PE and a CCJ I didn't know was coming!

Brokenknee

Hi all,

Quick summary -

• Checked my credit file and was surprised to find a £170 CCJ loaded this week, which I knew nothing about.
  
• This is a result of Parking Eye. They claim that my vehicle was parked for 1.20 hours, with a 1 hour paid ticket.
  
• On checking with PE, the offence allegedly took place mid December. I moved house in October.
  
• All correspondence has been sent to my old address. I have received nothing in the post.
  
• I have requested a copy of all letters via email

My question is, how can I resolve this before the month is up, and the CCJ remains on my credit file.

Am I just going to have to swallow this, or can I get an appeal through in time?

Thank you in advance.

da_rule

You have two options:

1) Pay the outstanding amount
2) Apply to the court to have the judgment set aside

SevenTowers

You should have a good chance of getting the judgement overturned and getting the case referred back to POPLA, here is a case where PE got a default judgement against a disabled person. With forum help and a lay representative the case was referred back to POPLA where she of course won.

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4802567

Redx

and quite rightly so too !!!

The_Deep

Did you arrange to have your mail forwarded? Did you inform DVLA of your change of address? If the answer to both is "yes" then you may be able to go after them for compensation.

Coupon-mad

Loads of 'set aside' cases happen, almost every week versus PE there are one or two listed in the courts. We know that as a fact. You need to show good reasons such as that you didn't get the letters and/or that your defence has good prospects of success. So look up how to defend, start with the post #5 of the NEWBIES thread 'small claims' links which show you example defences etc. and cases where people won... and what they won on.

FairWorldCitizen

The 'set aside' path is an option which is wrongly suggested in plenty of forums, especially when it is about defendent/debtor's addresses.

To be valid a claim or a judgement has to be served by the court to either the defendent's current address or one of its last known addresses. It is stated in court procedures. The rationale in this is that it is up to a defendent to follow up a potential debt.

Coupon-mad

These PE cases are in fact set aside practically every week, we know because a team of us on this forum see the Court records. It's not just about whether or not the paperwork was received (although PE letters are often never received). We've seen Judges allow a set-aside when the OP has shown they have good prospects of success in defending the issue.

da_rule

There are both mandatory grounds for a court setting aside a default judgment and optional grounds for setting aside a default judgment.

The mandatory grounds do include a failure to serve documents, but as has been said, it only has to be served on the current address or the last known address.

The optional grounds for setting aside a default judgment are that either the defendant has a real prospect of defending the claim or there is good reason why the default judgment should be set aside or there is good reason why the defendant should be able to defend the claim.

Whilst not having received the paperwork would not satisfy the mandatory condition it could be used for the optional conditions. As long as the defendant can also show that it is either in the interest of fairness to allow the claim to be resurrected or that the defence is strong enough that it may succeed.