UKPC County Court Claim and Actions from - Advice Required

RLD02071

Hi and thanks in advance for any advice / guidance that is provided.

I have had two parking notices issued to me in 2017 for parking in my own parking bay (assigned to the flat on the lease and shown on plan at land registry) which I refused to pay. I have now received court summons for the two tickets.

One is for failing to display a permit (believe it fell down the dash as have never managed to recover it) and the second is for displaying a non valid photocopy permit (used whilst awaiting issue of new permit). I did receive a third ticket after the previous two which I won on a POPLA appeal.

 I did not appeal the first two,  as foolishly thought everyone would be reasonable and it would get resolved. I have an email from the Management Company to UKPC requesting they cancel any tickets to my vehicle on this basis,  but they followed this up by saying there is nothing that they could to do get UKPC to cancel them.

Q1: Should I include the POPLA appeal result in my defence (this was for the same "offence" as the 2nd ticket - displaying non valid photocopy permit).

Q2: Would the fact the MC have requested the tickets be cancelled be evidence of no interest to charge for the "offence".

I have read throught the advice on here and think I have my defense in order barring the two questions above and those below (I will post on here for comment before submission) but had a couple of queries about other avenues I have followed (based on the advice from here).

1. LBC was submitted to both the management company and the land owner (my purchase was a leasehold property) but I have had no reply from either - this was due on the 24th (Letter gave them 10 days to reply and not 14 if this makes a difference?). The templates were taken from here and adjusted to my particular circumstances.

If no response is received what is the best course of action from there? I was hoping it would possibly drive them to get UKPC to drop the court action.

2. I have over the years replied to all correspondence from the various companies and direct to UKPC denying the debt and requesting the "locus standi" to enble UKPC to take me to court on behalf of the landowner (which If I am correct even the BPA guidelines require) - this has never been provided and have no response to these requests.

3. I have requested the same from the Management Company and the landowner with no reply (The MC did say on the phone previously that they never had a contract with UKPC - they approached them with the offer to manage the car park? - but have not managed to get this in writing.

Should this also be included in my defence?

4. Requests to all parties for a copy of the contract agreement between either the Landowner / MC have been ignored.

5. The SAR sent to UKPC was responded to, but only provided the information and photos for one ticket along with the names of companies they had provided my details to.

This information is incorrect as they have issued court papers for two tickets and there are at least three companies who have written to me on behalf of UKPC that are not disclosed on the SAR.

I wrote back to UKPC and said I had reason to believe they had not supplied me with all the information they have and could they either confirm their initial response was correct or provide the "missing" information. They have now responded stating their initial response is correct.

I don't know if this can be used in the defence or if there are any other actions I can take based on this reply?

6. I have been advised it may be worth applying to have the MC and the landlord added to the claim (on the back of my LBC) - is this the correct way to proceed and how would i go about doing this?

Any assistance that you can give would be helpful as I am tight for time to search now.

I haven't been able to find the above information on any of the threads I have located that are similar to mine (but I haven't read all the threads so apologies if it has been covered elsewhere - if someone could link or direct me to any guidance already on here that would also be appreciated.

Coupon-mad

No you don't put details of a POPLA Appeal in your defence.

If you own that bay why are you displaying a permit at all?  Stop letting them police your bay, it buys into the scam regime.

What's the DATE OF ISSUE of the claim form?

Is the claim filed by DCBLegal?

RLD02071

this is a historical case and I am no longer at the flat.

I was displaying a permit at the time as foolishly thought it may help the parking situation but in the end it made no difference

It's only after reading up and looking into the conduct of these firms I understand what a scam it all is.

The date of Issue is the 2nd Feb and I have sent the acknowledgement of service - so by my maths I have until the 7th to submit my defence.

I am working on that this week and hope to complete it by Friday as have been away the 2 weekends so time has been limited.

Yes the claim is from DCB Legal -  I ahd assumed they would submit as it is nearly 6 years since the PCN was issued.

KeithP

RLD02071 said:

The date of Issue is the 2nd Feb and I have sent the acknowledgement of service - so by my maths I have until the 7th to submit my defence.

