DR+ New threatening letter

JamesRead

Hi guys, been having hassle from DR+, zenith and all sorts of reincarnations since my wife parked in the staff car park of the hospital she works in, but instead of our car with scarp of paper saying she had a "permit" she was in a hire car as ours was being fixed.
We foolishly tried to defend our innocence which just caused the companies to latch on, which is when i went searching and found these forums and took the advice to just ignore them, and its worked kind of! haven't seen a letter for a good few months but this week I got another letter from Small Claims Solicitors part of LPC Law ltd, website is thesmallclaimsservice.co. uk, cant find a similar one in the gallery you kindly provided so just wondering if anyone else has had one or if its new. I'm thinking its another limp attempt at intimidation as although it says its from a solicitor firm it says on the letter not to contact the solicitors but to ring DR+
I also like the fact they cant be arsed to put a real name on and just signed the letter with the initials of the company!
I have picture but cant put a link or the pic in this post as im a new user, can someone help with this?
Your thoughts would be appreciated

Redx

another one here too , quite recent

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4870010

martmonk

just post a broken link and one of the regulars will fix it

JamesRead

As per a tip on the post suggested by Redx ive removed the http: from the link below
dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/70812081/IMAG0020.jpg

Does seem to be a thing DR+ do about 1 yr after first contact

SevenTowers

JamesRead wrote: »

I'm thinking its another limp attempt at intimidation as although it says its from a solicitor firm it says on the letter not to contact the solicitors but to ring DR+
I also like the fact they cant be arsed to put a real name on and just signed the letter with the initials of the company!

I think that you you are right!

1. It doesn't identify who their client is, it just refers to "Legion" - who the hell is that? Day 1 at Solicitor's school should teach them that they have to get the legal name of their clients right!

2. "We shall advise them" - more posturing nonsense.

3. "to issue legal proceedings against you and obtain a County Court Judgement" - Last time I looked, a judge had to award a CCJ, they try to make it appear like it's a mere formality to "obtain a County Court Judgement".

4. Followed by the paragraph to scare you into to handing your money over to them.

LPC law only provide a body to turn up in court on behalf of Parking Eye on the day of the hearing, it is the PE so-called "legal department" who do all the preparation legwork. If this PPC was to task LPC with doing all the work, it would cost the £1,000's .

It's another cheap mass produced template letter, trying to use the LPC name to scare people into paying.

I would continue to ignore, there is not much else you can do at this stage anyway, unless you cave in and pay the scammers.

Stay Strong!

SevenTowers

JamesRead wrote: »

As per a tip on the post suggested by Redx ive removed the http: from the link below
dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/70812081/IMAG0020.jpg

Does seem to be a thing DR+ do about 1 yr after first contact

Remove your VRN from the letter!!!

MothballsWallet

James, I think LazyDaisy (another posted on here) once said that large legal firms often just "sign" letters with the firm's name or initials.

(I'm dealing with a similar thing myself at the moment, but not parking-related.)

Coupon-mad

Redx wrote: »

another one here too , quite recent

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4870010

And here - is this you yesterday, JamesRead, as he says his 'wife works at the Hospital'? Very similarly written:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4870468

Anyway you can see the advice on all the threads so far is to tell you that you have a choice whether to ignore this one too or respond as per the LBCCC Fightback thread. Only respond (if you decide to) as the registered keeper, once you have read all the advice about what a real Letter before Claim should contain and how to tear into this 'solicitor' without giving away who was driving nor anything about the parking event.

4consumerrights

The letter doesn't clearly identify the creditor who is actually
OCS Group (UK)Ltd t/a the Legion group

http://www.legion-group.co.uk/default.asp?

The Legion Group do have a lot of contracts with hospitals.

The small claims solcitors pricing structure is here:

http://www.thesmallclaimsservice.co.uk/for-business

and includes this as one of their products.

LETTER OF CLAIM (Letter Before Action) £62.50+vat
If the company or individual owing your business money is ignoring your payment requests this is the service to help your business.


Our solicitor team will discuss your claim with you and will check any relevant order and invoice documents before sending a letter to the other party setting out your claim and advising that a court claim will be issued in default of payment.

Conversely they can't even detail their prices correctly as each on listed on website states +VAT yet at the bottom it states

All fees include vat. Pay over the phone using credit or debit card. Or contact us for other payment options.

What an appalling letter from a solicitors. IMO it is meant to be a letter before action and the OP should respond robustly as per daisy's thread and deny the debt and as per coupons point above as registered keeper.

zzzLazyDaisy

See this thread:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4870010

First I would write to the SRA as per post 25, enclosing a copy of the letter that you have received. The reason is that the name of a solicitors practice is supposed to be registered with the SRA on the list of solicitors, so that anyone can look them up and verify that they are bona-fide. While it is true that they claim to be part of LPC, it won't do any harm to check it out. Also if the SRA get a spate of letters from confused members of the public, they may well look into it. Also the letter is a load of cobras and it won't do any harm to bring it to the SRA's attention.

As far as the letter itself is concerned - you could just ignore it, as it is not an LBC and it only says that they will advise their client to start proceedings. Having said that, personally I would reply, as (in my view) it is better to let them know now that you are aware of the Practice Direction and know what to expect from an LBC, than wait and risk getting a court claim because they are too sneaky or incompetent to do the job properly.

You will find a draft letter on the thread linked to above. You just need to change it to meet your own circumstances and send it.

Daisy