Parking Eye Claim form received due to exceeding time in free car park

Pop_queen

I am new to this site so I apologise in advance if I miss any information ect. I will proceed to explain my circumstances:

I visited my sister for a birthday meal and parked in a retail park on Manchester Rd, Manchester. I was not familiar with the terms of the parking as I have not visited this area but followed other family members. I received a letter dated 13/3 stating that I had parked their for 2 hrs 30 minutes and was only allowed 2 hrs free parking. It requested payment of £100 but was discounted to £60 if paid within 28 days.

A further letter claiming the same came.

A reminder letter came stating the 29 days have now lapsed and I was required to pay £100.

A further letter came which was a letter before county court claim. Giving me a further 14 days to pay £100.00.

Yesterday I received what looks like a claim form states it's in the county court business centre.

I naively thought that if I ignored these letters they would go away as my initial research stated not to contact them as it accepts liability and they have to prove there has been a loss. As this was a free car park they haven't suffered a loss.

I'm panicking now and wondering if I should just pay the £100 claimed plus £25 court fee plus £50 solicitors costs they are claiming?? Please can anyone help me?

I've not worked out how to attach my letters to this but will keep looking to add.

Guys_Dad

From whom does this letter come? Is in Northampton County Court or is it still from PE or their solicitors.

Very important,

da_rule

Unfortunately it appears you are now at the county court stage.

Have a read of post 5 in the Newbies sticky thread. This contains information on how to defend such a claim.

You need to be extremely careful of time limits though. You only have 14 days from the date of issue to acknowledge the claim. Once you acknowledge the claim you then have 28 days from the date the claim form was issued (not the date you acknowledge the claim form) to file your defence.

Pop_queen

Thankyou for your replies so far.

Yes I am in England, it was private land that I was parked on.

The claim form it's officially sealed or stamped and looks just like a photo copy if I'm honest although after googling the address provided for the court it's is one based at Northampton.

I've still not worked out how to attach a picture of the letters if anyone knows? I'm on an ipad if that helps or makes a difference.

da_rule

You'd need to upload it as an image to a site like Photobucket and then post the link. You would also need to obscure any identifiable information, which will essentially be the whole form, so it may be a bit pointless.

All County Court claims originate in Northampton before they are allocated to a local court. If you go to Money Claims Online you can acknowledge service, this then gives you some extra time to sort this out.

Redx

you cannot attach pictures here , you will have to use a broken weblink to tinypic or to photobucket

if you read the newbies sticky thread at the top of this forum you will see that IGNORE has not been the advice for about 16 months due to the law changing in oct 2012 due to POFA 2012

all you have done by ignoring PE is brought about a small claim using the northampton bulk centre (an MCOL)

if you read the newbies thread you will find the advice you seek , also if you use seach words like northampton on here to find similar threads to yours

PE are taking thousands of people to court so you are one of many , especially those who ignore them

so read the advice and read parking pranksters guides to court claims by PE too (one is free, you buy the other one if required)

da_rule

Can I suggest that you edit your first post to remove the dates etc as these could be used to identify you.

Pop_queen

Thankyou for your kind help. I'm wondering if I should just pay this to eliminate any further stress but part of me thinks why should I, this is extortionate and I have better use for my money.
I guess what I'm asking is what is their success rate or such claims if they are doing this to many others? I know out of my other 2 family members only 1 other received a fine despite us all turning up together.

The claimant on the claim form is Parkingeye Ltd.

Any help is appreciated and will be cascaded to my family to help them also.

da_rule

No one can tell you what to do, but the resources are here should you opt to fight this claim. There is quite a good track record of success.

The ultimate decision has to be yours though. Personally I would fight it every step of the way, but this takes time and energy.

Redx

and nobody received a FINE here, check the paperwork, no mention of a fine because no court of law or judge has been involved so no fine was incurred and no judgement of a fine was handed down either , its not a fine , never was , never will be

they and you received a parking charge invoice for breaking their parking "rules"

you incorrectly ignored this and now have an MCOL to defend , which if you do it correctly you could hopefully steer it towards popla which is what you should have done from day one , then win at popla , if the court is not minded for popla you may win in court due to not a gpeol , no contract (no locus standii) , poor signage , no losses incurred, all manner of ways you may win this or steer victory from the jaws of defeat (the same legal appeal points are raised with popla too)

nobody will tell you what to do , you have to decide for yourself

what I will tell you is that wherever you got the advice to ignore this was incorrect, so in future tell your relatives , friends and yourself to come here for help if any more come your way , especially from PE but also other private parking companies too (supermarkets , airports , retail parks etc etc) - and asap , not weeks or months later

ignoring letters like these never did anyone any good , especially not in england and wales since POFA 2012 became law

some recent decisions or current arguments going on are these

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4980638

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/forumdisplay.php?f=163

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4908490

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4978725

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4844795

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4972883

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4968331

Coupon-mad

Pop_queen wrote: »

Thankyou for your kind help. I'm wondering if I should just pay this to eliminate any further stress but part of me thinks why should I, this is extortionate and I have better use for my money.
I guess what I'm asking is what is their success rate or such claims if they are doing this to many others? I know out of my other 2 family members only 1 other received a fine despite us all turning up together.

The claimant on the claim form is Parkingeye Ltd.

Any help is appreciated and will be cascaded to my family to help them also.

That's covered in post #5 of the sticky thread for NEWBIES. As is examples of defence wording, a link to the Parking Prankster's guide for defending a PE claim and various useful links you need to read. ONLY READ POST #5 of the sticky (not all the beginning) but read all the links in post #5 of it, so you understand what is required as acknowledgement and then, soon, your defence wording.

We can help you fine tune your defence but you need to read up on it first and that's what the NEWBIES FAQs thread is for and why post #5 is separate, all about small claims (mostly about PE!). They try LOTS of small claims and lots never end up in a hearing at all. This isn't even a fine!! See it for what it is and get your head around the defence arguments. Certainly don't pay them the entire amount on that flippin' claim form - that really would be the daftest outcome for any victim.

And I have to ask - what happened when - of course, as you would - you complained to the retailer/restaurant Managers where you were a customer (and the Centre manager of the retail park)? The 'customer is King' and this customer doesn't take kindly to being sued for using their facility for a birthday meal! Don't tell us you didn't complain - if the answer is 'not yet' then DO SO this week once you've taken the first step of acknowledging the claim online via MCOL (one of the links in the sticky tells you how to complete the acknowledgement and what boxes to tick - NOT putting in defence words yet).