6 year old pcn county claim form received

Bookbug123

Sorry for starting a new thread, please don't slate me. I have been reading the advice here all weekend and I am still lost and panicking.

Basically, as registered keeper of a vehicle I no longer own, I received a pcn in 2012 for an alleged contravention (parking without displaying a valid ticket) on 28/01/2012. At the time, I believed that the driver on that day purchased a ticket but did not enter the full reg number. The pcn included photos of the car entering and leaving the car park.

Back in 2012, I read the available advice and I believe that I did nothing (I say this because I think I started writing an appeal to Excel Parking Services and then decided better of it). I received the expected chain of letters including those from debt collection companies which came in flurries over the years. I have since sold the car and last year we moved house. During that process I shredded all of the correspondence thinking that we were approaching the six year mark and having not received anything recent.

In October 2017 I received another letter at my new address and was surprised they had my new details. I now realise that letter was a LBC (it is headed Letter of Claim) but being busy with moving into a new house and heavily pregnant, I didn't look into it properly and I just ignored it the same as all previous correspondence. I now realise that was a mistake.

This week I received the Claim form dated 26/01/2018. It includes the Particulars of Claim and the original 'debt' of £90 is now £262.80 as it includes initial legal costs, court fees and legal rep costs. It is signed by Claimants Legal Representative - BW Legal Services Limited.

I don't know what I should do now. I feel like an idiot for missing the LBC and getting rid of all my previous correspondence. I am no longer even sure that as registered keeper I had a defense from the start. I really don't want to end up in court. I am reading the forums at night while feeding a new baby and getting very anxious about it all. I understand that I only have a short amount of time to respond to the county claim form and that it is too late now to respond to the original LBC. Do I go ahead with the AOS? Do I have reasonable grounds to defend this? Please help!

Quentin

Everyone is politely asked to read up on this in the newbies faq thread near the top of the forum before starting a new thread.


Court claims are covered comprehensively in #2 including link to a walkthrough on AOS


Go there now to learn how to do this and get an extra 14 days to do your defence

The_Deep

the original 'debt' of £90 is now £262.80

Clearly a scam, even if they won, which is most unlikely, a judge is unlikely to award more than £200. Copy the letter to the SRA, it may be a breach of their Code

https://www.ombudsman-services.org/sectors/solicitors-regulation-authority.

There is no need to get stressed over this, imo, the chances of you having to pay a penny are almost zero.

Bookbug123

Thank you. I have read the newbie thread repeatedly but will go back and look at #2 again. I suppose I was in part asking if I'd messed up so much at previous stages that it was still worth trying to put together a defence or if indeed I had a defence?

Quentin

Shame you destroyed everything, but not fatal if you are certain you never contacted them and they don't know the driver's ID

beamerguy

Before I read your post Bookbug, just from the heading,
this was going to be BWLegal again.

They are not the smartest legal in the book so read up
all about BWLegal which will give you an idea on how
they behave/perform so badly in court

BWLegal - the list of failures growing
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5672664

You will probably see many similar cases to your own
and take note what the judges have said

The_Deep

You have not messed up at all. You engaged with them where it would probably have been better to ignore, not a huge deal.

Castle

Bookbug123 wrote: »

Basically, as registered keeper of a vehicle I no longer own, I received a pcn in 2012 for an alleged contravention (parking without displaying a valid ticket) on 28/01/2012. At the time, I believed that the driver on that day purchased a ticket but did not enter the full reg number. The pcn included photos of the car entering and leaving the car park.

If you're not the driver, you have no liability and it would be too late for Excel to chase the driver as the 6 years limit has now been reached.

Quentin

Castle wrote: »

.....it would be too late for Excel to chase the driver as the 6 years limit has now been reached.

No


They have 6 years to start legal proceedings

Johno100

I'd add Abuse of Process to any defence. There is no legitimate reason why a PPC and it's solicitor agents should wait until a couple if days before the alleged debt is statute barred before issuing proceedings.

beamerguy

Johno100 wrote: »

I'd add Abuse of Process to any defence.

YES ... Code name = BWLEGAL, usual bad stuff as expected