Parking Fine and Claim Form from County Court Business Centre

Quidditch · 17 October 2022 at 4:30PM

I have had a read of the Newbies Forum re. above and had some further questions.

For background, In November 2021, I parked at KFC whilst consuming food at their restaurant. I stayed in the restaurant (paid at KFC using my credit card) longer than the free limit allowed me to. This meant that I was sent a parking fine. I ignored these letters over the last year. finally, I received the Claim Form around 10 days ago. Upon receiving this and reviewing the Newbies Forum, I immediately went online to Money Claim and submitted my Acknowledgement of Service. This was sent on 10 October 2022 and I understand that I now have 14 days to email a defense. Email is preferred to the "file defense" option on the Money Claim site unless I have misunderstood?

I have prepared my defence using the template available here:Template defence to adapt for all parking cases where they add false admin costs - edited March 2022 — MoneySavingExpert Forum
I intend to email it to the following:

ccbcaq@justice.co.uk
Yasmin@dcblegal.co.uk
info@dcblegal.co.uk
Paul@dcblegal.co.uk
Danielle@dcblegal.co.uk

I appreciate that the ccbcaq@justice.co.uk email address is the critical one here, but I picked up the advice to send to the DCB Legal contacts too. Advisable?

In the template defence I ahve adapted section 3 as follows:

3. The defendant is unclear of the exact circumstances as this Claim Form is the first he has seen regarding this matter. Judging by the dates, the defendant was consuming a meal at KFC and used this car park during the consumption of this meal. It is inferred from this Claim Form – although with some level of uncertainty, given the lack of facts – that the defendant over-stayed the free parking time limit of this car park.

The defendant was unaware that this was a “private” car park and nor did the defendant know of any time limit at the time of parking.

I look forward to your advice on the above matters. Thanks in advance.

KeithP · 17 October 2022 at 4:41PM

Quidditch said:

I received the Claim Form around 10 days ago. Upon receiving this and reviewing the Newbies Forum, I immediately went online to Money Claim and submitted my Acknowledgement of Service. This was sent on 10 October 2022 and I understand that I now have 14 days to email a defense. Email is preferred to the "file defense" option on the Money Claim site unless I have misunderstood?

Hello and welcome.

That's not quite right.
It sounds like you may have filed an Acknowledgment of Service a little earlier than optimal and also by filing an AoS you extend the Defence filing deadline by fourteen days.

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

Upon what date did you file an Acknowledgment of Service?
Your MCOL Claim History will have the definitive answer to that.

Le_Kirk · 17 October 2022 at 4:42PM

You need to include signs (or lack of them) to tell you that you had a limited time to spend money at a fast (slow) food outlet. What happened when you complained to KFC? It is not recommended to send the defence to the claimant or their solicitor anymore; this was a precaution a little while ago when CCBC were failing to send defences to claimants.
Why is the claim form the first you have seen (despite your own admission that you ignored letters!)? Is your V5C up-to-date with the correct address?

Coupon-mad · 17 October 2022 at 4:50PM

Remove all of this, because you don't have to help their vague case by guessing it was an alleged overstay, and of course any retail car park is private land as opposed to Council ('private land' doesn't have a special secret meaning that a consumer knows or doesn't know):

It is inferred from this Claim Form – although with some level of uncertainty, given the lack of facts – that the defendant over-stayed the free parking time limit of this car park.
The defendant was unaware that this was a “private” car park and nor did the defendant know of any time limit at the time of parking.

You did know it was a KFC car park, so you did know it was private land because even your local Tesco or local sports centre or church or whatever, is, of course, private land (it simply means 'non Council' and is nothing to focus on).

Quidditch · 17 October 2022 at 5:58PM

KeithP said:

Quidditch said:

I received the Claim Form around 10 days ago. Upon receiving this and reviewing the Newbies Forum, I immediately went online to Money Claim and submitted my Acknowledgement of Service. This was sent on 10 October 2022 and I understand that I now have 14 days to email a defense. Email is preferred to the "file defense" option on the Money Claim site unless I have misunderstood?

Hello and welcome.

That's not quite right.
It sounds like you may have filed an Acknowledgment of Service a little earlier than optimal and also by filing an AoS you extend the Defence filing deadline by fourteen days.

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

Upon what date did you file an Acknowledgment of Service?
Your MCOL Claim History will have the definitive answer to that.

Details from MCOL:

A claim was issued against you on 05/10/2022

Your acknowledgment of service was submitted on 10/10/2022 at 12:59:51

Your acknowledgment of service was received on 10/10/2022 at 16:05:10

Issue date for the Claim is 5 October 2022

Quidditch · 17 October 2022 at 6:01PM

Le_Kirk said:

You need to include signs (or lack of them) to tell you that you had a limited time to spend money at a fast (slow) food outlet. What happened when you complained to KFC? It is not recommended to send the defence to the claimant or their solicitor anymore; this was a precaution a little while ago when CCBC were failing to send defences to claimants.
Why is the claim form the first you have seen (despite your own admission that you ignored letters!)? Is your V5C up-to-date with the correct address?

I never complained to KFC.
On the letters, I must confess I had been receiving them and promptly binning them. I didn't want to add this in my defense and give these rascals any weight to their claim.

