Clam form from Gladstone Solicitors

Itakerisk

MCOL website state that following :

Amount Claimed
£169

Court Fee
£25.00

Solicitor Costs
£50.00


The PCN was for £60 (originally) then they inflated the cost to 169 as stated in MCOL website, Since as per point 8 maximum recovery can be done for 100£ they have added £69 extra with no explanation given hence the figure.



Does it sound correct ?

beamerguy

£69 is an odd figure but will still include ABUSE OF PROCESS of £60

Maybe a typo error

Regardless, it's still abuse of process

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6014081/abuse-of-process-district-judge-tells-bwlegal

Itakerisk

[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]Thank you [/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]beamerguy and 1505grandad, i have corrected it,
[/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]
[/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]DEFENCE[/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif] ________________________________________

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

2. [/FONT]The facts are that the vehicle, registration XXXX, of which the Defendant was the registered keeper was not driving the vehicle.


[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]3. The defendant has no liability as they are the Keeper of the vehicle, and the Private Parking Company has failed to comply with the strict provisions of PoFA 2012 to hold anyone other than the driver liable for the charges.

4. There is no presumption in law that the keeper was the driver and nor is a keeper obliged to name the driver to a private parking firm. This was confirmed in the POPLA Annual Report 2015 by the POPLA Lead Adjudicator and barrister, Henry Greenslade, when explaining the POFA 2012 principles of 'keeper liability' as set out in Schedule 4.[/FONT]


[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]5. The PCN letter arrived in December 2019 When the defendant was out of country, however defendant’s son made multiple contacts to the claimant to explain that the person driving the car on that day was not the registered keeper of the vehicle but all calls are handled by automated answering system, the call charge at 7p per minute and only provides options to pay, No human interaction made it very complicated for defendant to discuss the claim and left with no option but to pay the charge.

6. 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. They are stuck on wall very high that are out of sight.

7. 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.

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. The claim includes an additional £60, for which no calculation or explanation is given, and which appears to be an attempt at double recovery.[/FONT]


[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]9. In an Abuse of process, in addition to the 'parking charge' the Claimant's legal representatives, Gladstone solicitors, have artificially inflated the value of the Claim by adding costs of £60 which has not actually been incurred by the Claimant, and which are artificially invented figures in an attempt to circumvent the Small Claims costs rules using double recovery. The Court is invited to read Claim number F0DP201T District Judge Taylor, Southampton Court, 10th June 2019 on the subject. [/FONT]


[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]10. 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. The court is invited to note that no named Solicitor has signed the Particulars, in breach of Practice Direction 22, and rendering the statement of truth a nullity.

11. 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.

12. 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.

13. 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 Order was identical in striking out both claims without a hearing and here the defendant quotes from the cases cited:
''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…''[/FONT]


[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]14. Claim number F0DP201T District Judge Taylor, Southampton Court, 10th June 2019, 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 and here the defendant quotes from the case cited: "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 not with reference to the judgement 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"[/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]
[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]15[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]. That is not an isolated judgment striking a parking claim out for repeatedly adding sums they are not entitled to recover. In the Caernarfon Court in Case number FTQZ4W28 (Vehicle Control Services Ltd v Davies)on 4th September 2019, District Judge Jones-Evans stated: [/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]''Upon it being recorded that Distract 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 v 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.''[/FONT]

16. 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.

17. 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 repeatedly attempting to claim fanciful costs which they are not entitled to recover.

I believe the facts contained in this Defence are true.

Name
Signature
Date[/FONT]

Le_Kirk

You still don't have the landowner authority point as remarked upon in post # 27, is there a good reason for this? Searching the forum produced this: -

Further (and in the alternative), 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 under defined parameters and to form/offer contracts in their own name, and to pursue payment by means of litigation.

Leave out the part in Italics if it doesn't suit.

Itakerisk

Thank you Le_kirk, My bad, it was clearly lack of attention to detail on my part apologies for that however i now added that point too, revised defence looks like below,


[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]DEFENCE[/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]________________________________________

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

2. [/FONT]The facts are that the vehicle, registration XXXX, of which the Defendant was the registered keeper was not driving the vehicle.

[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]3. The defendant has no liability as they are the Keeper of the vehicle, and the Private Parking Company has failed to comply with the strict provisions of PoFA 2012 to hold anyone other than the driver liable for the charges.

