BW Legal Claim form

HSR123

Hi Guys,

I Have just received a claim Form from the County Court Business Centre in Northampton but have. The Claim Form states that the Claimant’s Claim is £100, plus interest, plus costs, plus court fee, plus legal costs totalling £256.60. Letters issue date is 9/12/16 and I received it 13/12/16

The PCN itself is for a car that was parked at the Quadrant Redditch car park. The PCN was attached to the car as the driver got back to it. The car was also sold on a few weeks later. PCN issue date was 28/2/13

My gripe with this is that the company has not suffered a financial loss with the car being over by a few minutes as it was pretty empty at the time and also how they can justify a £100 charge for being over by a few minutes is crazy.

I am currently trying to work out whether I might have any luck with a defence. Any advice and guidance will be appreciated.

Quentin

First read up the newbie faq thread near the top of the page to learn about the whole private parking issue you are caught up in.


There are specific links there to other sources of advice on dealing with a court claim


(The first thing to do is return the acknowledgement of claim to buy an extra 14 days to get your defence in)

pappa_golf

HSR123 wrote: »

Hi Guys,

I Have just received a claim Form from the County Court Business Centre in Northampton but have. The Claim Form states that the Claimant’s Claim is £100, plus interest, plus costs, plus court fee, plus legal costs totalling £256.60. Letters issue date is 9/12/16 and I received it 13/12/16

The PCN itself is for a car that was parked at the Quadrant Redditch car park. The PCN was attached to the car as the driver got back to it. The car was also sold on a few weeks later. PCN issue date was 28/2/13

My gripe with this is that the company has not suffered a financial loss with the car being over by a few minutes as it was pretty empty at the time and also how they can justify a £100 charge for being over by a few minutes is crazy.

I am currently trying to work out whether I might have any luck with a defence. Any advice and guidance will be appreciated.

please read this link , before filling any paperwork in

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5546325

HSR123

Thanks for the replies guys.

in regards to the actual incident, do you think I have any chance of it being overturned?

pappa_golf

yes , because thier case will be shabby and full of errors , study the paperwork , for a start , the figure they are asking is %^&*£hit , fill the forms in correctly


PS: does a "few minutes" equel or lower than 10?

HSR123

The ticket was stuck on the car literally as it was unlocked, but I cant remember what the expiry time was. If anything it must have been less than 10 minutes after the ticket expiry time.

HSR123

Bit of an update:

I have returned the acknowledgment of service letter saying that I will be defending the claim.

I have also received a letter from BW Legal stating 'notice of county court claim issued'. Once again the letter states the outstanding balance of £256.60 and that they may enter a CCJ against me after the 29th December.

I have started to daft up my defence argument and will post that up shortly for advice.

Coupon-mad

Good! You will find shedloads of example defences if you search the forum for 'BW Legal roboclaim defence' or 'Excel defence'.

Also there are some linked under 'Small Claim?' in the NEWBIES thread too, including Lamilad's defence and thread about how he won.

Hope you have read enough by now to realise that following the Beavis case a year ago, this stuff about 'no loss' and 'the amount is crazy' will NOT be mentioned in any defence as it has no legs at all as an argument:

My gripe with this is that the company has not suffered a financial loss with the car being over by a few minutes as it was pretty empty at the time and also how they can justify a £100 charge for being over by a few minutes is crazy.

HSR123

I have indeed read about the 'no loss' being insufficient to win a case, its just me being annoyed with an empty car park haha

HSR123

I have been reading around on the forum and have picked up on several relevant points my scenario but I'm struggling to find statements that relate to the 10 minute grace period. Any further points will be appreciated greatly as I don't think I have much time left to respond.

I have also got several points listed below:

The charge is an unenforceable penalty, neither based upon a genuine pre-estimate of loss nor any commercial justification. The Beavis case confirmed that the penalty rule is certainly engaged in any case of a private parking charge and was only disengaged due to the unique circumstances of that case, which do not resemble this claim.

The claim is unsigned and simply marked 'Legal Team' in typeface. The Claimant has provided no further details of how the proposed £50 legal representative's fees have been accrued. The claimant has added unrecoverable sums to the original parking charge. If 'Legal Team' is or are an employee or employees then the Defendant suggests they are remunerated and the claim/draft claim are templates, so it is not credible that £50 legal costs were incurred. Nor it is believed that any fee was paid to any debt recovery agency so the Claimant is put to strict proof it has. I deny the Claimant is entitled to any interest whatsoever.

The Protection of Freedoms Act does not permit the Claimant to recover a sum greater than the parking charge on the day before a Notice to Keeper was issued. The Claimant cannot recover additional charges. The Defendant also has the reasonable belief that the Claimant has not incurred the stated additional costs and it is put to strict proof that they have actually been incurred. Even if they have been incurred, the Claimant has described them as "Legal representatives costs". These cannot be recovered in the Small Claims Court regardless of the identity of the driver.

peter_the_piper

HSR123 wrote: »

Bit of an update:

I have returned the acknowledgment of service letter saying that I will be defending the claim.

I have also received a letter from BW Legal stating 'notice of county court claim issued'. Once again the letter states the outstanding balance of £256.60 and that they may enter a CCJ against me after the 29th December.

I have started to daft up my defence argument and will post that up shortly for advice.

The ppc cannot issue a ccj, neither can their toy legal company. A ccj can only be issued by a court after( if) you lose the case and refuse to pay the sum the court decides.