Quidditch · 17 October 2022 at 6:02PM

Coupon-mad said:

Remove all of this, because you don't have to help their vague case by guessing it was an alleged overstay, and of course any retail car park is private land as opposed to Council ('private land' doesn't have a special secret meaning that a consumer knows or doesn't know):
It is inferred from this Claim Form – although with some level of uncertainty, given the lack of facts – that the defendant over-stayed the free parking time limit of this car park.
The defendant was unaware that this was a “private” car park and nor did the defendant know of any time limit at the time of parking.
You did know it was a KFC car park, so you did know it was private land because even your local Tesco or local sports centre or church or whatever, is, of course, private land (it simply means 'non Council' and is nothing to focus on).

OK. Good point. I wil reduce it to the following:

The defendant is unclear of the exact circumstances as this Claim Form is the first he has seen regarding this matter. Judging by the dates, the defendant was consuming a meal at KFC and used this car park during the consumption of this meal.

KeithP · 17 October 2022 at 6:33PM

Quidditch said:

KeithP said:

Quidditch said:

I received the Claim Form around 10 days ago. Upon receiving this and reviewing the Newbies Forum, I immediately went online to Money Claim and submitted my Acknowledgement of Service. This was sent on 10 October 2022 and I understand that I now have 14 days to email a defense. Email is preferred to the "file defense" option on the Money Claim site unless I have misunderstood?

Hello and welcome.

That's not quite right.
It sounds like you may have filed an Acknowledgment of Service a little earlier than optimal and also by filing an AoS you extend the Defence filing deadline by fourteen days.

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

Upon what date did you file an Acknowledgment of Service?
Your MCOL Claim History will have the definitive answer to that.

Details from MCOL:
A claim was issued against you on 05/10/2022
Your acknowledgment of service was submitted on 10/10/2022 at 12:59:51
Your acknowledgment of service was received on 10/10/2022 at 16:05:10

With a Claim Issue Date of 5th October, and having filed an Acknowledgment of Service in a timely manner, you have until 4pm on Monday 7th November 2022 to file your Defence.

That's three weeks away. Plenty of time to produce a Defence and it is good to see you are not leaving it to the last minute.

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'.

KeithP · 17 October 2022 at 6:38PM

Quidditch said:

Coupon-mad said:

Remove all of this, because you don't have to help their vague case by guessing it was an alleged overstay, and of course any retail car park is private land as opposed to Council ('private land' doesn't have a special secret meaning that a consumer knows or doesn't know):
It is inferred from this Claim Form – although with some level of uncertainty, given the lack of facts – that the defendant over-stayed the free parking time limit of this car park.
The defendant was unaware that this was a “private” car park and nor did the defendant know of any time limit at the time of parking.
You did know it was a KFC car park, so you did know it was private land because even your local Tesco or local sports centre or church or whatever, is, of course, private land (it simply means 'non Council' and is nothing to focus on).

The defendant is unclear of the exact circumstances as this Claim Form is the first he has seen regarding this matter.

Probably best not to say that.
Particularly as you have already said...

Quidditch said:

Le_Kirk said:

You need to include signs (or lack of them) to tell you that you had a limited time to spend money at a fast (slow) food outlet. What happened when you complained to KFC? It is not recommended to send the defence to the claimant or their solicitor anymore; this was a precaution a little while ago when CCBC were failing to send defences to claimants.
Why is the claim form the first you have seen (despite your own admission that you ignored letters!)? Is your V5C up-to-date with the correct address?

On the letters, I must confess I had been receiving them and promptly binning them.

Always stick to the truth. You don't have to volunteer information, but telling fibs is definitely not a good idea.

Quidditch · 17 October 2022 at 8:25PM

KeithP said:

Quidditch said:

KeithP said:

Quidditch said:

I received the Claim Form around 10 days ago. Upon receiving this and reviewing the Newbies Forum, I immediately went online to Money Claim and submitted my Acknowledgement of Service. This was sent on 10 October 2022 and I understand that I now have 14 days to email a defense. Email is preferred to the "file defense" option on the Money Claim site unless I have misunderstood?

Hello and welcome.

That's not quite right.
It sounds like you may have filed an Acknowledgment of Service a little earlier than optimal and also by filing an AoS you extend the Defence filing deadline by fourteen days.

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

Upon what date did you file an Acknowledgment of Service?
Your MCOL Claim History will have the definitive answer to that.

Details from MCOL:
A claim was issued against you on 05/10/2022
Your acknowledgment of service was submitted on 10/10/2022 at 12:59:51
Your acknowledgment of service was received on 10/10/2022 at 16:05:10

With a Claim Issue Date of 5th October, and having filed an Acknowledgment of Service in a timely manner, you have until 4pm on Monday 7th November 2022 to file your Defence.

That's three weeks away. Plenty of time to produce a Defence and it is good to see you are not leaving it to the last minute.
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'.

Is this the defence template you are referring to?
Template defence to adapt for all parking cases where they add false admin costs - edited March 2022 — MoneySavingExpert Forum

I've used this and amended section 3 to state the following:
The defendant is unclear of the exact circumstances as this Claim Form is the first he has seen regarding this matter. Judging by the dates, the defendant was consuming a meal at KFC and used this car park during the consumption of this meal.

Can you please let me know if any further adaptations are required to this template to suit my circumstances.

Also, would you advice that I send a copy of this to all the following: