VCS ticket and no written follow up for 21 months!

Dottys28

Hi there

Sorry if I’m asking an obvious question or have missed something. I received a ‘letter of claim’ in the post today from a legal recovery company BW Legal re a parking charge notice I had on my windscreen in Feb 2016! I have never had any follow up in writing until today, 21 months later.

Do I have the basis of any argument to challenge this? They have requested £154.

It is on behalf of VCS limited.

Any help would be much appreaciated!

Redx

you can send a rebuttal letter , see post #2 of the NEWBIES sticky thread near the top of this forum

VCS have 6 years to try a court claim, they use BW LEGAL as solicitors for this sometimes (other times they do it themselves in-house)

a court claim is an MCOL

treat this letter you have as an LBC

Umkomaas

Ask them to confirm if what the have sent is a simple debt collector letter, or is it a fully compliant Letter of Claim. If the latter, demand they provide all the information required of them as per new Pre-action Protocol (PaP). If they are a professional legal firm they should know this - the PaP very clear.

https://www.justice.gov.uk/courts/procedure-rules/civil/pdf/protocols/pre-action-protocol-for-debt-claims.pdf

If they are adamant it is a formal Letter of Claim, any failure by them now to provide the required information will result in a complaint to the Solicitors’ Regulation Authority.

KeithP

Dottys28, is the address of the registered keeper on your vehicle's registration document correct?

Or have you changed address in the last twenty-one months?

Dottys28

Hi Keith

No it is not, I have been meaning to update the address on my RC document but it is an old address. Car is insured to my current address however

DoaM

Well there you go ... postal invoices go to the keeper's address. So everything sent by VCS or debt collectors will have gone there. (Think yourself lucky that they appear to have used a tracing service to find the registered keeper - they could have simply sent court papers to the old address and won a default claim. Or did someone from the old address forward this BWL letter to you?)

Is the old address still a serviceable address for the keeper? If not then it's no wonder you've fallen into this mess.

Has the driver changed the address for their driving licence from the old to the current address? (It's a possible £1,000 fine for not doing so).