DCBL notice of debt recovery - unpaid parking charge

Half_way

As  NHS staff, are you aware of the NHS parking principles for staff, patients and visitors?
have you looked through that and used it to draft a complaint to PALS?
if not the please google the principles (I'm on mobile at the moment so can't post links easily) ads of you haven't contacted PALS please post your complaint here first.
remember these are not fines penalties, offences etc

Coupon-mad

Don't post it.  Clearly this is an email, which will give you immediate proof of sending.

Tell your colleagues to do the same and ALL OF YOU complain to the Trust and inform Piers Morgan (but tell him you DON'T want him to pay the scam firm, you want him to publicise what is happening to all these staff!).

You need to write your own bit about being a nurse and how dare they...(your words, your distress, not ours).  Write it from the heart.

Both include mandatory rules and principles which QDR has breached

QDR?  It's DCBL.

re Civil Enforcement PCN ref *********, ********* and **********

 Civil Enforcement?  It's CP Plus...

Oh, also add stuff about a threat of a counterclaim for harassment by CP Plus and breach of the FCA rules by DCBL.  Here is the ending of one I wrote for a friend to DCBL (I've altered it to add relevant things for the NHS situation).  I want you to add all of this and to circulate this to colleagues to copy too, and get someone to contact the papers and Piers Morgan by Twitter:

Breach of debt collection rules - complaint to the FCA about DCBL

I draw your attention to the Financial Conduct Authority's (FCA) Consumer Credit sourcebook which your staff can read here (May 2020 source 50):

https://www.handbook.fca.org.uk/handbook/CONC.pdf 

 

which includes mandatory principles including those I have quoted below.  It is noted that DCBL's letters say that you are regulated by the FCA and your online 'payment portal' offers payments by instalments (i.e. you offer credit on behalf of clients) therefore it is my position that your conduct is bound by the Sourcebook rules.

As an FCA member (if DCBL in fact are), you have breached the basic 'clear fair and not misleading' rule and the Duty not to use misleading names which would include displaying on your horrific letters, the misleading logo ''Can't Pay?  We'll Take it Away'' and using the word 'bailiffs', yet knowing that you are not in fact acting as bailiffs at all:

''A firm must not carry on a credit-related regulated activity under a name which is likely to mislead customers about the status of the firm or the nature of its business, or in any other way. [Note: section 25(1AD) of CCA]''.  2.2.3. 

(1) ''In relation to CONC 2.2.3 R, an example of where a name may mislead is if the average customer of the firm is likely to be misled by the name of the firm.

 (2) Examples of the matters concerning a firm's status or the nature of its business about which its name may mislead customers include: 

(a) the identity or nature of the firm;  

(b) its commercial or profit-seeking status; 

(c) its role, including any relationship with any other person; 

(d) the extent of its authority; 

(e) stating or implying that the firm is a public body or that it is related or connected in some way to a charitable, not-for-profit or governmental or local governmental organisation or to the courts; 

(f) the nature of the products or services supplied; 

(g) the cost of those products or services; and 

(h) the scale of the business including its geographical scope. 

(3) A firm which operates under a variety of trading names should take particular care to ensure that customers are not misled as to the identity of the firm, or the nature or scale of the firm’s business''.   2.2.4.  

"A firm must not ignore or disregard a customer's claim that a debt has been settled or is disputed and must not continue to make demands for payment without providing clear justification and/or evidence as to why the customer's claim is not valid." 7.5.3

"A firm must suspend any steps it takes or its agent takes in the recovery of a debt from a customer where the customer disputes the debt on valid grounds or what may be valid grounds." 7.14.1

"Where a customer disputes a debt on valid grounds or what may be valid grounds, the firm must investigate the dispute and provide details of the debt to the customer in a timely manner." 7.14.3

If you do not stop your 'recovery' activity (whatever that means) whilst investigating my dispute, then DCBL will be in further breach of the FCA's rules.  Bear in mind I am sending a formal complaint to the SRA and FCA about DCBL in any case, so this email is a final chance for you and your client to avoid digging a deeper hole.

