Non-standard appeal to IAS - advice welcome

xilverhawk

Hi to all forumites. MSE has been a wonderful passive resource for me and my family in the past, so I thought I'd reach out to request some advice on an appeal I'm working on for a couple of PCNs issued by UK Car Park Management. I've read through the N00b sticky and there's some good foundation there which I've already used, but I think I need some tailored advice for this.

UK CPM state they issued PCNs for a pair of parking incidents in Nov and Dec last year to my address, however, these were never received. After a some other correspondence (including the wonderful Debt recovery Plus) I sent them this 2 weeks ago by email and post:

"...Subject: Website Contact Page Enquiry
Message: Digital copy - also posted today 10-03-2017 PCN REF: 337375/336480 I am writing with regards to the above Parking Charges and am raising a complaint regarding as the Registered Keeper on the following grounds.

Procedural impropriety - I did not receive any Notice to Keeper letters through the post relating to the alleged contraventions on dates 25-11-2016 and 07-12-2016. The first letters received on this matter were Formal Demands received in January to which I did not respond as I genuinely believed them to be a hoax or scam, having not received any prior letters as mentioned above. I also received follow-up letters from Debt Recovery Plus, acting on your behalf, and have subsequently advised them that the debt is denied due to the reason given above (non-receipt of NTK letters) and that the matter should be referred back to you. Since none of the mail received was sent using a courier service or tracked Royal Mail service such as Recorded or Special Delivery, it would be reasonable to assume that: Your postal correspondence up to this point has been delivered using basic mail services with no tracking or 'signed for' facility.

As such, there is no reliable, impartial method to prove that any of the post allegedly sent to my address has actually been delivered. Related to the above, it would seem difficult to prove that any letters from you were actually posted. An entry on your own computer system might prove that a letter has been drafted, printed and put in an envelope, but cannot reasonably be considered proof that this letter would have actually been received by the service responsible for delivering it. Since there were no Notice To Keeper letters verifiably received within the required timeframe and prior to the Formal Demands, the 14 day limit imposed under Schedule 4 of the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 has been breached and hence the criteria necessary to hold the Registered Keeper liable for this charge has not been met . Any further pursuit of me in connection with this charge will be deemed as harassment and action may be taken accordingly.

Please also note that DRP have chosen not to refer this matter back to you as per my request and have instead continued to contact me for a denied debt. I have called UK CPM today and spoken to Katie in Customer Services to give her a verbal account of these proceedings and to request that DRP refrain from contacting me again or I will consider it a breach of Data Protection and will report this to the appropriate authorities. She has stated that this conversation will be recorded on the account. Under these circumstance I respectfully request that these Parking Charges be cancelled on the grounds of procedural impropriety as laid out above.
..."

However, they continue to maintain that there is an assumption of the original letters having been received when they have no proof whatsoever that they were as, in my letter above, I pointed out that none of their mail is tracked, so how can delivery been proved or disproved? :huh:

I believe that as I never received the NTK letters within 14 days of either alleged incident that the whole think is null, but they're still fighting this point. I'l post the last letter they sent later today, but any thoughts on this would be most welcome!

Coupon-mad

Non-standard appeal to IAS - advice welcome

DO NOT GO THERE. Never never never do an IAS appeal and even more NEVER a non-standard one which is binding on you AND costs you money - no way, pay £15 only to lose (you will lose, it's known and considered to be a kangaroo court) and then have no rights to refuse to pay?! Nope!

A small claim would be a fairer place to hear the dispute and no risk, no cost to you and no CCJ even if you lost, really do not try IAS!

Loadsofchildren123

Ok, so in any proceedings, this will be a "we posted them" "I never received them" argument, with no irrefutable evidence either way. Your word against the PPCs. I very much doubt the PPC will accept your word for it, they are more likely to issue a roboclaim. That's just what they do.


If it boils down to deciding which of you is telling the truth, the judge will have to decide who he favours, on the "balance of probabilities".


It is correct of the PPC to say that there is a presumption that the NtK is received once it's been posted. POFA says this:


Paragraph 9(4):


The notice must be given by—
(a)handing it to the keeper, or leaving it at a current address for service for the keeper, within the relevant period; or
(b)sending it by post to a current address for service for the keeper so that it is delivered to that address within the relevant period.


and paragraph 9(6):
A notice sent by post is to be presumed, unless the contrary is proved, to have been delivered (and so “given” for the purposes of sub-paragraph (4)) on the second working day after the day on which it is posted...




I have highlighted the relevant wording in red. If para 8 is the applicable one for you, subparagraphs (4) and (6) say the same thing.


The onus is therefore on you to prove you didn't receive them. You can only do that by convincing the judge that you are not lying. What you have to bear in mind is that whilst we all view the PPCs as liars and cheats, the judge may well start from the standpoint that it is a law abiding company just going about its business. At best your chances of persuading a judge they are lying or made a mistake is 50:50.


