90 seconds part two

Redx

what a great result !! yet another loss for VCS and JB !!  made my day to read this, as a fellow blue badge holder ( had one ever since they were orange, never mind blue ), Hit them where it hurts is definitely the way forward, they clearly dont like a taste of their own medicine

Another one bites the dust !!

If VCS or Excel ever try it with me , there will be a similar counter claim , because I do not suffer fools gladly !

As parking companies they should stick to providing fair parking , not litigation !

Fruitcake

I knew about this this morning, but didn't want to steal the OP's thunder.

It is an absolutely brilliant result, and well deserved. The OP worked very, very hard for justice, and he got it in the end.

JB, I hope you are reading this thread. 

321p123

Just read the report and very happy for you lol wow!!! Get urself on holiday next year haha scumbags 

ellaro9

321p123 said:

Just read the report and very happy for you lol wow!!! Get urself on holiday next year haha scumbags 

Haha yeah, I’ll send SRS and JB a postcard. 

The day the claim arrived I emailed JB stating a counterclaim would be lodged at 4pm that day, that was his opportunity to discontinue. 

He actually replied that he would look into it and get back to me, needless to say, he never did. 

So they went into this with their eyes open and were given ample opportunity to stand down. 

95Rollers

Redx said:

what a great result !! yet another loss for VCS and JB !!  made my day to read this, as a fellow blue badge holder ( had one ever since they were orange, never mind blue ), Hit them where it hurts is definitely the way forward, they clearly dont like a taste of their own medicine

Another one bites the dust !!

If VCS or Excel ever try it with me , there will be a similar counter claim , because I do not suffer fools gladly !

As parking companies they should stick to providing fair parking , not litigation !

Its like they love being humiliated! Do they get off on it or something? They should just give up and stop being pathetic parasites.

They must have pretty thick skins taking all these whoopings in court as their names are in the public domain and we all know what they are - but their greed and petty spite keeps them going and blocks out any shame a normal person with a shred of integrity has!  

SRS aka Captain Calamity Clampit and Jake "Michael Mansfield" Burgess and Mr Khan who they seem to use a lot - who no doubt couldn't cut it as a real solicitor or forge a decent meaningful legal career so chases illicit  parking charge notices!. Laughing stocks for sure!  Where is JB - he likes to gloat normally.  You'd think its his own money the way he carries on when he loses lol.

A great result. Justice if there ever was any - £1000 down and all the other money they've wasted harassing the OP on bringing this spurious guff through the system.

I would report this scam to the Police or ActionFraud now it has been dealt with in civil court and found in your favour citing the Judge's comments about it being "abhorrent" etc.

Coupon-mad

I hear this wasn't the only £1000 that VCS got ordered to pay today!  @bargepole knows of another.

ellaro9

Coupon-mad said:

Eminowa said:

This is interesting,  good job coupon-mad and others.  I will love to hear the outcome of this case. Please.

It will help others, @ellaro9, to post your witness statement here, suitably redacted of your data, as it will help with future counterclaims.

Here is my WS, I will put the whole thing includung the exhibits on dropbox when I get chance.

IN THE COUNTY COURT AT DERBY

 

CLAIM No: ######

BETWEEN 

 

VEHICLE CONTROL SERVICES LIMITED
 -and
ellaro9
 __________
WITNESS STATEMENT OF THE DEFENDANT AND PART 20 CLAIMANT
 __________

1. I, ellaro9 of my address am the Defendant and Counterclaimant in this matter will say as follows in support of my defence and counterclaim, both of which are repeated.

2. The facts and matters referred to in my witness statement are within my own knowledge, except where I have stated otherwise. Where the facts are within my knowledge, they are true. Where they are not within my own knowledge, they are true to the best of the information, resources, and belief to be correct.

3. As my counterclaim was undefended the only matter to be determined is confirming the quantum. The Claimant failed to defend my counterclaim despite them being given extra time to do so by District Judge MacCuish.

On 29th April 2021 District Judge MacCuish found that “The claimant not having filed a defence in response to the defendant’s counterclaim, there shall be judgement for the defendant on his counterclaim in a sum to be determined by the court”. This witness statement is a large document as it contains the counterclaim.

