Help: court date 19th Jan - reived claimants witness statement and need to counter

Sammie2018

Hi


Just found this amazing website, but worried it might be yoo late to help me. I'm due in court on the 19th January and have just recieved the witness statement from Vehicle Control Solutions LTD.


I have a parking notice from a free carpark in from 10th July 2017. Minimum stay 3 hours i was there for almost 5. photos do not identify driver. Car park signs at the time were hard to spot as the carpark had always been unmanned for the previous 6 years at least.


I ignored all letters until i received a small claims court summons.


In my defence (which i did in September of 2018) i stated:
1) that i did not recieve the PCN until 10th August 2017 - it was dated a month after the parking incident took place.
2) I denied being the driver, both my husband and I are insured to drive my car but i could not remember who had been driving over a month ago. photo's dont show a driver, just reg plate.
3) I stated that the signs at the time were not clear or obvious, esp as that carpark had no restrictions for so many years.
4) i stated that the charge of £160 they were requesting was unjust and unreasonable.


So im off to a bad start after reading all the threads.


I have now received the witness statement from VCS and need to do my own.


they have submitted
1) a contract from the land owner dated 31/05/2017.
2) they have sent through photos of the signage dated Feb 2018 (7 months after i parked there).
3) they have not addressed that i deny being the driver and cannot name a driver.
4) they state that there is not legal time limit to submit the PNC
There is a lot of there other standrd waffle in there as well.


What should i put in my witness statement to counter this or is it too late at this stage to pull it back and i should just pay the £160+£25 court costs?


My defence relies on not naming a driver and the photos they have sent being irrelevant as after the date the alleged parking took place?


Thanks in Advance

Quentin

The newbies faq thread near the top of the forum has comprehensive advice on court claims right through the various stages to the hearing (including advice on preparing a WS)


See #2 in that thread

Redx

and your post above identifies the driver , so a bad start there

surely you know to write in the third party, so KEEPER, DRIVER, CLAIMANT , DEFENDANT etc ?

edit your post again

then decide if this is a KEEPER WS and write what a KEEPER would know about this (or not) and what the KEEPER has found out since

ps:- there are millions of people who could have been insured and been the driver , including me, so it could have been a friend, a mechanic from your local garage, anybody could have been the driver, legally or illegally

having named drivers on a insurance policy doesnt limit the number of drivers to two or to one, for example, my insurance policy covers ME to drive that vehicle, so dont get hung up on insurance policies


read the advice by BARGEPOLE and LOC123 in recent posts about what a WS contains, and no more mistakes