Harassment by Private Parking Co

A_Step-Mum

Keeping this as brief as possible.

1. Vehicle parked at a residential site as a visitor Dec 2016. Resident said visitor could park in any of the visitor spaces, did not mention permits or anything else. No signs at entrance, only signs on site more than 50 m from visitor spaces on an unrelated building, unlit, vehicle arrived around 9pm, dark and raining heavily.
2. NTD placed on vehicle overnight. Very small local company, IPC member. Ignored.
3. NTK received within time limits, multiple issues, not relying on POFA anyway. Based on there being very limited information about this company (still haven't found another thread which mentions them and would therefore prefer not to name them) decided a letter denying liability would be sensible.
4. Letter written on behalf of registered keeper, who is disabled and vulnerable, denying any responsibility for charge and listing all grounds for dispute including not being the driver. On grounds of RK's disability, requested future correspondence be directed to their representative with signed authority from RK.
5. PPC sent increasingly strident demands for money to the RK, then instructed a debt collector. Simple no liability letters sent on each occasion, but repeating request that correspondence be sent to the rep. Letter tennis petered out July 2017.
6. Horribly deficient LBC received from Gladstones Oct 2017, addressed (address was not quite right, but the postman knew where to take it) to the RK. Responded using information from this site requesting proper information and repeating 'reply to rep'. No response received.
7. Equally deficient LBC now received from BW Legal, again to the RK.

Using the advice on here and other forums, we're reasonably confident at dealing with any court claim which does eventually arrive, but actually wish they'd get on with it and stop what amounts to harassing the RK - she's easily led and believes all the threats 100% despite assurances that she's done nothing wrong. Is there anything we can do to stop this being passed around all and sundry who just issue demands for more and more money and totally ignore anything sent to them - surely it's unfair to do this especially (or because?) they know the alleged debtor is vulnerable.

bargepole

A_Step-Mum wrote: »

... Is there anything we can do to stop this being passed around all and sundry who just issue demands for more and more money and totally ignore anything sent to them - surely it's unfair to do this especially (or because?) they know the alleged debtor is vulnerable.

When the inevitable Court Claim arrives, respond with a Defence and Counterclaim.

Do NOT counterclaim for breach of the Data Protection Act (or Great Deal of Pointless Rubbish, as it's now known), these are very difficult to win.

Instead, the counterclaim should be for damages under the Protection from Harassment Act 1997, using all those letters from dodgy debt collectors and shyster solicitors as evidence.


Calculate the time spent on dealing with all this at your professional hourly rate, and whatever the figure is, double it for the distress caused. The leading authority is Ferguson v British Gas Trading [2009] EWCA 46.


That's the best way to get back at these muppets; hit them where it hurts.

Quentin

Sending unpleasant letters is the way they work!

This latest lbcca needs responding to. #2 in the FAQ covers responding to lbcca.

If it works (or doesn't) should bring this to a head - either by accepting the rebuttal or issuing a court claim

Umkomaas

Both above advice posts are ones you should follow, both experienced posters, bargepole is often involved in parking-related court cases.

There should be no impediment to revealing the name of the PPC - we then should be able to give you more precise information on how this might go in the context of court.

Coupon-mad

So have they ignored a reasonable request to write to an authorised representative, and instead continued to bombard the rk with letters? Even though they knew that person was disabled/vulnerable?

I would contact the EHRC and ask for their advice/suggested response, because it seems to me the PPC has failed to make a reasonable adjustment under the EqA 2010. Might even breach the Human Rights Act, so I would ask the EHRC to advise on some wording to send to the PPC and BW Legal.

Le_Kirk

Coupon-mad wrote: »

it seems to me the PPC has filed to make a reasonable adjustment under the EqA 2010.

Should that be failed to make.....

Just in case the OP is going to use that, it needs to be correct.

Given the amount that you post C-M, it's not surprising the odd one slips through. Of course, if I have misread it or misunderstood it, I retract and stand suitably chastised!

A_Step-Mum

I have emailed EHRC regarding reasonable adjustments.

In a previous letter the Parking Co said they had no intention of doing court so didn't need to comply with CPR and when we had the letter from Gladstones I was very surprised that the court claim didn't arrive shortly after. I've not been able to find another thread on any of the forums where Gladstones are involved, do just one letter and then it gets passed to BW Legal. I can think of 3 scenarios for what will happen next :-

1. I'll write back to BW Legal and hear nothing more from anyone.

2. I'll write back to BW Legal, they'll issue a claim and things will finally come to an end.

3. I'll write back to BW Legal, things will go quiet for a while again and then we'll get a letter from yet another debt collector and we'll be back at square one again.

It seems very unfair that any company could in theory just keep instructing different debt collectors to recover a disputed debt until the alleged debtor presumably caves in just to get rid of them - not everyone is likely to be able to withstand 6 years of scary looking demands with red writing and words like court and bailiffs in them.

beamerguy

A_Step-Mum wrote: »

It seems very unfair that any company could in theory just keep instructing different debt collectors to recover a disputed debt until the alleged debtor presumably caves in just to get rid of them - not everyone is likely to be able to withstand 6 years of scary looking demands with red writing and words like court and bailiffs in them.

You are so right and that is how this scam industry works.