Harassment and notice of proprosed £900 counter claim

Due to the nature, number and wording of the unrelenting and wholly misleading ZZPS and DCBL letters, which followed predatory PCNs issued to an NHS employee by this notoriously rogue parking company, at a site which is operated in breach of the BPA Code of Practice, the entire series of communiciations constitutes unwarranted harassment.  I dispute the quantum and object to the intimidatory, misleading nature of the entire operation.  

Your clients have no cause of action, and must stop.  A formal complaint has been made to the NHS Trust by a group of nurses, and if your client still operates this car park, the hope is that they will now be removed for unreasonably intimidating NHS staff and for breaching the NHS Car Parking Principles, a Government policy found here:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/nhs-patient-visitor-and-staff-car-parking-principles

Kindly inform your clients that if a claim is filed, I will counterclaim and I will seek damages for distress and/or breach of statutory duty in the sum of £900, which is at the lower end of established guidance regarding harassment claims, pursuant to the following: 

a) damages for distress caused by the Claimants’ breach of statutory duty and misleading actions within the meaning of the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008, as amended by the Consumer Protection Regulations (Amendment) Regulations 2014 (“the Regulations”);  

b) damages for distress caused by the Claimants’ breach of statutory duty arising from breaches of the Consumer Rights Act 2015 ('the CRA');

c) damages for distress caused by breach of statutory duty under the Data Protection Act 2018 and General Data Protection Regulation ('the GDPR');

d) damages for distress caused by harassment contrary to the Protection from Harassment Act 1997 ('the PFHA') ref section 3.

Personal data must be processed fairly and lawfully.  Your clients stand in breach of Article 5 (1) of the GDPR (the requirement for lawfulness, fairness and transparency) and the doctrines of open dealing and good faith in the CRA.   Accordingly, the processing of my DVLA data was not “necessary for the performance of, or commencing, a contract”, since no such contract existed.

I will be reporting your clients to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) for the initial processing and for sharing and allowing my data to be misused by ZZPS and DCBL to send various misleading communications and will be reporting DCBL for the same data misuse.

Your client had, and still has, no prospect of furthering their purpose and no legitimate cause to continue processing my data. In accordance with Principles 1,2 and 5 of the Data Protection Principles they were not permitted to either obtain, process or keep it.  The quantum of the alleged debt is in breach of Schedule 2 of the CRA and the misleading wording of this bombardment of demands from apparent 'bailiffs' pays no regard to the PAP, the FCA rules or the Regulations cited above in (a).  It is unfair business practice for a parking firm to state that they are an AOS member, yet fail to comply with the BPA's Code of Practice which the Supreme Court took to be effectively 'regulatory'.  The conduct of CP Plus Ltd and their agents has amounted to an unfair commercial practice which is prohibited under regulation 3 of the CPTURs and a misleading action within the meaning of regulations 5 and 6, for which redress is available under regulation 27(J)(b).

In all the premises, the conduct of CP Plus and their agents amounts to harassment under section 1 of the PFHA.  It is pertinent to adduce the authorities of:

(i) Ferguson v British Gas Trading Ltd  [2009] EWCA Civ 46

https://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2009/46.html 

where Sedley LJ held: 

[52] ''...For my part I would draw attention to the fact [...] that harassment is a crime as well as a tort. Contrary to what was more than once suggested, this does not modify in any way the constituents of the wrong. 

[53] Parliament's intention in passing the Protection from Harassment Act 1997 was to criminalise the kind of serious and persistent unwarranted threat which is alleged here, giving a right of civil action as a fallback. In this situation it ought not to be left to hardy individuals to put their savings and homes at risk by suing. The primary responsibility should rest upon local public authorities which possess the means and the statutory powers to bring alleged harassers, however impersonal and powerful, before the local justices.''

and 

(ii) Harrison v Link Financial Ltd [2011] EWHC B3 (Mercantile)

https://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Mercantile/2011/B3.html 

 

where HHJ Chambers QC concluded at [83]:

''Cumulatively and damningly is what I find to be the way that MBNA and the Defendant went about recovering their debt. [...] It seems to me that such conduct has no proper function in the recovery of consumer debt. Whatever the strength of the suggestion that the courts should only be a last resort, I can see no legitimate comparison between a series of measured warnings which, after full opportunity for response, lead to legal proceedings and what took place. {...there} ...can be no excuse for conduct of which it must be supposed the sole purpose must have been to make the Claimant's life so difficult that he would come to heel. I cannot think that in a society that is otherwise so sensitive of a consumer's position this is conduct that should countenanced.''

