UK Car Park Management Court Claim!!

The_Deep

I am probably an older gentleman than you goodself Sir, but, perhaps, less pf a gentleman.

The links in posts 3 and 13 are pertinent.

The_Deep

Coupon-mad wrote: »

Regulars have no time to find links galore and it stops newbies using the forum well!

I have the time, but the ability is lacking.

Le_Kirk

The_Deep wrote: »

I am probably an older gentleman than you goodself Sir, but, perhaps, less pf a gentleman.

The links in posts 3 and 13 are pertinent.

Hmm, now I am confused, there are no links in posts 2 or 13! Have I missed something?

Kazaa

Ok guys, i have received my court date which is the 15th of November, so coming soon.
I have received a witness statement from Gladstones, which seems like it is literally replying to my defence. Please see attached pictures.

Please advice next steps, i am working on my witness statement which i will post in next few days, this will mainly focus on the terrible sign and no marking on the roads.
Please let me know if i need to reply specifically to any points mentioned in the pictures?

https://ibb.co/album/fsci6F

Coupon-mad

I have received a witness statement from Gladstones, which seems like it is literally replying to my defence.

No, it isn't - it is generic. Like all the others on every Gladstones thread, just with a few words tweaked to relate to an access road. This is exactly what we hope you were expecting to see and that you've already read half of it before, on other Gs threads.

You'll have read about how to rebut Vine (if not, search the forum for Roch Vine).

They can't spell manoeuvring and the grammar is terrible in places, but that's by the by.

There is nothing wrong with an 'internet defence'. Don't worry. 99% of posters win.

Can you please find the VCS v Ward attachment that they talk about, and separately host that in Dropbox and post the shared link to it here? We were wanting to read that case again and I assume it's in their evidence bundle?

Kazaa

In the evidence bundle there was no VCS vs Ward attachment. I have done some reading up and seems they mention this case as its to do with a broken down vehicle.

My car did have heating issues and was stopped for less than 10 mins so the grace period wasnt followed?

I am currently drafting a witness statement and will post it up shortly. Thanks for the help here

Coupon-mad

My car did have heating issues and was stopped for less than 10 mins so the grace period wasnt followed?

No need for a question mark, and VCS v Ward was a truly awful 'decision' by a Judge led up the garden path by a VCS rep when Mr Ward did not attend, and the outcome was an embarrassment to the courts, IMHO. And if UKCPM have not filed & served a copy of it, then they CANNOT use it so no letting them foist it on you outside the court room; drop it on the floor and refuse.

We will assist more when we see your draft WS and evidence you intend to use (photos, case law, etc.).

Also this is the time to file & serve a costs schedule of 3 figures, so post a draft of that too (see NEWBIES thread for examples).

Kazaa

WITNESS STATEMENT

I, xxxxx of xxx will say as follows:
I am the Defendant and registered keeper of the vehicle in this case. I am unrepresented with no legal background or training and have had no previous experience of county court procedures. If I do not set out documents in the correct way, I trust the Court will excuse my inexperience.

Attached to this statement is a paginated bundle of evidentiary documents marked Exhibit AC1 to AC7 to which I will refer.

1. I deny that the Claimant is entitled to relief in the sum claimed, or at all.
2. The Claimant asserts that my vehicle parked in a restricted/prohibited area.
3. Before I describe what happened on the day when my vehicle was stopped due to overheating issues in the Godfrey Mews, I confirm that the essence of my defence to this claim is that:
a) I have not breached any terms and conditions of parking.
b) My vehicle was not parked in any reasonably visible restricted/prohibited areas.
c) There were no parking signs on the entrance of the road
d) The grace period of 10 minutes was not followed



BACKGROUND

4. On the 10th May 2016 I had entered a side road as my car had overheated, I stopped my car and went to a shop to buy some water to cool the car. (Exhibit AC1) shows the route I took into the road, there are no parking signs to the entrance of this road which can be seen in (Exhibit AC2).

5. I came back to my car in less than 10 minutes, this can be seen in the Claimants’ photographs which shows the penalty was given in 7 minutes. I was shocked to see a PCN and ultimately this was issued on a poorly signed private road where I had pulled over due to heating issues and not parked.

