Civil Enforcement Ltd - can they pursue RK?

Coupon-mad

A tiny bit was on the payment slip! Nothing like all the wording...needs a complaint to the BPA and DVLA though as they have altered their PCNs to be non-POFA but have left very misleading words about keeper liability on the payment slip.

Frannybobs

CEL have responded and have even stated that they do in fact comply with Protection of Freedom Act 2012 and seem quite adamant about the fact. I have scanned in the response and blanked out the identifiable details. My friend is getting twitchy and thinking about paying the lower charge of £60 which, I think, is their intention...but I still think we should appeal to POPLA. Be interested to hear what people have to say about the points CEL make in their letter.

http://i1343.photobucket.com/albums/o783/Frannybobs/CELresponse_zpsb7652526.jpg

Many thanks.

HO87

Their response is standard guff, addresses no substantial issues which seems to be fairly standard across a wide variety of PPC's atm - probably so as not to provide any clue as to the basis of their charges. In recent weeks CEL have moved away from GPEOL to contractual charges after being spanked at court on several occasions. However, their Notice makes no mention of VAT that I can see something that they will be paying - or at least accounting for - if their argument is that the invoiced amount is actually a contractual charge.

Of course asserting that they comply does not mean they have.

If CEL are going to go with the contractual charge argument then it would be useful to see the signs. I suspect that unless they have been changed recently they will not be appropriately worded.

@OP are you able to get pics of the signs?

Frannybobs

HO87 wrote: »

Their response is standard guff, addresses no substantial issues which seems to be fairly standard across a wide variety of PPC's atm - probably so as not to provide any clue as to the basis of their charges. In recent weeks CEL have moved away from GPEOL to contractual charges after being spanked at court on several occasions. However, their Notice makes no mention of VAT that I can see something that they will be paying - or at least accounting for - if their argument is that the invoiced amount is actually a contractual charge.

Of course asserting that they comply does not mean they have.

If CEL are going to go with the contractual charge argument then it would be useful to see the signs. I suspect that unless they have been changed recently they will not be appropriately worded.

@OP are you able to get pics of the signs?

Thanks for all this.

Yes, I notice they have stuck to £100 which is just under "punitive" charges as it says anything over £100 is considered a penalty.

Yes, I can go down there tomorrow evening after work and get some photos...how quickly do we need to appeal to POPLA?

The way I see it our main argument is that they do not explicitly state on the PCN "the creditor" and therefore they are not POFA compliant and cannot pursue the keeper - but I'd like a few more arguments to back me up as I'm a little worried that that one point of law could be a bit of a flimsy "defence".

Have to admit to not understanding the VAT argument fully but will read up on it and go and inspect the signs!

Thanks again !

bod1467

Frannybobs wrote: »

Have to admit to not understanding the VAT argument fully but will read up on it and go and inspect the signs!

Basically, if they are claiming a contractual charge then their invoice to a consumer must include a VAT amount shown as a separate element, and should also include a VAT reg number (assuming their business exceeds the VAT reg threshold, which it almost certainly does).

HO87

The fact that they do not use GPEOL doesn't reduce the arguments that can be advanced in a POPLA appeal. Instead of tackling GPEOL we target contractual charge. There remain the issues of POFA compliance (their PCN appears deficient), authority/legal interest in the land and ability to offer a contract to park, signage, and the fact that almost certainly (let's see what the signs say) the fact that no contract is offered.

Coupon-mad

I repeat:

''Nothing from POFA2012 paragraph 9 is on that actual main body of a 'PCN' ''

...so that letter claiming 'keeper liability' should be sent as a complaint to the BPA and DVLA (Steve C and David Dunford, email addies as in the NEWBIES sticky) pointing out the lack of POFA wording from para9 of Schedule 4 and yet CEL when challenged on that point still say the keeper is liable and (too late) cite words that are not on the main body of the Notice. And those words are not the only statutory requirements of para 9 anyway.

If you want to see for yourself I do link POFA2012 on the NEWBIES thread near the top, and paragraph 9 is shown in simple bullet points.

4consumerrights

+1 C-M above - that NtK was not compliant under POFA2012 to pursue the keeper - it would appear that after cancelling a few charges (based on newbie template) they are attempting to dig their heels in now.

There is nothing in the NtK that proves any alleged contravention took place.

Ask them to supply the photographic evidence they claim to have that the driver in relation to this breached the terms on the signage- and a copy of the signage for the site for your consideration. (or if you can get a photo of signage).



Edit - have you checked that the POPLA code is valid ?
Start your reseaching your POPLA appeal wording.

Frannybobs

Coupon-mad wrote: »

I repeat:

''Nothing from POFA2012 paragraph 9 is on that actual main body of a 'PCN' ''

...so that letter claiming 'keeper liability' should be sent as a complaint to the BPA and DVLA (Steve C and David Dunford, email addies as in the NEWBIES sticky) pointing out the lack of POFA wording from para9 of Schedule 4 and yet CEL when challenged on that point still say the keeper is liable and (too late) cite words that are not on the main body of the Notice. And those words are not the only statutory requirements of para 9 anyway.

If you want to see for yourself I do link POFA2012 on the NEWBIES thread near the top, and paragraph 9 is shown in simple bullet points.

Legal point I'm obviously not familiar with...the wording has to be on the main body and not the payment slip - how do you know this - is it a general point of law? I have read para9 of POFA2012 (mentioned in a previous post), as far as I could see a lot of it was in there on the payment slip wording, but they didn't explicitly state the creditor, but I'm far from a legal expert - I work in IT Systems! :rotfl:

Frannybobs

4consumerrights wrote: »

+1 C-M above - that NtK was not compliant under POFA2012 to pursue the keeper - it would appear that after cancelling a few charges (based on newbie template) they are attempting to dig their heels in now.

There is nothing in the NtK that proves any alleged contravention took place.

Ask them to supply the photographic evidence they claim to have that the driver in relation to this breached the terms on the signage- and a copy of the signage for the site for your consideration. (or if you can get a photo of signage).



Edit - have you checked that the POPLA code is valid ?
Start your reseaching your POPLA appeal wording.

It's entirely possible the driver may have breached their "terms" and overstayed, so wouldn't the photographic evidence just identify who that driver is and shoot ourselves in the foot?

No, not checked the code - thought they were unique so I blanked it out on my upload - I will find where I can validate that.

Have already done lots of research on the POPLA appeals and read the various threads and the links from within the POPLA Appeal stage section of the NEWBIE thread, and the POPLA Decisions thread. Will be starting to put together a letter once I have all my arguments straight, copying and pasting from the relevant parts of other letters recommended from the threads - first stop tonight getting a photo of the signage...

Thanks all for your help, everyone. Work a bit mad so not able to give it my full attention to get it sorted and sent off and want to make sure it's right when the appeal to POPLA goes off and maximises chances of winning, hoping to get it pulled together by Fri night at the latest.