Porthpean Car Part, St Austell, Cornwall - BWLegal. Advise Please

commachio

Have now also emailed my MP, the MP ins St Austell (where the car park is located) and London (where Amtrac is located).

For clarity:

BW Legal - sent 'hold notice' (debt advice)
BW Legal - SAR (to see what correspondence, email chains etc have been sent internally with their organisation)
Amtrac - SAR (to identify all photos, correspondence etc they hold for this case)

Currently reviewing the COP.

Awaiting next steps once BW or Amtrac reply where I will post.

Many thanks for everyone's help and advice thus far. 

KeithP

commachio said:

Awaiting next steps once BW or Amtrac reply where I will post.

Perhaps you could use this 'waiting time' profitably by starting to work out exactly how you are going to defend the inevitable claim.

commachio

Yup, absolutely. COP outlines that

1. "The size and positioning of the sign must take into account the expected speed and direction of travel of vehicles approaching the entrance and must be visible"

2. "Signs at the entrance to a parking area must clearly show the type of parking available..."

3. Permissible maximum parking charges (England, Outside of London) - Lower £50, Higher £70

On points 1 & 2 there is no signage when approaching the entrance. The signage is visible only after you enter the car park and is not visible when driving in (as it is behind the drivers line of sight).

On point 3 - I have been charged £100 and thus this is above the permissible maximum charge

Not to do with COP -

Payments:

Payment was made via Just Park after managing to get a signal. The car Park advocates the use of Just Park even though no signal is available. If you have no cash then the alternatives are to find a signal and pay or leave. I opted to find a signal and pay. This was deemed as being both outside of their grace period and they stated I was trying to pay retrospectively.

Photographic Evidence:

One letter stated “We can see in the photographic evidence that we hold for this PCN that your vehicle was parked within clear view of one of our warning signs….”. 

None of the photographs supplied to the Defendant show this evidence. 

GDPR Data Breaches (1):

 The Claimant has insinuated that the Defendant performs a GDPR data breach.

“If any information relating to another person is accidentally or unlawfully lost, altered, disclosed, destroyed, or accessed, this is classed as a Data Breach.”

 Letter dated 03.11.2021 states that:

 “If you were not the driver you should tell us the names and current postal address of the driver by completing the form on the reverse so that we may address this request to them, and pass on the notice to the driver”.

The Claimant has asked the Defendant to perform data breaches which is considered unlawful and against GDPR as set out by the ICO.

GDPR Data Breaches (2):

The Claimant does not adhere to either their own GDPR processes, does not follow a clear, defined due process for collecting personally identifiable information resulting in Data Protection Breaches.

The Claimant emailed the Defendant on 11.12.2021 stating the need for the Defendant to complete further detailed information about the Defendant in order to adhere to “Data Protection”:

 “Before we are able to reply we need you to confirm a few Data Protection Questions which we have specified below“.

On 19.10.2021 the Claimant sent an email to the Defendant through an unsecure email account with embedded Personally Identifiable Information relating to the appeal process (including name, address and vehicle registration number). This was sent to the Defendant prior to the email dated 11.12.2021 asking the Defendant to complete GDPR information. The Claimant does not adhere to their own GDPR processes.

 By sending unsecured emails containing Personally Identifiable Information the Claimant, according to ICO guidance, has performed a GDPR Data Breach.

The Claimant has performed multiple GDPR data breaches by sending personally identifiable information in an unsecured format (via email and embedded documentation).

 GDPR Data Breaches (3):

On 19.10.2021 the Claimant sent an email to the Defendant through an unsecure email account with embedded Personally Identifiable Information relating to the appeal process (including name, address and vehicle registration number). This was sent to the Defendant prior to the email dated 11.12.2021 asking the Defendant to complete GDPR information.

 On 11.12.2021 the Defendant stated in response:

 “I do not authorise you to collect any further personal information on me nor do you need to collect those items in bold. You already have this information as you have written to me.”

On 13.12.2021 the Claimant emailed the Defendant a letter outlining the Defendants name, address, debt/amount owed in an unsecure format and against the Defendants wishes/request (12.4).

