Parking eye County Court despite canceled ticket

panini_2

Dear all.

I have received a parking charge from Parking eye for parking in a Wicks car park in March.

At the time, my van had broken down and was having issues with the power steering (fluid leak so I could not steer the van properly). I went into Wickes and asked a guy on the till about it an he said it would be fine to leave my van for longer than the allowed 2 hours.

In the end, my Dad made it to my van with some more power steering fluid and we managed to fix the pipe and I drove away. I over stayed for 1 hour.

I still received a parking notice through the post. I wrote back to appeal the charge to Parking eye, stating that Wicks had canceled the ticket because they had allowed me to park for longer and that I had broken down.

I received nothing more from Parking eye, or wickes and assumed the matter had been dealt with.

On Friday, I received a county court letter asking me for 160 quid and my defense.

I went into Wickes on Sunday and spoke to the guy at the information desk. He apologized about it and said perhaps the till operator had forgotten to ask him to cancel the ticket at the end of the day. So in front of me, he emailed Parkingeye and canceled the ticket. He apologized that I had still received this county court letter.

I'd like to know:

1, If Wickes cancel the ticket, even after the county court judgement, is it too late and do I still need to defend this?

2, What can i do about parking eye not writing back to me with a popla code? They have ignored my letter of appeal. I did not follow this up as at the time as Wickes had told me thy had canceled the ticket. So I assumed it was all canceled.

3, If parking eye are still allowed to take me to court to recover their legal fees or any other charges they want to squeeze out of me, IS the fact that I had broken down in the car park a defense?

Also, if the fact that Wickes agree that I should not have a ticket, is this a defense, or are parking eye still allowed to recover costs from me?

4, I do not have the proof of posting of my letter for appeal which i sent to parking eye as I posted this from a letter box and it was a while ago and as I said I thought it had all been canceled.

ANy help with this would be fantastic. I have the phone number for the county court. Should I write to the court to tell them that this should not be happening or ring them?

I have also emailed popla today to explain that I have no popla code because they never responded to my appeal.

Thank you,

Coupon-mad

So in front of me, he emailed Parkingeye and cancelled the ticket.

No he didn't - he thinks he did but he won't be able to cancel now it's gone as far as court. You need to read the NEWBIES thread links in post #5 of it (ALL the links in post #5) but not the other posts, only post #5 is relevant if you've got Northampton court papers. Breaking down in the car park would be 'part' of your defence but certainly not the whole shebang and PE will continue to court, and they might send a letter asking you for £50 or £75 for their 'wasted costs'. Don't fall for it, read other Northampton PE Claim threads on here and search the forum for similar cases to read about.

I would be sending an urgent email to Wickes CEO (Head Office) telling that because of this: 'I went into Wickes and asked a guy on the till about it and he said it would be fine to leave my van for longer than the allowed 2 hours.' that Wickes are liable if PE do not cancel the court claim. Which you understand they will not without demanding a stupid payment of £50 or £75 which you will not pay but hold Wickes responsible for. Say that if Wickes settle this with PE so the claim is discontinued completely, you will say no more about it but otherwise you are considering a counter claim against Wickes if their agent PE put you through the trauma of court.

panini_2

Thank you very much for your quick reply!

I had assumed that if the land user (Wickes) had requested to cancel my ticket, then Parking eye would have no reason to follow me up in court. So do you think parking eye will still ask me for legal costs? this is 65 pounds. Surely as Wickes have requested that I should not pay this fine, then I am not liable for these legal costs either?

Coupon-mad

panini wrote: »

Thank you very much for your quick reply!

I had assumed that if the land user (Wickes) had requested to cancel my ticket, then Parking eye would have no reason to follow me up in court. So do you think parking eye will still ask me for legal costs? this is 65 pounds. Surely as Wickes have requested that I should not pay this fine, then I am not liable for these legal costs either?

Please, stop thinking it's simple - this will result in a default judgment against you if you do not act. It's not even about the smaller amount yet, you'll lose £160+ if you 'assume'!

You have a court claim from PE who are very litigious, a machine that rolls on regardless. YES they will proceed and NO Wickes won't have been able to stop the claim. You must defend it which is why I advised you to sit down and read post #5 of the newbies thread to get your head around court defence, what happens, etc. Look what happened to lainieee who thought the Range had cancelled her ParkingEye court papers (even though they couldn't in fact as court is too late unless a retailer CEO really stamps their foot - which is what you need to happen). A mere Store employee cannot stop a court claim:

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

Do read lots of other threads on this forum (go back about 20 pages!!) to see all the other recent cases. You will learn from them so it's worth searching back.

The legal costs are not £65. PE will ask for £75 in a stupid 'without prejudice' letter which you will learn about when you read other threads who have court claims.

YOU MUST ACKNOWLEDGE THE CLAIM ONLINE VIA MCOL SAYING YOU WILL DEFEND IN FULL AND NOT CONTEST JURISDICTION. If you don't then the claim will continue without your knowledge and you will lose by default for the whole amount which is the situation that happened to lainieee and we (the regulars here) took months to dig her out of that hole and it took huge efforts and personal help in court by one of our regular posters.

Then - once acknowledged - come back here to read lots and lots of other Northampton PE claim cases (look for the typical thread headers) and to work on your defence and your urgent and assertive complaint to Wickes CEO.

panini_2

HI. Thanks again for replying.

I have the following initial defense which I am going to send to the court to acknowledge that I wish to defend the claim in full and NOT challenge the courts jurisdiction.

IS this also the part where I ask the judge if this can be referred to popla instead of the court?