4. Whilst parts of this Witness Statement may be familiar to the Claimant, as a litigant-in-person it would not be right to be criticised for using all relevant resources and advice that have been available to me. This statement was prepared by me specifically for this matter and unlike the Claimant’s case; it deals properly and individually with the facts, the non-existent breach of contract, and the quantum.

5. Exhibited to this witness statement are the following attached documents which I will rely on to support the facts and arguments contained in this statement:

a) All correspondences received and made to Vehicle Control Services Limited including photographic evidence and data entries obtained byway from a Subject Access Request made.
b) All correspondences to and from Debt Recovery Plus.
c) All correspondences received from Zenith Collections.

6.  I have had bi-lateral hip replacements following a condition called Avascular Necrosis of the hip; I also have arthritis in the lower back region and suffer severe mobility problems. On top of this, at the time of the parking event I had recently suffered a broken back for which I am still to this day awaiting surgery. The broken bone trapped a nerve causing severe pain in the lower back and leg; I also suffer from loss of sensation in my foot lowering my already poor ability to walk. As a result of all this I easily fall within the remit of the equality act 2010 as severely disabled. I have been issued with a blue badge permit for disabled persons, and have been awarded a badge since 1998 to the present day. It has been necessary to postpone my next spinal surgery due to this ongoing court case. I am no longer able to work and unfortunately now rely on state benefits, which include a Personal Independence Payment (PIP), this benefit replaced Dissability Living Allowance (DLA).

 

7. To summarise this case before going into full details, starting on around a few days after the Claimant issued a Parking Charge Notice back in February 2018.  They continued with numerous attempts seeking payments which I were never liable for and further enlisted two other private 'debt recovery' agencies with the increasing demands and similar threats, demand after demand and threatening letter after threatening letter were sent . Despite communications submitted in writing to the claimant, the demands still continued.  Nothing I ever did would stop it. The threats were threefold in nature: those to start legal proceedings against me could cause considerable anxiety, distress and harm having bailiffs turn up at my door to remove goods and having a CCJ being recorded at the credit reference agencies for 6 years.

 

8. My business was under threat , not only a CCJ would harm my business prospects should I have one issued against me - my disability restricts the type of work I can do, and what matters most to me is the threat of my credit rating being destroyed causing significant problems applying for loans and credit. I wrote letter after letter pointing them to the video showing their agent ticketing me within 84 seconds of leaving the vehicle, proving to them that I am disabled and showing them proof but to no avail. The majority of my letters received no response at all - especially not from the Claimant. I had received assurances that the matter would be looked into (Exhibit , but then the demands and threats continued. I wasted so many hours of my life on this, more importantly, I was brought to a state of considerable anxiety and distress on multiple occasions, not knowing whether I would end up with a County Court judgment and a bailiff would come at any time to remove all my goods, whether I missed a court claim form, that a legal proceedings had already been brought upon me or it had already been reported to a credit rating agency.

9. My counterclaim is that Vehicle Control Services’ course of conduct amounts to unlawful harassment pursuant under the Protection from Harassment Act 1997, breach of the Equality Act 2010 and 4 counts of data protection breaches, pursuant under the respective Data Protection Act 1998 and 2018 for unlawfully obtaining, processing and passing on my data to notoriously aggressive third party debt recovery agencies. I am seeking remedy for £900 for distress, anxiety and alarm caused by the actions of the Claimant pursuant to the above respective acts.

10.  I am a victim of appalling abuse of process and vexatious use of the court system in a blatant attempt to bully and enrich themselves without any lawful entitlement whatsoever. It is submitted that the principal object of my counterclaim is to bring Vehicle Control Services Limited to book. They have spectacularly failed in their duty of care to ensure that the simplest of checks were made in the first instance and this could and should have been avoided. How a seasoned professional parking company got this wrong is beyond me. They should instead start taking responsibility for the running of their company in a competent, honest and ethical manner.