On 13.12.2021 the Claimant has sent a separate email with an embedded appeal letter which is unsecured and against the Defendants wishes/request (12.4).

On 21.01.2022 the Claimant sent the Defendant an email referring to “…. We have recently written to you regarding the amount owing to our client of £160.00” despite the Defendant requesting on 11.12.2021 that “I do not authorise you to collect any further personal information on me nor do you need to collect those items in bold. You already have this information as you have written to me.”

In all cases (12.5, 12.6 and 12.7 - itemised numbers removed from above) the Claimant, according to ICO guidance, has performed a GDPR Data Breach.

The Protection of Freedoms Act 2012: [Note: seems to be a conflict with COP]

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. In addition to the original PCN penalty, for which liability is denied, the Claimants have artificially inflated the value of the Claim by adding purported added 'costs' of £150.89, which the Defendant submits have not actually been incurred by the Claimant. 

These have been variously described as a 'BW Legal instructions fee' (in the pre-action exchange of letters) and/or a 'debt collection charge' (not part of any terms on signage and cannot be added, not least because it was never expended). Suddenly in the Particulars there is also a second add-on for purported ‘estimated interest’ costs of £5.89, ‘estimated court fees’ of £35.00 and ‘estimated solicitors costs’ of £50.00 artificially hiking the sum to £250.89. This would be more than double recovery, being vague and disingenuous and the Defendant is alarmed by this gross abuse of process.

Not only are such costs not permitted (CPR 27.14) but the Defendant believes that the Claimant has not incurred legal costs. Given the fact that BW Legal boasted in Bagri v BW Legal Ltd of processing 'millions' of claims with an admin team (and only a handful of solicitors), the Defendant avers that no solicitor is likely to have supervised this current batch of cut & paste PPS robo-claims at all, on the balance of probabilities.

According to Ladak v DRC Locums UKEAT/0488/13/LA the claimant can only recover the direct and provable costs of the time spent on preparing the claim in a legal capacity, not any administration cost. 

According to previous court appearances with respect to extra unlawful amount for debt collection/recovery costs many judges have dismissed an entire claim because of this. 

Coupon-mad

You can't use the draft statutory Code on signage and parking charge levels retrospectively.

Ladak v Locums is never used now. That's very old stuff.

Just read the new template defence (too of this forum, new for March 22) and other threads at your stage and be ready to fire back something meaningful to BW, like the reply by @jabfish

Umkomaas

Have now also emailed my MP, the MP ins St Austell (where the car park is located) and London (where Amtrac is located).

They're not based in London, that's just an address of convenience, allowing them to hide their real address, which I understand to be in Cornwall. 

https://www.companiesmadesimple.com/blog/registered-office/20-22-wenlock-road-registered-office/

Here's an extract from the blurb of the address of convenience company:

"Protecting your home address from the public register
Whilst you are allowed to use a residential address as the registered office, many people choose not to do this as the registered office is on the public register. This means anyone can easily find it out. Because of this, and to prevent unexpected visitors turning up on their doorstep, company directors will often provide an alternative address as the registered office.

Giving a great impression to your customers and contacts
The registered office is the official address for a limited company; the home of the business. The address you use says a lot about your operation. By using a residential address you could give the impression that your business is ‘small-time’ or ‘amateur’. With a registered office based in a renowned startup area you’re showing that you really mean business. What’s more, with our meeting rooms, you can host business meetings at the address. Find out more here"

You are now embroiled in this world of murk, smoke and mirrors!

commachio

And the latest reply......

Le_Kirk

If you have not received a N1 claim form yet, you could write to "their client" and BW Legal telling them that, whilst you deny any debt, you are requiring them to put the claim on hold for 30 days in line with the pre-action protocol for debt claims.  Of course, if you have a N1 claim form it is too late.

commachio

No N1 Claim for received or sent......so looking into it now

commachio

Do I merely fill in one of these: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1015936/n1-eng.pdf

thanks

Coupon-mad

No.  That's a claim form.

Just read the new template defence (too of this forum, new for March 22) and other threads at your stage and fire back something meaningful to BW, like the reply by @jabfish