VCS Claim

sogu

IN THE COUNTY COURT

CLAIM No: -

BETWEEN:

VEHICLE CONTROL SERVICES LTD (Claimant)

-and-

- (Defendant)

________________________________________
DEFENCE
________________________________________

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

2. The facts are that the defendant was the registered keeper of the vehicle, registration -, on the date - on which the alleged Parking Charge Notice was issued.

3. 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.

4. 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 Defendant notes that there are many separate companies that have signage within the same space of land, each claiming that parking represents acceptance by conduct of a contractual agreement with themselves only, and therefore each contradicting the possibility of such actions forming a contractual agreement with any of the other companies displaying signage. This causes an entirely ambiguous situation in which there is no certainty as to whom any such contract could be in agreement with.

5. 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.

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.

Costs on the claim - disproportionate, disingenuous and an abuse of process

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. Such a claim represents an abuse of process.

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 administrative 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 was identical in striking out both claims without a hearing, stating:
''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 believe that the facts stated in this Defence are true.


Name

Signature


Date

Coupon-mad

Why doesn't your defence mention the red card?

Which car park is this?

Why doesn't your defence use the POFA, like in adambuzz14's thread where he won in court about the red card issue, and he (or maybe crowdfunding thanks to softwaremad) paid for a transcript to help the greater good here?

Remove #11 and #12 as they are not used any more.

Read the ABUSE OF PROCESS thread post #14 which now includes two Warwick cases struck out without a hearing, which mention the CRA 2015 and echo the Southampton case.

nosferatu1001

C-M - from what I can tell the OP has already submitted their defence

Coupon-mad

OK they will have to address the missing stuff at WS stage, no worries.

They need to read adambuzz14's thread to learn, and use his transcript as evidence.

sogu

Been away for a while, sorry. 
Coupon - the "infringement" occurred at LGCP at QMC Nottingham. 
I submitted my defence months ago. I need to submit my WS by end of May. 

sogu

I didn't mention the red card as I thought this would infer that I was the driver....

nosferatu1001

Not hard for people to have been occupants of tghe vehicle, or to have told the defendant.

Coupon-mad

Wow you need to read the thread by @adambuzz14

D_P_Dance

I didn't mention the red card as I thought this would infer that I was the driver...

Could you not have been a passenfger

sogu

Point noted - I will add the red card to my WS. 
I forgot to mention that I received a letter from VCS offering to end processings if I agreed to pay the reduced amount of £120. 
I see that this is quite common for VCS. I didn't respond to it. Should I respond?
I will read the thread mentioned, thanks.