Claims form received - unsure of next steps to take

dmw959

I received a claims form today from county court for a parking charge notice issued by 'Elite car parking management' in November of 2022 at Eddington in Cambridge. I think this fine has been issued unfairly - there is some error on my part however which i will explain and hopefully get peoples opinion on.

Parking at Eddington on the weekends needs to be bought through an app from 10am onwards with 1 hours free parking available to begin with, followed by a chargeable period thereafter. There are multiple sites at Eddington, all within a short distance of one another and identified by different codes within a parking app (Just park). I booked 1 hours free parking but, as it turns out i had used the wrong code for the area i was in parked in and so therefore was not technically covered. I came to move my car prior to the end of the 1 hour period and noticed a parking attendant photographing my car. When i drove the car away, i took a picture of the time and date on the dash of my car whilst stopped at a set of traffic lights to show that i had moved the car and it was no longer at Eddington if a PCN came through for any reason.

Lo and behold, further down the line i received the whole sequence of letters from elite parking, debt collection, solicitors etc. I basically ignored these without replying thinking nothing would come of them. As mentioned, I have now received a claim form. Would I stand a good chance of winning my case if this went to court? Nobody (i.e. the parking company or the landowner) has been cheated out of anything here - I 'paid' for parking and moved my car off site before the end of the period covered. The only thing i did wrong was select the incorrect parking site in the app, several of which come up when you type in Eddington, so it can be a bit confusing. To now potentially be hit with £250+ cost (£170 hiked up parking charge with debt collectors taking a cut and court/solicitor fees being asked for) seems ridiculous. Any help or advice would be appreciated. 

KeithP

Hello and welcome.

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

dmw959

Hello, the issue date the 26th of June 2023.

KeithP

dmw959 said:

Hello, the issue date the 26th of June 2023.

With a Claim Issue Date of 26th June, you have until Monday 17th July to file an Acknowledgment of Service.  Do not file an Acknowledgment of Service before 1st July, but otherwise there is nothing to be gained by delaying it. 

To file an Acknowledgment of Service, follow the guidance in the Dropbox file linked from the second post in the NEWBIES thread.

Having filed an Acknowledgment of Service in a timely manner, you have until 4pm on Monday 31st July 2023 to file your Defence.

That's over four weeks away. Plenty of time to produce a Defence, but please don't leave it to the last minute.

To create a Defence, and then file a Defence by email, look again at the second post on the NEWBIES thread - immediately following where you found the Acknowledgment of Service guidance.

Don't miss the deadline for filing an Acknowledgment of Service, nor that 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'.

dmw959

Any feedback on the below defence would be greatly appreciated. I made reference to details of my prior parking record to try to reflect the fact that on every occasion i have parked at Eddington, i have booked.

Defence

3. The defendant has been travelling from XXXX to Eddington, Cambridge since XXXXX to visit their partner (from Friday evening until Monday morning), who lives on site at XXXXXX. Parking at Eddington on the weekends is free between the hours of 6PM on Friday evening to 10AM on Saturday. Parking is then once more free after 5PM on Saturday until 10AM on a Sunday, with further free parking available from 5PM on Sunday until 8AM on Monday. Between these periods, parking needs to be bought through a mobile app with 1 hours free parking available to begin with, followed by a chargeable period thereafter.

4. The defendant has regularly made use of and diligently booked the 1-hour free period between 10AM and 11AM on Saturday and Sunday, which is booked through a parking app (Just Park). There is a record of a booking for Saturday, Sunday and Monday (and Friday, where required) between November 2021 and July 2023 for every day when the defendant has visited Eddington (see defendants exhibit XX). Once this free period of parking expires at 11am on the weekends, the defendant moves their car to the nearby park and ride on Madingly Road, where 18 hours free parking is available. The defendant then moves their car back onto the Eddington site after 5PM on Saturday and Sunday, before the 18 hour period at Madingly Road expires.

5. Management of parking at Eddington had recently changed hands close to the period where the PCN was issued, with several issues with the customer facing parking apps reported (defendant exhibit XX). There are multiple car parking sites at Eddington, all within a short distance of one another and identified by different codes within the parking app (Just Park).

6. On the 26th of November 2022 the defendant booked 1-hours free parking from 10.12AM to 11.13AM at the Eddington 4 hour car park believing this covered the area the defendants vehicle was parked in. No prior PCN notices had been received, despite bookings at this same 4 hour location having been made on the 30th and 31st of October 2022, and the 16th of November 2022. The defendant came to move their car prior to the end of the 1-hour booking period and noticed a parking attendant photographing their car, which the defendant thought was unusual, given a booking had been made through the mobile app and the defendants vehicle was still covered by the booking period. Whilst moving the car to the Madingly Road park and ride at approximately 11.13-11.15AM, the defendant took a picture of the time and date on the dash of their car whilst stopped at a set of traffic lights as proof that the vehicle had been moved off site from Eddington before the booking period had elapsed (defendants exhibit XX).

