County Court - Britannia Parking

Parking_Appeal19

Hi,


My ongoing case against Britannia Parking has been documented on Pepipoo. I cannot post with links as a new user so need to add http://



forums.pepipoo.com/index.php?showtopic=117508&st=20&start=20




High level case summary:

- The case relates to an overstay of circa 29 minutes on a 2 hour free car park.
- Britannia Parking issued two PCN's for the same event, albeit the time on each were different by one second (please see first post on thread for details).
- Appealed to Britannia parking who issued POPLA codes for both invoices.
- I submitted my appeal to POPLA for both tickets and Britannia withdrew one as a 'gesture of goodwill' (very nice of them)!
- POPLA rejected my appeal on the second PCN.
- Britannia have pursued me for the second, with the usual debt collection letters etc and now a County Court Claim form.
- I have submitted an extensive SAR to Britannia parking, they have failed to respond to all the points where I requested PII (I am pursuing separately with ICO).
- The information that they did respond with in relation to the SAR shows that they applied to DVLA on two separate occasions for my personal information. This is clearly in breach of GDPR and BPA Guidelines as they should check any ANPR hit for errors before pursuing. Had they checked then they would have realised it was two PCN's for the same event and immediately cancelled one. Instead they have requested my details twice, clearly excessive and in breach of GDPR.



I have written a first draft of my defence. Please can the experts on this forum review and comment.

All assistance is much appreciated. I have uploaded relevant documents and photographs to Google Drive (the folder contains photos I took recently) and the other photos (on the main page) are the ones that Britannia Parking provided as their evidence.



IN THE COUNTY COURT

CLAIM No: xxxxxxxxxx

BETWEEN:

BRITANNIA PARKING GROUP LIMITED T/A BRITANNIA PARKING (Claimant)

-and-

xxxxxxxxxxxx (Defendant)

________________________________________
DEFENCE
________________________________________

1. The Defendant denies that the Claimant is entitled the sum claimed, either all or in part.

2. The Defendant is the registered keeper. The Claim relates to an alleged debt from an unsettled PCN issued on the 2nd December 2017 at Southampton - Portswood Centre Southampton. Any breach is denied, and it is further denied that there was any agreement to pay the Claimant a £100 'parking charge'.

Unclear Particulars of Claim

3. The Particulars of Claim state that the Claimant is seeking the sum of £111.60 from the Defendant in respect of a Parking Charge Notice (PCN) issued on the 2nd December 2017 at Southampton – Portswood Centre Southampton at 14:33:51. The PCN relates to the vehicle XXXXXXX and the Defendant has failed to settle their outstanding liability. The Claimants Particulars of Claim have failed to identify a Cause of Action, and the Claimant simply offering a menu of choices. As such, the Claim fails to comply with Civil Procedure Rule 16.4, or with Civil Practice Direction 16, paras. 7.3 to 7.5. Further, the particulars of the claim do not meet the requirements of Practice Direction 16 7.5 as there is nothing which specifies how the terms were breached.

4. Due to the sparseness of the particulars, it is unclear as to what legal basis the claim is brought, whether for breach of contract, contractual liability, or trespass. However, it is denied that the Defendant, or any driver of the vehicle, entered into any contractual agreement with the Claimant, whether express, implied, or by conduct.

Unclear and Inadequate Signage

5. Further and in the alternative, it is denied that the claimant's signage sets out the terms in a sufficiently clear manner which would be capable of binding any reasonable person reading them. The signs are illegible whilst driving a vehicle into the car park and are difficult to identify and read once the vehicle is parked. The only legible section of the terms and conditions sign is ‘Welcome to the Portswood Centre’.

6. The terms on the Claimant's signage are also displayed in a font which is too small to be read from a passing vehicle, and is in such a position that anyone attempting to read the tiny font would be unable to do so easily. It is, therefore, denied that the Claimant's signage is capable of creating a legally binding contract.

7. The Claimant is put to strict proof that it has sufficient proprietary interest in the land, or that it has the necessary authorisation from the landowner to issue parking charge notices, and to pursue payment by means of litigation.

8. This Claimant uses ANPR camera systems to process data but fails to comply with the Information Commissioner's 'Data Protection Code of Practice for Surveillance Cameras and Personal Information' (the ICO Code). This is both a specific Data Protection and BPA Code of Practice breach. The Supreme Court Judges in Beavis held that a Code of Practice is effectively 'regulation' for this blatantly rogue industry, full compliance with which is both mandatory and binding upon any parking operator.

