PCN at small claims hearing 6/6/2023

WD40fan

Good afternoon. Unfortunately I found your forum by accident too late to 'save' me earlier. However any advice on formulating my witness statement at this late stage would be much appreciated.

In brief-
I used a car wash service in October 2019. This is situated within a Total Car Parks site in Ipswich. Paying for a wash included parking, which I had done many times before. Paid in cash, no receipt or paperwork received in exchange, as was always the case.

Possibly due to moving house at around this time I never received the PCN or follow up letter, even though all mail was forwarded to me.

The first I am aware is August 2021 when I received a final reminder of unpaid Parking Charge from DCBL. On request they helpfully forwarded the original PCN and follow up letter, stating that I was now out of the appeal period. I replied to DCBL, copying in Total Car Parks stating what had happened and naively expecting them to stop the proceedings. They didn't bother to even acknowledge let alone reply and I heard nothing further until the Letter of Claim arrived in Feb 2022. Since then I have completed all requested paperwork etc. with my own limited understanding and assuming that truth and decency will prevail.

I am re-writing my witness statement before sending it off, but although I have found this new wealth of information, I'm a bit stumped on the specifics for my witness statement as my situation is a bit unusual due to the third party company involved, who have also been no help.

Boat_to_Bolivia

Hello and welcome.

Can you post here what you wrote in your Defence.

Current exemplar WS are by @aphex007 and @SJRRJS.

You can adapt the above to suit your case.

Have you advised all relevant parties of your new address and asked them to erase the old one.

Have you updated your V5?

Coupon-mad

Being in a car wash is de facto not "parking".  Make sure you state that the Claimant should have had an additional camera to exclude patrons of the car wash, which is under separate leasehold ownership, does not have time limits and is certainly not appropriate nor likely to be part of the authorised enforcement area (the car park).

WD40fan

Boat_to_Bolivia said:

Hello and welcome.

Can you post here what you wrote in your Defence.

Current exemplar WS are by @aphex007 and @SJRRJS.

You can adapt the above to suit your case.

Have you advised all relevant parties of your new address and asked them to erase the old one.

Have you updated your V5?

Hi, thank you for responding.

All parties are using the new address, and V5 was always as up to date as possible, thank you.

My defence was- 
1  On 19/10/2019 I took my car to Mint car wash. This is situated within Slade Street carpark, Ipswich.

2  The cost of car parking is included in the cost of the wash. This is stated on a green sign in the car park.

3  I have a photograph showing the sign, It states “Mint car wash. Free car parking with any wash from £5.99 Monday till Friday 4 hours, Saturday and Sunday all day”

4  I had used this car wash many times before and no receipts/tickets are ever issued. I had never needed proof of payment, so had never asked.

5  I moved house 19/11/2019. Despite mail forwarding I never received the PCN. I moved house again in August 2020.

6  In August 2021 I received a debt recovery letter form DCBL. I contacted them requesting copies of the original PCN.

7  PCN copy received by e-mail. The ANPR photo shows a man driving my car. I do not know him. He appears similar to others who work at the Mint car wash.

8  I replied by email to DCBL and copied in Total Car Parks to explain the problem. Neither deigned to reply.

9  I believe the fault lies with Mint Car Wash. I paid them for a service which included parking. They did not comply.


I have adapted my defence to become my witness statement.

WD40fan

Coupon-mad said:

Being in a car wash is de facto not "parking".  Make sure you state that the Claimant should have had an additional camera to exclude patrons of the car wash, which is under separate leasehold ownership, does not have time limits and is certainly not appropriate nor likely to be part of the authorised enforcement area (the car park).

Brilliant advice, thank you.

Rocky88

Hi,

I am also dealing with this exact same company and situation you are in. Used the car wash and free parking that comes along with it. Used it many times without issue, until this time.

Court date set for July. If I can help at all, just let me know.

WD40fan

Section of my witness statement. cannot get the darn thing to copy across with the paragraph numbers in tact.

Sequence of events

1. I drove to Mint Car Wash, Ipswich on Saturday 19th October 2019.

1. The company operates within Key Street Car Park, Ipswich. On the wall outside the car park there is a large sign that states “Mint car wash. Free car parking with any wash from £5.99 Monday till Friday 4 hours, Saturday and Sunday all day”. I have used Google Street View to find the image closed to the time of the PCN (see Exhibit XX- 01).

1. There is a second large sign within the car park, near the entrance to Mint Car Wash’s working area, photographed by me  (see exhibit XX- 02).

