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"Letter of Claim" from Northern Parking Services

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Luc1fer
Luc1fer Posts: 28 Forumite
Fourth Anniversary 10 Posts Name Dropper Combo Breaker
edited 20 January 2020 at 6:53PM in Parking tickets, fines & parking
Hi,
After scanning this forum for a while I have come to the conclusion that I am dim and can't find much information on how to proceed with a PCN.

Backstory - the keeper received a PCN back in July for returning within a 1 hour no return period.
The free car park has a 90 minute maximum stay. The car park in question is operated by Northern Parking Services.
The driver was in the car park for a period of 20 mins, the driver then left and returned 20 minutes later to return faulty goods and was parked for a further 20 mins.
This totals 40 minutes of parking and 20 minutes of "no return" however the amount of time is still less than the 90 minutes maximum stay.
The driver visited Specsavers which is just a minute walk away from the car park - there is nothing on the signage that suggests that you must shop at the attached businesses.

The keeper received a PCN, then reminders then "DCBL" recovery - all of which were ignored.
The keeper has since received a "Letter of Claim" stating that if the keeper does not pay or submit a "Letter of claim" within 14 days they may file a court claim.

It states on the rear of the letter:
"With reference to paragraph 8 of the Practice Direction, please say whether you wish to engage in settlement discussions or some other form of Alternative Dispute Resolution. However, we confirm that we are wiling in principle to do this."

My immediate thought, should the keeper offer to pay a small amount of this "invoice" to cover the DVLA data sharing & postage (i.e £25 ish)? If so - how would the keeper do this?

Side note:
The keeper has attempted to contact all of the businesses on site and none have claimed any responsibility for land ownership or any knowledge of who the land owner is and as such the keeper is out of options in the complain regard.

I'm unable to attach images...

How should the keeper proceed?

Many thanks in advance
«1

Comments

  • KeithP
    KeithP Posts: 41,296 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 10,000 Posts Name Dropper
    Searching the forum using the words cross and eaton throws up ten posts, including this one:

    forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.php?p=74377893#post74377893
  • Redx
    Redx Posts: 38,084 Forumite
    Eighth Anniversary 10,000 Posts Name Dropper Photogenic
    It's a debt collector letter if it gives 14 days , ignore

    A formal LoC gives you 30 days and includes financial forms

    Come back if you get those
  • Luc1fer
    Luc1fer Posts: 28 Forumite
    Fourth Anniversary 10 Posts Name Dropper Combo Breaker
    Redx wrote: »
    It's a debt collector letter if it gives 14 days , ignore

    A formal LoC gives you 30 days and includes financial forms

    Come back if you get those

    Is it possible for me to share the letter through a PM? I'm unable to post links...
    It's all very legal-ese.

    Thank you thus far.
  • KeithP
    KeithP Posts: 41,296 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 10,000 Posts Name Dropper
    Luc1fer wrote: »
    Is it possible for me to share the letter through a PM?
    No point. Redx has already explained why.
  • BrownTrout
    BrownTrout Posts: 2,298 Forumite
    1,000 Posts Third Anniversary Photogenic Name Dropper
    Yes we dont need to see it at all, we know what they look like
  • Snap! We received an NPS Letter of Claim today too (for a different car park).

    Although the letter you have received from NPS is hopelessly non-compliant with the Pre-Action Protocol and Practice Direction, I think it will need to be taken seriously on the basis that it states:

    If however, we do not receive either your payment or your letter of response we will file our Claim in the County Court without further notice to you.

    I note that to date you have ignored all correspondence from NPS. Presumably you did not "appeal" and did not go to POPLA?

    In their letter NPS state that they are willing to consider "some other form of Alternative Dispute Resolution". Perhaps you could suggest referring the matter to POPLA. If nothing else this means that should NPS take you to Court, you will be able to demonstrate that you made a reasonable attempt to engage in ADR.