UNCLEAR SIGNAGE
6. I was completely unaware that the site was 'private land' or being enforced by any restrictive terms, due to insufficient signage. I refer to the IPC Code of Practice (CoP) Part E, highlighting that adequate and clear entrance signs are required.

7. The parking sign in the evidence attached to the Claimants bundle is not applicable to this road because this sign is on the entrance to a church as seen in (Exhibit AC3 and AC4) which cannot be seen if you enter Godfrey Mews.
8. If this was a truly no parking zone I would expect to sign double yellow signs or hatched lines to communicate ‘no stopping’ on the road and as seen in Claimants’ photographs there are no signs or road markings.
9. Even if the court is minded to accept that a sign was visible, the wording on the sign is prohibitive. The Claimant’s sign is in small print, the terms are illegible. Thus, no contract was formed with me to pay any sum at all, since the sign has no legible ‘charge’ which could be visible on arrival. From the pictorial evidence in the Claimants’ photographs, you can see that the font type is incredibly small and would not be legible from the driver’s seat and is therefore prohibitive
10. Upon a recent visit to the site, it appears now there is double yellow lines on the road as well as cones which prevent parking, this can be seen in (Exhibit AC5)
Claimants witness statement and addressing individual points.

11. Paragraph 12 – It is denied the Claimant would off mitigated this charge as it when appealed it was simply ignored and if evidence would have been required this would have been provided.
12. Paragraph 14 – Need some help here to what I can say
13. Paragraph 15 – It is denied as there are No signs on the entrance to this road, which is clearly seen in (Exhibit AC1). Even if there are 15 signs this is irrelevant as the entrance I entered from did not have one.
14. Paragraph 15 of the Claimants Witness Statement, the Claimant refers to ‘Vine v Waltham Forest’. The Court of Appeal on this case ruled in favour of the Defendant on the basis that a person cannot be presumed bound by terms and conditions on signage that they haven’t seen. It would appear that the Claimant is attempting to wrongfully persuade the court by mis-quoting Roch L.J. The full quote is this;

“Alternatively, and this is the ground principally urged upon us by Mr. Mott, the question whether a person voluntarily assumes a risk or consents to trespass to his or her property is to be judge objectively and not subjectively. Once it is established that sufficient and adequate warning notices were in place, a car driver cannot be heard to say that he or she did not see the notice. Were that to be the law, it would be too easy for car drivers who trespass with their cars to evade the only method landowners have of stopping the unauthorised parking of cars in parking spaces or parking areas on their property.”

15. As you can see, Lord Justice Roch was simply reading one side of the argument. Roch L.J. found in favour of the motorist in this case. Therefore, this case can be immediately dismissed as it has no bearing on this case in question.
16. Paragraph 23 – It is denied that the signs are clear, if this was the case then it would clearly be seen on the entrance to the site and not use a sign which is the entrance to a church car park, please refer to paragraph 6.
17. Paragraph 28 – The Claimants’ signs are in small print, the terms are illegible. Thus, no contract was formed with me to pay any sum at all, since the signs have no legible ‘charge’ which could be visible on arrival. From the pictorial evidence in the Claimants’ photographs, you can see that the font type is incredibly small and would not be legible from the driver’s seat and is therefore prohibitive.
18. Paragraph 32 – It is denied a grace period was offered as seen in Claimants Notice, the PCN was issued within 7 minutes.
19. Paragraph 33 – It is denied I was parked, I was simply stopped for less than 10 minutes and the parking operative had only observed me for 7 minutes before issuing the charge.
20. Paragraph 39 through 43 – As previously stated in paragraph 14 no contract was ever established and therefore no terms were breached.

Costs on the claim – disproportionate and disingenuous

21. Paragraph 28 – In addition to the ‘parking charge’, the Claimant has artificially inflated the value is inflated of the claim by adding costs of £60 which has not actually been incurred by the Claimant, and which are artificially invented figures in an attempt to circumvent the Small Claims costs rules using double recovery.
22. Any purported 'legal costs' are also made up out of thin air. Given the fact that robo-claim solicitors and parking firms process tens of thousands of claims handled by an admin team or paralegals, the Defendant avers that no solicitor is likely to have supervised this current batch of cut & paste claims. The court is invited to note that no named Solicitor has signed the Particulars, in breach of Practice Direction 22, and rendering the statement of truth a nullity.

