Northampton CCJ Claim Form

benjamin1969

Hi.

Hope you’re all well.

Firstly I have searched everywhere for a new thread button which I can’t find so please, my apologise for writing this on here on somebody else’s thread.

My sister is the registered keeper for her vehicle and has just showed me two claim forms from Northampton county court by the claimant National Car Parks Ltd represented by BW Legal.

Both Claim forms are for the same private car park on two different days in September last year.

During time these two tickets were issued it was me driving her car and only today did we receive the claim forms from the County Court Business Centre.

The problem is she hasn’t received any letters previously regarding this matter otherwise she would have slumped me with them and told me to pay which I would have done as its only fair I was using her car.

Now that this has gone further without any previous letters to pay the reduced fine within the 28 days which is what I believe it to be I called up national car parks ltd and told them my issue (they never got any details from me, they didn’t even ask) the lady just told me if I haven’t got any letters previously which has a reference number on it she can’t even bring anything up on her computer as it has already gone to the County Court Business Centre.

My sister doesn’t have any letters from them and I just want to pay them both at the reduced cost (not sure how much that will be but guessing anywhere between £40-£70).

Where do I stand and who do I contact or how do I go about it to do this.

Surely these guys should have at least sent me some fines in to pay or the only thing I can think of is that the letters went upstairs (she lives in the basement flat and letters have by mistake and letters have been posted upstairs (4 different flats upstairs post goes to a communal shelf) but she has looked and asked the neighbours if they found any post of hers which they told her no!

Please help/advise me who to contact so this doesn’t have to escalate and I can only pay a reduced fine.

its too much stress for me to take this to court, in fact she won’t go to court and doesn’t want anything to do with it!

Thanks for any info/advice...

KeithP

Hi and welcome.

What is the Issue Date on each of the Claim Forms?

Your sister simply cannot ignor this as she is the Defendant.

Well I suppose she can but that would be stupid.

Umkomaas

Your sister must deal with this, the liability can no longer be passed to the driver. By way of some background for her:

BRITANNIA or NCP / BW LEGAL CASES

As you will see from the first few pages of the forum, there is an onslaught by BWL on behalf of Britannia or NCP (and a few other hitherto court-shy PPCs) which is being conducted on an industrial scale - roboclaims.

You are caught in a one-way traffic flow where you must fight or pay - there is no longer a safe 'do nothing' option.

1. Pay now, it costs you exactly what they are currently demanding.
2. Ignore it, a 'judgment in default' will inevitably follow for at least what they want - maybe with even more costs added; continue to ignore that, you're getting a CCJ with credit crushing consequences for 6 years.
3. Defend, yet lose in court, the cost award is likely to be noticeably less than their current demand ~£175.
4. Defend, and win in court, you owe them nothing and you could claim up to £95 for half a day's pay/loss of annual leave, plus travel costs @45p per mile, plus your parking cost for the day.

Your least costly option has to be 3, with hopefully a win as per 4.

But BWL/Britannia or NCP cannot physically take everyone to court, and there is evidence to show that with a well constructed defence, BWL can come along with a reduced 'offer to settle', which if refused, becomes a discontinuation. We can't give you guarantees on that, but as you have little choice other than to defend (if you don't want to pay), you need to give this your very best shot.

Whether you have a good defendable case to argue, you will need to read other similar cases at the defence (or beyond) stage and learn from those.

ROBOCLAIMS - HOW BWL OPERATE

You might find it useful to understand how BWL operate - as I have surmised from the hundreds of different threads I've read involving BWL.

Other than the auto acknowledgements and template letters, you will get nothing sensible from BWL - they are dealing with literally hundreds of thousands of unpaid parking charges and are spewing out various threatening letters, using a conveyor belt approach to go through a computer controlled process towards a LBC, and a MCOL Claim - and it is really only at the final stages, as a court hearing becomes a possibility, that there's any real human intervention.

You need to understand that you're not dealing with an old fashioned firm of solicitors, just progressing from a quill and ink operation, BWL are industrial harvesters of debt, using the equivalent of massive combine harvesters to do their work. This is what their website tells you:

A multi-award winning law firm specialising in volume collections, across both regulated and unregulated sectors, who are dual regulated through the FCA and SRA.

We employ around 265 people at our Leeds based office which in turn makes us the largest privately owned debt collection law firm in the UK.

D_P_Dance

On 18th March 2019 a Bill was enacted to curb the excesses of these private parking companies. Codes of Practice are being drawn up, an independent appeals service will be set up, and access to the DVLA's date base more rigorously policed, and persistent offenders denied access. Hopefully life will become impossible for the worst of these scammers.

Until this is done you should still complain to your MP, citing the new legislation.

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2019/8/contents/enacted

Just as the clampers were finally closed down, so hopefully will many of these Private Parking Companies.