1. I drove my car to the large concrete pad used by Mint car wash, located on the left, just inside the entrance from Star Lane. This area is marked in blue on the Claimants Exhibit 1, which I have utilised. (see Exhibit XX-03)

1. I left my car with a male employee of Mint Car Wash in the designated area for Mint Car Wash.

1. I handed my car keys to the male employee of Mint Car Wash. There was a brief conversation about how long I would leave my car with them and how much I would need to pay. This was the usual format for using the service and I only ever stayed for a maximum of 3 hours.

1. There was no requirement upon me to do anything to exempt my car from further parking fees except to use the services of the car wash.

1. Upon returning to collect my car from Mint Car Wash I paid the amount due in cash, as I always did, being unaware that other methods were available.

1. As per previous purchases of this service, no receipt of any sort was offered or received.

The Parking Charge Notice

1. I first became aware that there was a Parking Charge for this event when I received a Notice of Debt Recovery from DCBL, dated 18th August 2021. I telephoned DCBL on 2nd September 2021 to explain that I had not received any prior paperwork to this and was unaware of what it related to. I was told that my file would be put on hold and they would contact Total Car Parks to request duplicate letters be sent to me. 

1. On 2nd September 2021 DCBL emailed me 2 documents, one dated 28th October 2019 titled Notice in Breach of Parking Conditions showing 2 photos of my car. The second was dated 13th November 2019 titled Final Warning before further action is taken. I had not seen either of these documents before.

1. The driver shown in the ANPR photograph that was part of the Notice in Breach of Parking Conditions is clearly a man. I do not recognise this man and can only surmise that he is an employee of Mint Car Wash who had control of my car at this time. (see Exhibit XX- 04)

1. I had to move house in mid November 2019 therefore my home was in a chaotic state but all mail would have been opened. For the next 6 months I frequently collected my post from the new owners, again all mail would have been opened. I updated my V5 and driving licence details as soon as practicable after this house move. Having moved again in August 2020 a postal redirect was set up to my current address, again I updated my V5 and driving licence details as soon as practicable.

1. The email from DCBL stated that I had missed the appeal window, as set out in the original Notice. I replied to their email on the 8th September 2021, copying in the Claimant, explaining that as I had not received the original letters I could not therefore appeal in due time. I explained, as above, that I had used and paid for the service by Mint Car Wash. I had hoped that Total Car Parks would deal with Mint Car Wash directly as they must be leasing or sub-leasing the land. Their Ipswich office is located within the same car park as Mint car wash. I did not receive a reply from DCBL or Total Car Parks.

Attempts to obtain proof of my claim

1. On my many previous visits to use Mint Car Wash I was never provided with a receipt or paperwork for purchasing their car wash and parking service. On calling the number advertised (see Exhibit XX- 05), the man who answered said he had sold the car wash “years ago” and hung up. I attempted to contact them via a message on their Facebook page with no response, that page has now been removed.

1. From the limited company research available to a civilian, Mint Car Wash in Ipswich appears to be a franchise. I therefore e-mailed and telephoned the lead Mint Car Wash. No response was ever received.

1. I attended Mint car wash, on 19/5/2023, to attempt to speak to someone in charge. I was handed a mobile phone and had a conversation with a man who I was told was in charge. He would not give me his name, but said that he had only owned the company since 2021. He did however explain that they have a tablet on which they record vehicle registrations for exemption with the Claimant. He suggested that I visit the Claimants office, which is located within the same car park.

1. I visited the Ipswich office of the Claimant on 19/5/2023. I spoke to a lady, whose name I was not given. She confirmed that the current owner of Mint Car Wash is not the same as the owner in 2019. She told me that in 2019 the car wash had a computer to enter vehicle registrations into, exempting them from parking charges. On busy days they would have written vehicle registrations on a sheet of paper and entered them onto a computer at the end of the day.

1. The facts in this statement are my own knowledge and honest belief.  To pre-empt the usual template responses from this serial litigator: the court process is outside of my life experience and I cannot be criticised for adapting some pre-written wording from a reliable advice resource. The Claimant is urged not to patronise me with (ironically template) unfounded accusations of not understanding their defence.

Attempts to challenge the claim

1. The claimant states in paragraph 21 of their witness statement that “no challenges have previously been raised”. I refute this.

1. Challenge 1. In August 2021, when I became aware of the Parking Notice and then received copies of it by email from Ian Lee of DCBL (acting on behalf of the Claimant), I replied to Ian and copied in the Claimant via info@totalcarparks.co.uk. I explained the situation as I have above and in my defence statement, expecting, perhaps naively, that this may solve the issue. I did not receive a reply from either DCBL or the Claimant. See Exhibit XX- 06.