9. The ICO Code applies to all ANPR systems, and states that the private sector is required to follow it, in order to meet its legal obligations as a data processor. Members of the BPA are required to comply fully with the Data Protection Act (DPA) and all ICO rules and guidelines, as a pre-requisite of being able to use the DVLA KADOE system and in order to enforce parking charges on private land.

10. The Claimant's failures to comply include, but are not limited to the following, and the Claimant is put to strict proof otherwise on all counts:

i) Lack of an initial privacy impact assessment, and

ii) Lack of an evaluation of proportionality and necessity, considering concepts that would impact upon fairness under the first data protection principle, and

iii) Failure to prominently inform a driver in large lettering on clear signage, of the purpose of the ANPR system and the Pay & Display system and how the data captured on both would be used, and

iv) Lack of the 'Privacy Notice' required to deliver mandatory information about an individual's right of subject access, under the DPA. At no point has the Defendant been advised how to apply for, and what a data subject's rights are, to obtain all images and data held via a Subject Access Request from the Claimant.

11. This Claimant has therefore failed to meet its legal obligations and has breached principle 1 (at least) of the DPA, as well as the BPA Code of Practice.

12. In a similar instance of DPA failure by excessive and inappropriate use of ANPR cameras - confirmed on this Claimant's Trade Body (BPA) website in a 2013 article urging its members to comply - Hertfordshire Constabulary was issued with an enforcement notice. The force were ordered to stop processing people's information via ANPR until they could comply. The Information Commissioner ruled that the collection of the information was specifically illegal; breaching principle one of the DPA.

13. The ‘ParkingEye v Beavis’ case exposes this charge as unconscionable, with no overriding ‘legitimate interest. To save it from offending against the penalty rule.

14. The Protection of Freedoms Act 2012, Schedule 4, at Section 4(5) states that the maximum sum that may be recovered from the keeper is the charge stated on the Notice to Keeper, in this case £100. The claim includes an additional £60, for which no calculation or explanation is given, and which appears to be an attempt at double recovery.

Breach of BPA Codes of Practice

15. Under section 21 of the CoP, BPA members are only allowed to use ANPR if they:

- Use it to enforce parking in a reasonable, consistent and transparent manner.
- Have clear signs which tell drivers that the operator is using the technology and what the data captured by ANPR cameras will be used for.
- Manual quality checks of the ANPR images to reduce errors and make sure that it is appropriate to take action.

15.1. The Claimant pursued the Defendant for two PCN’s for the same event. This error was raised with the Claimant, who ignored the appeal and continued to pursue a double charge for the same event, it was only when the matter progressed did the Claimant drop one of the PCN’s as a ‘gesture of goodwill’. The Defendant puts to the Claimant that they have breached guidelines under section 21 of the CoP and GDPR. The Defendant requests that the Claimant provides evidence that checks were carried out before requesting data from DVLA and the PCN’s were issued.

Unconscionable and unrecoverable inflation of the 'parking charge'

16. This claim inflates the total to a staggering £246.60, in a clear attempt at double recovery. The Defendant trusts that the presiding Judge will recognise this wholly unreasonable conduct as a gross abuse of process and may consider using the court's case management powers to strike the claim out of the court's own volition.

16.1. The acid test is whether the conduct permits of a reasonable explanation, but the Defendant avers it cannot.

16.2. Not only are such costs not permitted (CPR 27.14) but the Defendant believes that the Claimant has not incurred legal costs. Given the fact that BW Legal boasted in Bagri v BW Legal Ltd of processing 'millions' of claims with an admin team (and only a handful of solicitors), the Defendant avers that no solicitor is likely to have supervised this current batch of cut & paste Britannia robo-claims at all. According to Ladak v DRC Locums UKEAT/0488/13/LA the Claimant can only recover the direct and provable costs of the time spent by legally qualified staff on preparing a claim in a legal capacity.

16.3. It was held in the Supreme Court in Beavis (where £85 was claimed, and no more) that a private parking charge already includes a very significant and high percentage in profit and more than covers the costs of running an automated regime of template letters. It is also a fact that debt collection agencies act on a no-win-no-fee basis for parking operators, so no such costs have been incurred in truth. Thus, there can be no 'damages' to pile on top of any parking charge claim, and the Claimant knows this, as do their solicitors. The Defendant asks that the Court takes judicial notice of this repeated abuse of consumers rights and remedies, arising from BW Legal clients artificially inflating their robo-claims, which are filed in tens of thousands, per year.