Yes, that's correct if the Acknowledgment of Service was filed sometime after 6th February and before 22nd February.

But there might be something useful here...

With a Claim Issue Date of 2nd February, and having filed an Acknowledgment of Service in a timely manner, you have until 4pm on Tuesday 7th March 2023 to file your Defence.

That's just one week away. Plenty of time to produce a Defence and it is good to see that 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'.

RLD02071

Thanks for clarifying - glad i was about right.

Have almost finished my defence - still needs a final run through and checking.

Think i may have doubled up and gone into too much detail in places but cannot print at home so am going to run a copy off

tomorrow to physically read through.

Would have appreciated some feedback and comments in case i have made any "schoolboy" errors but won't let me post the defence (too large) or a dropbox link as I havent been on here long enough?

May have to just run with it as it is now.

One question is do i need to send any of the transcripts or sections of the cases i have referred to and my lease agreement with the defence?

Again appreciate any assistance with this.

 

KeithP

RLD02071 said:

One question is do i need to send any of the transcripts or sections of the cases i have referred to and my lease agreement with the defence?

No evidence gets filed with a Defence.

Why not just show us that couple of paragraphs of your Defence that you have written?

Coupon-mad

You can copy the one by @Johny86 except for paragraph 3, which changes to your facts.

RLD02071

Evening All,

Thankf you again for the advice. The defense I have drafted is similar to the one you have suggested by Johnny86 (had found this one previously and utilised relevant sections).

The main addition to this is in relation to primacy of contract and the fact that there is no contract between myself and the parking company. I.E I had the right to park there through my lease so there is no offer.

It then refernces relevant cases (Jopson, Pace etc)

Have also included forbdding signage, lack of authoirty, refers to the fact that the Management agents requested the tickets were cancelled ("no interest in charge") and have made reference to the settlement offer I had made previously - the £15.00 sum they reduced to after appeal (to avoid time and costs of court) which was ignored.

My main worry was the presentation and sequencing of the defence.

I will be fine tuning it tomorrow for submission Monday as I can't afford any more time on it now.

Thanks to both for the advice and guidance so far - it is appreciated.

Coupon-mad

Show us what the parts you added look like.

RLD02071

Good Morning.

(will try and add bits in seperate posts)

In what is the description of the events I have explained that there are pursuing on 2 different charges - Was going to argue that if the signage is the contract there is no mechanism to park without a permit (ie when it is lost and awaiting replacement) and that I had been using a copy ticket since the 1st ticket for not displaying a permit.

The PCN(s) were issued whilst I was parked in bay no 14, the allocated parking space granted to
me by the stated lease. The lease makes no reference that a permit must be displayed, nor that charges can be claimed by a third party if no such permit is displayed.

The first charge was resultant of the permit slipping down the dash of the vehicle resulting in it’s loss.

The second charge was issued for “displaying a non valid photocopy permit” which was in use until the re-issue of the lost permit was resolved.

Surely this has to be relevant otherwise the situation (according to UKPC) is that I could not have used the space when I was not in posession of a permit?

RLD02071

the main additiona is to do with primacy of contract (with reference to my lease - there were no conditions or restrictions on the use of the parking space)

Along with references to Jopson, Link and Saeed I have added the following:

With reference to the Croydon Court decision in Pace Recovery and Storage v Mr N C6GF14FO 16/9/2016, where District Judge Coonan dismissed the claim and refused leave to appeal, it was found that a third party parking firm cannot unilaterally alter the terms of the tenancy agreement. It was stated: “I have to deal with this on the evidence that is before me now. I have before me a tenancy agreement which gives Mr [N. redacted] the right to park on the estate and it does not say “on condition that you display a permit”. It does not say that, so he has that right. What Pace Recovery is seeking to do is, unilaterally outside the contract, restrict that right to only when a permit is displayed. Pace Recovery cannot do that. It has got to be the other contracting party, Affinity Sutton, which amends the terms of the tenancy agreement to restrict the right to park on a place in circumstances in which a permit is displayed but that is not in this tenancy agreement and you as a third party cannot unilaterally alter the terms of the tenancy agreement.''

I was hoping this would be the main argument but have read other posts on here where they say the judge has dismissed this.