(iii) Vidal-Hall v Google Inc [2015] EWCA 311 which confirms that pecuniary loss is not necessary for compensation to be payable and that pure distress is enough.

By reason of the matters aforesaid I have been obliged to deal with unjustified and aggressive correspondence from your clients and their agents which has arrived at my old family home and has been opened by my parents, with increasing alarm, during lockdown.  As a Litigant in Person I have suffered substantial damage and distress, causing sleepless nights, headaches and extreme worry.  I consider myself a robust person but I am only human and will attest to the severe effect on my peace of mind, on oath if required by the Judge.  Your clients are the cause of enormous anxiety for my mother and for me, witnessing and trying to allay her distress whilst myself feeling exhausted doing my job. 

Until I sought advice about the issues and was assisted by a layperson to write this substantive reply, my family initially believed that bailiffs were about to arrive and we were scared by DCBL's letters. As a nurse, I was seriously upset by what has been painted as if it is a credible threat to my possessions, credit rating and I thought that people might knock on the door at my family home.  It is even more alarming that the DCBL letters were timed by you or your client's deliberate actions, to arrive during the 2020 lockdown.  I am certain that most people would have succumbed to the crippling pressure DCBL exert, and paid to avoid bailiffs. 

If the bullying and misleading conduct aimed at me regarding these two PCNs is an example of what CP Plus and DCBLegal do every day, then sanctions by the various authorities are long overdue.  Nurses do not need this harassment at the best of times - but at the worst of times, it is unforgivable from a supposedly 'authorised operator' of a BPA scheme that clearly means nothing at all to consumers and is merely self-serving drivel to prop up their paying members. 

Your clients must take stock of their position and cease immediately and/or deal properly with the dispute.  You/your clients must now address the various complaints made about CP Plus and DCBL respectively, to the FCA, BPA, DVLA, ICO, the SRA and now to the NHS Trust and the national press/television.  I expect an apology at the very least but if your client chooses court then I will proceed with my counterclaim and also pursue my entire costs pursuant to Part 27.14(2)(g) of the Civil Procedure Rules.

Yours faithfully, 

YOUR NAME 
(REPEAT YOUR ADDRESS FOR SERVICE HERE)

waamo

Which hospital is this? CP Plus patrol our local one. Their signs are atrocious and if yours are similar they won't stand up in court.

supernurse123

Coupon-mad said:

Don't post it.  Clearly this is an email, which will give you immediate proof of sending.

Tell your colleagues to do the same and ALL OF YOU complain to the Trust and inform Piers Morgan (but tell him you DON'T want him to pay the scam firm, you want him to publicise what is happening to all these staff!).

You need to write your own bit about being a nurse and how dare they...(your words, your distress, not ours).  Write it from the heart.

Both include mandatory rules and principles which QDR has breached

QDR?  It's DCBL.

re Civil Enforcement PCN ref *********, ********* and **********

 Civil Enforcement?  It's CP Plus...

Oh, also add stuff about a threat of a counterclaim for harassment by CP Plus and breach of the FCA rules by DCBL.  Here is the ending of one I wrote for a friend to DCBL (I've altered it to add relevant things for the NHS situation).  I want you to add all of this and to circulate this to colleagues to copy too, and get someone to contact the papers and Piers Morgan by Twitter:

Breach of debt collection rules - complaint to the FCA about DCBL

I draw your attention to the Financial Conduct Authority's (FCA) Consumer Credit sourcebook which your staff can read here (May 2020 source 50):

https://www.handbook.fca.org.uk/handbook/CONC.pdf 

 

which includes mandatory principles including those I have quoted below.  It is noted that DCBL's letters say that you are regulated by the FCA and your online 'payment portal' offers payments by instalments (i.e. you offer credit on behalf of clients) therefore it is my position that your conduct is bound by the Sourcebook rules.

