Late Defence

mercuteio

Hello everyone,

Apologies for the nature of this post, seeing as I’ve made a crucial error, but I would appreciate the advice of this forum nonetheless. My question is, if I’ve missed the deadline for submitting a County Court defence statement by several days, is it still worth submitting a defence alongside a sincere apology? The claim is dated 27th June 2022, and I submitted an Acknowledgement of Service, which means the deadline should have been on Monday 25th July 2022. I haven’t had any communication from either the court or the claimant, so my thought is that perhaps it’s still worth submitting a defence statement and apologising for the error and delayed submission?

The claim itself is one that I am confident that I can win, so long as I’m not automatically ruled against for missing the deadline. In a nutshell, it’s a parking area for a village hall nearby where I live that has been a free car park for decades. I was finishing a phone call in my car around 9pm whilst driving home from work one evening in January this year (hands-free, in case that causes any consternation), and I didn’t want to disturb my family by continuing the conversation when I got inside the house, so I pulled into the village hall car park for about 40 minutes until I finished the conversation, then went home. I didn’t see any signs indicating that payment was required, but about a week later I received a letter from Parking Eye saying I’d violated the terms of this car park. 

When I looked into it, the hall had introduced parking charges a couple of years ago, with Parking Eye managing the car park. The irony is that almost all of the roads immediately around the car park are free to park on (it’s a quiet area on the outskirts of the city), and I could have just parked on the kerb, but because it was dark I thought it may be safest to pull into the village hall car park instead. Of note, the hall was not in use that evening, and there was virtually no-one using the car park. Had I known that it was a paid car park, the price for my stay would have been 20p. 

Having returned to the car park since receiving the letter from Parking Eye, I’m not surprised I couldn’t see any signs. There is virtually no lighting around them, and on a January evening it’s extremely dark, so if you don’t know that parking requires payment already then you can’t see the signs. Therefore, the argument is straightforward, I think, in so much as that I didn’t enter into a contract because I didn’t see the signs.

In terms of appeals, I didn’t appeal through Parking Eye’s appeals system because my experience of these appeals processes is that they are kangaroo courts, but I did write directly to the village hall, and received a curt response that simply told me that the hall “is unable to deal with this notice” before redirecting me back to Parking Eye, which I found to be offensively disingenuous. I didn’t appeal any further, and subsequently received a county court claim on 27th June.

However, I’ve made a clerical error and missed the deadline for the Defence statement, so I’m not sure if I will automatically be ruled against, or if I can simply apologise for the delay and submit now? 

I’m inclined to give it a go, but equally it takes me a lot of time to prepare statements of this nature, so I’d prefer not to lose a day or two if you think it’s with certainty that I’m going to be ruled against? What do you think?

Many thanks for your help.

Mouse007

This is currently a bit of a daily event, we had it yesterday and the day before. You are now in a race to submit your defence before the claimant applies for a default judgment

See

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6375049/claim-form-received-for-pc-claim-accuses-me-of-agreeing-to-the-pay-i-dont-remember-agreeing-this/p1

and

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6375120/missed-issue-date-19-days-deadline-for-cc-claim/p1

and crack on with your defence to file Monday morning - everything you need is in those two threads along with a very big warning to do exactly as advised in all the links.

Mouse007

You may be in luck, I think your deadline is actually 4pm Monday 1st August.

Hopefully @KeithP will confirm - date of issue 27 June but he will also need to know the date you filed the AoS

Castle

mercuteio said:

Hello everyone,

Apologies for the nature of this post, seeing as I’ve made a crucial error, but I would appreciate the advice of this forum nonetheless. My question is, if I’ve missed the deadline for submitting a County Court defence statement by several days, is it still worth submitting a defence alongside a sincere apology? The claim is dated 27th June 2022, and I submitted an Acknowledgement of Service, which means the deadline should have been on Monday 25th July 2022. I haven’t had any communication from either the court or the claimant, so my thought is that perhaps it’s still worth submitting a defence statement and apologising for the error and delayed submission?

In terms of appeals, I didn’t appeal through Parking Eye’s appeals system because my experience of these appeals processes is that they are kangaroo courts, but I did write directly to the village hall, and received a curt response that simply told me that the hall “is unable to deal with this notice” before redirecting me back to Parking Eye, which I found to be offensively disingenuous. I didn’t appeal any further, and subsequently received a county court claim on 27th June.

Did you really receive it on the same date it was dated?

Coupon-mad

Helli again @mercuteio - good news - your defence is not late!

KeithP

Please confirm the date you filed an Acknowledgment of Service.
Your MCOL Claim History will have the definitive answer to that.

