CEL court claim issued - do I pay??

Lozza63

Sorry one more point. I have read somewhere that when requesting information from CEL to to this via e-mail not by letter. However, they do not have an e-mail address. Should I send it to their solictors e-mail address ie Wright Hassall who are the ones who have been writing to me?

claxtome

Should I send it to their solictors e-mail address ie Wright Hassall who are the ones who have been writing to me?

Yes, Once you are in court proceedings all correspondence to the Claimant goes to the solicitor not the PPC.

System

Yes, Once you are in court proceedings all correspondence to the Claimant goes to the solicitor not the PPC.

What is the name in the second top left box. The one that says where to send the papers.

WH may have been writing to you but they are unlikely to have issued the claim on behalf of Civil Enforcement.

At this stage you send the defence to MoneyClaim online who send a copy to Civil Enforcement. After that, you then use the address in the second top left box (the one that says where to send the papers.)

As regards the defence, if you have had to go back to see the signs and check the wording your [honest] defence will be that the signs did not meet the standards of prominence set down in the ParkingEye v Beavis test. Put them to proof it does. It's a fairly low standard to meet and yet most parking companies don't meet it because if they did, they wouldn't be able to issue tickets.

[Deleted User]

2) In the letter I received from ZZPS, they state that court fees, solictors costs and statutory interest could be added to the amount owed if I did not pay and then the solictors letter said original PCN was £140 with outstanding balance incl additional charges "the debt" being £236. They state their client (CEL) have followed all the correct processes in pursuing the matter and that clients have confirmed any further evidence will only be provided at litigation stage.

1. There are very limited costs that can be claimed at all on the small claims track. Out of pocket expenses and the court fees (hearing fee and hearing fee are recoverable).

2. Wright Hassall fees are unlikely to be recoverable at all - and even if they were, you might like to note that they'll do a generic letter of claim for £5. Not that I often have call to quote Naomi Campbell, but frankly I wouldn't get out of bed for that.
https://www.wrighthassall.co.uk/debt-recovery/business-debt-collection/

3. The point is, if the Claimant wants to recover the cost they'll have to prove that outlay. I appreciate this is a ZZPS debt recovery matter, but it is likely that they work on a "no win/no fee" basis (certainly Debt Recovery Plus do). If you've not paid, then the Claimant won't have paid them anything and cannot claim for a cost that has never been incurred. This is a breach of the indemnity principle.

4. Where the claimant relies on you agreeing to their contract (the sign) if the additional costs are unspecified then they will have an issue recovering the full amount in any event (or indeed those costs at all)

5. If a claimant claim succeeds under POFA 2012 you should argue hard that the statutory terms limit them to the £100 cost of the ticket only, because that is the effect of it.

I think that's everything on costs. Save other than to note that if in the exchanges of correspondence the Claimant are made to look unreasonable, that may enhance your claim to costs at conclusion.

Lozza63

Am I correct that the PCN should have been sent within 14 days of the incident if using ANPR (according to BPA code of practise, Schedule 4, paragraph 9, sub-paragraph 5) ?

Umkomaas

Lozza63 wrote: »

Am I correct that the PCN should have been sent within 14 days of the incident if using ANPR (according to BPA code of practise, Schedule 4, paragraph 9, sub-paragraph 5) ?

If they are attempting to invoke Keeper liability. There’s nothing to invalidate the charge as a result of it being sent after 14 days, it just means that the keeper is out of the loop - although that doesn’t stop them trying to implicate the keeper, if they do, you (and they) will have to argue it in front of the judge.

Loadsofchildren123

Yes so in your defence you say you can't be held liable as keeper because POFA not complied with, and that neither were you driving.
Court has the power to make a finding of fact that you were driving so realistically you should produce some evidence (eg more than one named driver on the insurance plus others who drive under their own insurance, or evidence you were elsewhere)

Coupon-mad

Lozza63 wrote: »

Sorry one more point. I have read somewhere that when requesting information from CEL to to this via e-mail not by letter. However, they do not have an e-mail address. Should I send it to their solictors e-mail address ie Wright Hassall who are the ones who have been writing to me?

NO - Wright Hassall do not have conduct of the case and are no part of it.

If the POC were backdated and (hopefully) you kept the envelope that proved they were not posted when dated, PLEASE NOW forward the complaint you made to the CCBC, to another email address.

We need LOTS of these to fly into a specific inbox now:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/73400735#Comment_73400735

Once that has been done, please confirm. We need to bombard the CCBC (specifically to Amanda Beck who is aware of this scam) with evidence about CEL.

Do this - even if you've already emailed a complaint - PLEASE forward it now!

System

@Lozza63

How did this case turn out. Did they drop or did you pay out? There was a lot of help given here.