Parking eye. County Court Claim

Gurty

I have spent some time reading through all related posts.

PE sent me first letter a while back 23/05/14

Eastgate retail park
4 hour max stay and i was 24 mins over but spent time & money pratically in every shop there that day and stayed onsite for lunch.
Sadly i sought advice from a friend and was advised to ignore the fine.
The county court claim was issued on 30/09/14
I have completed the AOS and will now begin to contact the retail park and PE but am worried i have left this well too late.
From my understanding i cannot play the 'name the driver' card to 'rewind the clock' as it is PE.
My main concern is if i try to turn this around at this late stage in the game, if i fail to get the claim dropped and judgement goes against me what is the damage other than a £160 fine.

If only I knew how easy this fine could of been dropped back then.
What other steps should i take?
I don't really understand completely what lies ahead.
Or how to properly prepare for court proceedings at all.

Umkomaas

Please read the NEWBIES FAQ sticky post #5. Purchase (cost of a cup of Costa coffee) the Parking Prankster's guide to defending PE court cases (Google his name).

Search this forum and PePiPoo for previous court cases involving PE.

Look at the Parking Prankster's website at the various transcripts from completed PE court cases.

Once proceedings have commenced (as they have in your case) you can't rewind the clock by naming the driver.

If you lose the cost won't be very much more than £160.

Ask your knowledgeable friend, who clearly knows all about this stuff, if he will help write your defence and act as your lay rep in court. Alternatively ask if he will make a major contribution towards any costs awarded against you arising as a result of his duff advice!

Coupon-mad

No damage to your credit rating or anything if you lose then straight away pay up (average £190) so you may as well fight it. A lot of people now seem to have success in getting their case stayed for the PE v Beavis Court of Appeal outcome (see the Newbies thread post #5 for when to send your local court a letter asking if they might 'stay' the case for that or POPLA if you are lucky). Also two people just won their cases - all recent and all findable on the forum by looking back twenty pages or so, browsing the thread titles & clicking on all those threads about a PE Court claim. There aren't shedloads but there are some good ones to read.

So start with the Newbies thread post #5 and the Parking Prankster's guide - and then read back lots of pages to find the recent outcomes v PE, to learn from what happened. Also read Bartos1976 thread as I seem to recall he got his claim stayed for POPLA instead (nice court!) and then of course won at POPLA. Another poster just the other day got theirs adjourned as well, by asking the court, after they had submitted their strong defence.

And almost everyone gets a '£60 offer' letter from PE to settle, if they complain long and loud enough to the retail CEO/retail park landowner (Google it to find out who runs/owns it). You will find threads where people talk about the £60 offer and most actually decline it and defend anyway but it is an option you should be aware of if you complain - and I would! Some landowners even get PE to cancel outright.

Gurty

Thanks for your speedy replies, you have put my mind alot more at ease.

Coupon-mad

Keep your thread updated, defend AND complain and if the case continues to be allocated locally, then try to get the case stayed like bartos1976 did.

Umkomaas

And tell us how you get on with roping your friend in, to help you get rid of this. Clearly he knows it all. :rotfl:

Don't you just love them, the pub expert - in all things!

ampersand

Umkomaas - that sort of post's not like you.

Let's just stick to helping op as best we can. He knows he's been silly - not the first, not the last, but fully aware now.

Half_way

Loads of good advice in Coupon mads reply's.
Defend and complain to the landowner.
if the landowner doesn't play ball, and you win then it may be possible to claim your losses against the landowner as in most cases the parking company are acting as agents of the land owner.

Plus you should be able to get some good publicity in the papers/local media along the lines of
anyone who has paid the car park owners agents may be entitled to a full refund from the land owner

Gurty

Ok i have a defence written up. its too large to send via MCOL online.
To send by post do i need to send anything with it at all or just literally the defence on its own?

gertysingh

State the claim number on all correspondence. On this occasion you only need to send the defence to the court. The court will forward a copy of your defence to the claimant.

After that:
- PE will have to send you a Reply to Defence if they want to defend anything you have written in your defence!
- If it looks like it will go to court the court will send you a questionaire for you to fill in and you can elect which court you want the proceedings to be held in
- A court date and court location based on the questionaire will be provided
- Both parties will need to submit all correspondence + any witness statements to each other and the court

ampersand

Gurty - have you followed halfway's advice here?
Defend and complain to the landowner.
if the landowner doesn't play ball, and you win then it may be possible to claim your losses against the landowner as in most cases the parking company are acting as agents of the land owner.

Plus you should be able to get some good publicity in the papers/local media along the lines of
anyone who has paid the car park owners agents may be entitled to a full refund from the land owner
#
Next, I hope you've understood c-m's pivotal advice here:
AND complain and if the case continues to be allocated locally, then try to get the case stayed like bartos1976 did.

Now, did you check back on your bank Statements for that day's relevant shopping and COMPLAIN?

Can you not show us your defence? [When you send it, obtain a free Cert of Posting,]