Received Court Claim form from Gladstones

caraspider

Dear Forum advisors,


I received a court claim form on 8 nov for offence occurred in jun 2017 the private parking company issued 3 offences within 4 consecutive days as it claimed I parked in a private parking during those days.


The Court Claim form only has my name and current address and the incident dates but no registration no mentioned. I thought it was a scam in the beginning as not received any notice or letter prior the court claim form.
The alleged claim was for 3 x £100 PCN and legal and interest and court fee total £659.32.
as the form has a moneyclaim.gov.uk in there so it is a legal paper so I responded a counterclaimed immediately stating this was the first I have heard of the incidents and on top of that my car registration no wasn't mentioned in the court form, I did think this was not my car.


As soon as I paid the court counterclaim process payment, the claimant solicitor Gladstone replied with a Directions of Questionnaire stating small claim track and no mediation or court required.


I am due to send back the Directions Questionnaire by 3 Dec 2018, yes very last min as I was struggling and asked people I know they all said too late and just paid. I do not think it's fair and not even given any evidence of my fault and pay for an outrageous amount of £659.32.


My situation was I moved from London without updating DVLA my address as road tax is direct debit and I have never got any PCN stuck to my windscreen so not aware of any fault at all.


The place I parked was at the back of a Chinese restaurant where I went with a friend who took me there and she knows the restaurant people and we went in from the back. The restaurant people told us we could park for a little while so we thought it's for staff and guest parking without thinking of the car park management sign. As my car is red and parked on the side of the Chinese restaurant it is easily identified.


I have not been back to the restaurant for over a year as I work full time in London. Since I got the court form I telephoned my friend who took me to the restaurant to see if she got PCN as well. She said no but when she went there this year February, her restaurant friend told her that she cannot park there any more. Obviously the landowner has informed the restaurant not to let their customer park in their land. However my incident took place in 2017 and they stopped letting customers park in 2018


As my car was parked on the back of the restaurant side I was made to believe the restaurant people were allocated with that side of parking spaces for their staff and customers. We were told we could park for a little while by the restaurant staff, we would not challenge their words and asked them to provide proof we could park there.


I have tried to contact Gladstones but no reply only payment phone line and email no response.
I called and talked to UKCPM and the girl who is customer service adviser would not put me through to anyone senior than herself. I then emailed to ask for evidence of claim as I haven't received anything prior to that.


The girl from Glastone said you did not update your address with DVLA is a £1000 fine. I meant to update many times but I moved home 3 times in the last 5 years and the V5C was misplaced somewhere and never got to change. Also all tax direct debit I never thought this was an issued. In fact I got speeding ticket and the police had to write to me to change my driver licence to current address so they could prosecute me.


I have just found your site so I am not sure how I should put all information in the Directions of Questionnaire as I do not want to go to court as I work full time and difficult to get time off.
I would like mediation but form said if both parties agreed on mediation. I am the only party want a mediation. Not sure how to proceed and all these called Court claim form has caused me immensely stressed.


Appreciate if you could advice how to deal with it. I did go to citizen advice bureau but was told they they are not legally trained so can't give advice and referred me to local solicitors. I do not want to go through solicitors to further complicate the case. How should I proceed?

Desperately need help!

Thank you Cara

Redx

is the DQ you are filling in from GLADRAGS or from the CCBC in Northampton ?

also, please post below IN FULL the DEFENCE that you posted to the CCBC in Northampton or on the MCOL site

are you sure that you made a counter claim ? if so you must have paid a £25 fee in order to issue the counter claim, if so , post IN full what the counter claim said below (personally I do not believe you posted any counter claim at all)

read post #2 of the NEWBIES FAQ sticky thread

you will find a walkthrough on how to fill in the DQ from the CCBC ( not the DQ from GLADRAGS)

caraspider

Dear Redx


Thank you for the reply. The form was from Northampton as there was no car registration no on it I thought it was a scam as I never got any PCN nor letter before. Until I saw the moneyclaim.gov.uk which is a legitimate gov web so I had to reply and there were only pay full or pay half or counterclaim, I picked counterclaim and in order to submit I had to pay £60 into the system just to respond the paper.


As I had never got any legal or court paper before and before I found this web, I was very worried so in order to find out what's all about I had no choice but to counterclaim and pay the £60.


I called UKCPM this morning to ask them to reply my email and provide me with the claim information and they agreed to send to me today. I have also called the Luton court where the sent me the paper of Directions of Questionnaires and indicated my case has been passed to Luton County Court which is closer to my home.


Now I still don't know what to do with no paper or information, I could only guess what had happened.