If you are a legal professional or a magistrate, you are an officer of the court and your primary duty is always to the court - in these sorts of circumstances you could be more confident that the judge will believe you over them.


You can make this your primary defence, but you need to put in other defences as well (unclear/forbidding signage so no contract, no landowner authority etc).

Loadsofchildren123

The consensus on here, as C-M says, is not to bother with an IAS appeal. You are almost bound to lose because of the way they are set up. They then try to capitalise on this in any subsequent court proceedings by saying "Look, he's already appealed and lost". The judge is unlikely to understand that IAS is a kangaroo court and this point may sway him.


So by all means tell the b***ers that you never received the NTKs, and that any claim will be vigorously defended on that basis, but don't bother with the IAS appeal.

The_Deep

The consensus on here, as C-M says, ...


No it isn't.


the judge may well start from the standpoint that it is a law abiding company just going about its business. At best your chances of persuading a judge they are lying or made a mistake is 50:50.

I disagree, there is ample proof that PPCs are inherently dishonest.

Loadsofchildren123

Well we think that Deep, because we read these forums and have shared the experiences of ourselves and others. But I don't think a judge will have that sort of background knowledge, and it will be hard to persuade him/her that a. the industry is fundamentally dishonest and b. the particular PPC is fundamentally dishonest.


I read day after day experienced posters advising to stay away from IAS. I've seen you posting that you disagree, but I think your position assumes that it will be perfectly possible to show the judge how corrupt it is and that an adverse IAS decision is meaningless or, better, that it somehow makes things better for you as a defendant.


I work in an area of the law where litigants are frequently trying to rail against unfairness, wrongdoing and corruption on the part of the opposition. Often with good cause. But it takes a huge amount of time and effort, and often several court hearings, before the judge sometimes sees what's really going on. The assumption at the start will always be that everyone is coming with clean hands and its very difficult to overcome that in a big case, let along small claims. In this, the small claims court, I think there is very little, if any, opportunity to persuade the judge that the PPC can be assumed to be guilty of sharp practice/untruthfulness etc.

The_Deep

... but I think your position assumes that it will be perfectly possible to show the judge how corrupt it is and that an adverse IAS decision is meaningless or, better, that it somehow makes things better for you as a defendant.

Precisely so.

I work in an area of the law where litigants are frequently trying to rail against unfairness, wrongdoing and corruption

It sounds to me as though you associate with criminals and riff raff. You cannot equate magistrates with the dry types who preside in County Courts, nor the people who appear before them.


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Loadsofchildren123

The person who litigates on a "cause" rather than focusing on their own case usually comes unstuck. That is an observation based on 24 years of litigating in an area of the law in which such causes are rife. That's the point I was trying to make. Corruption was perhaps an inelegant choice of word, but I'm not sure how you make the leap to assume that I "associate with criminals and riff raff", which I can't help but find rude Neither do I practice in criminal law.

Ive only ever once appeared before magistrates. I appear frequently before the "dry types" of the County Court, the High Court and several times in front of the Court of Appeal (never the Supreme Court though). So I AM one of the people who appear before them and am entitled to equate myself with others who do.

The point I was making was that where it's the OP's word against the claimant's, if the Defendant happened to be a lawyer or magistrate then that might tip the balance in his favour because a judge would have to recognise that they are "an officer of the court" and less likely to lie. But otherwise IME it would be 50:50.

Edna_Basher

This particular case concerns the non-standard variant of the IAS appeal which involves the appellant paying £15 for the privilege of having a binding decision made against them by an anonymous adjudicator from the Court of Skippy

I'll stick my neck out and say that the consensus on here is that the non-standard IAS appeal should not be touched with a bargepole.

Fruitcake

Edna_Basher wrote: »

This particular case concerns the non-standard variant of the IAS appeal which involves the appellant paying £15 for the privilege of having a binding decision made against them by an anonymous adjudicator from the Court of Skippy

I'll stick my neck out and say that the consensus on here is that the non-standard IAS appeal should not be touched with a bargepole.[/QUOTE]

Or any other well respected poster.

Kind_Of_Irritated

I'm sorry, The Deep, but am I reading this correctly or is someone quoting someone?

"It sounds to me as though you associate with criminals and riff raff."

I can't imagine someone would write that in bold to another adviser on MSE. Surely not?

The_Deep wrote: »

... but I think your position assumes that it will be perfectly possible to show the judge how corrupt it is and that an adverse IAS decision is meaningless or, better, that it somehow makes things better for you as a defendant.

Precisely so.

I work in an area of the law where litigants are frequently trying to rail against unfairness, wrongdoing and corruption

It sounds to me as though you associate with criminals and riff raff. You cannot equate magistrates with the dry types who preside in County Courts, nor the people who appear before them.


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