Ignored PCN for 3 months, should I write to them?

Le_Kirk

When you complete your DQ (nominating your preferred court - as posted by Umkomaas) you also have an opportunity to block out dates when you WON'T be available.

Umkomaas

No its not the nearest, I thought since the letter came from them that's where it would be (read something about cuts to local courts so you dont usually get somewhere close to you?)

Northampton CCBC is the distribution centre for issuing MCOL claims. It is not an actual court.

What happens if the court date allocated to me is not suitable due to deadlines/labs? I wont have this information until October time and I'm sure I would have to let them know of my availability before then?

Wait to see when you receive your DQ. The DQ asks you to provide the dates where you would be unavailable for a hearing. If it's received before October you should call the CCBC to discuss your options.

Random101

Been given my court date - 28th January.
I need to submit a witness statement by the end of this month.
VCS have also sent me a letter saying that they have a 'strong' case against me and that I can pay them a reduced fee of £125 to avoid going to court. Do I respond to this? or do I just ignore it?

VCS also have to pay the court fees by the end of this month, will I get notified when they do? As if they dont pay it the case will be struck out.

nosferatu1001

So youve had that letter for how many weeks now? So you should have your WS already written!

VCS writing with a reduction - is that by any chance the exact template seen i n naother thread? Its marked "Without Prejudice" but then later claims they will show it in court (whcih they cant, thats what WP means!)

VCS will almost certainly pay, dont hold out on them not doing so. no, you dont get told. Yes, this means WRITE YOUR WS because you need to be doing it.

Random101

nosferatu1001 wrote: »

So youve had that letter for how many weeks now? So you should have your WS already written!

VCS writing with a reduction - is that by any chance the exact template seen i n naother thread? Its marked "Without Prejudice" but then later claims they will show it in court (whcih they cant, thats what WP means!)

VCS will almost certainly pay, dont hold out on them not doing so. no, you dont get told. Yes, this means WRITE YOUR WS because you need to be doing it.

Yes seems like the same letter.
Ive been busy with uni so havent had a chance to write my WS.
Will get working on it soon.

It says I have to send it to both the court and VCS, is it sufficient to just email it to VCS?

nosferatu1001

Nope, today. Youve had ages to write it, doing it piece meal in 10min chunks would have seen it done ages ago.

No, because the CPR state you must have their pemrission. The newbiues thread is explicit on yourWS and bundle.

Coupon-mad

Search the forum for:

VCS witness statement demolished

VCS Kumari

VCS Vine Roch

Read LOTS Of results and copy from them.

Their WS is a template and will be dead easy to shoot down even if it hasn't arrived yet!

You can learn from all the other VCS cases. The best one if yours was a 'red card' followed by a premature NTK, is the thread by adambuzz14 and you can and MUST use his court transcript as evidence.

You also need to get up to speed with developments at Southampton about the false added £60 costs that PPCs slap on, and how we slapped them (not VCS) down, Read the thread by CEC16 and learn how to use the CRA 2015 in your favour.

Random101

Here is the WS they sent me: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/u8lsre7ri6lax2y/AAAd7XhM4aXHSqYkH5Mfv-xka?dl=0

I have looked at the other witness statements from VCS and as suspected its pretty much the same. Except for the other witness statement (#52) (https://www.dropbox.com/s/fh07kbkdcj5cwre/CVS%20WS-edited-edited.pdf?dl=0)
mentions the 'this is not a parking charge notice' card. The witness statement they gave me doesnt address this the same way, even though I had it in my defence.

This is one for my skeleton I think but im still confused about this.
In my NTK there was no mention of POFA, so I couldnt include in my defence that they had sent me the NTK too soon (after 8 days). However, in their witness statement it says that 'the Claimant relies on schedule 4 of the Protection of Freedoms Act'.
Does this mean that they did in fact sent me the NTK too soon?

