VCS & Court claim stage

Amk89

Please see defence below (most taken from various other examples on the forum)


Is there anything that can be added or that needs to be removed?


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1. The Defendant denies that the Claimant is entitled to relief in the sum claimed, or at all.

2. The Claimant has failed to provide the Defendant prior to the claim, with essential information including details of what the alleged breach was, any photographs taken, what it time occurred and for how long, and proof that a breach actually occurred.



3. The Particulars of Claim (PoC) do not specify what are the terms breached by the driver of the vehicle. As such, the Claim fails to meet the requirements of Practice Direction 16 7.5 as there is nothing which specifies what the terms were and how they were breached.

4. 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.

5. Further and in the alternative, examination of a parking sign at the location of the alleged breach shows the sign to be completely unreadable and not fit for purpose. It is denied that the sign sets out terms in a legible manner which would be capable of binding any reasonable person reading them.

6. 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. The charge is disproportionate to the loss incurred by the claimant, and is punitive, contravening the Unfair Contract Terms Act 1997. The Defendant also states that the Claimant has no proprietary interest in the land and therefore has no authority to issue parking charge notices.





7. The claim includes interest charge but does not include dates used for calculation. As such, this is in breach of Civil Procedure Rule 16.4 (2)

8. 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. This claim includes an additional £60, for which no calculation or explanation is given, and which appears to be an attempt at double recovery.



9. Overall the costs on the claim are disproportionate and are an abuse of process. CPR 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.

10. Whilst quantified costs can be considered on a standard basis, this Claimant's purported costs are wholly disproportionate and do not stand up to scrutiny. In fact it is averred that the Claimant has not paid or incurred such damages/costs or 'legal fees' at all. Any debt collection letters were a standard feature of a low cost business model and are already counted within the parking charge itself.

11. The Parking Eye Ltd v Beavis case is the authority for recovery of the parking charge itself and no more, since that sum (£85 in Beavis) was held to already incorporate the minor costs of an automated private parking business model. 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 the alleged 'parking charge' itself is a sum which the Supreme Court found is already inflated to more than comfortably cover the cost of all letters.

12. 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.

13. 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.

14. 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 their artificially inflated claim, as pleaded, constitutes double recovery.

15. 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 stated:-
''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. 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 mendacious in terms of the added costs alleged.

17. 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.

18. The Court is invited to make an Order of its own initiative, dismissing this claim in its entirety and to allow such Defendant's costs as are permissible under Civil Procedure Rule 27.14 on the indemnity basis, taking judicial note of the wholly unreasonable conduct of this Claimant, not least due to the abuse of process in attempting to claim fanciful costs which they are not entitled to recover.

I believe the facts contained in this defence are true.

Name xxx
Signature xxx
Date xxx

JesterShoe

Hi, I've just won my two PCN's against VCS, very similar case.

The main argument that the Judge summarized on was that there was no consideration in the contract. The point is that the parties must exchange something of value. Consideration is needed so that both parties incur some sort of burden or obligation in the agreement. VCS could not offer me anything of value as I was already parked in my own demised parking bay, so no contract could exist.

If your partner gave you permission to park in the demised bay then you are on to a winner.

Amk89

Just wanted to quickly ask, do I email VCS in regards to step 8 with the DQ, along with CCBCAQ@Justice.gov.uk? If so what is the Email address for VCS?

Thank you

Le_Kirk

Yes, that is correct.

KeithP

You have the right email address for sending your DQ to the CCBC, but have VCS stated that they accept service by email?

There is an address for sending documents to the Claimant on your Claim Form.

Amk89

What is the next step after DQ?

KeithP

Amk89 wrote: »

What is the next step after DQ?

Continue to follow the guidance offered in post #2 of the NEWBIES thread.

Amk89

I've learned an interesting fact from a good source. The 'contract' which VCS hold for this premises has no money involved, they are not paid for 'managing' the car park. If that doesn't speak volumes?!

NeilCr

Amk89 wrote: »

I've learned an interesting fact from a good source. The 'contract' which VCS hold for this premises has no money involved, they are not paid for 'managing' the car park. If that doesn't speak volumes?!

I'd have thought that was pretty standard.

When we were contemplating having a PPC on our estate there is no way we would have paid them anything

They get the money from the "fines" and we get rid of our car parking problem. And, yes, I know it's not as simple as that but that's the basis of the deal