Accidental small underpayment

Jimsnap

Well, I've finally got a letter from DCB Legal threatening court action, it's headed 'Letter of Claim'
Any advice on how to proceed? should I ignore it or respond?  Thanks for any help.

BrownTrout

I would say a good few hundred lbcs sent for good ol Walton this week have been sent out.

KeithP

Jimsnap said:

Any advice on how to proceed?

Yes. Refer again to the NEWBIES thread. This time read the second post.

Ralph-y

try

.
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/64350585/#Comment_64350585

Ralph

beamerguy

Jimsnap said:

Well, I've finally got a letter from DCB Legal threatening court action, it's headed 'Letter of Claim'
Any advice on how to proceed? should I ignore it or respond?  Thanks for any help.

SPOT THE DIFFERENCE between the "wide mouth frog" and DCBL ???

ANSWER ... The frog tells the truth ? and if you look at this thread, see what happens to dodgy legals who don't tell the truth ......... it's all about adding fake amounts to their claim because they think you are a mug.
MAXIMUM IS £100

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6103933/abuse-of-process-thread-part-2/p1?new=1

Jimsnap

I've now had a response from DCB Legal informing me to pay up (£160.00) or face court proceedings.  
Their claim is based on the fact that I never displayed a valid ticket for my parking time, they've ignored any mitigating circumstances.
They also said I could possibly have avoided this by appealing to the IAS.
As explained at the start of this thread, I paid £6 to park overnight but only £5 registered, I never noticed the machine had issued a ticket for only £5. (this could be due to a faulty machine or a coin dropping through that I never noticed)
The charges were £3 for one hour and £6 for overnight. 
Although it showed the £5 payment on the ticket it only gave me one hour of parking time.
In a nutshell, my defense was going to be simply that it was obvious this was not an attempt to underpay, I had paid the correct fee, and that any reasonable person could see this. Also, the machine may have been at fault.
To sum up:
1. Technically I'm in the wrong, I didn't display a valid ticket.
2. Morally I'm in the right, I paid the correct fee.
3. The only other mitigating circumstances are that it was dark and I wasn't wearing my reading glasses.
4. I had just spoken to the parking attendant to ask him how much to pay.
I'm obviously relying on common sense and a reasonable judge.
That reliance has taken a severe blow after seeing what happened to robertcox99 (See link below)
I'm now wondering if I should just pay up to avoid further costs?
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6155269/court-claim-received-need-a-little-reassurance-that-im-in-the-right-direction/p8

Coupon-mad

Robert Cox's case was one of the 1% who lost, here.  99% who report back, report a discontinuance or a win, consistently, since 2016.

In a nutshell, my defense was going to be simply that it was obvious this was not an attempt to underpay, I had paid the correct fee, and that any reasonable person could see this. Also, the machine may have been at fault.

'Defence' not 'defense' (a Judge won't like American spellings).  And you rightly say your defence 'was' going to be...but it's not going to be now you are here, is it, given we have a template defence to which you add a few facts.  You won't be writing a simple defence about 'mitigation'!

I'm now wondering if I should just pay up to avoid further costs?

What further costs might those be, given the added £60 is disallowed?  Rhetorical question.  You do NOT risk anything by defending,.

Fruitcake

If you win, you could get nothing, or up to £95.
Even if you lose it will only cost you £175 - £200 as long as you properly defend it and attack the fake double recovery £60 they have added on.

Snakes_Belly

"In a nutshell, my defence was going to be simply that it was obvious this was not an attempt to underpay, I had paid the correct fee, and that any reasonable person could see this. Also, the machine may have been at fault."
Good point. 

It's possible that the machine accepted the £5.00 and became full at that point rejecting the £1.00 which you perhaps did not notice in the dark.  It's very likely that many visitors to the Hippodrome were parking at this time and the machine was filling up. PPC's do not maintain their ticket machines well and should be aware of the optimum time that a machine will need to be emptied. You could ask for the records to see if there was an error. They are unlikely to provide them.

Even if the coin fell through and issued you with a ticket for an incorrect tariff it is still a very minor transgression (de minimis). 

I guess that now the car park is empty and the Hippodrome is losing money at their busiest time of year.

Just as a matter of interest I think that there is another poster current fighting their corner against this company.  The car park is located in the Jewelry Quarter and looks very poorly maintained.   

Snakes_Belly

"They also said I could possibly have avoided this by appealing to the IAS."

If they are trying to use this as part of their argument then take a look on how the IAS has been described by MP's. It's been described as "putting Dracula in charge of a blood bank".  The IAS is not an independent appeals service hence the need for a new CoP and single appeals service.

You should be able to knock that comment out quite easily.