The contract between VCS and the landowner is also dated 2015 and says that it is valid for a fixed term of 12 months - surely this is now out of date? They do however mention in the WS (#9) that there has been no notice of termination.

Lastly, I have put together a quick witness statement. I have already spent too long looking up other cases, I know this WS isnt great but at this stage now I have exams that are more important and havent had free evenings and weekends to work on it.


In the County Court at XXXXX
Claim No. XXXXXXXX
Between
Vehicle Control Services (Claimant)
and
Random101 (Defendant)

---

Witness Statement

---

1. I am Random101, of [Address], [Postcode], the Defendant in this matter. I will say as follows:

2. On 08/02/19, I visited a friend who resided in Waterloo Quay Apartments, which uses the Waterloo Warehouse Residential Car Park, and parked my vehicle registration no, XXXXX in the car park. It is important to note that I arrived in the evening and the car park didn’t have sufficient lighting for any signs to be read. Evidence of the tenancy agreement is attached as Exhibit A.

3. Upon arrival, a parking permit was issued, where the issuer asked me how long I would be staying for. I informed them that I would be leaving on the morning of the 10/02/19, upon receipt of this information, I was issued a parking permit.

5. I returned to my car, at approximately 10am on 10/02/19, to find a note on my car saying ‘This is not a parking charge’. Evidence of this is attached as Exhibit B.

6. It is my position that, under the doctrine of promissory estoppel, the Claimant has no standing, or cause of action, to litigate in this matter.

7. As I am a student, I had not received the NTK in time to make an appeal, due to my car being registered at my home address, where the letters were sent.

8. However, I had made two attempts to resolve the matter without the need for court intervention and received no response from the Claimant. Evidence of this is attached as Exhibit C.

7. I invite the Court to dismiss this claim in its entirety, and to award my costs of attendance at the hearing, such as are allowable pursuant to CPR 27.14.

Statement of Truth

I believe that the facts stated in this Witness Statement are true.

KeithP

How does your Witness Statement compare with others you have read?

Have you looked at the example Witness Statements linked from post #2 of the NEWBIES thread?

Random101

KeithP wrote: »

How does your Witness Statement compare with others you have read?

Have you looked at the example Witness Statements linked from post #2 of the NEWBIES thread?

I know its not great, im not going to fail my exams over a stupid parking ticket. But I appreciate all the help so far.
I have added some more to it and will attach the court orders where the cases were struck out due to the extra £60 being an abuse of process.



In the County Court at XXXXX
Claim No. XXXXXXXX
Between
Vehicle Control Services (Claimant)
and
Random101 (Defendant)

---

Witness Statement

---

1. I am Random101, of [Address], [Postcode], the Defendant in this matter. I will say as follows:

2. On 08/02/19, I visited a friend who resided in Waterloo Quay Apartments, which uses the Waterloo Warehouse Residential Car Park, and parked my vehicle registration no, XXXXX in the car park. It is important to note that I arrived in the evening and the car park didn’t have sufficient lighting for any signs to be read. Evidence of the tenancy agreement is attached as Exhibit A.

3. Upon arrival, a parking permit was issued, where the issuer asked me how long I would be staying for. I informed them that I would be leaving on the morning of the 10/02/19, upon receipt of this information, I was issued a parking permit.

4. I returned to my car, at approximately 10am on 10/02/19, to find a note on my car saying ‘This is not a parking charge’. Evidence of this is attached as Exhibit B.

5. It is my position that, under the doctrine of promissory estoppel, the Claimant has no standing, or cause of action, to litigate in this matter.

6. As I am a student, I had not received the NTK in time to make an appeal, due to my car being registered at my home address, where the letters were sent.

7. However, I had made two attempts to resolve the matter without the need for court intervention and received no response from the Claimant. Evidence of this is attached as Exhibit C.

