HELP - Debt Enforcement & Action Limited

cjsnorky

Help! In early 2012 my wife parked her car in a private Co-Op car park - and went over the allotted time by 5 minutes (really!). No parking ticket was left on the car!

We received a letter from Civil Enforcement Ltd some weeks later (Jan 2012) demanding £90. I checked on the internet for it's validity and was led to MSE. I followed the advice on here to ignore all correspondence - and what followed over the next few months mirrored exactly what MSE users said it would (letters from Newlyn etc.). Eventually the letters stopped and so we assumed they had fine away!

It's now 2 1/2 years later and my wife received a letter this week from 'Debt Enforcement & Action Ltd' telling her that this is the Final Reminder Before Court Action - and are now demanding £170! It makes reference to a previous letter that we haven't had about the debt being acquired by them!

Is this legit?? What is our next move?? Is it too late to appeal?? Should we just pay?? Certainly don;t want to end up in court!

Help - please - I followed the original advice from this site - but it's all looking to have gone wrong!

Thanks in advance …

Marktheshark

Do they make any mention of POFA ?

Redx

so you didnt read this similar thread then ?

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5064598

or the one I linked in it ?

cjsnorky

Sorry for being the village thick - I'm not an advanced user of MSE (sorry!).

What is POFA (again, sorry!)?? And what is the relevance of it??

Any help appreciated!

Redx

cjsnorky wrote: »

Sorry for being the village thick - I'm not an advanced user of MSE (sorry!).

What is POFA (again, sorry!)?? And what is the relevance of it??

Any help appreciated!

a new law that came in 2 years ago for england and wales

google it

cjsnorky

So POFA is simply legislation that means the driver has to pay irrespective of who the driver was - right?? (I'm not a legal expert!)

And when did this law come in exactly (again not clear from what I've read quickly) - and does it apply retrospectively??

If you have the answers to hand I'd be most grateful … reading and making sense of the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 is hard going!

Thanks!

Redx

it makes the RK liable , not the driver, the driver is ALWAYS liable as they actioned the incident

01 oct 2012 it came in

no its not retrospective

MCOL statute is 6 years for these invoices , after that its statute barred

payment is a different issue , an RK would have to pay if taken to court, and lost

cjsnorky

So if the incident in question took place in Jan 2012 - can they now demand that the RK must pay, or nominate - even though this law didn;t come in until after the alleged offence??

Sorry for all the questions … help appreciated!

Do we just wait to see if they take us to court?? I guess it's too late to appeal it now!

Redx

they could try it, but any defendant would point out the law is against them

only the landowner or creditor can try an MCOL, but the coop wont be doing that

I would suggest you ignore the debt collectors as mentioned in the NEWBIES sticky thread

only deal with this if you get a valid LBC or MCOL, not these fake ones

bear in mind we cannot answer based on experience or knowledge as they dont appear to have tried any valid court claims yet

CEL have, but I dont think DEAL have

so we cannot tell you what we dont know

but we gave lots of advice yesterday in this thread here

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5064251

cjsnorky

Okay … many thanks for your help! I sometimes get 'snow-blind' reading all of the info. on these forums, as it's sometimes tricky to pick out the salient points and which bits are and aren't relevant!

Why on earth do the Co-Op employ these people?? It baffles me - what on earth is in it for them??

Anyway … big cheers … mind at rest again (until the next letter arrives!!)

Redx

they dont, not any more

like a lot of supermarkets etc they have been suckered in , especially if people were parking up and shopping elsewhere , once the coop sacked CEL they retaliated with these old claims, then sold them to DEAL

parking prankster blogged about it some 6 months ago in the CEL cases