7. The defendant continued to use the 4-hour car parking ID to book parking at Eddington in the app until February 2023, when a further PCN notice arrived. This same PCN was issued under the same conditions, with parking booked through the app at the wrong site. In light of the PCNs issued, the defendant subsequently realised that parking needed to be booked within the app at the Eddington 2 hour car park (site ID: 829643), which covers the car park the vehicle is regularly parked in by Wileman way. The 2 hour car parking site is less than 350 metres away from the 4 hour car parking site, located close to the nearby Sainsburys on Eddington Avenue.

dmw959

Is it worth including the indicated 'exhibits' too?

Coupon-mad

You don't attach exhibits to a defence.  Remove all those.  This is explained in the second post if the NEWBIES thread about 'knowing what happens when'.

I think your paragraphs 3, 4 and 7 should be removed entirely as none of what happens on-street or in Council car parks is relevant to this defence. It's too much detail.

More importantly:

Because your deadline for defence is at the end of July I'm going to tell you to wait a bit ...diarise an alert for, say, 28th July though - DO NOT MISS YOUR DEADLINE!

This slight delay advice is important because there is now good reason to wait for defence submission till close to/at your deadline.

Sorry if it might look conflicting with the usual advice "not to leave it till the last minute"!

It's because we are now in July.

Your timing is perfect if the DLUHC in their Draft Impact Assessment (due in a couple of weeks) give us all some damning words to add!

Things are changing quickly this Summer and as it's so close to the DLUHC's Announcement I would PREPARE the defence but hold off emailing it... not yet...

I will be changing the Template Defence to suit, this month.

dmw959

I should note too, that as mentioned in point 7, ive received a second PCN notice for exactly the same error (wrong site ID used). No claim form received yet, but DCB have sent a notice of claim letter so can assume they'll put in a separate claim form through the courts for that. Is it worth trying to push get the second PCN dealt with as part of this defence? If a second claims form does show up, the defence will be more or less exactly the same, just a change of dates / times. 

dmw959

Coupon-mad said:

You don't attach exhibits to a defence.  Remove all those.  This is explained in the second post if the NEWBIES thread about 'knowing what happens when'.

I think your paragraphs 3, 4 and 7 should be removed entirely as none of what happens on-street or in Council car parks is relevant to this defence. It's too much detail.

More importantly:

Because your deadline for defence is at the end of July I'm going to tell you to wait a bit ...diarise an alert for, say, 28th July though - DO NOT MISS YOUR DEADLINE!

This slight delay advice is important because there is now good reason to wait for defence submission till close to/at your deadline.

Sorry if it might look conflicting with the usual advice "not to leave it till the last minute"!

It's because we are now in July.

Your timing is perfect if the DLUHC in their Draft Impact Assessment (due in a couple of weeks) give us all some damning words to add!

Things are changing quickly this Summer and as it's so close to the DLUHC's Announcement I would PREPARE the defence but hold off emailing it... not yet...

I will be changing the Template Defence to suit, this month.

Thanks for the feedback. Ill get rid of those paragraphs.

Ill also hang on until later on in the month to submit for the reasons you highlight!

Coupon-mad

OK good, come back and see what the news is and don't miss your defence deadline as that is vital.

Coupon-mad

dmw959 said:

Coupon-mad said:

You don't attach exhibits to a defence.  Remove all those.  This is explained in the second post if the NEWBIES thread about 'knowing what happens when'.

I think your paragraphs 3, 4 and 7 should be removed entirely as none of what happens on-street or in Council car parks is relevant to this defence. It's too much detail.

More importantly:

Because your deadline for defence is at the end of July I'm going to tell you to wait a bit ...diarise an alert for, say, 28th July though - DO NOT MISS YOUR DEADLINE!

This slight delay advice is important because there is now good reason to wait for defence submission till close to/at your deadline.

Sorry if it might look conflicting with the usual advice "not to leave it till the last minute"!

It's because we are now in July.

Your timing is perfect if the DLUHC in their Draft Impact Assessment (due in a couple of weeks) give us all some damning words to add!

Things are changing quickly this Summer and as it's so close to the DLUHC's Announcement I would PREPARE the defence but hold off emailing it... not yet...

I will be changing the Template Defence to suit, this month.

Thanks for the feedback. Ill get rid of those paragraphs.

Ill also hang on until later on in the month to submit for the reasons you highlight!

How is it going?

Got the defence in?

The DQ (as explained in the Template Defence thread and the NEWBIES thread also) is currently taking 2 months.

We hope you did come back snd have seen the DLUHC's current Call for Evidence in the thread about it?