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County Court Claim - PCN from HX Car Park Management
Giant_Lobster
Posts: 3 Newbie
Hello!
It is the first time for me to post on the forum. Over last two weeks I have been reading other posts and followed second post of newbies thread.
Recieved correspondence were:
PCN from HX Car Park Management dated 13 May 2019, then KLN dated 13 June 2019, and Final Demand dated 01 July 2019. Letter Before Claim from Gladstones Solicitors dated 02 August 2019 and then Claim Form from County Court Business Centre dated 07 October 2019
Initial letters included photo of the car entering and exiting the car park with time stamps.
Knowing that the car park enforcement is a rocketeering scam, no contact was made prior to the County Court letter.
Particulars of Claim were copy paste standard:
'The driver of the vehicle with registration [xxxxxxx] (the vehicle) parked in breach of the terms of parking stipulated on the signage (the contract) at [address of the car park], on 05.05.2019 thus incurring the parking charge (the PCN). The driver of the vehicle agreed to pay the PCN with in 28 days of issue yet failed to do so. The claimant claims the unpaid PCN from the defendant as the driver/keeper of the vehicle. Despite demands being made, the defendant has failed to settle their outstanding liability THE CLAIMANT CLAIMS £100 for the PCN, £60 contractual costs pursuant to the Contract and PCN terms and conditions, together with statutory interest of £3.98 pursuant to s69 of the County Court Act 1984 at 8.00% per annum, continuing at £0.4 per day.’
Amount claimed: 163.97
Court Fee 25.00
Legal representative's costs 50.00
Total amount 238.97
So far SAR was send and AoS was done.
The defence just as the particulars is preety much copy paste as well.
1. The Defendant was the registered keeper of the vehicle registration number xxxxxx on the material date. The Defendant denies that the Claimant is entitled to relief in the sum claimed, or at all.
2. It is denied that any 'parking charges’ are owed and any debt is denied in its entirety because no keeper liability, no cause for action against the defendant. The claimant has failed to show locus standi, the defendant does not believe they have a right to bring an action against anyone.
3. Accordingly, it is denied that the driver breached any of the Claimant's purported contractual terms, whether express, implied, or by conduct as no enforceable contract offered at the time by claimant, no cause for action can have arisen.
4. The Claimant also stated in the Particulars of Claim that ‘the driver of the Vehicle agreed to pay the parking charge within 28 days of issue yet failed to do so’. However, the claimant has failed to provide evidence of that agreement and failed to identify who the driver that it is referring to.
5. It is denied that the signs used by this claimant can have created a fair or transparent contract with a driver in any event hence incapable of binding the driver as the claimant failed to comply with International Parking Community Code of Practice ‘PART E Schedule 1 – Signage’.
6. The Claimant is put to strict proof that it has sufficient interest in the land or that there are specific terms in its contract to bring an action on its own behalf. As a third party agent, the Claimant may not pursue any charge, unless specifically authorised by the principal. The Defendant has the reasonable belief that the Claimant does not have the authority to issue charges on this land in their own name, and that they have no right to bring any action regarding this claim.
7. 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.
8. 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.
9. 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.
10. 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.
11. 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.
12. 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.
13. 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.
14. 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 by Judge Tailor and DJ Grand was identical in striking out both claims without a hearing and stating that: ''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...''
15. 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.
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.
Statement of Truth:
I confirm that the contents of this defence are true to the best of my knowledge and belief.
The penalty was for overstaying in the car park for 24 minutes based on timestamps on the photos due to limited access ways to the car park and need for changing nappy after returning to the car. I believe there was a case won by deffendant in may 2019 did not buy a ticket for 19 minutes from moment of entering car park because of need of changing napy of a cryig baby.
It is the first encounter with the legal proces for me. Please advice accordingly. Thank you.
It is the first time for me to post on the forum. Over last two weeks I have been reading other posts and followed second post of newbies thread.