1. Challenge 2. An e-mail was sent to me dated 17/6/2021 from Shannon Robinson of DCBL. This was to inform me that the Claimant intended to proceed with the case. It also offered me 7 days to call them to reach a settlement. I replied to her email initially to say that the attached N180 was blank. She did not reply. See Exhibit XX- 07

1. I replied to her email a second time repeating my situation and my defence, putting the onus on the Claimant to contact the Car Wash proprietor, who the Claimant must have contact with. She did not reply. See Exhibit XX- 08. 

The Claimants case

1. The Claimant and DCBL have ignored my attempts to clear the problem up. The Claimant had access to and contact with Mint Car Wash and could have solved this months ago. It is my belief that as serial litigators they have hoped that fear of court and threats of a CCJ will make me lie about the events and pay the PCN.

1. The Claimant makes frequent references to my having had the opportunity to appeal, when I have categorically stated that I did not receive their first two letters and as stated by the Claimant, I was then outside of an appeal window anyway.

1. I deny that I was either the 'keeper' nor the driver at the time of the alleged breach.  By leaving the car with Mint Car Wash for several hours, they were the 'keeper' under the POFA 2012 definition.  The 'keeper' during an alleged parking event does not at all times remain the registered keeper in a case where the car was in fact being 'kept' for that period, by another party. Further, I was absent and was not driving at the material time, as evidenced by the Claimant’s Exhibit 5 as the ANPR photograph is a man. There can be no liability on my part, not even keeper liability in this case.

1. The Claimant states that they “reasonably believes that the Defendant was the Driver”, however they have clear photographic evidence that the driver is a male, they wrote to me using my first name- xxxx, which I believe could not be mistaken to be a male name. I dispute that the Claimant reasonably believed that I was the driver in the photograph.

1. The Claimant has exhibited what appear to be template signs in their Exhibit 2. They have provided what is possibly a single in situ site photograph, which shows no date of when the photo was taken. I dispute that these were the signs on display at the time of the PCN.

1. I have used Google Street View to explore, as far as is possible, whether these were the signs on display in October 2019. Although blurred due to distance and from slightly different angles, the colouring of the signs from Street View in March 2019 (Exhibit XX- 09)  and December 2020 (Exhibit XX- 10) differs from those in May 2022 (Exhibit XX- 11). The photos from March 2019 and December 2020 are either side of the material date.

1. The colouring of the signs from 2022 appear to be similar to the Claimant’s images in their Exhibit 2. 

1. The colouring in the signs from March 2019 and December 2020 have a lot of dark blue and do not match those in the Claimant’s Exhibit 2. I believe that this goes some way to prove that their witness statement is a set template and does not relate to my specific case.

1. The Claimant has included a map showing locations of their parking signs, their Exhibit 4. There is no date on this map to prove that these were the locations of the signs in existence in October 2019.

1. Comparison of the Claimant’s Exhibit 1 map showing the Mint Car Wash area in blue with their Exhibit 4 (parking sign locations) clearly shows that there are no signs relating to the Claimants charges within the Mint Car Wash area.

Le_Kirk

I have used Google Street View to find the image closed close to the time of the PCN (see Exhibit XX- 01).

I deny that I was either the 'keeper' nor or the driver at the time of the alleged breach.  By leaving the car with Mint Car Wash for several hours, th...........

Suggestions above.  It's "either or" or "neither nor"

Coupon-mad

Is the Total Car Parks NTK a POFA one or not? Compare to para 9 of schedule 4 POFA 2012.

As you were not the driver, this check is vital.

Separately:

Where exactly were the photos taken, at the entrance by ANPR?  So, why would the car wash employee be driving your car anywhere on site except within the car wash?

WD40fan

Le_Kirk said:

I have used Google Street View to find the image closed close to the time of the PCN (see Exhibit XX- 01).

I deny that I was either the 'keeper' nor or the driver at the time of the alleged breach.  By leaving the car with Mint Car Wash for several hours, th...........

Suggestions above.  It's "either or" or "neither nor"

Thank you. I have actually amended to 'closest to the date of the PCN'

WD40fan

Coupon-mad said:

Is the Total Car Parks NTK a POFA one or not? Compare to para 9 of schedule 4 POFA 2012.

As you were not the driver, this check is vital.

Separately:

Where exactly were the photos taken, at the entrance by ANPR?  So, why would the car wash employee be driving your car anywhere on site except within the car wash?

Thanks again for your input.

I've checked and they refer to POFA in bold type on the PCN.

As for the photo, I don't know which ANPR camera it was. I found this forum too late to put in the SAR requests. I know that the staff move the cars around when they are busy. The layout has changed multiple times over the 3.5 years since the PCN was issued. There used to be a section of land behind the actual car wash area that cars could be left and the staff would move them around, I've been unsure how to word this or in which section to mention it.