APCOA railway car park pcn, help with popla evidence pack

Fewie

Hi guys, looking for some help on analysing and responding if required to the popla appeal evidence pack I have just received in relation to my case. I'll start by giving a quick overview.

1. I received a NTK on 20th June for an alleged brief of parking T&c's at a local railway station, for failure to park within marked bays
2. On July 8th I wrote to APCOA in appeal of the PCN notice, stating in my grounds of appeal (amongst other things) that as I couldn't recall the driver of the vehicle at the time of the incident and that as the land was not Relevant (as defined in POFA 2012, as it's railway land and covered by bylaws). I included other challenges too but thought this was the most likely winner.
3. On 19/07 I received a letter dismissing my appeal from APCOA and providing a POPLa code. In the letter of rejection they made reference to my challenges about "landowner authority" and "genuine pre-estimate of loss" and offered response but made not reference at all to my "relevant land" challenge.
4. I then submitted an appeal to popla (just in time ) with the same grounds of appeal again.
5. Today I have received my evidence pack and have 7 days to challenge

If have read up extensively at each stage of this process and copied/edited templates as appropriate, I was hoping to go through this without needed a thread of my own but their response today has thrown me, in particular the challenge of relevant land so I feel I need help please. Their response to relevant land is below in bold.

[BAn appeal has now been made to popla quoting the below: 1) RailwayLandIsNot‘RelevantLand’
As APCOA do not work, issue or seek payment under POFA, as this the car park is private land where Railway Bye-laws apply.
As this notice was not issued under POFA; the BPA guidelines have been met in issuing this notice. According to British Parking Association (BPA) guidelines, the maximum permitted time to notify the registered keeper is no more than 28 days after receiving keeper data from the DVLA. It is our understanding that as we have not referred to this act in our documentation, we are able to work in accordance with the BPA code of practise (June 2013) which states that we have up to 28 days to deliver a postal PCN from the date of contravention.
][/B]

They have provided a copy of the bylaws, with a paragraph highlighted that suggests they have right to peruse the keeper for underpaid charges but I thought this was excluded by POFA?!

Should I be worried? Have I fudged this appeal somehow?

Fruitcake

They are trying to trick you.

They can go after the keeper, but must comply with POFA 2012 to do that, or they can go after the driver. It's one or the other.
However, in order for the keeper to be liable, the land must be relevant land as defined within POFA. It isn't, so they are stuffed.

You should obtain your own copy of the Byelaws to find out what they actually say.

Search the POPLA Decisions thread for other successful byelaw/non-relevant land appeals and then send the relevant bits to PoPLA as your rebuttal to the PPC's evidence pack.
New PoPLA has come up with some incredibly bad results recently so you will need to point out step by step where the PPC's case does not meet POFA requirements, so the keeper cannot be held liable, having of course stressed that the driver has not been identified.

I think only the landowner can make a claim against the driver for trespass, and has six months to do it. So your plan whatever the result of PoPLA is to stretch this out until six months have passed.

A PoPLA decision is only binding on the parking scumpany. There is no requirement for the motorist to comply with a PoPLA decision.

Redx

look for INDIGO 2016 decisions and popla appeals for inspiration too, as INDIGO seem to manage a lot , plus they also fail POFA2012 miserably too

same ideas with airports like luton and brum, not relevant land under POFA2012, so similar arguments and they retracted a luton one on the forum just this morning that was only a few days old

Fewie

Think I'm getting my head around how I can add to my defence, but can anyone corroborate the following please?

On both notice to keeper and appeal refusal APCOA haven't stated under which regulations or laws they are persuing either the driver/keeper under, simply stating they have issued a "parking charge notice" for breach of terms and conditions of the car park. The evidence pack shows pictures of the signage but does not clearly show/nor do they claim they show that the car park is covered by by-laws.

Therefore am I right to challenge saying that I assume POFA is applicable due to the wording of the "parking charge notification" and that any notice under bylaws should have been issued as a "penalty"? Do I then simply re-iterate that railway land is not relevant and no keeper liability exists and the driver hasn't been identified?

Umkomaas

POPLA are in no position to adjudicate on byelaw issues. This is the exclusive domain of the Mags court - and then it is the owner only to which byelaws apply, AFAIA. POPLA has been twitching around suggesting that byelaws comes under their purview, but this should be challenged robustly.

Read post 2276 of the POPLA Decisions sticky (last page).

Fruitcake

Fewie wrote: »

Think I'm getting my head around how I can add to my defence, but can anyone corroborate the following please?

On both notice to keeper and appeal refusal APCOA haven't stated under which regulations or laws they are persuing either the driver/keeper under, simply stating they have issued a "parking charge notice" for breach of terms and conditions of the car park. The evidence pack shows pictures of the signage but does not clearly show/nor do they claim they show that the car park is covered by by-laws.

Therefore am I right to challenge saying that I assume POFA is applicable due to the wording of the "parking charge notification" and that any notice under bylaws should have been issued as a "penalty"? Do I then simply re-iterate that railway land is not relevant and no keeper liability exists and the driver hasn't been identified?

Basically that's it, but PoPLA assessors don't seem to understand that the law supercedes the BPA CoP and the parking companies' Ts and Cs. You need to quote the part of POFA that covers non-relevant land stating that liability cannot be transferred to the keeper.

juliamarsh

Fewie wrote: »

Think I'm getting my head around how I can add to my defence, but can anyone corroborate the following please?

On both notice to keeper and appeal refusal APCOA haven't stated under which regulations or laws they are persuing either the driver/keeper under, simply stating they have issued a "parking charge notice" for breach of terms and conditions of the car park. The evidence pack shows pictures of the signage but does not clearly show/nor do they claim they show that the car park is covered by by-laws.

Therefore am I right to challenge saying that I assume POFA is applicable due to the wording of the "parking charge notification" and that any notice under bylaws should have been issued as a "penalty"? Do I then simply re-iterate that railway land is not relevant and no keeper liability exists and the driver hasn't been identified?

Would be really grateful if you could post the final version of your challenge up once you have sent it to POPLA as my relative finds themselves in a very similar position to yours. I am trying to help but going cross eyed with it all! They have not sent a POPLA appeal yet, being at the stage where their appeal has just been rejected by APCOA and they have been issued with a POPLA code. Any relevant information they could use in their appeal to POPLA would be so helpful, together with the eventual outcome of your appeal! Thanks so much and the very best of luck!