Debt recovery letter

Polbenn

Hi
My son received a letter from a debt recovery company regarding a parking ticket but has never received the original fine,they are saying he has to pay £170 or they will take him to court.he has tried emailing smart parking  to pay the original
Fine but received no reply. Has anybody experience this any help is appreciated
Thankyou

Le_Kirk

Is his V5C up-to-date with correct current address?  This is the usual reason for not receiving the initial PCN. Whilst checking the address your son should read the NEWBIE sticky for full advice.  Does the letter from the debt collectors contain a SMART parking refence number?

Umkomaas

Smart Parking so rarely issue court proceedings that neither you nor your son should lose any sleep on this. Every debt collector threatens court (they cannot issue court proceedings!), as well as skinning your cat, kidnapping your offspring .... Just ignore them!

Polbenn

Le_Kirk said:

Is his V5C up-to-date with correct current address?  This is the usual reason for not receiving the initial PCN. Whilst checking the address your son should read the NEWBIE sticky for full advice.  Does the letter from the debt collectors contain a SMART parking refence number?

Yes all details are correct and it has a reference number, he doesn't really have an issue in paying the original fine just the ridiculous amount they are asking but having no response to his emails he is panicking a little as he has read somewhere just to ignore the DC letter

Le_Kirk

You/he read it on here to "take no action" over debt collector letters; what he mustn't do is ignore PCNs, letters before claim or N1 claim forms from Northampton CCBC.

Polbenn

Le_Kirk said:

You/he read it on here to "take no action" over debt collector letters; what he mustn't do is ignore PCNs, letters before claim or N1 claim forms from Northampton CCBC.

He hasn't had a PCN that's his issue, only this letter from the debt recovery company

Fruitcake

He should send an SAR as per the NEWBIES information to the DPO of Smart Parking. He will need to include non-photo proof of ID with the request.
This will (should) flush out the original PCN. He can then go for Plan A, which is a landowner complaint.

It is safe to ignore DCAs, but he needs to see what the original charge is all about.

Has he actually looked at his V5C to check the keeper's details, or is he working from memory? It only takes one incorrect digit to cause a problem like this.

Polbenn

All details are correct on his V5C no issues with any other  correspondence for car.

Coupon-mad

Are you in Scotland or England?

These are not to be paid. A better life lesson for a young person (than just paying a rip off firm from a rogue industry) is recognising a scam and not paying it.

Paying scam PCNs is not what we do here.

He could complain to the BPA that no PCN was received, and suggest that Smart Parking's mail consolidator has failed again, like they did in 2019 and the BPA stepped in and got them to refund and cancel PCNs.

Complain (him, not you) to Sara Roberts:

sara.r@britishparking.co.uk

Don't imply who was driving nor offer to pay, nor say he is 'happy' to pay.

It's not a fine and it isn't something to just accept. Clued up people are not happy to pay these fake PCNs.

If by complaining, he can get a new PCN issued, it's as easy to beat as you could possibly ask for (regardless of facts) as long as he doesn't say who was driving.