Appreciate your help. Cara

Redx

when you logged in on the MCOL site , you had the options of doing the AOS and either filling in the defence box, or leaving the defence box blank and submitting your defence up to 28 days later

we want to see what your defence was that you submitted in that box, alternatively you may have left it blank and not submitted one to Northampton within the required 28 days , but I suspect that you have filled in the defence box and we need to see what you wrote, so try and get a copy from MCOL

any counter claim you made was to make a claim against the claimant, hence why you paid the money, so we need to see exactly what was in your counter claim (which I dont believe you needed to do and your £60 was probably wasted)

GLADRAGS willl have sent you a DQ, which you dont fill in

the CCBC in Northampton should have sent you a DQ in order to ascertain your intentions and which local court you require, so my question is, have they done this yet ? (from Northampton, not from GLADRAGS)

I assume that at this stage you have not had a local court allocated, but that you are at the DQ stage ?

read the timeline post made 2 years ago by member BARGEPOLE, it tells you what is done and when, its linked in post #2 of the NEWBIES FAQ sticky thread

I appreciate that you are in way above your head, but your rush to login online and do the wrong things has not helped you at all


you have said your local court in LUTON has been allocated, so you are awaiting their paperwork, hence why I wondered what this DQ form you talked about is for ? if its the GLADRAGS one, then you normally object, as detailed in the post by BARGEPOLE

caraspider

Hi,


the online option doesn't give me anything as I said either pay all or pay half or counterclaim.
as they are claiming £650.32 I have to file for a counterclaim option not that I wanted any money from them but to know and refuse to pay.


The online form once accepted the Northampton court immediately sent the notice of transfer of proceedings to Luton and it's allocated to Luton.


I did not fill in anything in the defence as I have no information to defend. I did email to Northampton to ask why I paid for the £60 but they said your case has been passed to Luton so we have nothing to respond to you.


I will search and have a look at the newbie FAQW post #2.


I apologise for the late request as I have never come across this before and I only moved up to this area 2 years ago and the parking were happened just a few months I moved to this town. I wasn't working then now I'm working full time in London and it's very distressed trying to deal with all these on my own.


Thank you. cara

The_Deep

Of course it is a scam, that is why Parliament wants to close these companies down, but until they do so you have to waste time playing their little games.

From now on follow the advice on this site, everything you need to know is here.

caraspider

Thank you I wish I found this site earlier as everyone I talked to including someone who is a police all told me too late, just pay the fine and spare the stress. But £650.32 is outrageous and I can't give in to these robbers!

Redx

if you failed to file a defence then that may prove fatal to you, but any counter claim you made must be heard

yoiu really need expert advice on this and very , VERY few people here can help you, especially as you cannot provide us with the exact writing on the defence or counter claim that you made, I suggest you obtain those ASAP

send UKCPM a SAR using the GDPR law and get copies of everything so far, docs , pics , signage , contracts, anything and everything

they are correct about the DVLA and the £1000 fines for the V5C and DRIVING LICENCE omissions, so ensure that BOTH are up to date with your current address and dont let them lapse again, if you move, you get them BOTH changed ASAP, its that simple (so you seem to be lucky and not 2 grand down for those errors)

I am afraid that your position is too complicated for most people on here, perhaps three or four people on here could help, half a dozen at most, but their time would be taken up so they may not wish to

in future, come here if this ever happens again , right at the start when the pcn,s arrive, dont try and do this on your own

caraspider

Oh no. Any good to talk to the shop, as the Chinese restaurant doesn't own the place, that only leaves the optical shop downstairs.


I have not written any defence in the counterclaim as I had not got any information or documents of proof yet so I couldn't fight back.


I have found my V5C recently after I got the Court claim form and sent off to update address already.
Hopefully all updated by now. With online technology, I should be able to update online or DVLA updated my record when I sent off my driver's licence to change to a picture licence.


Could anyone tell me what's the worst case if I lost in this case, how much more that whatever they claimed for?

Thank you. Cara

Redx

I do not believe that talking to the shop will help you, at best it will give you a WS (Witness Statement) for your local court

as I said, its such a mess that I cannot tell you what will happen but I suspect that the amount claimed will be the maximum they can claim and receive , OR LESS , a judge would have to deal with their claim, and your counter claim , like you see on Rinder , it may well be that both win, both lose, or one wins and one loses , those are the only 3 outcomes I believe


without seeing their POC and their breakdown of charges, its hard to say


=without seeing your defence (if any0 its hard to say


without seeing your counter claim , its hard to say


you are expecting answers when we are in the dark

Coupon-mad

the online option doesn't give me anything as I said either pay all or pay half or counterclaim.

No, it doesn't.

You only had to choose 'defend in full'...and submit a defence (no money).