JAS Solutions and TNC Parking Services - Staples

MagicQueen

just got an email from bpa, waiting for jas to sent popla code thx

MagicQueen

Finally got an email from JAS Parking with POPLA CODE.

15 May 2014
Dear Sir/Madam,
Re: Parking Charge Notice Number XXXXXXXX (Vehicle: XXXXXX)
Site: Staples XXXXXX
Issue date: XX/12/2013
Thank you for your emails. The reason the parking charge notice was issued was because your vehicle was
parked in Staples XXXXX car park and the male driver went out which is not authorised. When the parking charge
notice was issued the driver was not inside Staples.
Staples car park is only for customers whilst using the premises. Our car park terms and conditions are clearly
written on the 10 sign boards that are displayed throughout the car park.
Our sign boards clearly state below.
• Vehicle left in the car park before or after using the premises.
• Restrictions apply 24/7 including weekends and bank holidays.
• No waiting / no turning / no overnight parking / this is not a pick up or drop off site.
Contract law, Trespass and Cause of action:
Please note that this matter relates to a privately issued Parking Charge Notice not a council-issued Penalty
Charge Notice.
The claim in question is based in contract law. When you parked your vehicle on the site in question, you
contractually agreed to abide by the terms and conditions attached to that site. As stated, these terms and
conditions are adequately displayed on signage at the site. If you did not wish to abide by these terms and
conditions, you were under no obligation to park on the property in question.
Amount charged and alleged losses:
Regarding the amount charged, if you refer to the British Parking Association’s code of practice, you will
discover that the sum in question is within what this body deems reasonable.
This sum has been calculated after consultation with various bodies (e.g. BPA, DVLA, ICO).
It is a requirement that the figure itself must be a genuine pre-estimate of loss.
If a case were to go to court the ultimate decision on what charges are allowable rests with the individual County
Court Judge who is handling the particular case. In the vast majority of cases heard the Judges have ruled that
consequential losses may include.
All business activities which may come as a result of non-compliance to the parking terms and conditions offered.
This may include:
The potential losses to the retailer due to the parking contravention (if appropriate). An example would be
the loss of a customer to a store if a parking bay wasn’t available to use due to the parking contravention.
The cost of the staff issuing the parking charge notice (e.g. salary, equipment, stationary, insurance, etc.).
The Parking Management Companies costs (e.g. rent, rates, management fees, telephone, heating, staff,
post, stationary, DVLA fees, POPLA fees etc.).
This sum, and the calculations which have been made in setting it, has been approved and agreed by the
landowner (or the landowner’s agent). The amount charged was also clearly laid out on the signage at the site,
and by remaining on the site, we contend that the motorist has accepted all of the prevailing terms and conditions
of that contract attached to the site, including the charges for breach of terms and conditions contract.
The amount charged is in line with the parking charges notice accepted by the courts as being legally
permissible to be claimed.
See Parking Eye Ltd v Somerfield Stores [2011], Combined Parking Solutions Ltd v Dorrington [2012],
Napier Parking Ltd v Mr Darren Yau [2012] and Parking Eye Ltd v Kevin Shelley [2013].
Furthermore, if the charge is not settled with the parking company and the case was consequently passed to a
debt recovery company for collection, further costs would be incurred on a similar basis.
Photographs
We are not legally obliged to inform of audit trail etc. Should this matter go to court this will be produced then. I
must stress that, under the British Parking Association’s code of practice, I am under no obligation to provide such
evidence. (Therefore, this is provided merely as a gesture of goodwill).
Signage
The signage on site is sufficient and is in line with the guidelines laid down by the British Parking Association
(BPA). Our Sign board sizes are 768mm by 650mm, BPA require the signs to be 450mm by 450mm.
Your status
We are not the land owner, however we have a contract in place with the land owner’s agent, so we can
manage the car park (See the BPA Code of Practice S5.15)
Ownership of premises
We are not legally obliged to disclose this information
Legal representation
We are not legally obliged to send you our solicitor name we will provide this information to the court.
I would like to remind you that when you parked your vehicle on the site in question, you contractually agreed to
abide by the terms and conditions attached to that site. As stated, these terms and conditions are adequately
displayed on signage at the site. If you did not wish to abide by these terms and conditions, nor accept the
charges incurred should they be breached, you were under no obligation to park on the property in question.
Therefore you have breached the terms and conditions of the Car Park. So unfortunately on this occasion your
parking charge notice will not be cancelled.
You now have a number of options from which to choose
1. Pay the Parking Charge Notice of £94.
2. Make an appeal to POPLA – The Independent Appeals Service by making your appeal online at
https://www.popla.org.uk.
3. If you were not the driver then please provide the drivers details.
If you choose to do nothing, we will seek to recover the monies owed to us via our debt recovery procedures and
may proceed with Court action against you.
Payments can be made by cheque or postal order made payable to JAS Parking Solutions PO BOX 989
Ipswich IP1 9UJ. Please ensure you write your Parking Charge Notice number clearly on the reverse.
Please do not send cash through the post. Payment can be made using a debit or credit card by calling
the automated payment line on 08456805684.
Yours sincerely,
XXXX
Appeals Department
J.A.S Parking Solutions