THE CHRONOLOGY OF EVENTS (PRE-ACTION)

11. The Claimants employee took photos of my car on February 7th, it was NOT issued a Parking Charge Notice until February 13th, the Parking Charge Notice came by post (Exhibit E) some five days after me being in the car park, so the claimant used the photos of my registration and obtained my details from the DVLA to then issue their parking charge. If there had been a real PCN on my car, VCS would not have been able to get my data for a month.

VCS obtained my data from the DVLA despite their employee knowing I was disabled before they made the decision to issue a PCN

There is a video from my dashcam which has a timestamp placed indelibly at the bottom left of the picture which shows the sequence of events from entering the car park and leaving the car park. It can be seen that I was in the car park for less than four and a half minutes in total. The video is enclosed in this bundle as a playable DVD (Exhibit A) and can also be viewed here

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BEbsULY1PGY

 

12. I entered the car park at 15:13 and was vaguely aware of an entrance 'P' sign on my right (Exhibit C) as I turned into the entrance to the shopping park, but this was not legible from a moving vehicle and to stop was out of the question (dangerous). As my video shows, the sun was low in the sky causing glare and reducing visibility. I reversed into a parking bay, which was not an obvious disabled space, and there were no signs that could be seen from where the driver was sat facing the shops. Taking my Blue Badge in my hand, in case I needed to register it at a store customer service desk first to claim free parking or extra time (as is sometimes the case on private land) I alighted the vehicle and proceeded towards the P sign I had glimpsed at the entrance to the car park. This was no easy walk for me but I found that the sign only gave instructions to “refer to the terms and conditions signs located in the car park”. I looked around for another sign or a pay & display machine, anything by way of instructions about the terms and conditions but instead I was horrified to see a man taking photos of my car. He would surely have watched me walk to that sign to read it because this was a mere 84 seconds after I had left the vehicle and I was still in its vicinity, Blue Badge in hand.

13. If I can be ticketed within 84 seconds, then why not 60 seconds, why not 20 seconds, why not 2 seconds? This was predatory behaviour by the ticket issuer, he waited for me to leave and have my back turned and then pounced.

 

14. I hurried over and asked the person taking photos of my car what the problem was and was informed “it’s a disabled space”. I told him that I was indeed a Blue Badge holder and showed him, and that he must have seen me arrive and hobble over to read the entrance sign. I was shocked because I had been within his sight, trying to read some t&cs to find out if the car park was free and if I had to register my Blue Badge. He barked “you're not displaying a badge”, then “you will get a CCJ if you don’t pay a PCN''. 

 

15. I left without ever reading any t&cs, my reasons for visiting the shops forgotten because he'd scared and shocked me and his attitude and CCJ threat, drove me away. I wanted to avoid an unfair parking charge and he knew there was no legitimate reason to issue one from that point on. All this could have been avoided if he had noted our conversation and not passed the photos of my car to the office to intrusively and without 'reasonable cause' (DVLA requirement) obtain my data to issue a parking charge by post. This all happened after the event, at a point when the Claimant already knew I was disabled.

I invite the court to note that contract law (a contract I never had a fair opportunity to read) can't ever override statute law (the Equality Act 2010 duty not to discriminate against known disabled people and to make 'reasonable adjustments' for those persons).

 

16. I left the car park at 15:17 which means the defendant was in the car park around four and a half minutes, this time was used walking to the entrance sign, reading it, returning to the vehicle and speaking to the warden, and getting back in my vehicle. I would have left in less time than this but there was a vehicle blocking the thoroughfare and I had to wait for this vehicle to move. This can be seen in my video.

 

17. VCS will claim there was a sign directly behind my vehicle but it should be pointed out that it was very high from the ground and difficult to read even from an outside standing position, and it was in no way visible to the disabled driver from an inside seated position. Neither was it in any way obvious that my vehicle was in a disabled parking space as the paint was very faded and there were no ‘Disabled Bay’ signs. (Exhibit D)

ANYONE who qualifies under the EA2010 (NOT JUST DISABLED PEOPLE) can use those bays, the service provider has to make reasonable adjustments for those people

 

18. Subsequent to the alleged event, I received a Parking Charge Notice (PCN) from the Claimant which arrived in the post with a demand for £100, payment to be made within 28 days. Their Notice to Keeper [PCN] is attached marked as Exhibit  E.

