Car Parking charges and false information from Ipserv Ltd

D_P_Dance

18 hours at £19 per hour comes to more than £250.   Are you selling yourslf too cheaply?

Cardriver45

D_P_Dance said:

18 hours at £19 per hour comes to more than £250.   Are you selling yourslf too cheaply?

I'm a bargin.

I didn't want to put too high a figure as I thought they may just chuck it in the bin or for a judge to just throw it out.

I'm sure it's much higher than 18 hours that I spent but I didn't record it, so I just eatimated a number that would justify the £250 based on what I had to do.

Cardriver45

I just received this latest correspondence from Trace in response to the letter I sent drafted by @Coupon-mad How dense are these people?

Cardriver45

Here's the revised version of my lbc to IPserv with the changes advised.

Re PCN nos: 

Letter before commencing legal action

I am writing to you to claim for the sum of £342 for the distress, inconvenience and lost time caused in dealing with this matter under Article 82 UK GDPR that states;

“Any person who has suffered material or non-material damage as a result of an infringement of this Regulation shall have the right to receive compensation from the controller or processor for the damage suffered.

Any controller involved in processing shall be liable for the damage caused by processing which infringes this Regulation. A processor shall be liable for the damage caused by processing only where it has not complied with obligations of this Regulation specifically directed to processors or where it has acted outside or contrary to lawful instructions the controller.”

This is for the misprocessing of my data under the GDPR Article 5 paragraphs 1 (d)

“Personal data shall be accurate and, where necessary, kept up to date; every reasonable step must be taken to ensure that personal data that are inaccurate, having regard to the purposes for which they are processed, are erased or rectified without delay (‘accuracy’); and (f) Personal data shall be processed in a manner that ensures appropriate security of the personal data, including protection against unauthorised or unlawful processing and against accidental loss, destruction or damage, using appropriate technical or organisational measures (‘integrity and confidentiality).”

This is in regards to your letter dated 13th July 2021 in reply to my letter appealing the Notice to Keeper letters sent to myself. This letter contained incorrect dates for the parking contravention for both PCNs. I replied to this with my letter dated 16th July 2021 pointing out these errors. You replied with the letter dated 26th July 2021 admitting this misprocessing of my data.

I submitted a SAR request on 1st August 2021. You responded to this request on 6th August 2021 and omitted some of the data you hold on me. I emailed you to notify you of this on 7th September 2021. You replied to this email on 10th September 2021 admitting making yet another admin error in omitting some of my data.

Your agent acting on your behalf, Trace Debt Recovery UK Limited, has provided in writing false and misleading information in their letter dated 24th September 2021 on the consequences of court action being taken against me. They claim that court action being taken against me would result in a County Court Judgement. This is untrue as a CCJ would only be awarded in the event of the judge ruling against me and then my refusal to pay any outstanding fees within the 30 days allowed. I can only conclude that the providing of this false and misleading information is a deliberate attempt to mislead and intimidate me about the consequences of court action.

Trace Debt Recovery have added on a false £60 admin fee to the alleged debt. Trace openly advertise that they operate on a no fee basis to Private Parking Companies, so this fee is unjustified.

Added extras fees in this manner has already been ruled as unlawful by 

"Moneyclaim is in part/wholly a penalty, applying the authority in ParkingEye cases (ref: paras 98, 100, 193, 198) ParkingEye Ltd v Beavis [2015] UKSC 67 and para 419 of HHJ Hegarty’s High Court decision in ParkingEye Ltd v Somerfield Stores Ltd ChD [2011] EWHC 4023(QB) where the parking charge was set at £75 (discounted to £37.50 for prompt payment) then increasing ultimately to £135.  Much like the situation in this claim, the business model involved sending a series of automated demands to the keeper.  At para 419, HHJ Hegarty found that adding £60 to an already increased parking charge 'would appear to be penal' and unrecoverable.  ParkingEye had dropped this punitive enhancement by the time of Mr Beavis' famous parking event."

Trace threaten in their letters to me to instruct solicitors. They are not the creditors, so have no legal basis for doing this. They also claim they will pass the case onto their legal department when no such department exists.

As your agent, you are responsible for the conduct of Trace Debt Recovery.

I received a response from Ipswich Borough Council dated 3rd August 2021 in response to my complaint against you and this accuses me (the keeper) of parking in the University of Suffolk car park. It also accuses me of the same in the letter you sent to the University of Suffolk dated 22nd July 2021.
At no point have I admitted to being the driver on the date of contravention and you have provided no evidence to identify myself as the driver. So you should not be stating that I parked in the car park on the date in question.

I have calculated the £342 at £19 per hour for:

3x letters to you to point out your mistakes and ask for a chance to appeal to an independent appeals service.

1x email to point out the mistake you had made in replying to my SAR request

2x emails to the British Parking Association to inform them of your mistakes.

2x emails to the DVLA for the same reason.

2x emails to my local Member of Parliament.

Writing complaints to Ipswich Borough Council.

Total estimated no of hours; 6.

No of hours estimate for research and asking for advice; 12 hours.

Total no of estimated number of hours spent; 18 hours.