And a few pages form to appeal to POPLA. I wanna mention that in email said

Good Afternoon,
Please find attached correspondence relating to your parking charge notice.
There has been a delay, therefore the time line starts from today’s date.
Thank you

Code has been generated 15/05 but email sent 30/05.

Now...before I started all this I didn't read anything about POPLA. I just went through some stuff. I'm not too sure on which grounds I should appeal.
Do I have to take a pic and paste here of the boards which are placed on this car park?

Redx

see post #2 again and copy and paste a popla appeal into notepad, adjust it for your own circumstances and get to popla before the 28 day deadline (having checked the popla code against the parking cowboys checker for validity and expiry)

the dave.b jas appeal should suffice (for b and m , stockport) , I spent a lot of time preparing and adding to post #2 so fail to see why it wasnt acted upon properly ?

the basic grounds of a popla appeal are also in the newbies thread , there are also links in post #4 to examples too, time to do some reading which you should have been doing between asking for the popla code and now getting it

time to get a grip and get a move on

I suspect you have less than 2 weeks to get this popla appeal to popla , so you have wasted over 2 months in not preparing it ready for the popla code to be issued

MagicQueen

Yeah, wasted!
I thought is more straight forward

Let's read then

I'm just confused about Post numbers but will try work it out
Thanks!

Redx

try page one (the start of your thread) read post #2 , that is my first reply and has a hash and a 2 against it on the top line on the right hand side

the #2 means post 2 , this post I am writing now is post #26

MagicQueen

lol yeah i know that

for now i didnt c popla example but dont worry im reading. any problems i ll post here
thanks once again

MagicQueen

ok. My brain is steaming.
Donno if i done it in right way and even if I paste right thing ;-P

wanted to put as many things as I could hope it is not too long!


APPEAL RE: PPC Name CHARGE ******/******,*********
CAR PARK **/**/2013, VEHICLE REG: **** ***

I am the registered Keeper of the above vehicle and I am appealing against above charge. I contend that I am not liable for the parking charge on the following grounds and would ask that they are all considered.

1 UNCLEAR, INADEQUATE AND NON-COMPLIANT SIGNAGE
Due to their high position, overall small size and the barely legible size of the small print, the signs in this car park are very hard to read, understand and no notices at all are positioned near the entrance or exists to any of the shops.
I contend that the signs and any core parking terms JAS are relying upon were too small for any driver to see, read or understand. I request that POPLA check the Operator's evidence and signage map/photos on this point and compare the signs to the BPA Code of Practice requirements. I contend that the signs on this land (wording, position, clarity) do not comply and fail to properly warn/inform the driver of the terms and any consequences for breach, as in the case of Excel Parking Services Ltd v Martin Cutts, 2011 and Waltham Forest v Vine [CCRTF 98/1290/B2])

2 CONTRACT WITH THE LANDOWNER - NOT COMPLIANT WITH THE BPA CODE OF PRACTICE AND NO LEGAL STATUS TO OFFER PARKING OR ENFORCE CHARGES
JAS do not own this car park and are assumed to be merely agents for the owner or legal occupier. In their Notice and in the rejection letters, JAS have not provided me with any evidence that it is lawfully entitled to demand money from a driver or keeper, since they do not own nor have any interest or assignment of title of the land in question.
I would also request that POPLA to please check whether JAS have provided a full copy of the actual contemporaneous, signed & dated contract with the landowner/occupier (not just a signed slip of paper saying it exists or someone has witnessed it) and check that it specifically enables this Operator to pursue parking charges in their own name and through the court system. I say that any contract is not compliant with the requirements set out in the BPA Code of Practice.
I do not believe that the Operator has the necessary legal capacity to enter into a contract with a driver of a vehicle parking in the car park, or indeed the legal standing to allege a breach of contract. I refer the Adjudicator to the recent Appeal Court decision in the case of Vehicle Control Services (VCS) v HMRC ( EWCA Civ 186 [2013]): The principal issue in this case was to determine the actual nature of Private Parking Charges. It was stated that: "If those charges are consideration for a supply of goods or services, they will be subject to VAT. If, on the other hand, they are damages they will not be." The ruling of the Court was that "I would hold, therefore, that the monies that VCS collected from motorists by enforcement of parking charges were not consideration moving from the landowner in return for the supply of parking services." In other words, they are not, as the Operator asserts, a contractual term. If they were a contractual term, the Operator would have to provide a VAT invoice, to provide a means of payment at the point of supply, and to account to HMRC for the VAT element of the charge. The Appellant asserts that these requirements have not been met. It must therefore be concluded that the Operator's charges are in fact damages, or penalties, for which the Operator must demonstrate his actual, or pre-estimated, losses, as set out above.

