BW Legal - Parking fine. CCJ not received. Old address. Applying set aside.

21Moron

Hi There.

First of all want to say this forum is fantastic. Have learned a lot from reading other cases. Hopefully I can get some advice on this. To be clear, CCJ already issued - had no idea, found out two days ago parents reviewing post. am going to apply to set aside.

About me:

I’m Currently travelling Central America with no access to pc. All written on iPhone so please excuse any brevity.


Story In a nutshell:

I’ve been issued a CCJ by BW legal acting on behalf of Britainna Parking in Southampton. this happened in December 2015 whilst I was working as a car fitter in a car park for Halfords Southampton.

All correspondence was sent to an old uni address. BW legal started sending letters in 2018 they told me. The reason I had not updated DVLA after leaving uni straight away, was because soon after I left uni I was living in France, (December 2017) and also had my car SORN same time (December 2017)

I returned from France in May 2018, and set about getting a job and repairing my car.

I DID update my bank, credit cards etc to new UK address when returning to UK. Only reason not DVLA was because simply wasn’t driving.

As soon as I was driving again in UK, (car was 30 years old and French, needed time to fix) I updated DVLA to correct address (October 27 2018) this court date went ahead on February 1st 2019 and I had no letters from anyone until July 11th 2019 at my current address.

My parents received this and were shocked to see the words CCJ, warrant and Bailiff all on one letter. I was also in dismay as I worked in finance and could not be more aware of the damaged a CCJ can cause.

Needless to say I found a way to call the immediately, at first I thought this was a scam because I check my credit report regularly and nothing on there - Feb to July, 5 months you’d think it would appear?

Anyway they gave me reference number and Northampton court so I believed them as I thought the risk of them lying about legal documents would be too great, must be legit.

Of course I had to pay them straight away, I could not have bailiffs going to my parents house full stop.

To be clear I don’t want to refute the debt or the amount, I want to prove I was not aware of impending court date, could not pay in time.

I have hired a solicitor as I’m usually out of the UK and want to be represented.

So my questions are:1

1) My solicitor has advised me he is going to apply for copy of CCJ from court before sending in N244, is this normal, because I’ve read in everyone’s comments about being ‘prompt’ as possible.

2) Do you think I have any ground, I feel I have fair reason to have not been thinking about updating DVLA. whilst not living in the UK and not driving.

3) is there anything that absolutely SHOULD be included in a defence here, the Sir Oliver Weald quote seems like one of these.

4) if I CAN make the court date which will be by chance if I’m the UK or not, should I attend ? And will it look bad if I can’t make it as abroad?

5) should I be requesting anything from Britainna proof wise or BW legal i.e letters sent to which address and when

6) I want to find out who did the searching for my address, and which way they went about it. Because only using DVLA once a year or so seems inept.

I’m very new to all of this so please bear with me.

Any comments much appreciated.

21Moron

I should say the amount asked for after CCJ from BW legal was £250. I paid in full

Umkomaas

From what you say above, this doesn't sound like a judgment in default CCJ, more a debt collection letter from BWL with all the usual guff about CCJs, bailiffs, selling your children and skinning your cat. You having paid them off will, if my analysis above is correct, be the end of the matter. The prospect of getting your money back is zero; you've been panicked and succumbed to their pressure tactics - a perfect scam.

If you actually have had a full-blown CCJ, your credit rating would have fallen through the floor and it would be plain to see when you checked it online. The records are updated within a month of judgment.

If it is a real CCJ, your solicitor should be on the case and know how to deal with it, but having paid off the judgment could well be viewed as an admission of culpability and your acceptance that the court judgment is correct. Your credit rating, however, will remain blighted for 6 years, satisfying a default judgment after the due date (1 month after judgment) does you no favours in the context of credit.

I suspect there's more to become aware of as your solicitor gets to work.

21Moron

Okay from your reply I’ve done some searching. Turns out the monthly report I use hides CCJ’s in the 10th tab along -_-

So it is legit, date and reference matches.

The only reason I have any Hope here is I’ve done tonnes of reading of other cases on here where people have paid immediately (admitting they have a debt) but are contesting that had they known earlier I.e letters sent right place it wouldn’t have gone to court.

I also have another parking fine from Feb this year, it got sent to the right address and I paid it straight away. I aim to use this in my defence.

Do you think waiting for a copy of CCJ is normal procedure ?

Thanks

Umkomaas

Do you think waiting for a copy of CCJ is normal procedure ?

Sorry, I'm not a lawyer, but we do know that the courts seem to want set aside applications to be made as soon as the CCJ is discovered. I'd expect your solicitor will know the ropes - but it might pay you to ask the question of him/her.

However, I'm not sure what you are really trying to achieve now that you've paid the judgment. Is it a refund of your money or an attempt at credit rating repair, or the dismissal of the parking charge? I think I'd be talking through your objective(s) with your solicitor, because this is going to cost you a pretty penny, I would suggest - £250 already paid, £255 set aside fee (unless you qualify for concessions - check it out) plus your solicitor costs, which won't be cheap.

Be clear about what you wish to achieve, and weigh against the potential costs to do so.

KeithP

Also keep in mind that the courts seem to take a dim view of people simply trying to clean their credit record.

21Moron

Hi guys.

I’ll be asking on Monday re why wait for copy.

To be clear my only objective is getting this off credit history, I don’t think it’s fair I should be stuck with poor credit, loans or mortgages for 6 years when I had no real chance to pay it first.


I’m hoping with my situation of living out of country and also car being SORN will be enough to explain about DVLA address change.

Keith -
I see your point and agree, I’ve read a few cases here where they look down upon credit repair, but maybe this is when people knew about court and didn’t act, or did not have fair reason for not updating address.

I will keep thread updated with what’s going on with defence, another thing that might help me is the unprofessionalism within BW Legal, and that I’ve asked for the phone transcripts to use to show how they behaved.

Thanks again guys

ToxicWomble

Pretty sure it’s a requirement to update the address for your driving licence as well, the car being SORN may therefore be a moot point

KeithP

ToxicWomble wrote: »

Pretty sure it’s a requirement to update the address for your driving licence as well, the car being SORN may therefore be a moot point

But the parking company has no right to seek driving licence details from the DVLA.

Or are you making a point which has flown far above my head?

KeithP

21Moron wrote: »

...car being SORN will be enough to explain about DVLA address change.

A SORN'd vehicle still has a Registered Keeper and there is still an obligation to keep the DVLA updated with the RK's details.

ToxicWomble

I was making the point that if he was purely relying on the change of address issue due to being SORN as a defence it wouldn’t be a valid defence.