16.4. In addition to the original parking charge, for which liability is denied, the Claimants have artificially inflated the value of the Claim by adding purported Solicitor's/ Legal Costs of £110, which I submit have not actually been incurred by the Claimant.

16.5. Whilst £110 may be recoverable in an instance where a claimant has used a legal firm to prepare a claim, Britannia Parking Ltd have not expended any such sum in this case. This Claimant has a Legal Team with salaried in-house Solicitors and it files hundreds of similar 'cut & paste' robo-claims per month, not incurring any legal cost per case. I put the Claimant to strict proof to the contrary because the in-house Solicitors cannot possibly be believed to be paid in the millions per annum for their services.


17. The added 'legal' cost is in fact an artificially invented figure, which represents a cynical attempt to circumvent the Small Claims costs rules and achieve double recovery.

17.1. Similarly, in Somerfield (above) a £75 parking charge was not held to be a penalty but a sum mentioned in the harassing letters of double that amount, almost certainly would be.

18 The Claimant has also added statutory interest of £11.60 to the original charge, for which liability is denied. The Claimant has accrued interest for the period 2nd December 2017 to the 4th July 2019 which is not allowed and an abuse of process. Under section 69 of the County Courts Act 1984, it states that simple interest may be included from the date when the cause of action arose. This would be after the Notice to Keeper expired and no earlier, this being 29 days after the 2nd December 2017.

18.1 The Claimant has also unduly delayed proceedings as the letter of claim is dated 28th August 2018, 10 months before the County Court Claim was submitted. Again this is an abuse of process and is a delay entirely of the Claimants making, adding unjust interest to the already inflated sum claimed, for which liability is denied.

Conflicting Evidence Provided by Claimant

19. The Claimant has on numerous occasions provided evidential photographs of the signage in situ at the Southampton – Portswood Centre Southampton site to indicate the Defendant has breached the terms and conditions of the site, whilst pursuing a sum of £100. The photographic evidence shows a total sum payable at the site of £85. The evidence has been confusing for the Defendant and is in direct conflict with the charge claimed by the Claimant, therefore it is the Defendants submission that the Claimant has artificially inflated the sum owed.

20. In summary, it is the Defendant's position that the claim discloses no cause of action, is without merit, and has no real prospect of success. Accordingly, the Court is invited to strike out the claim of its own initiative, using its case management powers pursuant to CPR 3.4.

I believe the facts contained in this Defence are true to the best of my knowledge and belief

MonkeyRum

http://forums.pepipoo.com/index.php?showtopic=117508&st=20&start=20

Redx

needs the info about abuse of process in the beamerguy thread here, where DJ GRAND and DJ TAYLOR are mentioned

KeithP

From Pepipoo...

I acknowledged the County Court Letter on the 7th July 2019. The County Court letter is dated 5th July 2019.

With a Claim Issue Date of 5th July, and having done the Acknowledgement of Service in a timely manner, you have until 4pm on Wednesday 7th August 2019 to file your Defence.

That's over three weeks away. Loads of time to produce a perfect Defence, but please don't leave it to the last minute.


When you are happy with the content, your Defence should be filed via email as suggested here:

Print your Defence.
1. Sign it and date it.
   
2. Scan the signed document back in and save it as a pdf.
   
3. Send that pdf as an email attachment to CCBCAQ@Justice.gov.uk
   
4. Just put the claim number and the word Defence in the email title, and in the body of the email something like 'Please find my Defence attached'.
   
5. Log into MCOL after a few days to see if the Claim is marked "defence received". If not chase the CCBC until it is.
   
6. Do not be surprised to receive an early copy of the Claimant's Directions Questionnaire, they are just trying to keep you under pressure.
   
7. Wait for your DQ from the CCBC, or download one from the internet, and then re-read post #2 of the NEWBIES FAQ sticky thread to find out exactly what to do with it.

Parking_Appeal19

I have added the bits about DJ Grand and DJ Taylor into my defence.




