CEL Parking Fine AOS Submitted / POC Recieved Late

mrlowkey

Hi Guys,

Read as much as I can on the forum over the past 5 days and it seems i've made some mistakes along the way with contacting CEL etc but thought it worth laying out the circumstances and hope that someone help me with some pointers on the best way to approach this.

1) I received a PCN for parking at wycombe rye lido for an hour where they have automated cameras to take my son and dog out for a walk. Before visiting the the car park I looked on the landowners website where on the car parking information page the only wording was "Pay at meter car parking facilities - members are free". I have a screenshot of the webpage. Since this event the website page has been removed. I subsequently ensured I had change for the parking meter on arrival at the car park and after 15 minutes waiting for a space parked the vehicle and proceeded to find the parking machine which was out of order covered in a plastic tarpaulin with grey gaffa tape crosshatched round it (I have a photo of he machine). There was no other machine in the car park and only some small signs advising of mobile payment. I didn't have my mobile on me as I only came prepared on the advise of the landowners website. So after checking numerous cars dashboards for tickets took my son out for a quick 30 minute walk and left the car park. Worthy of mention the cost would have been 50p which I had in my hand the car park provided no obvious method to pay it.

2) The following Saturday received a PCN requesting £100 within 14 days. So I immediately went straight back to the car park to get evidence of the state of the machine and scenario etc etc. The machine was still broken the only difference was now there was a temporary upside down V shaped notice board next to the machine stating "Machine out of order" in large fonts - "please pay at the lido or via phone options" in very small fonts. So i ventured inside a nearby building reception and found an working machine and appropriately payed my 50p. I then scoured the rest of the car park and other than this temporary sign next to the out of order machine there is no other indication in the car park of an alternative machine inside a nearby building. Photo evidence taken of all.

3) Long and short a combination of misinformation on the landowners website, a broken payment machine and no notification that there was an alternative machine inside a nearby building caused the PCN and I believe i made all possible endeavours to pay using the information provided with the facilities I had with me, cash, payment cards and wallet (no phone).

4) It wasn't until later I found this forum and unfortunately I sent an appeals email to response email on the PCN letter stating the above facts. I received a response to representation saying "In the event that the payment machines are unavailable, the parking charges still apply and our 'phone and pay' service should be used' Then referencing the ombudsman and popla appeals.

5) It was then on some bad or good advice found on the internet I went into ignore mode.So after multiple letters transitioning through ZZPS and one from Wright Hassal all giving various levels of documentation about Parking Eye vs Beavis that I eventually received a County Court Claim form for the total amount of £326 signed Civil Enforcement Limited stating that I will receive the Particulars of the Claim within 14 days. The claim form package also included all defence, aos and payment forms. The issue date was the 10th Oct received on the 18th October.

6) The particulars of the Claim documents were received on the 28th October 18 days after issue. Unfortunately I panicked and went online and completed an AOS online with intent to defend on the 23rd October before I received the particulars of the claim as I didn't really understand what particulars of the claim exactly meant until i read this forum. But in all honesty i've never been involved in legal proceedings before so I have no idea how this all works.

7) The particulars of the claim don't say much other than Automated Cameras, Signs exist and are now referencing Vine vs Waltham Forest London Borough Council [2000] instead of Beavis vs Parking Eye. I'm not sure if this is a mistake. If it is, is it leveragable.

Just wanted to ask if anyone has any pointers on how to go about this before. I had prepped a a load of stuff around beavis vs parking eye but the vine vs waltham forest has thrown me.

My general theory is that basically I had already entered into a contract with the landowner before I left my house and made all possible provisions and endeavours within my power necessary to honour the agreement of using a payment machine at the car park. But the landowner failed to fulfil it's obligations by providing a payment machine in the car park or clear notification to the hidden machine in a building.

Many thanks for any advice in advance (even if bad news)

Redx

read this thread , mainly post #1

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5735738

and this post #38 by johnnersh

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5722800

that is as much as we know about the new POC and PaP topics , and those are 2 legal eagles so bear in mind you have the best and latest FREE legal advice

you can check with the extremely busy CCBC about these aspects and when your defence is due in by , plus any POC error issues etc

I would also be drafting a defence based on anything agreed on here in the last 7 to 14 days

mrlowkey

Many thanks. The particulars of the claim only referencing Vine vs Waltham Forest has really confused me though. I'm trying to get my head round how this case would be leveraged in the benefit of the claimant.

Redx

I would not bother trying to untangle legalities like those , leave it to the judge

they try to bamboozle people with legalese , plus that particular case has been discussed and dissected on here and peipoo and parking pranksters blogs many times before

personally , I would be getting on with doing what I said earlier

chances are that CEL wont pay the second stage court filing fee once they see a robust defence , so VINE vs Waltham forest wont even get debated , so you wont get the answer anyway

nosferatu1001

Vine is discussed on this forum in a number of places, so you can try. It usually helps the defendant, if you understand it.

Loadsofchildren123

PoC deemed served 30 October (as 28th a Saturday)
So defence due 13th.

How late does this make the PoC? May not be worth complaining under rule 3.8/9. But you should inform the court and CEL that the PoC were backdated and were n fact served on 30 Oct and so your defence is not due til 13 Nov. Ask for an explanation of why they backdated the PoC, for a copy of the filed Certificate of Service, and complain that the late service is not allowed and they should have made an application under rule 3.9. The court may do something but imo unlikely if they were only a few days late.

Loadsofchildren123

You sound like you have a good defence. Start drafting it so we can help you.
I don't think looking at the website creates a contract. But I suppose you could say it offered terms which you accepted once you'd read the terms and taken up the offer by going there and parking. The payment term was incapable of performance and you made every reasonable effort to comply. You will also defend on the basis of inadequate signage. You could say that the taking down of that part of the website and changing the signs clearly indicates an acceptance that the signage there on the relevant date was inadequate (otherwise they wouldn't have needed to change it).