The man who we hope will sort out this scam is
Sir Greg Knight who has a parking bill going through
at the moment.

As far as I can see, Sir Greg has one stab at this to stop
the scam so as every little helps, you could write to him
and state that the likes of BWLegal are the modern day
version of the Kray Twins

https://www.parliament.uk/biographies/commons/sir-greg-knight/1200

System

It seems very unfair that any company could in theory just keep instructing different debt collectors

It's the BW model as they know "not everyone is likely to be able to withstand 6 years of scary looking demands with red writing and words like court and bailiffs in them."

There is a difference between being "unfair" and people standing up for their rights. The so-called creditor thinks their rights have been breached so you need to establish yours - and stick to them.

Resident said visitor could park in any of the visitor spaces, did not mention permits or anything else

The key point is where the resident who said it was OK, actually had the authority to say that. This is what needs to be checked.

Loadsofchildren123

A_Step-Mum wrote: »

I have emailed EHRC regarding reasonable adjustments.

In a previous letter the Parking Co said they had no intention of doing court so didn't need to comply with CPR that will come back to haunt them and when we had the letter from Gladstones I was very surprised that the court claim didn't arrive shortly after very odd to use Gladstones and then change to BWL, not seen that before. I've not been able to find another thread on any of the forums where Gladstones are involved, do just one letter and then it gets passed to BW Legal. Yes this is very odd and I haven't seen it before. I can think of 3 scenarios for what will happen next :-

1. I'll write back to BW Legal and hear nothing more from anyone.

2. I'll write back to BW Legal, they'll issue a claim and things will finally come to an end.

3. I'll write back to BW Legal, things will go quiet for a while again and then we'll get a letter from yet another debt collector and we'll be back at square one again.

It seems very unfair that any company could in theory just keep instructing different debt collectors to recover a disputed debt until the alleged debtor presumably caves in just to get rid of them - not everyone is likely to be able to withstand 6 years of scary looking demands with red writing and words like court and bailiffs in them.

Some comments in the text above.


In your letter to BW, you must:
1. Emphasise the disability and the special protections of the legislation and that they and their client have breached it.
2. List the first occasion RK informed the PPC about the disability and to correspond with a representative, and each and every occasion when you have repeated that request.
3. Ask why that was ignored and why they have continued, in spite of all those letters, to contact the RK directly, knowing they are suffering from a disability which makes them vulnerable.
4. Spell out that RK has found the constant contact from different entities, all acting on the instruction of the PPC, harassing - that it upsets them enormously, they have been to their GP, they have phoned up other family members in tears etc. If you have ever in the previous letters mentioned harassment, refer to the letter. The point here is that if you counterclaim for harassment then you will be much better off if you have spelled out the fact that it makes RK feel harassed.
5. Tell them to treat this letter as a formal request that they cease writing. Say that in their letter of x date they said that they had no intention of proceeding to court (which they used as their excuse for failing to comply with the CPR) and so they have no just cause to continue writing. It has been clear since [date you first wrote] that any debt is denied, so frankly they need to either put up and stop harassing the RK, or shut up and issue proceedings.
6. For the avoidance of doubt, RK will pursue a counterclaim for damages for harassment because the constant writing of threatening letters and the constant ignoring of the instruction to write to a representative clearly amounts to a course of harassment under the Protection from Harassment Act. Say that in that regard they should treat this letter as a Letter Before Claim.


They may stop writing, they may issue a claim.


If they issue a claim, you do need to consider what RK's defence is. If the NTK was sent in time, you'll need to find other ways to show it was deficient and therefore they can't recover from RK under POFA. It's risky to run that defence alone, so you may also want to look at the various arguments that there cannot have been any contract between driver and PPC. You've mentioned about the insufficient signage, but what do the signs say about visitors parking? No signs by the visitors bays at all? What was the leaseholder/tenant told about visitors parking? Anything in writing? In due course we'll need to look at all of this in a bit more detail and it won't do any harm for you to start thinking about it in more detail now and doing some evidence gathering (eg PPCs often change their signs, so go back now and take photographs)


You can ask the BMPA how often this particular PPC has gone to court, they maintain statistics. The good thing for you is if this is a new PPC they won't know what they are doing. The bad news is that BWL will proceed regardless with its roboclaims model: they won't even read your letters, which is why you have had no joy in persuading them to correspond with a third party.

A_Step-Mum

Sorry for not posting an update sooner, my only excuse is all the other stuff going on got in the way.

I'm still waiting for a reply from EHRC, but needed to send something to BW Legal so I've kept it relatively simple on the basis that I've repeatedly written detailed letters that have been totally ignored and this letter isn't likely to be any different, and mostly just referred them to previous correspondence which contains pretty much everything suggested by Loadsofchildren and also details of the proposed defence.

The NTK is not POFA compliant on a number of technical points, they're not relying on keeper responsibility anyway, the keeper was not the driver (easy to prove, they can't physically drive), signage is forbidding, tenants lease makes no mention of permits, no proof that tenant had been informed of permit system (he had moved in the day before, he has in writing from his landlord that 'the visitor spaces are available on a first come first served basis' with no mention of permits or any other condition) and I'm pretty sure there's a few other 'belt and braces' points too.