PCN Court Claim Form

podscoreboard

I've read the sticky threads, so I understand I must submit an AOS as a first stage and then work on the defence. 

My claim form has an issue date of 26th of June, which as far as I understand, if I submit the AOS today or tomorrow, I will then have another 14 days on top of the initial two weeks to acknowledge the claim and submit my defence by 27th July?

Not entirely sure however how to structure the defence, or even how to defend this. Here are the particulars about the case:

In 2020, the driver worked on behalf of a company that paid third parties for their parking spaces so contractors could use their car parks. Needless to say, for this particular location the contractor parking spots were always full and in some occasions, the driver had to park on the non-contractor allocated spots. A few weeks before this PCN, the driver was able to get verbal permission to park on the non-contractor allocated spots and had to simply display a paper that was obtained from the company's front desk in the windshield. The driver asked if it needed to be dated, as there was clearly a prompt to fill in a date and the staff said it was not necessary.

A week or so later, the driver travelled to the same workplace and parked in the same location that required the paper from the front desk. The driver used the paper obtained from the front desk and ran out of the place to get to a meeting they were running late to. The driver assumed, based on his previous conversations with staff and the verbal agreement that there would be no issues as a result.

When the driver returned, there was a PCN on the windshield stating that the permit was expired or discontinued. However, after asking for a SAR, the evidence in the PCN made no attempt to show an expired permit on the windshield.

Other than the contractor parking spaces, the remaining car park seemed relatively empty for the day, and since the company the driver worked on behalf of paid for most of their parking space, this £250+ fine seems very out of proportion. It's not like they were not losing out on revenue because the driver parked there.

The driver/keeper received letters from DBC Legal, attempted to get them to cancel the PCN and now, here we are - I have a claim form to work on.

I would really appreciate your support and advice on how best to proceed based on the above!

Thank you in advance!

KeithP

podscoreboard said:

My claim form has an issue date of 26th of June, which as far as I understand, if I submit the AOS today or tomorrow, I will then have another 14 days on top of the initial two weeks to acknowledge the claim and submit my defence by 27th July?

Not entirely sure however how to structure the defence, or even how to defend this.

Hello and welcome.

With a Claim Issue Date of 26th June, you have until Monday 17th July to file an Acknowledgment of Service but 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 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'.

1505grandad

Who is the claimant?.

podscoreboard

1505grandad said:

Who is the claimant?.

The claimant is UK Parking Control limited.

Umkomaas

podscoreboard said:

1505grandad said:

Who is the claimant?.

The claimant is UK Parking Control limited.

Go through all the processes required by the court - each element, meeting each deadline - and, in a single ticket case, you should extract a discontinuation from UKPC/DCB Legal. Stick with the plan.

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6377263/dcb-legal-record-of-private-parking-court-claim-discontinuations/p1

podscoreboard

Here's my attempt at defence based on the above.

1. The parking charges referred to in this claim did not arise from any agreement of terms. The charge and the claim was an unexpected shock. The Defendant denies that the Claimant is entitled to relief in the sum claimed, or at all. It is denied that any conduct by the driver was a breach of any prominent term and it is denied that this Claimant (understood to have a bare licence as managers) has standing to sue or form contracts in their own name. Liability is denied, whether or not the Claimant is claiming 'keeper liability', which is unclear from the Particulars.

The facts as known to the Defendant:

2. It is admitted that the Defendant was the registered keeper and driver of the vehicle.

3. The defendant entered the car park on [INSERT DATE] which is paid for business purposes by [INSERT COMPANY]. On this particular day, the allocated parking spaces were full and the driver parked on one of the visitor spaces. 

4. On previous occasion, the driver had verbal agreement with the managers of the venue to use visitor spaces when all other business spaces were full. The driver was informed the parking slip did not need to be filled out and could be displayed on the wind shield 'as is' on such occasions.

5. On [INSERT DATE], the driver arrived on the car park and used the same window slip acquired from the venue in line with previous verbal agreement, but when the driver returned, there was a parking notice on the vehicle's windshield.

7. The POC are entirely inadequate, in that they fail to particularise (a) the contractual term(s) relied upon; (b) the specifics of any alleged breach of contract; and (c) how the purported and unspecified 'damages' arose and the breakdown of the exaggerated quantum.

8. The claim has been issued via Money Claims Online and, as a result, is subject to a character limit for the Particulars of Claim section of the Claim Form. The fact that generic wording appears to have been applied has obstructed any semblance of clarity. The Defendant trusts that the court will agree that a claim pleaded in such generic terms lacks the required details and requires proper particularisation in a detailed document within 14 days, per 16PD.3

9. The guidance for completing Money Claims Online confirms this and clearly states: "If you do not have enough space to explain your claim online and you need to serve extra, more detailed particulars on the defendant, tick the box that appears after the statement 'you may also send detailed particulars direct to the defendant.'"

10. No further particulars have been filed and to the Defendant's knowledge, no application asking the court service for more time to serve and/or relief from sanctions has been filed either.

11. The facts in this defence come from the Defendant's own knowledge and honest belief. To pre-empt the usual template responses from this serial litigator: the court process is outside of the Defendant's life experience and they cannot be criticised for using, in part, pre-written wording suggested by a reliable online help resource. The Claimant is urged not to patronise the Defendant with (ironically template) unfounded accusations of not understanding their defence. 

12. With regard to template statements, the Defendant observes after researching other parking claims, that the Particulars of Claim ('POC') set out a cut-and-paste incoherent statement of case. In breach of the pre-action protocol for 'Debt' Claims, no copy of the contract (sign) accompanied any Letter of Claim. The POC is sparse on facts and specific breach allegations, which makes it difficult to respond in depth at this time; however this claim is unfair, generic and inflated.

Coupon-mad

No such thing as a windshield in the UK!

And you are missing a paragraph 6 (we assume the rest is as per the template defence?).  I would remove paragraph 11.

podscoreboard

Coupon-mad said:

No such thing as a windshield in the UK!

And you are missing a paragraph 6 (we assume the rest is as per the template defence?).  I would remove paragraph 11.

And I'm confused as to why your paragraphs about the woeful PoC only span 4 paragraphs when the exemplar version by @Johny86 has this section from 5-11 (six paragraphs) so it looks like you are missing some of it.

And given your defence isn't due till 31st July you'll be well advised to wait and NOT to submit it until after the DLUHC publish their big news (as explained here) as ling as it happens in July if course:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/80147453/#Comment_80147453

Thanks for the follow up Coupon-mad. Regarding the missing paragraph, I tried to edit my post, but I don't have the option yet. 

I'll make sure to include the full six paragraphs by @Johny86 on my defence.

Not sure what the DLUHC is, but I'll check out the link you shared, thank you!

KeithP

podscoreboard said:

Not sure what the DLUHC is...

...but google knows.   

podscoreboard

Confirming that since following all the steps in the guide thread, I have received a N279 Notice of Discontinuance from DCBL.

LDast

Well done for persevering. Please post a redacted copy of your N279.

AOBTD. Attention @Umkomaas