As an FCA member (if DCBL in fact are), you have breached the basic 'clear fair and not misleading' rule and the Duty not to use misleading names which would include displaying on your horrific letters, the misleading logo ''Can't Pay?  We'll Take it Away'' and using the word 'bailiffs', yet knowing that you are not in fact acting as bailiffs at all:

''A firm must not carry on a credit-related regulated activity under a name which is likely to mislead customers about the status of the firm or the nature of its business, or in any other way. [Note: section 25(1AD) of CCA]''.  2.2.3. 

(1) ''In relation to CONC 2.2.3 R, an example of where a name may mislead is if the average customer of the firm is likely to be misled by the name of the firm.

 (2) Examples of the matters concerning a firm's status or the nature of its business about which its name may mislead customers include: 

(a) the identity or nature of the firm;  

(b) its commercial or profit-seeking status; 

(c) its role, including any relationship with any other person; 

(d) the extent of its authority; 

(e) stating or implying that the firm is a public body or that it is related or connected in some way to a charitable, not-for-profit or governmental or local governmental organisation or to the courts; 

(f) the nature of the products or services supplied; 

(g) the cost of those products or services; and 

(h) the scale of the business including its geographical scope. 

(3) A firm which operates under a variety of trading names should take particular care to ensure that customers are not misled as to the identity of the firm, or the nature or scale of the firm’s business''.   2.2.4.  

"A firm must not ignore or disregard a customer's claim that a debt has been settled or is disputed and must not continue to make demands for payment without providing clear justification and/or evidence as to why the customer's claim is not valid." 7.5.3

"A firm must suspend any steps it takes or its agent takes in the recovery of a debt from a customer where the customer disputes the debt on valid grounds or what may be valid grounds." 7.14.1

"Where a customer disputes a debt on valid grounds or what may be valid grounds, the firm must investigate the dispute and provide details of the debt to the customer in a timely manner." 7.14.3

If you do not stop your 'recovery' activity (whatever that means) whilst investigating my dispute, then DCBL will be in further breach of the FCA's rules.  Bear in mind I am sending a formal complaint to the SRA and FCA about DCBL in any case, so this email is a final chance for you and your client to avoid digging a deeper hole.

Harassment and notice of proprosed £900 counter claim

Due to the nature, number and wording of the unrelenting and wholly misleading ZZPS and DCBL letters, which followed predatory PCNs issued to an NHS employee by this notoriously rogue parking company, at a site which is operated in breach of the BPA Code of Practice, the entire series of communiciations constitutes unwarranted harassment.  I dispute the quantum and object to the intimidatory, misleading nature of the entire operation.  

Your clients have no cause of action, and must stop.  A formal complaint has been made to the NHS Trust by a group of nurses, and if your client still operates this car park, the hope is that they will now be removed for unreasonably intimidating NHS staff and for breaching the NHS Car Parking Principles, a Government policy found here:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/nhs-patient-visitor-and-staff-car-parking-principles

Kindly inform your clients that if a claim is filed, I will counterclaim and I will seek damages for distress and/or breach of statutory duty in the sum of £900, which is at the lower end of established guidance regarding harassment claims, pursuant to the following: 

a) damages for distress caused by the Claimants’ breach of statutory duty and misleading actions within the meaning of the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008, as amended by the Consumer Protection Regulations (Amendment) Regulations 2014 (“the Regulations”);  

b) damages for distress caused by the Claimants’ breach of statutory duty arising from breaches of the Consumer Rights Act 2015 ('the CRA');

c) damages for distress caused by breach of statutory duty under the Data Protection Act 2018 and General Data Protection Regulation ('the GDPR');

d) damages for distress caused by harassment contrary to the Protection from Harassment Act 1997 ('the PFHA') ref section 3.

Personal data must be processed fairly and lawfully.  Your clients stand in breach of Article 5 (1) of the GDPR (the requirement for lawfulness, fairness and transparency) and the doctrines of open dealing and good faith in the CRA.   Accordingly, the processing of my DVLA data was not “necessary for the performance of, or commencing, a contract”, since no such contract existed.

I will be reporting your clients to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) for the initial processing and for sharing and allowing my data to be misused by ZZPS and DCBL to send various misleading communications and will be reporting DCBL for the same data misuse.

Your client had, and still has, no prospect of furthering their purpose and no legitimate cause to continue processing my data. In accordance with Principles 1,2 and 5 of the Data Protection Principles they were not permitted to either obtain, process or keep it.  The quantum of the alleged debt is in breach of Schedule 2 of the CRA and the misleading wording of this bombardment of demands from apparent 'bailiffs' pays no regard to the PAP, the FCA rules or the Regulations cited above in (a).  It is unfair business practice for a parking firm to state that they are an AOS member, yet fail to comply with the BPA's Code of Practice which the Supreme Court took to be effectively 'regulatory'.  The conduct of CP Plus Ltd and their agents has amounted to an unfair commercial practice which is prohibited under regulation 3 of the CPTURs and a misleading action within the meaning of regulations 5 and 6, for which redress is available under regulation 27(J)(b).

In all the premises, the conduct of CP Plus and their agents amounts to harassment under section 1 of the PFHA.  It is pertinent to adduce the authorities of:

(i) Ferguson v British Gas Trading Ltd  [2009] EWCA Civ 46

https://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2009/46.html 

where Sedley LJ held: 

[52] ''...For my part I would draw attention to the fact [...] that harassment is a crime as well as a tort. Contrary to what was more than once suggested, this does not modify in any way the constituents of the wrong. 

[53] Parliament's intention in passing the Protection from Harassment Act 1997 was to criminalise the kind of serious and persistent unwarranted threat which is alleged here, giving a right of civil action as a fallback. In this situation it ought not to be left to hardy individuals to put their savings and homes at risk by suing. The primary responsibility should rest upon local public authorities which possess the means and the statutory powers to bring alleged harassers, however impersonal and powerful, before the local justices.''

and 

(ii) Harrison v Link Financial Ltd [2011] EWHC B3 (Mercantile)

https://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Mercantile/2011/B3.html 

 

where HHJ Chambers QC concluded at [83]:

''Cumulatively and damningly is what I find to be the way that MBNA and the Defendant went about recovering their debt. [...] It seems to me that such conduct has no proper function in the recovery of consumer debt. Whatever the strength of the suggestion that the courts should only be a last resort, I can see no legitimate comparison between a series of measured warnings which, after full opportunity for response, lead to legal proceedings and what took place. {...there} ...can be no excuse for conduct of which it must be supposed the sole purpose must have been to make the Claimant's life so difficult that he would come to heel. I cannot think that in a society that is otherwise so sensitive of a consumer's position this is conduct that should countenanced.''

(iii) Vidal-Hall v Google Inc [2015] EWCA 311 which confirms that pecuniary loss is not necessary for compensation to be payable and that pure distress is enough.

By reason of the matters aforesaid I have been obliged to deal with unjustified and aggressive correspondence from your clients and their agents which has arrived at my old family home and has been opened by my parents, with increasing alarm, during lockdown.  As a Litigant in Person I have suffered substantial damage and distress, causing sleepless nights, headaches and extreme worry.  I consider myself a robust person but I am only human and will attest to the severe effect on my peace of mind, on oath if required by the Judge.  Your clients are the cause of enormous anxiety for my mother and for me, witnessing and trying to allay her distress whilst myself feeling exhausted doing my job. 