Thanks

This is what I'm sending so far for my initial defense:



On March the 1st 2014, I drove my van to ***** (***** Road, ****) with my girlfriend.
Unfortunately during my journey, my vehicle encountered difficulties affecting the steering. I managed to make it into the car park, but when I investigated, I found that my van had been leaking power steering fluid. It became apparent that I could not drive my vehicle home without fixing this leak and topping the fluid back up.

After trying to figure out what to do, I was fearful that I would have to leave my van in the car park after store closing hours or even over night. I went in to the busy store and informed a young man on one of the tills that I may have to leave my vehicle in the car park and that I didn't want it to be clamped or towed away. He assured me that it would not be clamped or towed and that any parking ticket which was issued would be canceled as he was able to get his manager to email the parking company to cancel it. He took down my registration number on a bit of paper and said he would get this sorted out at the end of the day.

Luckily, I was able to call my father who advised me what to do and eventually turn up with some power steering fluid, duck-tape and some pipe wrap. I was in the car park for around 3 hours, not parked, but trying to fix my van. Luckily, we were able to repair my van and I was able to drive it off.

Around 2 weeks after this, I was sent a letter from Parking Eye, asking me to pay £85 for a parking charge. I was confused by this, as I had assumed that the gentleman in **** had already given Parking Eye my registration number to cancel the ticket.

I wrote a letter to Parking Eye explaining why their cameras had picked up my van being in the car park for 3 hours instead of 2 hours and I explained that they should have or would be receiving an email or letter from **** demanding that the ticket should be canceled.

I heard nothing back from Parking Eye, which indicated to me that the parking charge had of course been dropped and the matter had been closed.

However, three months later, I received a further request from Parking Eye this time demanding £160. You can imagine the shock, stress and sickness I felt at this, as this time it is a county court letter.

I cannot describe to you my disappointment first of all that this matter has become so out of hand. From a minor situation of being told that I would not receive a parking fine or be clamped whilst on your car park, to now receiving a county court letter demanding I pay £160 is unacceptable.

I of course went back into **** on Sunday and this time approached your customer services desk. I showed a gentleman my parking letter and he immediately explained that he could get that canceled by email (something that I was promised back in March). I waited and he did this for me so i could see that he had done it. he was very helpful about this and did not ask me any details of the situation, he just explained that it would be canceled.

I in no way think I am responsible for paying the court costs. I have done everything I could to ensure that this did not get this far. As ****** originally agreed to get this ticket canceled, it seems clear that this did not happen on the day as promised.
Parking Eye are also to blame as I appealed against this in writing well within the time frame, and they simply have ignored it and failed to provide me with any follow up paperwork, leading me to believe that the matter had been dealt with.

Coupon-mad

That's not a small claims court defence - that's the story of what happened. A defence looks like the linked examples in post #5 of the NEWBIES sticky thread. Bullet points of why the claim is unenforceable and why the charge is not a GPEOL etc. (acronyms are explained in the NEWBIES thread).

Also I didn't say to send your defence yet. I said to acknowledge and say you ''will'' defend in full - which you will within 28 days (later on, not yet) if Wickes CEO doesn't stop the machine that is PE. Please re-read the info you've been given and just acknowledge it online (a priority), and your next step is then is to email the CEO of Wickes (and not very politely either, not a please/thankyou email).

Keep us informed this week and next as to how the complaint is going and if not cancelled after 3 weeks, you must then submit a defence - and we'll help you with that as long as you have at least read post #5 of the NEWBIES thread and have sussed a bit more about what it all means. I hope you won't have to write a defence at all but you should be ready to do so if you have to - and we'll help.

Also be ready for the rubbish letter pretending you should pay £75 (or £50 or whatever figure PE pluck out of the air this time) because you ignored PE. Tell the CEO of Wickes that you are not liable and Wickes need to sort this out at zero cost to you. DO NOT TELEPHONE THE HEAD OFFICE. Must be a written/email complaint.

panini_2

Hi,

Just to let you know...

Wickes agreed that it was their fault regarding the ticket and that they should have canceled it in the first instant. They said they have a lot of cases like mine and it takes up a lot of their time sorting out the mess that Parking Eye cause. They have a number of customers in Wickes who need to stay for over the 2 hour mark due to ordering kitchens and this results in several tickets. Wickes do request to cancel these, but apparently Parking Eye ignore them. Even the burger van who works there got taken to court for a parking ticket! Wickes had to pay all the costs and remove his CCJ!

Wickes are unhappy about using Parking Eye, but apparently as they only lease the land, they need the landowner to remove Parking Eye....but he's not interested.

So the cycle continues.

The moral of the story is...get Wickes to cancel the ticket immediately. But remember that Parking Eye usually ignore this. Then appeal to parking eye immediately online as they ignore appeals in writing.

Get this, Parking eye also told Wickes that they had sent me 4 letters! Liars (unless my postman was having an off few months).

Parking Eye also sent me a letter demanding that I pay £50 costs. As Wickes were paying me back for this, I paid it and got an immediate refund from Wickes. Although I did feel like not paying this and seeing if they would actually go to court, but not worth the stress.

Thank you for your help with this.

panini_2

PS, As the case appears to still be 'live', I have submitted a defense online. Just in case the court rules in Parking Eyes favour

trisontana

This just shows the true nature of Parking Eye.

bazster

I think if I were in a position of authority at Wickes I would deduct the costs of dealing with ParkingEye's depredations from the rent and challenge the landowner to begin eviction proceedings.

hoohoo

Let us know if this goes any further, despite your paying the £50.

Thanks for the update - it just shows what kind of company parkingeye are, still trying to suck £50 from you even though you broke down and wrote to them explaining this