Parking Charge Notice - Defence Submission

B789

You can print out the signature page and sign that and keep it handy. If you just type your name on the electronic version, you can send that. As long as the original page with the signature is available should anyone query it, you should be safe.

However, it is not really that difficult to just take a photo of your signature and append that to the PDF document.

allshallbewell

Okay, I get that Coupon-mad. I've no problem sending as an email a pdf attachment but I've spent half a day going bonkers by trying to make an on-line signature work and failing.  

allshallbewell

Thank you B789. I can can certainly follow your first suggestion and make sure I've got the physically signed one. I'm quite sure it's dead easy to sign on-line but I can't get it to work for love nor money. It may be because PreView (mac) doesn't work with Acrobat reader - or something. I probably need a child to show me how to work it.

allshallbewell

In the Defense, for one thing, I've relied on Britannia Parking Group v Crosby (2019) for finding against the Claimant for inflating the parking charge by adding unknown addition costs. Do I need to trawl for multiple similar judgements or will one 'good one' do to cover this point?

B789

allshallbewell said:

Thank you B789. I can can certainly follow your first suggestion and make sure I've got the physically signed one. I'm quite sure it's dead easy to sign on-line but I can't get it to work for love nor money. It may be because PreView (mac) doesn't work with Acrobat reader - or something. I probably need a child to show me how to work it.

In Preview on the Mac you can literally take a photo of your signature and it is then permanently available when using that app. There are literally hundreds of how-to videos but here is just one that will do the job:

https://youtu.be/NfJPm4fMChI

B789

allshallbewell said:

In the Defense, for one thing, I've relied on Britannia Parking Group v Crosby (2019) for finding against the Claimant for inflating the parking charge by adding unknown addition costs. Do I need to trawl for multiple similar judgements or will one 'good one' do to cover this point?

Crosby is out of date. As it is a DCB Legal issued claim use this defence template:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/5r7vbqttho3q948/2023 defence.pdf?dl=0

Coupon-mad

allshallbewell said:

In the Defense, for one thing, I've relied on Britannia Parking Group v Crosby (2019) for finding against the Claimant for inflating the parking charge by adding unknown addition costs. Do I need to trawl for multiple similar judgements or will one 'good one' do to cover this point?

But we don't use Crosby. It was effectively overturned, do not use it!

If you are at defence stage you don't add case law anyway.  We advise clearly only to add your facts into the Template Defence.

Case law (but not Crosby) comes later.

allshallbewell

Thanks Coupon-mad but you've shaken me. I thought Britannia Parking Group v Crosby 2019 found in favour of the Defendants. Did they lose on appeal?

Coupon-mad

Not exactly.  It's all history now but:

I lay-repped and won the Crosby case.  Sadly, one other Defendant listed in the case (there were 6 listed Defendants) also rocked up and sat in on it.  Mr Semark-Jullien sat there hanging on our coat-tails.  Hardly said a word. Was very arrogant though.

He didn't have a clue what the hearing was even about but revealed himself to be a Freeman of the Land hopeless case Defendant with zero defence, who would have lost.

The hearing I won was NOT an appeal, just a county court level application hearing.

Then Britannia/BW Legal appealed the Semark-Jullien decision (ONLY, not ours - but it relied on MY outcome) behind my/Mr Crosby's back, knowing that Semark-Jullien would be a total pushover in front of a Circuit Judge.

Apparently, from what I can gather, he was in over his head and he stormed out halfway through.  We had no idea until it was over.

Thus the decision I'd secured was overthrown.

BW Legal boasted about it on their website - naming me and bargepole in what was described by us (me and bargepole) as a bit of a rant - but that page no longer exists because they've recently changed their website.

Not that this matters in the scheme of things.

That was a mere battle!

I'm fairly confident we are winning the war.

It's what the DLUHC says in their upcoming Draft Impact Assessment and Public Consultation next month that really matters now because the new Code of Practice will define and cap what can be charged and it will be a creature of statute.

You know I have been an ever-present on the Private Parking (Code of Practice) Steering Group since 2020, as the only individual consumer member?  I can't talk about the work but motorists have certainly had a voice this time.

allshallbewell

Thanks Coupon-mad and I'm sorry to hear that Mr S-J's antics upset the apple cart despite your best efforts. Does that totally wipe out District Judge Grand's standpoint though? Surely his eminently sensible remarks could be quoted nevertheless or would that press the legal self-destruct button? I thought I'd got a reasonable Defence by including Crosby but now it looks like I may need to go back to the drawing board with 12 days to go.
Thank you also B789, I've finally managed to work the signature. The secret is knowing how to open the pdf document in PreView by control/clicking on it.