Until I sought advice about the issues and was assisted by a layperson to write this substantive reply, my family initially believed that bailiffs were about to arrive and we were scared by DCBL's letters. As a nurse, I was seriously upset by what has been painted as if it is a credible threat to my possessions, credit rating and I thought that people might knock on the door at my family home.  It is even more alarming that the DCBL letters were timed by you or your client's deliberate actions, to arrive during the 2020 lockdown.  I am certain that most people would have succumbed to the crippling pressure DCBL exert, and paid to avoid bailiffs. 

If the bullying and misleading conduct aimed at me regarding these two PCNs is an example of what CP Plus and DCBLegal do every day, then sanctions by the various authorities are long overdue.  Nurses do not need this harassment at the best of times - but at the worst of times, it is unforgivable from a supposedly 'authorised operator' of a BPA scheme that clearly means nothing at all to consumers and is merely self-serving drivel to prop up their paying members. 

Your clients must take stock of their position and cease immediately and/or deal properly with the dispute.  You/your clients must now address the various complaints made about CP Plus and DCBL respectively, to the FCA, BPA, DVLA, ICO, the SRA and now to the NHS Trust and the national press/television.  I expect an apology at the very least but if your client chooses court then I will proceed with my counterclaim and also pursue my entire costs pursuant to Part 27.14(2)(g) of the Civil Procedure Rules.

Yours faithfully, 

YOUR NAME 
(REPEAT YOUR ADDRESS FOR SERVICE HERE)

Thank you so much coupon-mad. Sorry about the incorrect abbreviations in the letter that i hadn't changed (i'm still earning) and thank you for correcting me so that i don't sound like an idiot. 

I am going to complain to the trust; i have been given the general managers email and will also complain to PALS also as advised. 

You have been of amazing help, i don't know how to thank you more. I shall email this off and be back in touch soon with any correspondence.

Thanks again 

D x

Fruitcake

If you are a member of a trade union, your rep should be all over this scam like a rash.

supernurse123

Just a little update on this guys. 

I emailed the constructed email to CP plus and DCBL as advised. CP Plus replied stating that they are unable to consider an appeal as the time limit for appeals had passed and to contact DCBL. I expected as much from them to be honest, but they subsequently got my new address anyway as intended for further correspondence if needs be and cease harassment to my mums address. 

I complained to PALS, and i also emailed the general manager of the hospital who forwarded this on to their business support administrator, who has sent off the PCN's for cancellation. 

Last week DCBL had emailed the business support administrator back saying they are unable to see the PCNS in email and have asked for car reg, so i forwarded on again both car reg and PCN's, which she states she has done and i have email thread of this. 

Only yesterday DCBL have emailed me back a response informing me that my name didn't match the records (already knew this) and i needed to respond with the name on the DCBL correspondence for them to respond to my enquiry. So replied to them stating that the relevant persons have already sent off for them to be cancelled with themselves and has clarified car registration and PCN's therefore they will no longer need any further correspondence from myself as the matter has been dealt with. 

Nothing back from them as of yet. Should i expect or is this finally done?

They seem to be more responsive to the business administrator. 

So as far as I'm aware its all done with... unless there is anything i should be aware of or expect?

- Cant thank all of you for your help and advise 

Forever grateful

Supernurse x

D_P_Dance

Nine times out of ten these tickets are scams, so consider complaining to your MP., it can cause the scammer extra costs, and in some cases, cancellation. 

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 later this year,

Just as the clampers were finally closed down, so hopefully will many of these companies, 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.

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2019/8/contents/of these Private Parking Companies.

Coupon-mad

They seem to be more responsive to the business administrator. 
So as far as I'm aware its all done with

Great news!  Keep all the paperwork just in case and email DCBL in September telling them and CP Plus to erase your data.

Have your colleagues made the same complaints to the business admin?

supernurse123

I intend to!
Yes as far as I'm aware they have all complained to the business administrator and the general manager. 

Any more updates ill post on here, thank you guys! 

Coupon-mad

One last thing...please can you and your colleagues take time to comment on the new Code of Practice and tell your experiences and state what you think about the draft code when it is published soon for public consultation, by the BSI & Government. 

Get this wrong now and consumers will regret it forever.