Lost to PE in Court Today: Had to happen sooner or later!

4consumerrights

The_Deep wrote: »

Whatever the odds. if you go to court and are against a person trained in the law, you need to keep your wits about you. Using a defence which you do not fully understand is a recipe for losing.

It seems that, in this case that the plaintiff was a pilgrim who believed what she had been told by armchair lawyers and hobbyists and had signed off on a defence which was incomplete.

The Judge was obviously not prepared to cut her any slack, and the PPC won. No big deal, she dis not make the best of the hand which she had been dealt and lost to a superior player.

Considering the Deep you appear to always advocate going to court on this forum .....

It is clear that you did not read the opening statement - she was not told by any "armchair lawyers and hobbyists" but submitted a template defence she found herself so hardly being believed what she was told !!!

The Judge had a pre-conceived idea that the Beavis case was relevant - which is quite incredible as no contract was produced in this case.

The_Deep

Considering the Deep you appear to always advocate going to court on this forum .....

Ah, another one who shoots before taking aim

I only advocate going to court for consumer aware landlords and owner occupiers who are targeted by PPCs in their own spaces. I do not advocate that the poorly educated, the illiterate, harassed housewives, the terminally confused, P&D chancers and the riff raff who park in disabled spaces "for two minutes" tough it out in court.

is clear that you did not read the opening statement

No, it is not a bit clear

- she was not told by any "armchair lawyers and hobbyists" but submitted a template defence she found herself so hardly being believed what she was told !!!

And who would have written that template do you think? Perhaps an armchair lawyer/hobbyist.

bargepole

The_Deep wrote: »

... And who would have written that template do you think? Perhaps an armchair lawyer/hobbyist.

Actually, it turns out she got it from the Croydon branch of the CAB. As I said in the report, most Judges would have allowed her subsequent witness statement and skeleton argument (which I wrote for her) into the case, and would then most likely have won. She was unlucky to get that particular Judge.

Marktheshark wrote: »

... Many judges will just reside against you for acting as lay vs advocate.

See the figures on my signature. Then think again.

andy_foster

4consumerrights wrote: »

Andy I am really surprised as you have missed out a basic flaw there.... (plus most are for £100 - Morrisons have £85.00)

circa - 700,000 tickets issued
less 30% circa 200,00 for those who pay first

leaves 500,000

less 55% circa 324,000 * which are cancelled on first appeal to parking eye

leaves circa 276,000

not including popla


which narrows the odds considerably when you additionally factor in those who pay at debt collector stage, those who cough up after receving a LBCC

The 30% who pay figure is somewhat 'rough and ready', but it broadly equates to PE's entire turnover - so it must roughly represent the percentage who pay up full stop. If the number who pay up initially is ~30%, then the number who pay up subsequently must be trivial in the context of a rough and ready estimate.

Your claim that ParkingEye uphold appeals against 324,000 of their own fake parking fines a year is more absurd than anything I've ever heard from any PPC. That's £3,240,000 based on £100 charges - although less if the charge is less or paid at a discounted rate.

Obviously you have gotten a figure of 55% of appeals upheld from somewhere, and applied it to the total number of unpaid tickets, not the number of appealed tickets. As the number of tickets appealed will be relatively small, this is a substantially inaccurate and misleading.

The number of tickets appealed to POPLA are so small to be irrelevant to the rough and ready calculations.

There was however a flaw in my post - I based it on the premise that those who were inclined to fold would pay £85. That is incorrect - not because the charge is higher at some sites, but because those who are inclined to fold would tend to pay at the discounted rate, which would usually be £50 - £60.

The major flaw however is yours.

MRS_A_3

That was unfortunate Bargepole and I agree some judges are awkward.

On a lighter note, I hear the camera at my local Morrisons went 'pop' one day, no PCN's for PE to issue for a while until it's fixed.

I do prefer my way of dealing with things now :rotfl:

bargepole

andy_foster wrote: »

... Your claim that ParkingEye uphold appeals against 324,000 of their own fake parking fines a year is more absurd than anything I've ever heard from any PPC. That's £3,240,000 based on £100 charges ...
.

Actually it's 324,000 x £100 = £32,400,000, which is even more than the inflated turnover figure they forecast to Capita.


PE do claim, in letters to defendants, that they 'uphold 55% of appeals'. But they don't say what % of tickets are appealed, and I would be very surprised if it's even as high as 5%.

4consumerrights

It seems to be a bit of a bad night for figures for some of us - whoops

it has been a long day and I certainly need to retract and qualify a statement -

PE claim that over 55% of appeals are cancelled at first stage appeals - this was claimed by none other than our fragrant Rachel signed in a response to a LBCC.

Yet as stated no figures are available for % of tickets appealed. I can say with certainty though that we see a far higher percentage cancelled at first stage via parkingticketappeals.

There are however a number of discrepancies comparing the last two years accounting records.

******************************************************

The point here though regardless of the percentages or probabilities of receiving court papers - why take the risk when this can be appealed and successfully using the system at the moment.

Given the unpredictability of county court hearings and the fact that judges are heeding the Beavis case - regardless of taking into account different car parks and contract arrangements; would you ignore a pcn or appeal it ?