pcn to registered keeper

Umkomaas

Coupon-mad wrote: »

Good to be back - although we've moved house so I was busy, and still am up to my eyes in stuff!

:eek:

Glasgow?

Coupon-mad

Hahaha - very good!

Actually I've never been that far North! I'm such a Southerner.

Pdmum

First draft of witness statement, am thinking evidence will be be numbered and linked back to defence.


In the County Court at xxxx
Claim No. xxxx
Between
Xxxxx Claimant
and
xxxxxx Defendant

Witness Statement ( In support of Defence already filed)
1. I am xxx of xxxxxx and the defendant in this matter.
I deny I am responsible for this claim for the following reasons:-
2. I am the registered keeper of vehicle xxxx, I was neither driver or passenger in the vehicle at the time of the alleged incident.
3. I received a parking charge notice relating to the above vehicle . The reason being Failure to pay for the duration of stay. The duration was stated as being 2 hours and 18 minutes.
The driver confirmed that parking had been paid for ,so I appealed to Claimant.
4. The appeal was rejected, although the claimant admitted at this point that payment had been made but there had been ‘ an overstay to a paid parking period’. I believed at this point there had been a deliberate attempt to mislead on the Parking Notice and that this was a scam.
5. Proof of relevant documents have been requested, both during the POPLA appeals process and as part of the Pre Action Protocol and have still not been provided.
6. 2 SARS have been refused by the claimant as being unfounded and excessive. Although the claimant states that they would do a search if payment was made. A complaint was made to the ICO and the claimant was found to have not complied with its data protection obligations.
Further investigation of the claimant by the ICO is ongoing in relation to the Code of Practice for ANPR & Surveillance Cameras
5. The claimant states that they are members of the British Parking Association, however they have failed in many aspects of this claim to follow their Code of Practice .
In addition The Protection of Freedoms act is not fully complied with and I believe there is also breach of the ICO Code of Practice for ANPR & Surveillance Cameras.
6. Evidence of the specific points raised in my defence are included.
7. The claimant continues to mislead by claiming the Defendant is the Driver. The Defendant has not named the driver and the burden of proof rests with the claimant.
8. It is my belief that the Parking Charge Notice was issued incorrectly from the start and that this unwarranted harassment and baseless litigation has caused distress to me and my family.

KeithP

Spell out acronyms the first time they are used.

E.g. para 6 should start "Two Subject Access Requests [SARs] have...".

Similarly for ICO and ANPR.

Coupon-mad

Evidence of the specific points raised in my defence are included.

You need to refer to each piece of evidence in the WS, by number (e.g. your initials followed by a number for each thing).

I think you need more detail about the fact that the parking time was paid for and it seem the parking firm is playing fast & loose with the 'observation period' and 'grace period' that the BPA's Kelvin Reynolds confirmed that professional parking firms should take on board are separate timings they must allow without enforcement arising.

Maybe use some of what I suggested earlier for the ICO, in the WS?

- in this case, they use ANPR 24/7; excessive & unnecessary at this site where the signs are unlit, so the contract cannot be read and enforcement should not be taking place.

- they misuse and abuse the two data streams for profit, and routinely use against consumers, the ANPR data stream with the unknown 'alternative time' that they call 'total stay' that works most onerously against unsuspecting, genuine paying drivers.

- PP fails to properly inform people of this, and these are paying customers who will be reasonably relying on the tangible PDT issued by the machine, as that has actual 'parking time' on it. Misleading data with no warning printed on the ticket.

- e.g. they should have a wealth warning: 'PLEASE NOTE: Your total stay time has been calculated from the point of your car's entry, by ANPR, and you will only be allowed a total of 10 minutes extra, for driving in/out before a PCN is issued - so the time shown on this ticket may not be relied upon as the time to return to the car if it took you more than 10 minutes to park today!''.

- PP use the ANPR 'data stream' (a) to create an artificial 'total stay time' when in fact, this trader has the actual 'parking contract' time in their hands already, via the second 'data stream' (b) of the PDT machine.

- The two times conflict, and yet the PDT data stream is surely the truest data (for those people who have paid) because the time taken to drive round and find a space before parking and paying can vary, due to all sorts of factors that PP are disproportionately taking advantage of.

