County Court Claim received not sure on defence strategy - I beat the system!

alldoors

Trainerman said:

alldoors said:

 also attached a copy of the sign that was present on parking.
Not sure if I should mention who the Uni are just in case.  This was not a car park so it's more like trespass I suppose.

Is it just me? There is surely a defence that the sign does not make sense, therefore no contract. It actually says that you get a ticket for not 'complying with a contravention'. To me  that says ticket if you DON'T make a 'contravention

Trainerman said:

alldoors said:

 also attached a copy of the sign that was present on parking.
Not sure if I should mention who the Uni are just in case.  This was not a car park so it's more like trespass I suppose.

Is it just me? There is surely a defence that the sign does not make sense, therefore no contract. It actually says that you get a ticket for not 'complying with a contravention'. To me  that says ticket if you DON'T make a 'contravention

You are spot on. Never even noticed that. 

alldoors

Back from my holiday and just finalising the defence. Have been to the Uni to look at where the parking took place. Now have SAR info which just shows the car on the grass. There are no timings other than the time they put the ticket on the car. The driver parked up at 11pm next to a lot of other cars.  No sign seen (it  has no light above it to illuminate it). She was not dropping off the boyfriend.  The car was parked from 11pm until the following day. All the other cars had left.  The grassed area would accommodate about 50 - 75 cars as a guess. Here is (hopefully) the final draft:-

2.     It is admitted that the Defendant was the registered keeper and driver of the vehicle in question but liability is denied. 

3.     a) The Defendant does not agree with the particulars of the claim of “contractual breach” or “failure to comply with terms and conditions”. The Claimant is put to strict proof of their assertions. The Defendant did not see a sign when parking their vehicle.

            b) The Defendant has revisited the location to look for “the sign”. The “contractual terms and conditions” on the sign are misleading with wording that dresses up the charge as a ‘contractual’ fee, which it is not. One cannot contract to be allowed to do something the sign states as “not permitted”. The elements of a contractual agreement/offer did not exist. This echoes the judgement of DJ Glen in PCMUK v Bull.

c)The sign indicates that there is an absolute prohibition against parking on a road, pavement or verge at any time, for any period. It is impossible to construct out of this in any way, either actually or contingently or conditionally, any permission for anyone to park. All this is essentially saying is you must not trespass on the roadway, pavement or verge. If you do, then we are giving ourselves, and we are dressing it up in the form of a contract, the right to charge you a sum of money which really would be damages for trespass. This sign is not lit and it is also at a distance from where the vehicle was parked.

d) Should the defendant have seen the sign, it does not make sense. It states that “vehicles failing to comply with the above contravention will be issued with a PCN”.  The sign also reads “this car park is private property” yet the sign is positioned in the middle of a large area of grass.

alldoors

Also, is there a way of logging back into Money Claim Online to check the date that we need to get the defence emailed by?

Le_Kirk

alldoors said:

Also, is there a way of logging back into Money Claim Online to check the date that we need to get the defence emailed by?

Once you have the account set up, you should be able to log in using the details supplied on the N1 claim form, although not sure it states that, however if you go back through this, your own thread and find this post, you will see that @KeithP has given you the date : -
23 September at 3:10PM <<<<<LINK

alldoors

Well that's it. Defence now sent. Have received a reply from the court titled "AUTO RESPONSE DO NOT REPLY - CCBC AQ Acknowledgment" so I'm presuming this is all I need now to confirm they have received it?

Umkomaas

alldoors said:

Well that's it. Defence now sent. Have received a reply from the court titled "AUTO RESPONSE DO NOT REPLY - CCBC AQ Acknowledgment" so I'm presuming this is all I need now to confirm they have received it?

Yep, you presume correctly. They'll deal with it now and farm out a copy to the Claimant's solicitors. 

alldoors

I've just been reading that you should not use a Gmail account to email your defence which is what I have done. If I've got the auto response CCBC acknowledgement am I ok? The deadline was today!

Trainerman

alldoors said:

I've just been reading that you should not use a Gmail account to email your defence which is what I have done. If I've got the auto response CCBC acknowledgement am I ok? The deadline was today!

Gmail does seem to work sometimes and not others. Two of our responses were on Gmail and got through ok. If you have the proper acknowledgment I would say all is well

I would still check on Mcol tomorrow, just in case

alldoors

Here is another thing that is puzzling me. The total of the PCN and damages is £150.00. The parking event took place on the 19th Jan and the Court Claim is 20/09. Their interest calculation is 2p per day and comes to £6.39. This equates to 319 days. Yet the time span from 19/1-20/9 is 244 days? 

Coupon-mad

AND don't forget the parking charge wasn't £150.

The fake added £60 or £70 wasn't added until later, so to charge interest on that extortionate add-on, as if it were due from January, is an abuse.  Just call it out!