19.  I wrote a challenge (Exhibit  I) stating that I am disabled and provided a copy of my blue badge (Exhibit F and G), I also pointed out that I was ticketed within 84 and gave a link to the video from my dashcam. I also pointed out that a contract could not conceivably be formed within 84 seconds.

 

20. This challenge was rejected with what appeared to be an assembled template response from Excel Parking, this is the sister company to VCS and I have no dealings with Excel in any way, although the letter was in VCS’s name (Exhibit H). They claimed the blue badge booklet states the blue badge must be shown face up on the dashboard but failed to mention that the booklet also says that the badge is for public land and not private land and that ‘different rules apply on private land’, so they had picked and chosen words to fit their narrative. They also failed to answer how a contract could be formed within 84 seconds.

 

ellaro9

21. This was replied to reiterating my disabilities and Protected Characteristics under the Equality Act 2010, and pointed out they were breaking the law (Exhibit  J).

My letter went unanswered.

 

22. The next correspondence was a “NOTICE OF INTENDED COURT PROCEEDINGS” (Exhibit K) which was a threat letter and caused considerable distress as it spoke of “warrant of control” and “bailiffs”.

 

23. This was replied to (Exhibit L) again reiterating I was not liable for the charge as I am disabled and have protected characteristics under the Equality Act 2010, it also stated court proceedings would be defended and a counter-claim lodged due to their harassment, breaches of Data protection law and breaches of the Equality Act.

Unsurprisingly, I had never received any sort of response back from the Claimant in relation to the facts stated in my letter.

 

24. A complaint was made to the claimants Approved Operator Scheme the IPC, (Exhibit M) this went unanswered as did several more complaints.

 

 

25. I took advice on how to deal with this claim and was advised to locate the landowner, and contact my MP, and having contacted the land registry I found the managing agent for the landowner (Exhibit Y) as they were responsible for instructing Vehicle Control Services.  They were informed of the situation and agreed to tell VCS to cancel the charge. (Exhibit N)

 

26. I got my MP involved as I believed they were more likely to get a response than me, a response was given to my MP by the IPC but it was in defence of the claimant’s sister company Excel. Ultimately they stopped answering my MP.

 

27. Exhibit O page 5 point 1.2 is from the House of Commons Library which clearly states “The scheme does not apply on private land; “. VCS are aware of this fact.

 

28.  A letter dated 04/05/2018 from Debt Recovery Plus(DRP) arrived in the post with an increased demand for £160, I was so angry and was shocked. I immediately wrote to DRP and sent a copy of the letter I had sent to Vehicle Control Services asking them to cease and desist. This went unanswered and was followed by numerous letters from Debt Recovery Plus and Zenith Collections demanding various amounts and making numerous menacing threats, each letter causing more anxiety than the last. (Exhibit P 1-7)

 

29. I wrote to vcs complaining that I had been written to by DR+ and complained about harassment and their breach of Data protection law. (Exhibit Q).  My letter went unanswered.

 

30. Throughout the time I was getting these threatening letters my wife was suffering with health problems and was diagnosed with a tumour. The tumour could not be operated on because of other health conditions, so not only were we worried about this we were wondering if bailiffs were going to turn up and remove our car. When my wife was finally admitted to hospital to have the tumour removed, she went into theatre in tears wondering if we would have a car or any possessions when she got home.

 

31. At this point, I was so fed up, thinking it was becoming something of a joke or a scam - the letters coming in was relentless, nothing I say or write will ever bring any resolution to this matter at all. 

32. A SAR was sent to VCS but was incomplete when it arrived. VCS were informed of this but my concerns again went unanswered, another SAR was sent which also went unanswered, despite receiving an automated confirmation that they had received it. I informed the ICO who wrote to VCS giving those 28 days to provide me with my information, they failed to comply so the ICO wrote to them again giving them 7 days to respond. (Exhibit R) They have also failed to comply with this demand from the ICO.