IN THE COUNTY COURT

CLAIM No: xxxxxxxxxx

BETWEEN:

BRITANNIA PARKING GROUP LIMITED T/A BRITANNIA PARKING (Claimant)

-and-

xxxxxxxxxxxx (Defendant)

________________________________________
DEFENCE
________________________________________

1. The Defendant denies that the Claimant is entitled the sum claimed, either all or in part.

2. The Defendant is the registered keeper. The Claim relates to an alleged debt from an unsettled PCN issued on the 2nd December 2017 at Southampton - Portswood Centre Southampton. Any breach is denied, and it is further denied that there was any agreement to pay the Claimant a £100 'parking charge'.


Unclear Particulars of Claim


3. The Particulars of Claim state that the Claimant is seeking the sum of £111.60 from the Defendant in respect of a Parking Charge Notice (PCN) issued on the 2nd December 2017 at Southampton – Portswood Centre Southampton at 14:33:51. The PCN relates to the vehicle XXXXXXX and the Defendant has failed to settle their outstanding liability. The Claimants Particulars of Claim have failed to identify a Cause of Action, and the Claimant simply offering a menu of choices. As such, the Claim fails to comply with Civil Procedure Rule 16.4, or with Civil Practice Direction 16, paras. 7.3 to 7.5. Further, the particulars of the claim do not meet the requirements of Practice Direction 16 7.5 as there is nothing which specifies how the terms were breached.

4. Due to the sparseness of the particulars, it is unclear as to what legal basis the claim is brought, whether for breach of contract, contractual liability, or trespass. However, it is denied that the Defendant, or any driver of the vehicle, entered into any contractual agreement with the Claimant, whether express, implied, or by conduct.


Unclear and Inadequate Signage

5. Further and in the alternative, it is denied that the claimant's signage sets out the terms in a sufficiently clear manner which would be capable of binding any reasonable person reading them. The signs are illegible whilst driving a vehicle into the car park and are difficult to identify and read once the vehicle is parked. The only legible section of the terms and conditions sign is ‘Welcome to the Portswood Centre’.

6. The terms on the Claimant's signage are also displayed in a font which is too small to be read from a passing vehicle, and is in such a position that anyone attempting to read the tiny font would be unable to do so easily. It is, therefore, denied that the Claimant's signage is capable of creating a legally binding contract.

7. The Claimant is put to strict proof that it has sufficient proprietary interest in the land, or that it has the necessary authorisation from the landowner to issue parking charge notices, and to pursue payment by means of litigation.


8. This Claimant uses ANPR camera systems to process data but fails to comply with the Information Commissioner's 'Data Protection Code of Practice for Surveillance Cameras and Personal Information' (the ICO Code). This is both a specific Data Protection and BPA Code of Practice breach. The Supreme Court Judges in Beavis held that a Code of Practice is effectively 'regulation' for this blatantly rogue industry, full compliance with which is both mandatory and binding upon any parking operator.

9. The ICO Code applies to all ANPR systems, and states that the private sector is required to follow it, in order to meet its legal obligations as a data processor. Members of the BPA are required to comply fully with the Data Protection Act (DPA) and all ICO rules and guidelines, as a pre-requisite of being able to use the DVLA KADOE system and in order to enforce parking charges on private land.

10. The Claimant's failures to comply include, but are not limited to the following, and the Claimant is put to strict proof otherwise on all counts:

i) Lack of an initial privacy impact assessment, and


ii) Lack of an evaluation of proportionality and necessity, considering concepts that would impact upon fairness under the first data protection principle, and

iii) Failure to prominently inform a driver in large lettering on clear signage, of the purpose of the ANPR system and the Pay & Display system and how the data captured on both would be used, and

iv) Lack of the 'Privacy Notice' required to deliver mandatory information about an individual's right of subject access, under the DPA. At no point has the Defendant been advised how to apply for, and what a data subject's rights are, to obtain all images and data held via a Subject Access Request from the Claimant.

11. This Claimant has therefore failed to meet its legal obligations and has breached principle 1 (at least) of the DPA, as well as the BPA Code of Practice.

12. In a similar instance of DPA failure by excessive and inappropriate use of ANPR cameras - confirmed on this Claimant's Trade Body (BPA) website in a 2013 article urging its members to comply - Hertfordshire Constabulary was issued with an enforcement notice. The force were ordered to stop processing people's information via ANPR until they could comply. The Information Commissioner ruled that the collection of the information was specifically illegal; breaching principle one of the DPA.