Recieved correspondence were:
PCN from HX Car Park Management dated 13 May 2019, then KLN dated 13 June 2019, and Final Demand dated 01 July 2019. Letter Before Claim from Gladstones Solicitors dated 02 August 2019 and then Claim Form from County Court Business Centre dated 07 October 2019
Initial letters included photo of the car entering and exiting the car park with time stamps.
Knowing that the car park enforcement is a rocketeering scam, no contact was made prior to the County Court letter.
Particulars of Claim were copy paste standard:
'The driver of the vehicle with registration [xxxxxxx] (the vehicle) parked in breach of the terms of parking stipulated on the signage (the contract) at [address of the car park], on 05.05.2019 thus incurring the parking charge (the PCN). The driver of the vehicle agreed to pay the PCN with in 28 days of issue yet failed to do so. The claimant claims the unpaid PCN from the defendant as the driver/keeper of the vehicle. Despite demands being made, the defendant has failed to settle their outstanding liability THE CLAIMANT CLAIMS £100 for the PCN, £60 contractual costs pursuant to the Contract and PCN terms and conditions, together with statutory interest of £3.98 pursuant to s69 of the County Court Act 1984 at 8.00% per annum, continuing at £0.4 per day.’
Amount claimed: 163.97
Court Fee 25.00
Legal representative's costs 50.00
Total amount 238.97
So far SAR was send and AoS was done.
The defence just as the particulars is preety much copy paste as well.
1. The Defendant was the registered keeper of the vehicle registration number xxxxxx on the material date. The Defendant denies that the Claimant is entitled to relief in the sum claimed, or at all.
2. It is denied that any 'parking charges’ are owed and any debt is denied in its entirety because no keeper liability, no cause for action against the defendant. The claimant has failed to show locus standi, the defendant does not believe they have a right to bring an action against anyone.
3. Accordingly, it is denied that the driver breached any of the Claimant's purported contractual terms, whether express, implied, or by conduct as no enforceable contract offered at the time by claimant, no cause for action can have arisen.
4. The Claimant also stated in the Particulars of Claim that ‘the driver of the Vehicle agreed to pay the parking charge within 28 days of issue yet failed to do so’. However, the claimant has failed to provide evidence of that agreement and failed to identify who the driver that it is referring to.
5. It is denied that the signs used by this claimant can have created a fair or transparent contract with a driver in any event hence incapable of binding the driver as the claimant failed to comply with International Parking Community Code of Practice ‘PART E Schedule 1 – Signage’.
6. The Claimant is put to strict proof that it has sufficient interest in the land or that there are specific terms in its contract to bring an action on its own behalf. As a third party agent, the Claimant may not pursue any charge, unless specifically authorised by the principal. The Defendant has the reasonable belief that the Claimant does not have the authority to issue charges on this land in their own name, and that they have no right to bring any action regarding this claim.
7. 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.
8. 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.
9. 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.
10. 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.
11. 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.
12. 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.
13. 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.
14. 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 by Judge Tailor and DJ Grand was identical in striking out both claims without a hearing and stating that: ''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...''
15. 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.
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.
Statement of Truth:
I confirm that the contents of this defence are true to the best of my knowledge and belief.
The penalty was for overstaying in the car park for 24 minutes based on timestamps on the photos due to limited access ways to the car park and need for changing nappy after returning to the car. I believe there was a case won by deffendant in may 2019 did not buy a ticket for 19 minutes from moment of entering car park because of need of changing napy of a cryig baby.
It is the first encounter with the legal proces for me. Please advice accordingly. Thank you.
0
Comments
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If this was PDT machines and you paid for parking, how many minutes were before the payment time, and how many minutes after expiry of the ticket?The penalty was for overstaying in the car park for 24 minutes based on timestamps on the photos due to limited access ways to the car park and need for changing nappy after returning to the car.