As someone who suffers from Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, I am limited to how much time I can spend on activities each day before becoming unwell and heavily fatigued. I had to undertake many hours of research and writing letters not only to yourselves but also writing to my local Member of Parliament, DVLA, BPA and the University of Suffolk to first identify and have these errors rectified. This took a heavy toll on me and risks causing a relapse in my disability. Added to this I was also diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome and Obsessive Compulsive Disorder which affects my ability to understand situations and your administration errors added to my anxiety and stress in dealing with this situation so that I had to consult with many different people to help me to understand your letters and situation as a whole. Symptoms of Asperger’s Syndrome include communication difficulties and affects socialisation skills, so having to communicate with people I do not know well, caused me a great deal of stress and anxiety. I have had to restart taking anti-anxiety medication prescribed by my doctor because of this whole situation.  

I am currently studying a counsellor course, and this seriously affected my studies that I have been undertaking as well as my role as a volunteer with a mental health charity and group due to my frequent bouts of fatigue and anxiety this situation caused. I also felt the need to attend several wellbeing online webinars and sessions on a coaching and therapy organisation/website I am a member of, to help me to cope with the stress.

PCNs are very emotive matters and cause significant upset and in addition to the inconvenience of having to correspond and complain, I suffered worry and distress about having to pay money I could ill-afford to lose. The stress and worry caused by the whole situation has resulted in many sleepless nights for me and has seriously affected my health and wellbeing. You should have had processes in place to prevent and detect the administrative errors made and that would have prevented the distress, inconvenience etc inflicted on me and ensured that you used a debt collection agent who acts in a proper manner.

You have the right to nominate an independent arbitration service of your choice to attempt to resolve this matter.

I am allowing 4 weeks for a response from you and if I do not receive a response within these 4 weeks then I shall be submitting a county court claim.

I await your response.

Yours Faithfully

 

 

 

Cardriver45

The uni of Suffolk have failed to respond anymore to my request so I am going to file a complaint with the ICO.

Here's what I have drafted to send to the ICO for anyone on here to check please before I send it.

• I made a request to the University of Suffolk to provide a copy of the contract between themselves and Ipserv Limited for the management of parking at The University Car Park' Long Street Ipswich under the Freedom of Information act 2000.

• I also requested proof that the contract was put out to tender before being awarded to Ipserv Limited under the Freedom of Information act 2000.

• Initially, UOS refused this request citing commercial interests. 

• I asked for an internal review and proof that the necessary prejudice and public interest tests were carried out.

• UOS then provided a copy and pasted version of the contract with virtually the whole of it redacted. It shows hardly any of the information requested and is a completely inadequate response to my request.

• UOS has completely ignored my request for proof that the contract was put out to tender before being awarded to Ipserv Limited.

 

• UOS has failed to show that they carried out any prejudice and public interest tests or show any results of this from my internal review request.

• They have not replied to my message further requesting they provide the information I originally requested.

Please find the full Whatdotheyknow thread of my request and correspondence with UOS attached for your information.

Cardriver45

I've sent in the ICO complaint about UOS. 

Half_way

Somewhere in the past there was something along the lines that publicly funded bodies such as schools hospitals universities etc could not hide behind the  commercially sensitive excuse when disclosing foi request information on contracts.

Someone else on here may be able to add more to that 

sdmitch

Local authorities and other publicly funded bodies hide the disclosure of 'commercially sensitive' information through use of Section 43 of the FOIA

https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/section-43-commercial-interests/

And in particular the Prejudice Test - follow the link in that section - takes you to a pdf document - good cure for insomnia!

The OP should maybe ask them (UOS) to produce the results of their Prejudice Test - ties them up in knots with this - then take the results to the ICO who will take it from there.

Cardriver45

sdmitch said:

Local authorities and other publicly funded bodies hide the disclosure of 'commercially sensitive' information through use of Section 43 of the FOIA

https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/section-43-commercial-interests/

And in particular the Prejudice Test - follow the link in that section - takes you to a pdf document - good cure for insomnia!

The OP should maybe ask them (UOS) to produce the results of their Prejudice Test - ties them up in knots with this - then take the results to the ICO who will take it from there.

I did request they do an internal review and show proof of the predjuce. They then responded by producing a copy and paste version of the contract with most of the info either redacted or missing.

I included in my complaint to the ICO that I requested the University to provide evidence of this test and that they sent a redacted version of the contract instead with virtually none of the information I requested.

I also mentioned that they haven't replied to my further request for the information.

Cardriver45

I sent the Uni another request for an internal review.

This was their reply.

"Thank you for your email of 29 October 2021 in which you note that our response to you has been "woefully inadequate and has multiple failings".

Our Director of Finance and Planning has, in the response shared with you on 25 October 2021 provided information from the contract that contains information that directly relates to motorists using the car park and which is not commercially sensitive. The information provided was, as indicated to you in the email from the data protection team, extracted from the contract. We have previously shared with you information that is in the public domain either via our website (https://www.uos.ac.uk/content/staff-and-...) and Ipserve's (https://www.ipserv.co.uk/uos-car-parks/) We are not subject to the statutory procurement duties of a local authority and as such ensure that we follow our university procedures.

If you remain dissatisfied with your request and how the University dealt with the review, you have the right to apply to the Information Commissioner for a decision."