With a Claim Issue Date of 27th June, and assuming you filed an Acknowledgment of Service sometime after 1st July and before 18th July, you have until 4pm on Monday 1st August 2022 to file your Defence.

That's just a couple of days away but plenty of time to produce a Defence.

To create a Defence, and then file a Defence by email, look at the second post in the NEWBIES thread.

Don't miss the deadline 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'.

mercuteio

Mouse007 said:

This is currently a bit of a daily event, we had it yesterday and the day before. You are now in a race to submit your defence before the claimant applies for a default judgment

See

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6375049/claim-form-received-for-pc-claim-accuses-me-of-agreeing-to-the-pay-i-dont-remember-agreeing-this/p1

and

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6375120/missed-issue-date-19-days-deadline-for-cc-claim/p1

and crack on with your defence to file Monday morning - everything you need is in those two threads along with a very big warning to do exactly as advised in all the links.

Mouse007 said:

You may be in luck, I think your deadline is actually 4pm Monday 1st August.

Hopefully @KeithP will confirm - date of issue 27 June but he will also need to know the date you filed the AoS

Hello @Mouse007 - thank-you so much for your speedy replies, and yes, it does look like several of us have found ourselves falling at the same, very early, hurdle. Maybe it's the warm weather . . . 

Fortunately, you're quite right! I hadn't factored in the additional 5 days into my calculation and so, not by design in the slightest, it seems that I find myself in the fortunate position of having an extra day to sort my defence - phew!

Reading glasses: On!

mercuteio

Castle said:

mercuteio said:

Hello everyone,

Apologies for the nature of this post, seeing as I’ve made a crucial error, but I would appreciate the advice of this forum nonetheless. My question is, if I’ve missed the deadline for submitting a County Court defence statement by several days, is it still worth submitting a defence alongside a sincere apology? The claim is dated 27th June 2022, and I submitted an Acknowledgement of Service, which means the deadline should have been on Monday 25th July 2022. I haven’t had any communication from either the court or the claimant, so my thought is that perhaps it’s still worth submitting a defence statement and apologising for the error and delayed submission?

In terms of appeals, I didn’t appeal through Parking Eye’s appeals system because my experience of these appeals processes is that they are kangaroo courts, but I did write directly to the village hall, and received a curt response that simply told me that the hall “is unable to deal with this notice” before redirecting me back to Parking Eye, which I found to be offensively disingenuous. I didn’t appeal any further, and subsequently received a county court claim on 27th June.

Did you really receive it on the same date it was dated?

Hello @Castle,

Fair comment - I did not. Not exactly sure when I received it.

mercuteio

Coupon-mad said:

Helli again @mercuteio - good news - your defence is not late!

Hello again, @Coupon-mad! It's been too long

Very good news indeed! I had started to resign myself to bitterly paying up but, as ever, this forum has picked me back up! On the case reading looking for recent Parking Eye defences now. Will be posting very soon

Thank-you very much!

mercuteio

KeithP said:

Please confirm the date you filed an Acknowledgment of Service.
Your MCOL Claim History will have the definitive answer to that.

With a Claim Issue Date of 27th June, and assuming you filed an Acknowledgment of Service sometime after 1st July and before 18th July, you have until 4pm on Monday 1st August 2022 to file your Defence.

That's just a couple of days away but plenty of time to produce a Defence.

To create a Defence, and then file a Defence by email, look at the second post in the NEWBIES thread.

Don't miss the deadline 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'.

Hello @KeithP!

Thank-you so much for this reply - it looks like I filed the Acknowledgement of Service on 5th July, and I had totally forgotten that this adds 5 days to the 28-day deadline, so fortunately you're quite right, I have until Monday afternoon. Hurray! 

Just starting to read through recent defences now, so should be back in touch very soon - many thanks again

mercuteio

Hi @KeithP, thanks for chasing me up on this and checking the details so quickly - I believe I was trying to confirm that assumption when I said

mercuteio said:

it looks like I filed the Acknowledgement of Service on 5th July, and I had totally forgotten that this adds 5 days to the 28-day deadline, so fortunately you're quite right, I have until Monday afternoon. 

So, yes, the Acknowledgement of Service was filed on 5th July, and very fortunately, as you say above, that gives me until Monday to file the defence. I am going to try and get it sorted by tomorrow evening, but can I check one thing - you've said above that:

KeithP said:

The good news in that case is that nothing untoward will happen before 8am Monday.

However, I think maybe I have until 4pm on Monday, as per your previous post, quoted below?

KeithP said:

With a Claim Issue Date of 27th June, and assuming you filed an Acknowledgment of Service sometime after 1st July and before 18th July, you have until 4pm on Monday 1st August 2022 to file your Defence.