VCS Claim received, defence help please

rob800

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rob800

Bumping this up so people can read about a victory :-)

Coupon-mad

rob800 wrote: »

So I went to court on Friday and won. VCS made so many mistakes it was a joke. In their WS they called it a pay and display car park several times, which it isn't. They also said it had 21 spaces when even their own contract from the landowner confirmed it was 100 spaces.


On the day they sent someone to rep for them who was only instructed 90 minutes before the hearing and only just got there in time, he had none of the documents and they were too big to email him, some karma in there somewhere. He tried to have a 'little chat' before the hearing and tried to get me to cut a deal and pay part of it - no chance.


The judge spent an hour reading all the documents before calling us in. She amusingly asked if I was a solicitor or just done a lot of research. It didn't proceed how I expected, she narrowed the list of issues down to only a few, rather than hearing points from both sides. She didn't want to consider the POFA issue, even though that was one of my main points, also pre action protocol and the lack of independents appeals process were considered not relevant.


In the end I won because of a signage issue on site, which they failed to explain or address in their evidence. Also the photos of the number plate were partly obscured so didn't prove it was my vehicle. She also was not impressed with the errors in their evidence or lack of evidence from the attendant either.


A very time consuming and stressful thing to do but won in the end, even if I only get the £95 for having a day off work. It has at least given them a black eye and cost them a few quid.


Thank you to Coupon Mad and everyone else that has helped on here.

Yay - well done you!

Another one bites the dust! :T

Snakes_Belly

Well done. You must have put the work in. Love the fact that the rep tried to cut a deal. That smacks of desperation.

Yes, I had a strong argument that they had not complied with their windscreen notice that they claim isn't a CN but then claim later it is the CN in question. They clearly didn't comply with paragraph 7 and 8 in that instance.

With regard to the above, is this referring to the 'Not a Parking Charge Notice' the yellow ticket that they put on the windscreen?

Problem is with these cases you never quite know where the judge will come from so need to cover a number of bases.

Good to see people winning against VCS and Excel.

[Deleted User]

Great result, well done! Proper preparation prevents p*** poor performance. With instructions like that provided to their advocate, you were always going to know the case better - and the judge clearly thought so too. Enjoy a celebratory drink!

Sounds like an old statement (precedent) was rehashed by the PPC but without stopping to tailor it for your case. Woeful.

Yours is the second court case report in the past few days where the Judge decided not to consider PoFA. All a bit worrying that our judiciary feel able to disregard a law of the land.

I disagree with Umkomass on this, only because if there's a chance there's no contract at all it makes sense for the judge to cut to the chase and focus on that. It doesn't mean the law has been outright ignored. If you'd lost on that point, you'd need to have confidence to then raise the PoFA point again, but that's the point it is key - restricting the PPC to the £100 in the PCN.

rob800

Yes my argument on POFA was that the yellow notice they put on the screen has to be considered a CN, it notifies the driver of the charge and asks them to log into the parkingcharge website and pay. It was also referred to in their POC as the CN in question for the case, so they admit it is a CN, even when it says it is not. Therefore they have to comply with paragraphs 7 and 8 and not 9, which of course they didn't. It wasn't required in the end but I would have asked to go back to it if it was.