    For information, we have had recent success at POPLA regarding an NPS PCN issued at Cross Street Retail Park. Although POPLA ruled in our favour on a different point, I think we would probably have also won on NPS's very ropey evidence regarding landholder authority (the landholder was purportedly Merlin Properties Limited).
  • Luc1fer
    Luc1fer Posts: 28 Forumite
    Fourth Anniversary 10 Posts Name Dropper Combo Breaker
    edited 13 November 2019 at 10:36PM
    Snap! We received an NPS Letter of Claim today too (for a different car park).

    Although the letter you have received from NPS is hopelessly non-compliant with the Pre-Action Protocol and Practice Direction, I think it will need to be taken seriously on the basis that it states:

    If however, we do not receive either your payment or your letter of response we will file our Claim in the County Court without further notice to you.

    I note that to date you have ignored all correspondence from NPS. Presumably you did not "appeal" and did not go to POPLA?

    In their letter NPS state that they are willing to consider "some other form of Alternative Dispute Resolution". Perhaps you could suggest referring the matter to POPLA. If nothing else this means that should NPS take you to Court, you will be able to demonstrate that you made a reasonable attempt to engage in ADR.

    For information, we have had recent success at POPLA regarding an NPS PCN issued at Cross Street Retail Park. Although POPLA ruled in our favour on a different point, I think we would probably have also won on NPS's very ropey evidence regarding landholder authority (the landholder was purportedly Merlin Properties Limited).

    I didn't go to POPLA - haven't given those cowboys anything but a SAR.

    Regarding the won cases, don't suppose you're able to provide any links or information regarding contracts between the landowner etc?

    Many thanks.
  • Coupon-mad
    Coupon-mad Posts: 151,694 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 10,000 Posts Name Dropper Photogenic
    edited 15 November 2019 at 3:48AM
    My immediate thought, should the keeper offer to pay a small amount of this "invoice" to cover the DVLA data sharing & postage (i.e £25 ish)? If so - how would the keeper do this?
    No. That is pointless but if you really want to respond to a letter that is NOT a proper LBC, do as advised by Edna Basher:
    In their letter NPS state that they are willing to consider "some other form of Alternative Dispute Resolution". Perhaps you could suggest referring the matter to POPLA. If nothing else this means that should NPS take you to Court, you will be able to demonstrate that you made a reasonable attempt to engage in ADR.
    Other than that, read CEC16's thread to learn some of the arguments to later use if they try a claim, and come back if they do (NO PAYING IT).

    We win cases almost every time in court and there is no huge costs or CCJ risk.

    Same as all the exact same threads posted this week...we assume all of you newbies with tedious (exactly the same) NPS letters have all been reading the forum and have been in touch with each other:

    https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6069249/northern-parking-services-letter-of-claim

    https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6069378/lbc-for-2016-pcn

    https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6069383/parking-charge-from-3-years-ago

    https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6069212/received-a-letter-of-claim-but-not-aware-of-the-pcn-from-2017

    https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6069244/parking-charge-notice-2-year-chase-up

    https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6069984/being-threatened-with-court

    https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6069442/paid-a-parking-charge-now-how-a-letter-from-a-separate-company

    ...we can't do this umpteen dozen times in duplicate so please get together to prevent us having to answer the same thing throughout when your claims arrive.
    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 THREAD
  • Luc1fer
    Luc1fer Posts: 28 Forumite
    Fourth Anniversary 10 Posts Name Dropper Combo Breaker
    How interesting...
    Northern Parking Services has just issued the keeper with another "Letter of Claim" - this time for an additional £10 in the costs! The wording is identical otherwise.

    I'm curious as their previous non-compliant "Letter of Claim" stated that after 14 days they would a claim in the county court with no further correspondence to the keeper. Does this not count as "further correspondence"?

    How much further until this amounts to harassment? :angry:
  • KeithP
    KeithP Posts: 41,296 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 10,000 Posts Name Dropper
    Have a look at this thread started earlier today...
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