Have you posted about this before using another username? We have one just like it.PRIVATE 'PCN'? DON'T PAY BUT DON'T IGNORE IT (except N.Ireland).
CLICK at the top or bottom of any page where it says:
Home»Motoring»Parking Tickets Fines & Parking - read the NEWBIES THREAD0 -
It is the first time I am posting on this forum. It was pay and display car part with automatic plate recognition. The parking ticket was lost before the CPN arrived so i can just estimate that it was paid maybe 6-10 minutes after entering. About 15 minutes after expiry. Can not be certain before SAR comes back.
24 minutes was counted based on timestamps from car entering picture to car exiting picture provided.0 -
[FONT=Times New Roman, serif]Nine times out of ten of these tickets are scams so consider complaining to your MP, it can cause the scammer extra work.
Parliament is well aware of the MO of these private parking companies, many of whom are former clampers, 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.
[/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman, serif]http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2019/8/contents/enacted[/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman, serif]
Just as the clampers were finally closed down, so hopefully will many of these Private Parking Companies.[/FONT]You never know how far you can go until you go too far.0 -
OK so don't talk about 24 min, in the defence. Talk about the two Code of Practice grace periods that apply, before and after paying.PRIVATE 'PCN'? DON'T PAY BUT DON'T IGNORE IT (except N.Ireland).
CLICK at the top or bottom of any page where it says:
Home»Motoring»Parking Tickets Fines & Parking - read the NEWBIES THREAD0 -
With a Claim Issue Date of 7th October, and having done the Acknowledgement of Service in a timely manner, you have until 4pm on Monday 11th November 2019 to file your Defence.Giant_Lobster wrote: »...Claim Form from County Court Business Centre dated 07 October 2019.
That's over two weeks away. Plenty of time to produce a Defence, but please don't leave it to the last minute.
When you are happy with the content, your Defence could be filed via email as suggested here:-
Print your Defence.
- Sign it and date it.
- Scan the signed document back in and save it as a pdf.
- Send that pdf as an email attachment to CCBCAQ@Justice.gov.uk
- 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'.
- Log into MCOL after a few days to see if the Claim is marked "defence received". If not chase the CCBC until it is.
- Do not be surprised to receive an early copy of the Claimant's Directions Questionnaire, they are just trying to keep you under pressure.
- 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.
0 - Sign it and date it.
-
From IPC:
15. Grace Periods
15.1 Drivers should be allowed a sufficient amount of time to park and read any signs so
they may make an informed decision as to whether or not to remain on the site.
15.2 Drivers must be allowed a minimum period of 10 minutes to leave a site after a
pre-paid or permitted period of parking has expired.
15.3 The reference to 10 minutes in 15.2 above shall not apply where the period of pre-paid
or permitted parking does not exceed 1 hour providing that the signage on the site
makes it clear to the motorist, in a prominent font, that no grace period applies on that land.
Ok. Pictures of markings/notice boards on site were made. I can not post link to the photo so I will cite it " You must make a valid payment for your full parking duration within 10 minutes of entering the car park. Payment must be made by using the payment terminal or by parkonomy.
Payment was made within 10 minutes. Nothing on the sign is said about exiting.
Remember things are not obvious to me, yet. So I should add one point to the defence above including reference to the Paragraph 15 of IPC Code of Practice saying that not enought time to leave was given in the particular case.
I'll have to think about proper wording.0 -
You'd be saying that the time taken at the start on arrival, and the time taken to leave after the PDT expired, was mere minutes and well within a reasonable period of grace. Then quote the IPC para 15 which is not just about one grace period, it is about the two.
Read 20 or 30 other claim/defence threads before you post here again, please.PRIVATE 'PCN'? DON'T PAY BUT DON'T IGNORE IT (except N.Ireland).
CLICK at the top or bottom of any page where it says:
Home»Motoring»Parking Tickets Fines & Parking - read the NEWBIES THREAD0
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