33. At the point of submitting this witness statement VCS have failed to supply me with a complete SAR and failed to comply with instruction from the ICO.

34. It is clear VCS will have the instruction from their client, the principal to discontinue, and that is why they are not sending me a complete SAR, and failing to comply with the ICO and therefore breaking data protection law and putting me at a disadvantage by not showing me the information to which I am legally entitled.

35. The last letter from VCS was a ‘Letter Before Claim’ on 22/05/2020. This was replied to pointing out once again that I was not liable for the charge and that a counterclaim would be issued if they followed through their threat of issuing a claim against me. (Exhibit T)

 

36. Communications now went cold and I heard no more from Vehicle control Services, Debt Recovery Plus or Zenith Collections. I was of the belief they had taken stock of the situation and were now going to leave me alone.

 

37. My family moved house and I thought it would be better to inform VCS of my new address so they did not issue a court claim which I would not know about and thereby get a default judgement against me. So I wrote to VCS with my new address and the next thing I heard was from Northampton bulk centre as VCS had issued a county court claim against me.

 

38. This claim came at a time just before I was scheduled to go into hospital for surgery. It was almost impossible to deal with the stress of the surgery and now the impending court claim for monies which I did not owe. I was having to take prescribed medication to make me sleep at night as I would lie awake thinking about VCS and the court claim. I am facing a court claim at a time when I am due to go into hospital again for spinal surgery, the strain of which is affecting my mental wellbeing, home life, relationship with my wife and ability to deal with day to day events.

 

39.  At this point I gave up, I was so distressed and angry, and it affected my relationship with my wife and family. The stress of all this triggered anxiety and uncertainty; I was not able to function normally in my daily routine. I couldn’t sleep because of the constant stress and worry. The thought of the amount of time I have wasted with this cowboy parking company - having to deal with this purported “debt” was too much to bear.

 

40. The claimant has a sister company called Excel Parking LTD, both VCS and Excel are owned by the same people.

In Case Number 3QT60496 Excel v Greenwood, a case about a forgotten blue badge, the Judge found that the Excel should have made reasonable adjustments once they knew about the disability.

The judge decided that the Operator had a legal duty to make a 'reasonable adjustment' for a genuine disabled person even when (as in that case) no Blue Badge was displayed. The judge also commented that the defendant (a disabled man issued with a Parking Charge) would have been likely to have had a case for compensatory damages.

ellaro9

41. A disability does not suddenly disappear in the absence of a blue badge but in my case, the ticketer saw my Blue Badge and had not issued a PCN. He had printed something that said 'this is NOT a parking charge notice', a hybrid 'soft ticketing' confusing document the the DVLA has since ordered this Claimant to stop issuing.  At the point of knowing I was disabled and entitled to use that bay, there was no parking charge and no notice issued. Instead of noting my disability on his hand held device, the ticketer uploaded his photos to the Claimant so that they could issue a parking charge by post, long after the firm had irrefutable knowledge of my entitlement to use the bay.  This is where the harassment comes in, and I ask the court to consult the law and note that harassment of a known disabled person is a specific breach of the Equality Act 2010 (not just the Protection from Harassment Act) at section 26 https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2010/15/section/26 :

26 Harassment

(1)A person (A) harasses another (B) if—

(a)A engages in unwanted conduct related to a relevant protected characteristic, and

(b)the conduct has the purpose or effect of—

(i)violating B's dignity, or

(ii)creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment for B.

(4) In deciding whether conduct has the effect referred to in subsection (1)(b), each of the following must be taken into account—

(a) the perception of B;

(b) the other circumstances of the case;

(c) whether it is reasonable for the conduct to have that effect.

 

42. I have now satisfied further that in the balance of probabilities that the claimant “knew or ought to have known” that this claim had no merit and I was not liable in law. I have further strengthened my position that the Claimant was negligent and lazy and their sole aim was to bully me for money which they had no lawful entitlement to.

