible to put a stop to this by getting in touch with the car park owner as they are responsible for the actions of their agents who are harassing you for an unenforceable charge.

The_Deep

They clearly think that, on the balance of probabilities, that they can convince a judge that you were the driver. They have a mountain to climb, so why not give them them the opportunity to try.

Go to court, swear under oath that you were not the driver and either produce evidence that you were not present when the "event" took place, or produce the driver as a witness, (or get a witness statement from him/her). Look the Judge straight in the eye and say "Sir I do not come to this court to lie under oath, whereas the claimant comes with unclean hands".

Let them chew over that.

Redx

quite a few threads recently on the same subject

like this one https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4636417

the advice is no different

esmerobbo

POFA is not retrospective so anything pre 01/10/12 is not keeper liability, and PS&P are full of bull, they can not start legal proceedings, only the owner or a solicitor acting for the owner of the alleged debt could.

PS&P often threaten sending doorstep collectors out, gawd knows what they want doorsteps for?

whitefeather

Thanks Half_Way.
I know who the owners are but given the time interval I'm not sure they would look kindly on an 'appeal for mercy' now. I'll bear it in mind though if the PS&P lot carry through their threat of legal action, though I've just seen some new posts on threads such as 'To Pay or Not' with similar stories to mine, which suggest that PS&P are just having another effort to chase old outstanding tickets.......
Perhaps I should just sit tight for now and see if this gets serious??

EDIT: Thanks to the others for your responses. Also just spotted earlier thread 'CPP Arrears Notice' with a similar case to mine and the advice does seem to be to keep ignoring these people.

Umkomaas

whitefeather wrote: »

Thanks Half_Way.
I know who the owners are but given the time interval I'm not sure they would look kindly on an 'appeal for mercy' now. I'll bear it in mind though if the PS&P lot carry through their threat of legal action, though I've just seen some new posts on threads such as 'To Pay or Not' with similar stories to mine, which suggest that PS&P are just having another effort to chase old outstanding tickets.......
Perhaps I should just sit tight for now and see if this gets serious??

EDIT: Thanks to the others for your responses. Also just spotted earlier thread 'CPP Arrears Notice' with a similar case to mine and the advice does seem to be to keep ignoring these people.

Other than paying up (and you wouldn't be here if you wanted to do that!), there's little else to do other than ride this out.

If the car park owner is a retailer it may still be worth a call to them (especially if the PPC is still operating there), with a 'look just how much harassment your agent puts YOUR customers to, this has been going on for 16 months, are you happy to see your agent harassing your customers incessantly like this?'

Half_way

Its not an appeal for mercy, its more of a (polite) demand for them to stop this nonsense now, as quoted above

'look just how much harassment your agent puts YOUR customers to, this has been going on for 16 months, are you happy to see your agent harassing your customers incessantly like this?'

The car park owner is responsible for the actions of its agents and they are liable for the shenanigans that their agents are getting up to.

Coupon-mad

whitefeather wrote: »

Perhaps I should just sit tight for now and see if this gets serious??

EDIT: Thanks to the others for your responses. Also just spotted earlier thread 'CPP Arrears Notice' with a similar case to mine and the advice does seem to be to keep ignoring these people.

Why don't you read the ''Newbies'' sticky info thread, where it says what to do if you are at debt collector stage and are thinking you are too late to appeal? Sitting tight is certainly an option but you need to make an informed decision (the sticky threads are at the top to inform!).

And why not read even more threads about CPP on here? Did you notice the four from yesterday?

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4636417

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4669005

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4858634

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4861673

and the dozens of others from 2013? Easily found if you search the forum for the keywords 'PS&P collector'.

If it were me I would ignore because CPP don't do court and a debt collector threatogram is not a 'Letter before County Court Claim' (covered on another sticky thread).