3 NO CONTRACT WITH THE DRIVER
There is no contract between PCC and the driver, but even if there was a contract then it is unfair as defined in the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations 1999.. So the requirements of forming a contract such as a meeting of minds, agreement, certainty of terms, etc. were not satisfied.

4 UNFAIR TERMS
The charge that was levied is an unfair term (and therefore not binding) pursuant to the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations 1999. In particular, Schedule 2 of those Regulations gives an indicative (and non-exhaustive) list of terms which may be regarded as unfair and includes at Schedule 2(1)(e) "Terms which have the object or effect of requiring any consumer who fails to fulfil his obligation to pay a disproportionately high sum in compensation." Furthermore, Regulation 5(1) states that: "A contractual term which has not been individually negotiated shall be regarded as unfair if, contrary to the requirement of good faith, it causes a significant imbalance in the parties' rights and obligations arising under the contract, to the detriment of the consumer" and 5(2) states: "A term shall always be regarded as not having been individually negotiated where it has been drafted in advance and the consumer has therefore not been able to influence the substance of the term."

5 UNREASONABLE
The charge that was levied is an unreasonable indemnity clause pursuant to section 4(1) of the Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977 which provides that: "A person cannot by reference to any contract term be made to indemnify another person (whether a party to the contract or not) in respect of liability that may be incurred by the other for negligence or breach of contract, except in so far as the contract term satisfies the requirement of reasonableness.”

6 NO BREACH OF CONTRACT AND NO GENUINE PRE-ESTIMATE OF LOSS
There was no parking charge levied, the car park is “free”. There can have been no loss arising from this incident. Neither can JAS lawfully include their operational day-to-day running costs in any 'loss' claimed. I contend there can be no loss shown whatsoever; no pre-estimate (prior to starting to 'charge for breaches' at this site) has been prepared or considered in advance.
The charge that was levied is punitive and therefore void (i.e. unenforceable) against me. The initial charge is arbitrary and in no way proportionate to any alleged breach of contract. Nor does it even equate to local council charges of £5.00 for all day parking. This is all the more so for the additional charges which operator states accrues after 28 days of non-payment. This would also apply to any mentioned costs incurred through debt recovery unless it followed a court order. I would question that if a charge can be discounted by about 45% by early payment that it is unreasonable to begin with.

7 UNLAWFUL PENALTY CHARGE
Since there was no demonstrable loss/damage and yet a breach of contract has been alleged for a free car park, it can only remain a fact that this 'charge' is an attempt at extorting an unlawful charge to impersonate a parking ticket. This is similar to the decisions in several County Court cases such as Excel Parking Services v Hetherington-Jakeman (2008), also OBServices v Thurlow (review, February 2011), Parking Eye v Smith (Manchester County Court December 2011) and UKCPS v Murphy (April 2012) .

8 FAILED TO COMPLY WITH INITIAL REQUEST FOR A POPLA CODE
I was waiting for POPLA verification code nearly three months. As soon as I received a letter informing me, as a registered keeper of car, about charges I sent an appeal letter to them. They respond I lost the right to appeal after 28 days from parking charge and they also refused to send me POPLA verification code. I had to complain to BPA to get that code. It took them another 10 days to send it to me.

SUMMARY
On the basis of all the 8 points I have raised, this 'charge' fails to meet the standards set out in paragraph 19 of the BPA CoP and also fails to comply with basic contract law.
Regards
………………………………..

MagicQueen

anyone can help?

Redx

move 6 up to 1 and have contracts and signage as next ones down , after that it seems ok to me

so a renumber , then add all the header points as numbered bullet points just below your opening paragraph, before the main appeal points , that way the assessor can find them easily

submit it online and tick all boxes except the STOLEN box

I would assume that JAS will cancel the charge when they see it as your popla appeal , meaning its likely popla will write to you saying JAS cancelled it

Coupon-mad

Redx wrote: »

move 6 up to 1 and have contracts and signage as next ones down , after that it seems ok to me

so a renumber , then add all the header points as numbered bullet points just below your opening paragraph, before the main appeal points , that way the assessor can find them easily

submit it online and tick all boxes except the STOLEN box

I would assume that JAS will cancel the charge when they see it as your popla appeal , meaning its likely popla will write to you saying JAS cancelled it

Seconded!