 

 

43. VCS claim that if a private car park has signs demanding that if drivers do not display a blue badge when using the disabled parking bays they risk getting a parking ticket, it somehow overrides primary statute law. However, the Equality Act makes it clear that just because someone does not hold (or does not display) a blue badge does not mean they are not disabled; the Equality Act does not require the driver to display any sort of badge or permit. Anyone who fits the lawful definition of disability is entitled to make use of the ‘reasonable adjustments’. What they are in effect doing is adding arbitrary rules to the lawful right of someone to use a ‘reasonable adjustment’, and this is a breach of the Equality Act.

 

44. I as the driver do indeed hold a blue badge and am disabled, so Vehicle Control Services are discriminating against me by not allowing me to use the disabled bays and trying to charge me for doing so. They have further discriminated against me by not allowing sufficient time (disabled people can take longer than able bodied persons) to make an informed decision as to whether to stay on the site or not. They have a duty of reasonable adjustment to disabled persons, charging a disabled person for parking in a disabled bay is failing to make a reasonable adjustment, as is not allowing a reasonable amount of time to read their signage.

A blue badge in not the only indication of a disability.

 

45. The IPC code of practice states

“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.”

It is denied I was given a reasonable amount of time to locate, read and make an informed decision as to whether to remain on site or not (as shown on my dashcam video), and as such VCS have breached their own AOS rules.

 

46. The IPC code of practice also states

“6.2 Blue Badge Holders should be aware that there are no statutory concessions for Blue Badge holders on private land. The badge is intended for on-street parking only. Off-street Car Parks, such as those provided in local authority, hospital or supermarket Car Parks are governed by separate rules and are not covered by the scheme. “

Vehicle Control Services are aware of this, despite that they continue to insist a badge should have been displayed and harass me for monies that I do not owe.

The equivalent British Parking Association code of practice states a 10 minute grace period should be granted.

 

47. Vehicle Control Services have continued to harass me having issued their claim with the court (Exhibit U+V+W) I have received several threatening letters asking for various amounts and making threats to claim their solicitors costs. They must know as they are serial litigators that they cannot claim legal costs unless I have behaved 'wholly unreasonably' with no reasonable explanation for a vexatious conduct, yet it is Vehicle Control Services that have behaved unreasonably and vexaciously throughout.

48. Due to my anxiety triggered this contact-, I did not contact VCS any further  to discuss this with them. My thoughts were “what’s the point?” - On previous occasions it was never dealt with, I couldn’t bring myself to go through this process again.

49. On the claim form I received it says Vehicle Control Services are claiming for a breach of contract. A contract requires and offer, consideration and acceptance. In this case the offer would be the sign, consideration would be reading it and deciding whether to agree to it or not, and acceptance would be remaining on site. It is wholly denied that sufficient time was given to form any contract.

50. Vehicle Control Services claim not to have had contact with the principal, so I once again contacted the principal, and they confirmed they had indeed contacted VCS and asked them to discontinue, the principal was told by VCS that this case had been raised for discontinuance. (Exhibit  X)

51. The claim form VCS have stated under particulars of claim “the act of entering private land was the acceptance of the offer”, yet the sign at the entrance simply states to refer to other signs (Exhibit C), so at the point of entering the land there was no ‘offer’.

 

52. The Claimant has failed in their duty of care and I have satisfied the balance of probabilities that the Claimant has committed at least 3 counts of Data Protection material breaches by unlawfully obtaining and misusing my details from DVLA, and for unlawfully passing on this sensitive data to these third parties firms, furthermore the relentless harassment for monies that was never due was unwarranted. 

 .

 

ellaro9

53. The Claimant has added £60 to their claim on top of what was on their signage (£100). The Defendant has the reasonable belief that the Claimant has not incurred damages or costs to pursue an alleged £100 debt. The arbitrary addition of a fixed sum purporting to cover; damages/costs; is also potentially open to challenge as an unfair commercial practice under the CPRs, where 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. Whilst quantified costs can be considered on a standard basis, this Claimant; purported added £60; damages/costs; are wholly disproportionate, are not genuine losses at all and do not stand up to scrutiny. This has finally been recognised in many court areas. Differently from almost any other trader/consumer agreement, when it comes to parking charges on private land, binding case law and two statute laws have the effect that the parking firms own business/operational costs cannot be added to the parking charge as if they are additional losses. The purported added & costs; are disproportionate, a disingenuous double recovery attempt, vague and in breach of both the CPRs, and the Consumer Rights Act 2015 Schedule 2 terms that may be unfair.