8. The Defendant has the reasonable belief that the Claimant has not incurred an additional £60 in damages or costs to pursue an alleged £100 debt. The arbitrary addition of a fixed sum purporting to cover 'damages/costs' is also potentially open to challenge as an unfair commercial practice under the CPRs, where 44.3 (2) states: ''Where the amount of costs is to be assessed on the standard basis, the court will –
(a) only allow costs which are proportionate to the matters in issue. Costs which are disproportionate in amount may be disallowed or reduced even if they were reasonably or necessarily incurred; and
(b) resolve any doubt which it may have as to whether costs were reasonably and proportionately incurred or were reasonable and proportionate in amount in favour of the paying party.

8.1. Whilst quantified costs can be considered on a standard basis, this Claimant's purported added £60 'damages/costs' are wholly disproportionate, are not genuine losses at all and do not stand up to scrutiny. This has finally been recognised in many court areas. Differently from almost any other trader/consumer agreement, when it comes to parking charges on private land, binding case law and two statute laws have the effect that the parking firm's own business/operational costs cannot be added to the 'parking charge' as if they are additional losses.

The Beavis case is against this Claim
9. Parking Eye Ltd v Beavis [2015] UKSC 67 ('the Beavis case') is the authority for recovery of the parking charge itself and no more, since that sum (£85 in the Beavis case) was held to already incorporate the costs of an automated private parking business model including recovery letters. There are no losses or damages caused by this business model and the Supreme Court Judges held that a parking firm not in possession cannot plead any part of their case in damages. It is indisputable that an alleged 'parking charge' penalty is a sum which the Supreme Court found is already inflated to more than comfortably cover all costs. The case provides a finding of fact by way of precedent, that the £85 (or up to a Trade Body ceiling of £100 depending upon the parking firm) covers the costs of the letters.
The POFA 2012 and the ATA Code of Practice are against this Claim
10. The Protection of Freedoms Act 2012, Schedule 4 ('the POFA') at paras 4(5) and 4(6) 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' (further, 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 their artificially inflated claim, as pleaded, constitutes double recovery.

The Consumer Rights Act 2015 ('the CRA') is against this claim
11. Further, the purported added 'costs' are disproportionate, vague and in breach of the CRA 2015 Schedule 2 'terms that may be unfair'. This Claimant has arbitrarily added an extra 60% of the parking charge in a disingenuous double recovery attempt that has already been exposed and routinely disallowed by many Courts in England and Wales. It is atrocious that this has been allowed to continue unabated for so many years, considering the number of victims receiving this Claimant's exaggerated Letter before Claim, or the claim form, who then either pay an inflated amount or suffer a default judgment for a sum that could not otherwise be recovered. It is only those who defend, who draw individual cases to the attention of the courts one by one, but at last in 2019, some areas noticed the pattern and have moved to stop this abuse of process at source.

11.1. In the Caernarfon Court in Case number F2QZ4W28 (Vehicle Control Services Ltd v Davies) on 4th September 2019, District Judge Jones-Evans stated: ''Upon it being recorded that District 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 in 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.''

11.2. That decision in Wales was contested in a N244 application by VCS, but the added £60 was still disallowed on 30 Oct 2019. District Judge Jones-Evans stated that even in cases parking firms win, he never allows the £60 add on, and despite parking firms continuing to include it in their Particulars, most advocates have now stopped pushing for it at hearings. The Judge said that a contract formed by signage is a deemed contract, which the motorist does not have the opportunity to negotiate. That, and the fact that there is no specified sum on the signage, means that the extra £60 cannot possibly be recoverable. He said that the £60 was clearly a penalty, and an abuse of process. The considered sum in that case was reduced to £100 with a full case hearing to follow, but the £60 would not be awarded under any circumstances, and further, he ordered that the Claimant must now produce a statement of how they pleaded claims prior to Beavis, and subsequently.
12. I invite the Court to dismiss this claim in its entirety, and to award my costs of attendance at the hearing, such as are allowable pursuant to CPR 27.14.

Statement of Truth

I believe that the facts stated in this Witness Statement are true.