DCBL county court claim

Wanda_Woman

12 Months ago i parked in a private car park, managed by One Parking Solution Ltd. I paid at the meter with coins for 1 hour. After that time I wished to stay longer but had no coins. There was an option to pay by phone, but there was no signal. I stayed @ 1 more hour.

I then got by post, a NTK, which i ignored, and @ 5 more over the last year. At no point have i replied or named a driver.

I have now received a County Court Business Center claim form on behalf of DCB Legal LTD

I will reply within 14 days to acknowledge service and will defend all of the claim.

Am i doing the right thing, and whats best way/grounds to defend the claim for £269.00 in total?

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KeithP

What is the Issue Date on your County Court Claim Form?

Do not file an Acknowledgment of Service until at least five days after that Issue Date.

Wanda_Woman

KeithP said:

What is the Issue Date on your County Court Claim Form?

July 1st 22

i wasnt going to reply without advice first

Do not file an Acknowledgment of Service until at least five days after that Issue Date.

KeithP

With a Claim Issue Date of 1st July, you have until Wednesday 20th July to file an Acknowledgment of Service. Do not file an Acknowledgment of Service before 6th July, but otherwise there is nothing to be gained by delaying it. 

To file an Acknowledgment of Service, follow the guidance in the Dropbox file linked from the second post in the NEWBIES thread.

Having filed an Acknowledgment of Service in a timely manner, you have until 4pm on Wednesday 3rd August 2022 to file your Defence.

That's over four weeks away. Plenty of time to produce a Defence, but please don't leave it to the last minute.

To create a Defence, and then file a Defence by email, look again at the second post on the NEWBIES thread - immediately following where you found the Acknowledgment of Service instructions.

Don't miss the deadline for filing an Acknowledgment of Service, nor that for filing a Defence.

Do not try and file a Defence via the MoneyClaimOnline website. Once an Acknowledgment of Service has been filed, the MCOL website should be treated as 'read only'.

Coupon-mad

Which site? We know all OPS places.

Wanda_Woman

Llangrannog car park

well known for its parking problems

no phone signal

and i wasnt notified in Welsh it seems

Im not a well Woman these days, having almost died of covid last year and now have a lot of brain fog / long covid symptoms and therefore i struggle to get my head round all of this

Ive followed Keith P instructions and returned the acknowledgement of service and said im defending and counter claiming

Coupon-mad

Ok, so you only have a few days to show us your defence facts to slot into para 2 and 3 onwards of the Template Defence.

Counterclaims are VERY hard to plead and usually fail and it sounds like you are better just working on a defence, to me.

Wanda_Woman

I havent got a clue what im doing, which is why im here for advice

If counter claiming is not good, i wont do it

My defence fact is, there was no way for me to pay

I had no coins, and i shouldnt need them because there is the option to pay by phone - which as per an article in Wales online its well known there is no phone signal at the carpark

https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/llangrannog-car-park-fine-beach-20537396

Will that be sufficient ?

what else can i say?

Coupon-mad

Well you need to show us what that looks like (written in the third person - not 'I' or 'me') as paragraph 3 of the entire Template Defence you will be using.

We know everyone is new to this. We get that! It's why we give you all a template defence with tips about what to put as para 3.

Easy as pie, takes most new posters about 15-30 minutes once they read the Template Defence thread, and get that 'lightbulb moment' when they see how easy it is.

For added confidence, read half a dozen other defence/claim threads on here (just browse the thread titles on page one onwards) and see how others managed it and what they just put as their para 3 this week.

Wanda_Woman

But i dont see how they can take me to small claims when i never once responded to any of their letters and they havent established who the driver was

surely thats their first hurdle and they failed?

Coupon-mad

No because they are pursuing you as registered keeper, as they can in law, under the POFA 2012.  This is normal and you will fail if you try that defence.

There is no hurdle for them. They do not have to prove you were driving. You were, so admit it and write some proper facts as para 3, like you read in all the other defences posted here every day.