Alleging that the letters the parking firm sent have caused an additional loss, is simply untrue. The standard wording for parking charge/debt recovery contracts is/was on the Debt Recovery Plus website; no recovery/no fee; thus establishing an argument that the Claimant is breaching the indemnity principle - claiming reimbursement for a cost which has never, in fact, been incurred. This is true, whether or not they used a third-party debt collector during the process.

53.1 The Beavis case is against this Claim. Parking Eye Ltd v Beavis [2015] UKSC 67 (the Beavis case) is the authority for recovery of the parking charge itself and no more, since that sum (£85 in the Beavis case) was held to already incorporate the costs of an automated private parking business model including recovery letters. 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 an alleged parking charge; penalty is a sum which the Supreme Court found is already inflated to more than comfortably cover all costs. The case provides a finding of fact by way of precedent, that the £85 (or up to a Trade Body ceiling of £100 depending upon the parking firm) covers the costs of the letters.

This charge is unconscionable and devoid of any legitimate interest, given the facts. To quote from the decision in the Beavis case at Para [108] But although the terms, like all standard contracts, were presented to motorists on a take it or leave it basis, they could not have been briefer, simpler or more prominently proclaimed. If you park here and stay more than two hours, you will pay £85; What matters is that a charge of the order of £85 is an understandable ingredient of a scheme serving legitimate interests.

In the Beavis case it was said at para [205] The requirement of good faith in this context is one of fair and open dealing. Openness requires that the terms should be expressed fully, clearly and legibly, containing no concealed pitfalls or traps. Appropriate prominence should be given to terms which might operate disadvantageously to the customer.

At para 98. The desirability of running that parking scheme at no cost, or ideally some profit, to themselves; Against this background, it can be seen that the £85 charge had two main objects. One was to manage the efficient use of parking space in the interests of the retail outlets, and of the users of those outlets who wish to find spaces in which to park their cars [...] The other purpose was to provide an income stream to enable Parking Eye to meet the costs of operating the scheme and make a profit from its services...;

At para 193; Judging by Parking Eye’s accounts, and unless the Chelmsford car park was out of the ordinary, the scheme also covered Parking Eyes costs of operation and gave their shareholders a healthy annual profit; and at para 198: The charge has to be and is set at a level which enables the managers to recover the costs of operating the scheme. It is here also set at a level enabling Parking Eye to make a profit.

53.2 The POFA 2012 and the ATA Code of Practice are against this Claim The Protection of Freedoms Act 2012, Schedule 4 (the POFA;) at paras 4(5) and 4(6) 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 (further, 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.

53.3 The Consumer Rights Act 2015 is against this claim. Further, the purported added are disproportionate, vague and in breach of the CRA 2015 Schedule 2 terms that may be unfair. This Claimant has arbitrarily added an extra 60% of the parking charge in a disingenuous double recovery attempt that has already been exposed and routinely disallowed by many Courts in England and Wales. It is atrocious that this has been allowed to continue unabated for so many years, considering the number of victims receiving this Claimants exaggerated Letter before Claim, or the claim form, who then either pay an inflated amount or suffer a default judgment for a sum that could not otherwise be recovered. It is only those who defend, who draw individual cases to the attention of the courts one by one, but at last in 2019, some areas noticed the pattern and have moved to stop this abuse of process at source.

53.4 In the Caernarfon Court in Case number F2QZ4W28 (Vehicle Control Services Ltd v Davies) on 4th September 2019, District Judge Jones-Evans stated: Upon it being recorded that District 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 in 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.