- and they retain the data of people who the PDT machine 'data stream' tells them HAVE paid, then simply churn out a PCN if ''(a) - (b) = more than 10 minutes'', this despite the fact that the BPA Code of Practice and a well-cited BPA article* state that 'observation time' (on arrival) and 'grace period' (at least 10 minutes purely for the end of paid for time) are two different things, and clearly a car cannot possibly teleport into a space and have the tariff paid, in zero seconds flat...! A 'grace period' does not negate the 'observation period'.

- and PP make wholly 'automated decisions' to issue PCNs with no human intervention, clearly nothing is checked individually by a person.

- it's just an algorithm between the data from the ANPR versus the data from the PDT machine, regardless of any other factors (very busy car park due to a local event, bad weather, hours of darkness where it takes longer to read signs and use a crappy scratched old PDT machine with faded keys...disability of a driver or passenger, which remote ANPR systems cannot pick up, but which is a factor within the population at large)

- whilst ANPR may have its place in a 'free for 2 hours' car park it has no place used in this automated way alongside a misleading timing that consumers will rely on (the PDT in their hand).

- The Parking firms using ANPR in this way, do so purely in order to profit from genuine paying drivers whose tariffs do match their actual parking time, but simply could not complete the in/out actions in 10 minutes flat. And who never knew they had to...

Evidence could include:

- Henry Greenslade's UNDERSTANDING KEEPER LIABILITY article from the POPLA Annual Report 2015.

- the Beavis case sign as a comparison of what a clear, brief and very legible sign with simple terms and the actual parking charge in large lettering, looks like.

- photos of the signs at this car park taken in the same light conditions, if you can get these.

- and pics of the PDT machine instructions which NEVER warn about the timing on the ticket not being the true time of 'stay' according to the scammers.

- Kelvin Reynolds' BPA ''good parking practice includes observation and grace periods'' article

- along with the para 13 of the BPA CoP (the one from the right date of the parking event) setting out the TWO grace periods before & after paid-for time.

- Thornton v Shoe Lane Parking (the transcript*) that talks about the contract starting when the money goes into the PDT machine.

* http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/1970/2.html

Pdmum

Thanks Keith, will sort that.


Coupon Mad, i will not be able to supply pictures as company no longer operate at this site.
According to 'contract' Parking Period Commences 5 mins from entry' so my thoughts were there could be no contract if
a) this hasnt been applied by PC

b)The driver could never know this information (point of entry not shown on ticket)

In this case is the transcript relevant or am i making this more complicated.

Coupon-mad

Coupon Mad, i will not be able to supply pictures as company no longer operate at this site.

GoogleStreetView probably does?

In this case is the transcript relevant or am i making this more complicated.

Thornton v Shoe Lane? ALWAYS relevant for defending a case where the PPC scammer is working against the normal accepted timings of when a paid parking contract commences. Even 5 mins goes against Kelvin Reynolds' article (5 mins is woefully inadequate to find a parking space at some sites/in certain busy conditions).

Pdmum

OK ,Noted.
Thank you

Fruitcake

From a Not so Smart case:-

The contract would be expected by any reasonable person, to begin and end at the times stated on the Pay & Display ticket purchased, as this is the 'point of sale' as confirmed in Thornton v Shoe Lane Parking 1971, where the Court of Appeal held that that the ticket machine was the offer, the insertion of money was the acceptance and any contract began at that point in time.

As opposed to being charged and held into by an unknown contract term, from the very second the vehicle was purportedly captured by ANPR entering into the car park. No signs explained at the site entrance (as cars pass in moving traffic, Smart's remote, high cameras that they cannot even see) that the driver's time was being counted from that point and not from the payment at the machine. Why would a different time be shown on the Pay & Display ticket, if it is not the timing upon which a driver can fairly rely?

Please don't forget to complain to your MP about this unregulated scam.

Pdmum

Thank you Fruitcake, thats helpful.
Already complained to my MP ,way back after the sham of a POPLA decision. Probably wouldnt hurt to fill him in on the progress of this.