Urgent advice needed - County Court Claim.

Resourceful

I focussed heavily on the poor signage, including bad positioning and lack of lighting when I submitted my POPLA appeal but I still lost...

Resourceful

Okay...so AoS has been sent, now it's time to start working on the complaint to the land owner (hotel) and my defence. Where to start? Should I outline my story here before starting a draft so you can get an overview and perhaps advise the best approach?
Thanks all.

KeithP

Resourceful wrote: »

Where to start?

By looking at the many example Defences linked from post #2 of the NEWBIES thread.

Redx

any "story" is for the WS later in the process


your defence is the legal arguments as to why you are NOT liable for this claim and why it should be thrown out


save any "story" for later on in a few months time


read the example defences and use the forum search to find a few more recent ones, draft your own , and post it below , for critique

Resourceful

KeithP wrote: »

By looking at the many example Defences linked from post #2 of the NEWBIES thread.

Thank you Keith and RedX.

Of course I will read the example defences, I have already downloaded some and intend to use them as a basis for my own draft.
My query is,would it be helpful to outline my case here first so that others can advise me as to what is and isn't relevant to my defence in terms of law based arguments? Or am I simply making a general argument against the dodgy practice of this company? I don't have a lot of time to deal with this so need to be sure that every minute I spend on it is focused in the right direction.

Coupon-mad

Yes, tell us things like the car park Hotel location, allegation, what you did about it (appealed & said who was driving, or ignored, or what?) etc.

Did you complain to the Hotel yet?

Any chance of showing us a pic of the signs or a Google Street View link to the Hotel car park/road so we can look?

If this is about being a Hotel patron but not having a hidden iPad brought to your attention to input your VRN, then you can use and adapt a little, the very similar facts ParkingEye defence in the NEWBIES thread (easy to find among the examples).

Resourceful

Thanks Coupon-mad.

Before I layout the details of my case (which were fully explained in both my initial and POPLA appeals) is there any risk of harming my defence if I do so? That's to say if a PE lurker should read it and identify me using the case description.

waamo

They get to see it in plenty of time anyway so it doesn't hurt.

Resourceful

Right...I'm back! Unfortunately work and family commitments over the last few days have left me with no time so I need to crack on with this now as the 16/17th deadline is looming.

I'll start by outlining my 'parking incident' in case any of you spot things which could help my defence. I should point out that I have already identified myself as the driver...school boy error!

I'm a professional musician. Last summer I was performing at a big annual public event on a south coast beach. My band were headlining the evening's entertainment and had been issued with parking passes for a council owned car park which is situated at the top of a very steep hill that leads down to the beach. We all parked our cars there. (I had my partner, 1 year old daughter and a fellow musician as passengers.) The road leading to the council car park was cordoned off all night and access was strictly limited to event staff and performers' vehicles only.
After the show, we packed down our equipment and started taking it up the hill (on foot). About two thirds of the way up I spotted another band member had moved their car down from the council car park and had pulled onto an area of gravelled land to get them closer to the beach for loading. 'What a good idea!' I thought so told my then tired family to wait there whilst I moved my car down the hill to the same place. I was followed by another band member who also thought it was a good idea!
Well you guessed it, the unlit piece of scrub land turned out to be a PE controlled car park and we all duly received our NTKs in the following weeks. Between us we had loaded our cars there for between 15 and 29 minutes each. We all appealed to PE but of course 'computer said NO'. The other two guys threw the towel in at that point and paid up £60 each. I on the other hand had had a previous dealing with PE and won at initial appeal stage using a MSE template letter so thought it would be worth trying again. Little did I realise that since my success a few years back, the Beavis case had turned the tables somewhat!

So here I am after being rejected at the POPLA stage wondering if I have a leg to stand on with a County Court Claim.
Potentially relevant points (but presumably not legal arguments) are:
1) The road which leads down to the PE car park entrance (the only vehicular access) was closed to public vehicles all evening so the car park was completely empty.
2) The car park was completely unlit on site.
3) The car park is owned by an adjacent hotel ( I think it may be used as an overflow when they get busy) but has no hotel signage identifying it as such. I didn't discover they were the landowners until POPLA evidence came through from PE. Shortly after I visited the hotel and spoke to the assistant front of house manager but got fobbed off with a 'there's nothing we can do' claim.
The irony is that the hotel (chain) actually sponsor the event that I was playing at, an event that draws thousands to this seaside town and probably their hotel every year!

So there's my story. I know that Coupon-mad has stated in the Newbies thread that no claim is unique, they're all the same but I'm struggling to see how I fight this. Clearly the reason I lost my POPLA appeal was because they don't allow arguments relying on mitigating circumstances so according to PE I have broken the contract. Is it therefore just a case of me having to challenge the legitimacy/legality of the so-called contract?

Answers on a postcard please...! ;-)

Coupon-mad

The car park was completely unlit on site.

That's a potentially winning legal argument. At POPLA you could have won with that as well, as we presume P/Eye only showed POPLA daylight images but you didn't challenge that 'evidence'?

Shortly after I visited the hotel and spoke to the assistant front of house manager but got fobbed off with a 'there's nothing we can do' claim.
The irony is that the hotel (chain) actually sponsor the event that I was playing at, an event that draws thousands to this seaside town and probably their hotel every year!

Seriously you need to update that complaint, especially if you have no claim yet. The Manager should cancel it and you should point out the sponsorship and the fact they entrapped 3 band members.

If not then ask for the contact details of the Hotel national chain CEO, and say the same thing and how stung the band members feel by the unlit signs and yet the Hotel were sponsoring the event!