13. The ‘ParkingEye v Beavis’ case exposes this charge as unconscionable, with no overriding ‘legitimate interest. To save it from offending against the penalty rule.

14. The Protection of Freedoms Act 2012, Schedule 4, at Section 4(5) states that the maximum sum that may be recovered from the keeper is the charge stated on the Notice to Keeper, in this case £100. The claim includes an additional £60, for which no calculation or explanation is given, and which appears to be an attempt at double recovery.


Breach of BPA Codes of Practice


15. Under section 21 of the CoP, BPA members are only allowed to use ANPR if they:

- Use it to enforce parking in a reasonable, consistent and transparent manner.
- Have clear signs which tell drivers that the operator is using the technology and what the data captured by ANPR cameras will be used for.
- Manual quality checks of the ANPR images to reduce errors and make sure that it is appropriate to take action.


15.1. The Claimant pursued the Defendant for two PCN’s for the same event. This error was raised with the Claimant, who ignored the appeal and continued to pursue a double charge for the same event, it was only when the matter progressed did the Claimant drop one of the PCN’s as a ‘gesture of goodwill’. The Defendant puts to the Claimant that they have breached guidelines under section 21 of the CoP and GDPR. The Defendant requests that the Claimant provides evidence that checks were carried out before requesting data from DVLA and the PCN’s were issued.


Unconscionable and unrecoverable inflation of the 'parking charge'

16. This claim inflates the initial £100 parking charge total to a staggering £246.60, in a clear attempt at double recovery. The Defendant trusts that the presiding Judge will recognise this wholly unreasonable conduct as a gross abuse of process and may consider using the court's case management powers to strike the claim out of the court's own volition. 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 an earlier General Judgment or Order of DJ Grand, who on 21st February 2019 sitting at the Newport (IOW) County Court, had struck out a parking firm claim. One was a BPA member serial Claimant (Britannia, using BW Legal's robo-claim model) and one an IPC member serial Claimant (UKCPM, using Gladstones' robo-claim model) yet the Order was identical in striking out both claims without a hearing:
''IT IS ORDERED THAT The claim is struck out as an abuse of process. 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.

16.1. The acid test is whether the conduct permits of a reasonable explanation, but the Defendant avers it cannot.

16.2. Not only are such costs not permitted (CPR 27.14) but the Defendant believes that the Claimant has not incurred legal costs. Given the fact that BW Legal boasted in Bagri v BW Legal Ltd of processing 'millions' of claims with an admin team (and only a handful of solicitors), the Defendant avers that no solicitor is likely to have supervised this current batch of cut & paste Britannia robo-claims at all. According to Ladak v DRC Locums UKEAT/0488/13/LA the Claimant can only recover the direct and provable costs of the time spent by legally qualified staff on preparing a claim in a legal capacity.

16.3. It was held in the Supreme Court in Beavis (where £85 was claimed, and no more) that a private parking charge already includes a very significant and high percentage in profit and more than covers the costs of running an automated regime of template letters. It is also a fact that debt collection agencies act on a no-win-no-fee basis for parking operators, so no such costs have been incurred in truth. Thus, there can be no 'damages' to pile on top of any parking charge claim, and the Claimant knows this, as do their solicitors. The Defendant asks that the Court takes judicial notice of this repeated abuse of consumers rights and remedies, arising from BW Legal clients artificially inflating their robo-claims, which are filed in tens of thousands, per year.

16.4. In addition to the original parking charge, for which liability is denied, the Claimants have artificially inflated the value of the Claim by adding purported Solicitor's/ Legal Costs of £110, which I submit have not actually been incurred by the Claimant.


16.5. Whilst £110 may be recoverable in an instance where a claimant has used a legal firm to prepare a claim, Britannia Parking Ltd have not expended any such sum in this case. This Claimant has a Legal Team with salaried in-house Solicitors and it files hundreds of similar 'cut & paste' robo-claims per month, not incurring any legal cost per case. I put the Claimant to strict proof to the contrary because the in-house Solicitors cannot possibly be believed to be paid in the millions per annum for their services.


17. The added 'legal' cost is in fact an artificially invented figure, which represents a cynical attempt to circumvent the Small Claims costs rules and achieve double recovery.


17.1. Similarly, in Somerfield (above) a £75 parking charge was not held to be a penalty but a sum mentioned in the harassing letters of double that amount, almost certainly would be.


18. The Claimant has also added alleged statutory interest of £11.60 to the original charge, for which liability is denied. The Claimant has accrued interest for the period 2nd December 2017 to the 4th July 2019 which is not allowed and an abuse of process. Under section 69 of the County Courts Act 1984, it states that simple interest may be included from the date when the cause of action arose. This would be after the Notice to Keeper expired and no earlier, this being 29 days after the 2nd December 2017.


18.1. The Claimant has also unduly delayed proceedings as the letter of claim is dated 28th August 2018, 10 months before the County Court Claim was submitted. Again this is an abuse of process and is a delay entirely of the Claimants making, adding unjust interest to the already inflated sum claimed, for which liability is denied.


Conflicting Evidence Provided by Claimant


19. The Claimant has on numerous occasions provided evidential photographs of the signage in situ at the Southampton – Portswood Centre Southampton site to indicate the Defendant has breached the terms and conditions of the site, whilst pursuing a sum of £100. The photographic evidence shows a total sum payable at the site of £85. The evidence has been confusing for the Defendant and is in direct conflict with the charge claimed by the Claimant, therefore it is the Defendants submission that the Claimant has artificially inflated the sum owed.

20. In summary, it is the Defendant's position that the claim discloses no cause of action, is without merit, and has no real prospect of success. Accordingly, the Court is invited to strike out the claim of its own initiative, using its case management powers pursuant to CPR 3.4.

I believe the facts contained in this Defence are true to the beset of my knowledge and belief

beamerguy

That's good.

Makes you wonder if BWLegal realises that they have signed a statement of truth to the court based on a fake £60 ???

Egbert_Nobacon

Hope you get DJ Taylor - that would be nice !!

One very small amendment at 16:-

The DJ stated ‘’IT IS ORDERED THAT............

Makes it clear it isn’t you ordering the court.

Coupon-mad

As it is Britannia and your local Court is hopefully Southampton, change this:

One was the same serial Claimant as in this case (Britannia, using BW Legal's robo-claim model)

The_Deep

Nine times out of ten these tickets are scams so complain to your MP.

Parliament is well aware of the MO of these private parking companies, and on 15th March 2019 a Bill was enacted to curb the excesses of these shysters. 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, persistent offenders denied access to the DVLA database and unable to operate.

Hopefully life will become impossible for the worst of these scammers, but 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.

Parking_Appeal19

I have made the amendments as suggested.


Is there anything else I should add, amend or remove or do you think it is good to go?


Thanks all for your help.






IN THE COUNTY COURT

CLAIM No: xxxxxxxxxx

BETWEEN:

BRITANNIA PARKING GROUP LIMITED T/A BRITANNIA PARKING (Claimant)

-and-

xxxxxxxxxxxx (Defendant)

________________________________________
DEFENCE
________________________________________

1. The Defendant denies that the Claimant is entitled the sum claimed, either all or in part.

2. The Defendant is the registered keeper. The Claim relates to an alleged debt from an unsettled PCN issued on the 2nd December 2017 at Southampton - Portswood Centre Southampton. Any breach is denied, and it is further denied that there was any agreement to pay the Claimant a £100 'parking charge'.


Unclear Particulars of Claim


3. The Particulars of Claim state that the Claimant is seeking the sum of £111.60 from the Defendant in respect of a Parking Charge Notice (PCN) issued on the 2nd December 2017 at Southampton – Portswood Centre Southampton at 14:33:51. The PCN relates to the vehicle XXXXXXX and the Defendant has failed to settle their outstanding liability. The Claimants Particulars of Claim have failed to identify a Cause of Action, and the Claimant simply offering a menu of choices. As such, the Claim fails to comply with Civil Procedure Rule 16.4, or with Civil Practice Direction 16, paras. 7.3 to 7.5. Further, the particulars of the claim do not meet the requirements of Practice Direction 16 7.5 as there is nothing which specifies how the terms were breached.

4. Due to the sparseness of the particulars, it is unclear as to what legal basis the claim is brought, whether for breach of contract, contractual liability, or trespass. However, it is denied that the Defendant, or any driver of the vehicle, entered into any contractual agreement with the Claimant, whether express, implied, or by conduct.


Unclear and Inadequate Signage

5. Further and in the alternative, it is denied that the claimant's signage sets out the terms in a sufficiently clear manner which would be capable of binding any reasonable person reading them. The signs are illegible whilst driving a vehicle into the car park and are difficult to identify and read once the vehicle is parked. The only legible section of the terms and conditions sign is ‘Welcome to the Portswood Centre’.

6. The terms on the Claimant's signage are also displayed in a font which is too small to be read from a passing vehicle, and is in such a position that anyone attempting to read the tiny font would be unable to do so easily. It is, therefore, denied that the Claimant's signage is capable of creating a legally binding contract.

7. The Claimant is put to strict proof that it has sufficient proprietary interest in the land, or that it has the necessary authorisation from the landowner to issue parking charge notices, and to pursue payment by means of litigation.


8. This Claimant uses ANPR camera systems to process data but fails to comply with the Information Commissioner's 'Data Protection Code of Practice for Surveillance Cameras and Personal Information' (the ICO Code). This is both a specific Data Protection and BPA Code of Practice breach. The Supreme Court Judges in Beavis held that a Code of Practice is effectively 'regulation' for this blatantly rogue industry, full compliance with which is both mandatory and binding upon any parking operator.

9. The ICO Code applies to all ANPR systems, and states that the private sector is required to follow it, in order to meet its legal obligations as a data processor. Members of the BPA are required to comply fully with the Data Protection Act (DPA) and all ICO rules and guidelines, as a pre-requisite of being able to use the DVLA KADOE system and in order to enforce parking charges on private land.

10. The Claimant's failures to comply include, but are not limited to the following, and the Claimant is put to strict proof otherwise on all counts:

i) Lack of an initial privacy impact assessment, and


ii) Lack of an evaluation of proportionality and necessity, considering concepts that would impact upon fairness under the first data protection principle, and

iii) Failure to prominently inform a driver in large lettering on clear signage, of the purpose of the ANPR system and how the data captured would b e used, and

iv) Lack of the 'Privacy Notice' required to deliver mandatory information about an individual's right of subject access, under the DPA. At no point has the Defendant been advised how to apply for, and what a data subject's rights are, to obtain all images and data held via a Subject Access Request from the Claimant.

11. This Claimant has therefore failed to meet its legal obligations and has breached principle 1 (at least) of the DPA, as well as the BPA Code of Practice.

12. In a similar instance of DPA failure by excessive and inappropriate use of ANPR cameras - confirmed on this Claimant's Trade Body (BPA) website in a 2013 article urging its members to comply - Hertfordshire Constabulary was issued with an enforcement notice. The force were ordered to stop processing people's information via ANPR until they could comply. The Information Commissioner ruled that the collection of the information was specifically illegal; breaching principle one of the DPA.


13. The ‘ParkingEye v Beavis’ case exposes this charge as unconscionable, with no overriding ‘legitimate interest. To save it from offending against the penalty rule.

14. The Protection of Freedoms Act 2012, Schedule 4, at Section 4(5) states that the maximum sum that may be recovered from the keeper is the charge stated on the Notice to Keeper, in this case £100. The claim includes an additional £60, for which no calculation or explanation is given, and which appears to be an attempt at double recovery.


Breach of BPA Codes of Practice


15. Under section 21 of the CoP, BPA members are only allowed to use ANPR if they:

- Use it to enforce parking in a reasonable, consistent and transparent manner.
- Have clear signs which tell drivers that the operator is using the technology and what the data captured by ANPR cameras will be used for.
- Manual quality checks of the ANPR images to reduce errors and make sure that it is appropriate to take action.


15.1. The Claimant pursued the Defendant for two PCN’s for the same event. This error was raised with the Claimant, who ignored the appeal and continued to pursue a double charge for the same event, it was only when the matter progressed did the Claimant drop one of the PCN’s as a ‘gesture of goodwill’. The Defendant puts to the Claimant that they have breached guidelines under section 21 of the CoP and GDPR. The Defendant requests that the Claimant provides evidence that checks were carried out before requesting data from DVLA and the PCN’s were issued.


Unconscionable and unrecoverable inflation of the 'parking charge'

16. This claim inflates the initial £100 parking charge total to a staggering £246.60, in a clear attempt at double recovery. The Defendant trusts that the presiding Judge will recognise this wholly unreasonable conduct as a gross abuse of process and may consider using the court's case management powers to strike the claim out of the court's own volition. 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 an earlier General Judgment or Order of DJ Grand, who on 21st February 2019 sitting at the Newport (IOW) County Court, had struck out a parking firm claim. One was a BPA member serial Claimant (Britannia, using BW Legal's robo-claim model) and one an IPC member serial Claimant (UKCPM, using Gladstones' robo-claim model) yet the Order was identical in striking out both claims without a hearing:
The Judge ''ORDERED THAT The claim is struck out as an abuse of process. 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.

16.1. The acid test is whether the conduct permits of a reasonable explanation, but the Defendant avers it cannot.

16.2. Not only are such costs not permitted (CPR 27.14) but the Defendant believes that the Claimant has not incurred legal costs. Given the fact that BW Legal boasted in Bagri v BW Legal Ltd of processing 'millions' of claims with an admin team (and only a handful of solicitors), the Defendant avers that no solicitor is likely to have supervised this current batch of cut & paste Britannia robo-claims at all. According to Ladak v DRC Locums UKEAT/0488/13/LA the Claimant can only recover the direct and provable costs of the time spent by legally qualified staff on preparing a claim in a legal capacity.

16.3. It was held in the Supreme Court in Beavis (where £85 was claimed, and no more) that a private parking charge already includes a very significant and high percentage in profit and more than covers the costs of running an automated regime of template letters. It is also a fact that debt collection agencies act on a no-win-no-fee basis for parking operators, so no such costs have been incurred in truth. Thus, there can be no 'damages' to pile on top of any parking charge claim, and the Claimant knows this, as do their solicitors. The Defendant asks that the Court takes judicial notice of this repeated abuse of consumers rights and remedies, arising from BW Legal clients artificially inflating their robo-claims, which are filed in tens of thousands, per year.

16.4. In addition to the original parking charge, for which liability is denied, the Claimants have artificially inflated the value of the Claim by adding purported Solicitor's/ Legal Costs of £110, which I submit have not actually been incurred by the Claimant.


16.5. Whilst £110 may be recoverable in an instance where a claimant has used a legal firm to prepare a claim, Britannia Parking Ltd have not expended any such sum in this case. This Claimant has a Legal Team with salaried in-house Solicitors and it files hundreds of similar 'cut & paste' robo-claims per month, not incurring any legal cost per case. I put the Claimant to strict proof to the contrary because the in-house Solicitors cannot possibly be believed to be paid in the millions per annum for their services.


17. The added 'legal' cost is in fact an artificially invented figure, which represents a cynical attempt to circumvent the Small Claims costs rules and achieve double recovery.


17.1. Similarly, in Somerfield (above) a £75 parking charge was not held to be a penalty but a sum mentioned in the harassing letters of double that amount, almost certainly would be.


18. The Claimant has also added alleged statutory interest of £11.60 to the original charge, for which liability is denied. The Claimant has accrued interest for the period 2nd December 2017 to the 4th July 2019 which is not allowed and an abuse of process. Under section 69 of the County Courts Act 1984, it states that simple interest may be included from the date when the cause of action arose. This would be after the Notice to Keeper expired and no earlier, this being 29 days after the 2nd December 2017.


18.1. The Claimant has also unduly delayed proceedings as the letter of claim is dated 28th August 2018, 10 months before the County Court Claim was submitted. Again this is an abuse of process and is a delay entirely of the Claimants making, adding unjust interest to the already inflated sum claimed, for which liability is denied.


Conflicting Evidence Provided by Claimant


19. The Claimant has on numerous occasions provided evidential photographs of the signage in situ at the Southampton – Portswood Centre Southampton site to indicate the Defendant has breached the terms and conditions of the site, whilst pursuing a sum of £100. The photographic evidence shows a total sum payable at the site of £85. The evidence has been confusing for the Defendant and is in direct conflict with the charge claimed by the Claimant, therefore it is the Defendants submission that the Claimant has artificially inflated the sum owed.

20. In summary, it is the Defendant's position that the claim discloses no cause of action, is without merit, and has no real prospect of success. Accordingly, the Court is invited to strike out the claim of its own initiative, using its case management powers pursuant to CPR 3.4.

I believe the facts contained in this Defence are true to the best of my knowledge and belief

Coupon-mad

at Southampton - Portswood Centre Southampton

I'd remove the first Soton even if that's how they describe the site. It reads oddly!

I think this little golden nugget should be MUCH higher than an afterthought!

the Defendant has breached the terms and conditions of the site, whilst pursuing a sum of £100. The photographic evidence shows a total sum payable at the site of £85.