4. There is no presumption in law that the keeper was the driver and nor is a keeper obliged to name the driver to a private parking firm. This was confirmed in the POPLA Annual Report 2015 by the POPLA Lead Adjudicator and barrister, Henry Greenslade, when explaining the POFA 2012 principles of 'keeper liability' as set out in Schedule 4.[/FONT]

[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]5. The PCN letter arrived in December 2019 When the defendant was out of country, however defendant’s son made multiple contacts to the claimant to explain that the person driving the car on that day was not the registered keeper of the vehicle but all calls are handled by automated answering system, the call charge at 7p per minute and only provides options to pay, No human interaction made it very complicated for defendant to discuss the claim and left with no option but to pay the charge.

6. 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. They are stuck on wall very high that are out of sight.

7. 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.

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. The claim includes an additional £60, for which no calculation or explanation is given, and which appears to be an attempt at double recovery.[/FONT]

[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]9. In an Abuse of process, in addition to the 'parking charge' the Claimant's legal representatives, Gladstone solicitors, have artificially inflated the value of the Claim by adding costs of £60 which has not actually been incurred by the Claimant, and which are artificially invented figures in an attempt to circumvent the Small Claims costs rules using double recovery. The Court is invited to read Claim number F0DP201T District Judge Taylor, Southampton Court, 10th June 2019 on the subject. [/FONT][/FONT]


[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]10. T[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]he 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 under defined parameters and to form/offer contracts in their own name, and to pursue payment by means of litigation. [/FONT]

[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]1[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]1[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]. 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. The court is invited to note that no named Solicitor has signed the Particulars, in breach of Practice Direction 22, and rendering the statement of truth a nullity.

1[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]2[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]. 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.

1[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]3[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]. 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.

1[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]4[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]. 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 Order was identical in striking out both claims without a hearing and here the defendant quotes from the cases cited:
''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…''[/FONT]

[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]1[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]5[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]. Claim number F0DP201T District Judge Taylor, Southampton Court, 10th June 2019, 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 and here the defendant quotes from the case cited: "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 not with reference to the judgement 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"[/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]
1[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]6[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]. That is not an isolated judgment striking a parking claim out for repeatedly adding sums they are not entitled to recover. In the Caernarfon Court in Case number FTQZ4W28 (Vehicle Control Services Ltd v Davies)on 4th September 2019, District Judge Jones-Evans stated: ''Upon it being recorded that Distract 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 v 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.''

1[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]7[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]. 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.

1[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]8[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]. 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 repeatedly attempting to claim fanciful costs which they are not entitled to recover.

I believe the facts contained in this Defence are true.

Name
Signature
Date[/FONT][/FONT]

Coupon-mad

2. The facts are that the vehicle, registration XXXX, of which the Defendant was the registered keeper was not driving the vehicle.

Eh?

5. The PCN letter arrived in December 2019

Eh?


Remove this (below) as it makes it sound like you did pay it:

and left with no option but to pay the charge.

Point #9 is obviously superfluous, given the words you added lower down.

Itakerisk

Thanks for the comments Coupan-mad


Quote:
2. The facts are that the vehicle, registration XXXX, of which the Defendant was the registered keeper was not driving the vehicle.
Eh?
Do i remove this point altogether ?


Quote:
5. The PCN letter arrived in December 2019
Eh?
Sure, I'll remove this bit.



Remove this (below) as it makes it sound like you did pay it:
Quote:
and left with no option but to pay the charge.
Point #9 is obviously superfluous, given the words you added lower down.



Sure, i'll remove point 9.

Coupon-mad

Do i remove this point altogether ?

No. Read it again and spot the error!

Itakerisk

Thanks for the comments Coupan-mad

2. The facts are that the vehicle, registration XXXX, of which the Defendant was the registered keeper was not driving the vehicle.
Eh?

Do i remove this point altogether ?

5. The PCN letter arrived in December 2019
Eh?

Sure, I'll remove this bit.

Remove this (below) as it makes it sound like you did pay it:


and left with no option but to pay the charge.

Sure i'll remove this.

Point #9 is obviously superfluous, given the words you added lower down.

Sure, I'll remove point 9.

Itakerisk

The facts are that the vehicle, registration <Reg No>, of which the Defendant is the registered keeper was not the driver.


I had "was" there because my Dad had sold the vehicle, is it better ?