Previous car's reg entered by mistake!

DeathByParking

Back in February I parked in the Excel car park on top of EuroSpar at Broomhill, Sheffield. I entered the reg of my previous car by mistake but did not realise and received PCN shortly after. I couldn’t find the ticket but I appealed stating that I might have made a mistake when typing the reg number. Excel dismissed this and refused to enter into any further communication, so I appealed to POPLA. Excel’s evidence contained a log of tickets purchased around that time clearly showing my previous car's reg number, proving that I did in fact pay for parking. However, although POPLA accepted that I had in fact paid for parking, they rejected my appeal because I had technically breached the terms of some contract that I didn't know I had entered into when I parked there. So now I face a demand for £100 or, as EXCEL put it in their letter refusing my initial appeal, DEBT RECOVERY AND/OR COURT ACTION!

Everyone makes mistakes. How can a system that punishes people for not being perfect ever be considered fair in law! I bet a large percentage of Excel’s profits come from older people who are more likely to make mistakes and who are too frail to contest PCNs.

I feel like going all the way with this one. What are my chances?

Also, this £100 that they are demanding is on top of the 60p that I have already paid. Isn't that theft?

Redx

very good in my opinion , as you can prove the details in court so proving no loss occurred

I also assume you can prove that you told them this in your appeal, also in the popla appeal as well , so hope you have copies of those appeals too , even better if you still have the parking ticket you bought as well

clearly you should have used not a gpeol , bad signage and no contract in your popla appeal , as they were stronger points and would easily have won at popla , but if you do not include them they wont consider them

but as thats water under the bridge , I would allow a court to decide , assuming they can even prove locus standii in front of the judge , never mind your evidence

Stroma

Shame you used mitigation on the appeal to popla, this will never go to court as they admit you paid, so there is no loss to them. So ignore them unless you get a letter before claim.

DeathByParking

Stroma wrote: »

Shame you used mitigation on the appeal to popla, this will never go to court as they admit you paid, so there is no loss to them. So ignore them unless you get a letter before claim.

Without my ticket, the only way I was going to be able to prove that I had paid was to get my hands on a copy of their database, so if the POPLA appeal achieved anything useful, it was that.

DeathByParking

Redx wrote: »

very good in my opinion , as you can prove the details in court so proving no loss occurred

I also assume you can prove that you told them this in your appeal, also in the popla appeal as well , so hope you have copies of those appeals too , even better if you still have the parking ticket you bought as well

clearly you should have used not a gpeol , bad signage and no contract in your popla appeal , as they were stronger points and would easily have won at popla , but if you do not include them they wont consider them

but as thats water under the bridge , I would allow a court to decide , assuming they can even prove locus standii in front of the judge , never mind your evidence

Thanks, it's encouraging that you think I'd be in with a chance. Sadly I have no ticket, but the database proves that I paid so I don't think it matters now. I've got copies of all correspondence in which I admit the possibility of making a mistake entering the reg, although I assumed it must have been a typo rather than my old car's reg in the 1st appeal to Excel! They wouldn't discuss that any further, but my 2nd appeal, to POPLA, included the possibility of having used the old reg.

Certainly, I feel that their losses are down to the inadequacies of their system and it's failure to cope with inevitable, honest, human error.

Redx

the BPA CoP also requires that they check for errors like this, especially when alerted to it

Coupon-mad

DeathByParking wrote: »

Without my ticket, the only way I was going to be able to prove that I had paid was to get my hands on a copy of their database, so if the POPLA appeal achieved anything useful, it was that.

What a shame you didn't add the usual stuff about no loss etc. You'd have won if you'd researched how to win at POPLA & come here earlier. I also suspect that Excel WILL select your case for a small claim now that you've lost at POPLA. That's what they do, especially as they know you didn't research how to win at POPLA they'll think you are a soft touch for a small claim and you'll get scared & pay up, or they hope you'll defend it badly. Don't make the same mistake in the defence (if you get court papers) as you did in the POPLA appeal - there was so much more you should have said.

Ignoring the Equality Act paragraph at the start, this is what a winning Excel (wrong reg number) POPLA appeal looks like:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/62187053#Comment_62187053

I am showing you that partly so you can see what sort of stuff will be needed in a decent court defence if needed (no GPEOL, no legal status, no BPA compliant authority/contract with landowner, dodgy signage, unfair terms, etc.) but also because you should read the Excel spokesman's words in the BBC Watchdog Daily article linked in that appeal. Look what they say to the BBC. Doesn't match what they did to you, does it? As soon as they knew you had paid they knew there was no loss and yet they still pursued it and I expect they will be like a dog with a bone now with all sorts of letters being sent to you.

If they send a pre-court letter then look at zzzLazyDaisy's sticky thread 'LBCCC Fightback' which is in Crabman's collection of parking board stickies near the top. You'd need to respond robustly this time as there was so much you missed out. What a shame as this would have been cancelled by POPLA with just the extra few words about 'no GPEOL' (explained in the acronyms section of the NEWBIES sticky thread at the top). I bet the Assessor was searching your appeals to check you hadn't used those words somewhere, so he/she could find in your favour on a contract law basis (which is how POPLA works). Mitigation (saying what happened) was doomed to fail.

DeathByParking

Thanks for that Coupon-mad! I'm going to take a very positive attitude to this and try to enjoy the experience. Inconvenient though it is, I'm hoping there will be a great sense of satisfaction at the end of it.

As people get older, mistakes like this must become more frequent along with a decline in the inclination and ability to take on a legal battle. Hence, I feel sure that much of Excel's profits will come from the more vulnerable drivers who will simply pay-up and who are clearly being exploited by a very unjust system of borderline-legality. For this reason, I feel like mounting a national campaign against Excel. I wonder whether there might be some mileage in involving groups like Help the Aged and so forth...

DeathByParking

UPDATE

Well folks, I have just received a NOTICE OF INTENDED COURT PROCEEDINGS from Excel Parking's Litigation Department, signed illegibly, warning me that I have until 25th June to pay the £100 'debt' else face costs and interest as well, or I could be unable to obtain credit in the future should the County Court Judgement go their way! They say that they may commence legal proceedings against me without further notice.

They still haven't formally acknowledged the fact that I actually paid for the parking ticket!

Does anyone know how I should best deal with this please? I'm not sure of the significance of this letter; it sounds pretty final. Is this the "pre-court letter"?

Coupon-mad

See post #7, I had already anticipated this and told you about the LBCCC Fightback thread.