Should I Let My Case Go To Court?

G_44

Hi all, I am after some advice please.

I appreciate there is a lot of information in the Newbies thread however my circumstances do not quite match with any of the advice given in there.

Quick bit of background to my case: - I recently went to pay for parking at a local car park, where the machine would not let enter my car reg, therefore i could not pay for parking. When i tried to enter car reg details the machine showed an error message and would reset to the home screen. With no other means of payment (i did not have my phone with me therefore could not pay using the app) i wrote a letter and left it in my windscreen stating that the machine was out of order and gave the time i had parked. I returned to my car a few hours later to find I had a ticket.

My appeal was rejected by the PPC who stated that the pay machine was working at the time i parked however i had simply tried to park before 8am therefore parking in the car park was free during this time and the machine only accepts payment from 8am onwards. Now i appreciate this was a stupid oversight on my behalf however parking would have only cost me a maximum of £4 to park all day and i felt that the signage in the car park and the error message displayed by the machine led to the confusion. If the machine or signage had clearly stated that payment could not be made before 8am then of course i would have realised however the signage only states that between 6pm and 8am parking is free.

Following this i then appealed to POPLA who also rejected my appeal. In my naivety i appealed using words such as 'it was a simple mistake' and 'i am a regular user of the car park and never had a ticket' etc Obviously all of my words have been used against me by both the PPC and POPLA. I also supplied photos of the signage in the dark as no lights are working in the car park and signage is not visible however they said these could not be used as evidence as they were not time stamped. they also said that as a regular visitor to the car park (which i stated in my appeal) then i would be familiar with signage and therefore the 'contract'.

I am now at the debt recovery stage where i have recently received a letter saying i owe £160 and this will go to £200 within next 14 days. In summary i just feel very very hard done by, as i actually attempted to pay for what would have been £4 of parking and now i owe £200.

My main questions are: Should i let this go to court or pay now? If i go to court do i have a leg to stand on or have i hung myself up to dry with my wording during the appeals process?

Thank you for any advice offered.

pappa_golf

1: who is the parking Co involved?

2: you do realise that if you go to court , you could and should win using your photogtaphic evidence

3: if you went to court and lost the fee payable would be £100 , plus court costs , this could be under the £200 they are greedyly asking for , and could cause the PPC to spend moneys , non recoverable

there is a article in the newbies thread , what to do with debt collectors

so question one again , who was the parking Co

G_44

Hi, thanks for this. Parking company involved is Northern Parking Services (NPS).

The_Deep

My appeal was rejected by the PPC who stated that the pay machine was working at the time i parked however

I think that a judge would probably believe you rather than the scammer

You owe them nothing you attempted to pay, they could have written to you asking tor the £4.00 but played silly beggers. PoPla tend to side with the PPC rather than apply common-sense.

Read some of these

https://www.google.co.uk/search?sourceid=navclient&hl=en-GB&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4GUEA_en-GBGB707GB707&q=Pay+and+dispay+machine+not+working+prankster+&gws_rd=ssl#spf=1

Coupon-mad

Not known for major court forays, a bit part player:

http://www.bmpa.eu/companydata/Northern_Parking_Services_North_East.html

Yes, wait for a LBCCC or court papers and return here. We win 99% of them, which would then end the scam, and if you lost you would just pay (no CCJ) again it would be over. Nothing to fear.

G_44

Thank you for your responses. Really appreciate it and i now feel a lot happier. I shall hang fire and see if they send me a LBCCC.

beamerguy

G_44 wrote: »

I am now at the debt recovery stage where i have recently received a letter saying i owe £160 and this will go to £200 within next 14 days.

Assume this is DRP ?

Whichever debt collectors, they are trying to scam you into paying.
Complete and utter plonkers ..... £200 indeed:rotfl::rotfl:

IGNORE THE RIFF RAFF

pappa_golf

Coupon-mad wrote: »

Not known for major court forays, a bit part player:

http://www.bmpa.eu/companydata/Northern_Parking_Services_North_East.html

Yes, wait for a LBCCC or court papers and return here. We win 99% of them, which would then end the scam, and if you lost you would just pay (no CCJ) again it would be over. Nothing to fear.

indeed , and on the company info section , there has been a posting , gosh same senario to you , https://bmpa.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/203549682-Northern-Parking-North-East-Limited

Quote:

September 17, 2016 20:20
Help, I have had a ticket from this company, (the ticket machine was visibly out of order with a note from NPS stating I had to pay via an app, I could not access internet from that location) I have photographic proof, provided this along with my appeal to the company, which was obviously rejected. I cannot complete an objection to POPLA without an 10 digit number from NPS, which so far, they have not replied with or replied to any emails I have sent. What do I do??

pappa_golf

when asked in court to produce the ticket machine printout for that period , It may be embarrassing for them

Umkomaas

Hope you realise that 'letting it go to court' is just a little bit more than turning up on the day, having a rant, and presuming the judge will be on your side.

It don't quite work like that. Read plenty of previous 'court' threads so you know what you have to do in order to 'win'.

G_44

pappa_golf wrote: »

when asked in court to produce the ticket machine printout for that period , It may be embarrassing for them

Yeah I should probably clarify. I asked for ticket machine printouts in my initial appeal however NPS were in fact correct. There ticket machine was working however would not accept money until 8am onwards. I attempted to park at 7.30am. Therefore my options were to either pay using the app (which I couldn't as I did not have my mobile with me) or return at 8am at which time the machine would accept payment.

My main gripe was that when I went to pay for my parking an error message appeared on the ticket machine which stated 'Opp Invalid'. Which I think is really confusing. And nowhere on the signage -which was completely unlit - does it say that machine will not accept payment. It states 'between the hours of 6pm and 8am parking is free'. In my past experience say if I had parked in a council ran car park at 7.30am and parking does not start until 8am then simply when you put your money in you parking starts from 8am. I had just never seen a machine that doesn't accep money until the time parking is charged.

Also parking is charged at £1 an hour or a max of £4 all day. I received my PCN at 10.15am, therefore I owed the car park at this point £2.25.According to the DRP I now owe £200 :eek: