Letter of claim from bwlegal

Coupon-mad

phoenixfreespirit wrote: »

Hi Coupon mad
I think I am stuffed as I have just realised I misread the date and my WS should have been in on 25th Feb, it was the trial fee that had to be in on 14th March.
Is there anything I can do now?

No phoning the local court, that will worry you an make you think you are stuffed.

Make plans to file & serve your WS and printed evidence in the morning!

Just TAKE IT IN ANYWAY in the morning, before noon, in a file with the Claim number, and the hearing date and 'WITNESS STATEMENT AND EVIDENCE FROM DEFENDANT' on the front page.

DO NOT sign/date it yet. Wait till we've check it over, tonight!

You need evidence too, not just a WS with links.

So did you print out a copy of the entrance signs (not just a link, the court will not follow a link). And a picture of that sign I found for you from 2015 that shows the only readable word was 'WARNING'? print out that too, I gave that to you on pepipoo I think.

And something that shows your Mum was disabled (YOU MUST HAVE SOMETHING?) You can't keep saying you 'will ask for medical records'. It is now too late for that, so what have you got as evidence, something, a letter from a Doctor or Hospital, anything?

I do deny being the driver.

Can you locate your insurance policy from that date and include that, to show more than one driver, or was the driver a relative or carer using their own insurance to cover them?

Think of how to evidence everything you say, will the Judge ask for anything else to prove it, think what that might be and file & serve that too.

Don't do nothing while we are commenting tonight.

Do some printing of your picture evidence and think what other evidence to file, and print that, e.g. Schedule 4 of the POFA which says a registered keeper of a car can only be held liable where there it:

- adequate notice of a parking charge? (nope, the entrance sign invited disabled people to park and the bays were not delineated)

- a relevant obligation or relevant contract? (nope, the only sign said 'warning' and nothing else was readable, partly as the signs were placed so low that a car would block the view of the terms. And there can be no relevant contract that breaches the rights and remedies of a disabled visitor relying on a sign allowing and inviting disabled parking to access the library).

- a valid Notice to keeper citing the relevant wording and keeper liability warning (nope, not in 2015, I doubt they got it right as per the statute)

- and the POFA also sets the max sum at the sum on the NTK, no add ons.


(The Beavis case also supports this view, as the Supreme Court stated that a parking firm CANNOT claim a sum in damages, and only £85 was claimed there = the PCN sum alone, no more was recoverable.

YOU DO NOT need the Beavis case in evidence, it's enormous and is Supreme Court law that the Judge will have in his/her grasp.

OK, so start your printing now.

Meanwhile let us comment tonight on that WS.

phoenixfreespirit

Thanks so much coupon~mad!!
I am working on it and all I need to include,
Just to add to it I don't have a working printer so am trying to sort something out!
I will post it up asap tho don't have a clue what I am doing

Coupon-mad

Although they have used 20 photos to pad out their claim they have not addressed the lack of their sign at the entrance or included the photo of the sign giving disabled access.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/n3u3szn4x49z5sk/IMG_20190224_162903%20%282%29.jpg?dl=0

THEY HAVE, but the bit allowing disabled parking is stangely blurred.

You need to put in your evidence, the versions of the signs from Google Streetview in 2015; those images were posted ages back on pepipoo.

Your WS is just your story in your own words, in the first person, confirming you were not the driver but your Mum was disabled and the signs invited disabled parking and the one nearest the car looked like a warning against thieves. one pf the bays were delineated in a clear way and the driver parked as near the library as possible to unload books, which is the access the entrance sign offers.

WS examples have been in the NEWBIES thread all along, please look.

But YOU must put those signs (readable versions) in evidence.

YOU MUST print all this out for the court even if it takes till Tuesday at the latest.

No phoning the court, please, there is no need, just concentrate on putting this together.

Le_Kirk

phoenixfreespirit wrote: »

Just to add to it I don't have a working printer so am trying to sort something out!

Can you write it to a USB memory stick and pop off to a friend or your local library or work or ..............

phoenixfreespirit

Thanks Le Kirk
I am emailing it all to a friend who will print it for me.
I understand I can also email it to bwlegal rather than send it by post?

phoenixfreespirit

Thanks Coupon~mad
The photo is not from bw but a screenshot I am using in my evidence, I can't seem to make the sign any clearer.

These are the copies of photos (not links) I am including..

Disabled access sign
https://www.dropbox.com/s/pc86gzjorw3ua9h/Disabled%20access%20sign.jpg?dl=0

Entrance without PPS signage
https://www.dropbox.com/s/vdrr52q1mkitset/Entrance%20with%20no%20sign.jpg?dl=0

Sign at time of incident
https://www.dropbox.com/s/rlzoqbfbllb0tn6/IMG_20181016_143522.jpg?dl=0

sign updated early 2015 shortly after incident
https://www.dropbox.com/s/g1j7ny5ughe2xn1/New%20sign%20in%202015.jpg?dl=0

I have found details of my mum's mobility issues and hospitalisation in a Devon Council Health Assessment from the following year and will include relevant excerpts including specific request for help to visit the Library.

Unfortunately her library account was deleted last year following her death so I can't evidence the actual date.

Still working on my WS

Please is it possible for you to clarify for me regarding point 5 in my defence about PPS failing to comply with BPA CoP and POFA 2012?
As BWL say 'The Defendant is put on strict proof as to how and why the claimant has failed the BPA CoP and POFA 2012.'
Thank you

phoenixfreespirit

IN THE COUNTY COURT - Claim No. .....

Between

Premier Parking Solutions (Claimant)

-and-
........................... (Defendant)
____________________________
WITNESS STATEMENT
__________________________

I, .......... of ............................... am the defendant in this case and will say as follows. ~:

1. The facts in this statement come from my personal knowledge. I have however no immediate first hand knowledge of the alleged incident. Where they are not within my own knowledge they are true to the best of my information, belief and recollection given the amount of time since the incident and extremely stressful circumstances. Attached to this document is a bundle of paginated evidence marked --1 to which I will refer.

2. I am not liable to the Claimant for the sum claimed, or any amount at all and this is my Witness Statement in support of my defence as already filed.

Liability

3. I assert that I was the registered keeper of the vehicle in question in this case. I was not the driver. I owned the vehicle for a short amount of time, which was needed specifically to visit my parents in Devon following the near death of my father and a fall by my mother whilst visiting him, which resulted in a lengthy hospitalization in both General and then cottage hospital. Both my parent’s health had severely deteriorated, my father had been diagnosed with dementia, my mother who was deaf and now unable to walk unaided was designated as his main carer but would not leave him with anyone who was not family. Please refer to Devon Council Health Assessment included in –1 from the following year which gives some relevant proof of their ongoing health difficulties.

4. Whilst I no longer have any documentation for the vehicle, I can attest that permission was given for third party use by carers during my visit, due to the extremely difficult situation, to be used to enable my mother to visit the local library when this incident took place. Given the amount of time that has passed and the circumstances I am unable to recollect the full names of carers at this time.
Following this incident this permission was subsequently revoked as I did not know the vehicle had received a PCN until I received a demand for money from Premier Parking Solutions. I did not reply as I did not think it was legitimate and was far too overwhelmed with responsibility for my parents’ health and welfare to do so.


5. Correspondence from BWlegal regarding who they are charging has been extremely confusing as it changed several times, the claim was served while I was still in communication with regards to clarifying this and other details including their refusal to provide proof of contract with the landowner. Please see correspondence in –1.

6 The Claimant submits that I was the keeper and driver when I have told them in correspondence I was not, they also refer to the defendant as the driver having parked and entered into a contract, which I the defendant refute.

7 As my father has dementia and thus no memory of this time, my mother has passed and I have no contact with her past carers, I cannot provide witness to the truth of the fact that I was at home looking after my father at the time of the incident, involved in sorting out all my parent’s needs and affairs having just had to take on Power of Attorney for them.

8 BWlegal’s assumption that I was ‘more likely than not the driver’ because I am aware that my mother has since died! Having some recollection of my mother’s health at the time so being therefore capable of imagining what happened, when combined with the sparse details which were relayed to me through the agency after the event, can in no way be construed as proof that I was the driver.

9 However keeper information is obtained, there is no ‘reasonable presumption’ in
law that the registered keeper of a vehicle is the driver. Operators should never
suggest anything of the sort. Further, a failure by the recipient of a notice issued
under Schedule 4 to name the driver, does not of itself mean that the recipient
has accepted that they were the driver at the material time. Unlike, for example,
a Notice of Intended Prosecution where details of the driver of a vehicle must
be supplied when requested by the police, pursuant to Section 172 of the Road
Traffic Act 1988, a keeper sent a Schedule 4 notice has no legal obligation to
name the driver. Henry Greenslade Popla report 2015.



Inadequate signage

9 There is no prominent sign at the entrance to the Library other than the County Council sign giving disabled access. I am also given to understand that the sign shown by the vehicle at the time of the incident, which is by no means clear or adequate, was replaced and enlarged shortly after this incident. It is certainly nowhere near the size or clarity of the sign used in Beavis, despite the claimant’s attempts to enlarge photos and use evidence of ‘permit holder only’ ‘maps’ which would seem to be recent and not evidenced in 2014. Please see photos of disabled access sign, lack of entrance signage, new sign in 2015, Beavis sign example.

10 In a letter dated 7th Sept BWLegal state that the vehicle was observed for 10 minutes 32 seconds before issuing the PCN with no proof whatsoever of this ‘fact’, however all photos of the vehicle in situ offered by the claimant as evidence are timed between 14.54 to 15.05. As far as I can ascertain there is no signage stipulating permitted length of stay it is however my understanding that a person with a long-term debilitating condition can be disabled without a BB, and will be legally entitled to a 'reasonable adjustment'. BWLegal had been advised more than once that the passenger needing to visit the Library had long term mobility issues and because of the sheer effort involved in getting there coupled with limited availability of both time and transport, she would have been unable to access the Library by any other means.



11 I request that the Court note that this case has caused extreme distress given its content, circumstances and timing. Whether or not my mother’s disability is in fact covered by a point of law or not, I would request to go on record at being appalled that the Claimant has used court time in such a way and demanded money with menaces under the given circumstances and in such an inhumane manner.



The Court is invited to dismiss the claim and to award my costs of attendance at the hearing, such as are allowable pursuant to CPR 27.14.

I believe that the facts stated in this Witness Statement are true.


Signature of Defendant:


Name:
Date:

I truly appreciate all your help and input on this

I know it is terrible

Coupon-mad

I have found details of my mum's mobility issues and hospitalisation in a Devon Council Health Assessment from the following year and will include relevant excerpts including specific request for help to visit the Library.

Now that is useful.

Also add as evidence, the page from the 2015 POPLA Annual Report with Henry Greenslade's words about 'understanding keeper liability':

https://popla.co.uk/docs/default-source/default-document-library/popla_annualreport_2015.pdf?sfvrsn=2


And the 2014 BPA Code of Practice, version 4 section on mandatory entrance signs (paragraph 18 'Signs', and also Appendix , and also para 13 on GRACE PERIODS:

https://www.britishparking.co.uk/write/Documents/BPA_CodeofPractice_February_2014_v4..pdf

And this article:

https://www.britishparking.co.uk/News/good-car-parking-practice-includes-grace-periods

phoenixfreespirit

OMG !! :A Coupon~mad :A you are an angel and an absolute :starmod: star :starmod: I cannot thank you enough or express how much I appreciate your massive amount of help :heartsmil :heartsmil I will edit accordingly and post the final version when I get back from the 30 mile round trip to the library to print it and the rest of the evidence and then submit everything.
I will add the other evidence you suggest, I have already included Henry Greenslade and Schedule 4 of POFA (as suggested by Bargepole)

I will update and no doubt thank you again when it is done and I am more coherant!

HUGE thanks and appreciation :A

Le_Kirk

In point 8 -

and how should would

maybe should have been: -

and how she would