That decision in Wales was contested in a N244 application by VCS, but the added £60 was still disallowed on 30 Oct 2019. District Judge Jones-Evans stated that even in cases parking firms win, he never allows the £60 add on, and despite parking firms continuing to include it in their Particulars, most advocates have now stopped pushing for it at hearings. The Judge said that a contract formed by signage is a deemed contract, which the motorist does not have the opportunity to negotiate. That, and the fact that there is no specified sum on the signage, means that the extra £60 cannot possibly be recoverable. He said that the £60 was clearly a penalty, and an abuse of process. The considered sum in that case was reduced to £100 with a full case hearing to follow, but the £60 would not be awarded under any circumstances, and further, he ordered that the Claimant must now produce a statement of how they pleaded claims prior to Beavis, and subsequently.

53.5 In Claim numbers F0DP806M and F0DP201T - BRITANNIA PARKING -v- Mr C and another - less than two weeks later - the courts went further in a landmark judgment in November 2019 which followed several parking charge claims being struck out in the area overseen by His Honour Judge Iain Hamilton-Douglas Hughes QC, the Designated Civil Judge for Dorset, Hampshire, Isle of Wight & Wiltshire. Cases summarily struck out in that circuit included BPA members using BW Legals robo-claim model and IPC members using Gladstones robo-claim model, and the Orders from that court were identical in striking out all such claims without a hearing during a prolonged period in 2019, with the Judge 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 the Beavis case. 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.

BW Legal made an application objecting to two test cases that had been struck out by District Judge Taylor against a parking firm for trying to claim for £160 instead of £100 parking charge. This has been repeated conduct in recent years, on the back of the Beavis case, where parking firms have almost unanimously contrived to add £60, or more, on top of the parking charge. Members of both ATAs who have influence on their self-serving Trade Bodies have even voted to have this imaginary damages/debt collection sum added to their respective two Codes of Practice, to create a veil of legitimacy, no doubt to allow their members to confuse consumers and to enable them to continue to get away with it in several court areas which are still allowing this double recovery.

That N244 application to try to protect the cartel-like position of some of the bigger player parking firms was placed before the area Circuit Judge and a hearing was held on 11th November 2019, with other parking charge cases in that circuit remaining struck out or stayed, pending the outcome. The Defendants successfully argued on points including a citation of the CRA 2015 and the duty of the court to apply the test of fairness to a consumer notice (a statutory duty that falls upon the courts, whether a consumer raises the issue or not). All three points below were robustly upheld by District Judge Grand, sitting at the Southampton Court, who agreed that:

(a) The Claimant knew or should have known that £160 charge (howsoever argued or constructed) was in breach of POFA, due to paras 4(5) and 4(6).

(b) The Claimant knew or should have known, that £160 charge (howsoever argued or constructed) was unconscionable, due to the Beavis case paras 98, 193, 198 and 287.

(c) The Claimant knew or should have known, that £160 charge where the additional recovery sum was in small print, hidden, or in the cases before him, not there at all, is void for uncertainty and in breach of the Consumer Rights Act 2015, Schedule 2 (the grey list of terms that may be unfair) paragraphs 6, 10 and 14.

At the hearing, the Judge refused their request to appeal. It was successfully argued that the parking firms consumer notice stood in breach of the CRA 2015, Schedule 2 (the grey list of terms that may be unfair) paragraphs 6, 10 and 14. Using the statutory duty upon the Courts to consider the test of fairness and properly apply schedule 2 of the CRA 2015 it was irrelevant whether or not the consumers defences had raised it before, which they had not. The same issues apply to this claim.

A transcript will be publicly available shortly. In his summing up, it was noted that District Judge Grand stated: When I come to consider whether the striking out of the whole claim is appropriate, that the inclusion of the £60 charge means that the whole claim is tainted by it, the claimant should well know that it is not entitled to the £60. The very fact that they bring a claim in these circumstances seems to me that it is an abuse of process of the court, and in saying that, I observe that with any claim that can be brought before the court that if a party doesn’t put in a defence to the claim, default judgments are entered. So, the Claimant, in bringing the claims is, in other cases, aware that if the defendant doesn’t submit a defence, the Claimant is going to get a judgment of a knowingly inflated amount. So I conclude by saying that I dismiss the application to set aside Judge Taylor’s ruling.