23. According to Ladak v DRC Locums UKEAT/0488/13/LA a Claimant can only recover the direct and provable costs of the time spent preparing the claim in a legal capacity, not any administration costs allegedly incurred by already remunerated administrative staff.

24. The Protection of Freedoms Act 2012, Schedule 4 (POFA) makes it clear that the will of Parliament regarding parking on private land is that the only sum potentially able to be recovered is the sum in any compliant 'Notice to Keeper' (and the ceiling for a 'parking charge', as set by the Trade Bodies and the DVLA, is £100). This also depends upon the Claimant fully complying with the statute, including 'adequate notice' of the parking charge and prescribed documents served in time/with mandatory wording. It is submitted the claimant has failed on all counts and the Claimant is well aware that their artificially inflated claim, as pleaded, constitutes double recovery.

25. Judges have disallowed all added parking firm 'costs' in County courts up and down the Country. In Claim number F0DP201T on 10th June 2019, District Judge Taylor sitting at the County Court at Southampton, echoed earlier General Judgment or Orders of DJ Grand, who (when sitting at the Newport (IOW) County Court in 2018 and 2019) has struck out several parking firms claims. These include a BPA member serial Claimant (Britannia, using BW Legal's robo-claim model) and an IPC member serial Claimant (UKCPM, using Gladstones' robo-claim model) yet the Orders have been identical in striking out both claims without a hearing, with the Judge stating: ''It is ordered that the claim is struck out as an abuse of process (Exhibit AC6). The claim contains a substantial charge additional to the parking charge which it is alleged the Defendant contracted to pay. This additional charge is not recoverable under the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012, Schedule 4 nor with reference to the judgment in ParkingEye v Beavis. It is an abuse of process from the Claimant to issue a knowingly inflated claim for an additional sum which it is not entitled to recover. This order has been made by the court of its own initiative without a hearing pursuant to CPR Rule 3.3(4) of the Civil Procedure Rules 1998...''

26. That is not an isolated judgment striking a parking claim out for repeatedly adding sums they are not entitled to recover. In the Caernarfon Court in Case number FTQZ4W28 (Vehicle Control Services Ltd v Davies Exhibit AC7) on 4th September 2019, District Judge Jones-Evans stated:

''Upon it being recorded that Distract Judge Jones-Evans has over a very significant period of time warned advocates [...] in many cases of this nature before this court that their claim for £60 is unenforceable in law and is an abuse of process and is nothing more than a poor attempt to go behind the decision of the Supreme Court v Beavis which inter alia decided that a figure of £160 as a global sum claimed in this case would be a penalty and not a genuine pre-estimate of loss and therefore unenforceable in law and if the practice continued he would treat all cases as a claim for £160 and therefore a penalty and unenforceable in law it is hereby declared [...] the claim is struck out and declared to be wholly without merit and an abuse of process.''

27. In summary, the Claimant's particulars disclose no legal basis for the sum claimed and it is the Defendant's position that the poorly pleaded claim discloses no cause of action and no liability in law for any sum at all. The Claimant's vexatious conduct from the outset has been intimidating, misleading and indeed untrue in terms of the added costs alleged and the statements made, in trying to justify the unjustifiable.

28. There are several options available within the Courts' case management powers to prevent vexatious litigants pursuing a wide range of individuals for matters which are near-identical, with meritless claims and artificially inflated costs. The Defendant is of the view that private parking firms operate as vexatious litigants and that relief from sanctions should be refused.

The Court is invited to dismiss the claim and to award my costs of dealing with this claim and 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: XXXXXXX
Date: XX/XX/XXXX

https://ibb.co/album/mmg2iv

Coupon-mad

It is denied the Claimant would off

I'm sorry?

Kazaa

Yes this will be corrected to "It is denied the Claimant would have"