CCJ set-aside. Now Small Claims & Draft Defence.

Coupon-mad

This is appalling.

Make sure your email says "I have not seen the Order dated last week yet as it hasn't arrived but I've just wasted all morning attending the court for MY application hearing (that I paid £275 for) only to find that Elms Legal has misled the court with the fake Consent Order (and wholly misleading email wording, pushing for no hearing) that I specifically warned the court NOT to fall for.

This is a formal objection to the recent Order from March 2024.  It is irregular, based on a fake Consent Order and the Order must be set aside.

Also prove your costs if you took time off for the hearing day.  Attach those costs and the £275 fee receipt and a replacement Draft Order.

Attach proof of the other cases you know about and the CiLeX complaint.

Attach the email you sent the Court begging them not to fall for this crap.

State that the Claimant's legal representative's conduct is so repeated and vexatious (having already been warned by CiLeX in 2023, not to do this after a similar case) that you ask the Judge to consider calling the solicitor responsible into court to explain why this conduct isn't a contempt of court, in all the premises. 

Grizebeck

This is certainly solvable but you have to be like a dog with a bone.
Which court was this ? You can escalate this to the court manager where it can be put immediately in front a judge.

Khayman

Grizebeck said:

This is certainly solvable but you have to be like a dog with a bone.
Which court was this ? You can escalate this to the court manager where it can be put immediately in front a judge.
Which court?

Leeds Combined Court

pinkelephant12

I think Dan Neidle would be interested in your experience of Elms Legal.

He is a well-respected campaigner on tax issues but has recently received the treat of correspondence from BW Legal over a parking ticket.  As the former head of tax law at the London office of solicitors Clifford Chance, he is shocked at the behaviour of these solicitors and seeking evidence of bad practice.  Others have made him aware that this is ‘normal’ for solicitors pursuing alleged parking debts. 

Dan is influential and if he receives enough evidence about the unprofessionalism of this legal sector, it is likely that the SRA would listen to him.

You can find him on Twitter or at Tax Policy Associates.

Harvez63

Absolute joke! 

My case was vacated without me knowing a week before, and I had no way of claiming costs as there was no case there. Another clear tactic of these bottom dwellers. 

pinkelephant12

@Harvez63 If the court is at fault for not informing you, you can make a formal complaint using the online form and ask for a goodwill payment.  You have to be quite insistent and go through all 3 stages of the complaints process.  I did this and I was awarded £500 by HMCTS last year due to all the administrative errors in my case.

Khayman

pinkelephant12 said:

I think Dan Neidle would be interested in your experience of Elms Legal.

He is a well-respected campaigner on tax issues but has recently received the treat of correspondence from BW Legal over a parking ticket.  As the former head of tax law at the London office of solicitors Clifford Chance, he is shocked at the behaviour of these solicitors and seeking evidence of bad practice.  Others have made him aware that this is ‘normal’ for solicitors pursuing alleged parking debts. 

Dan is influential and if he receives enough evidence about the unprofessionalism of this legal sector, it is likely that the SRA would listen to him.

You can find him on Twitter or at Tax Policy Associates.

I tweeted him the other day and he said he was just focusing on BW Legal at the moment, but I'll follow him in case that changes.

Khayman

I have today received another letter from the court in response to my email.

In my email I detailed what had happened (my hearing being incorrectly vacated and ELMS Legal's false 'consent order' being followed) and set out why I think it shouldn't have. I provided evidence that the court may have been misled and requested they amend the order to maintain the set aside and at the very least award my fee be paid if not dismissing the case entirely. I also requested they consider not forcing me to take another day off work unpaid to attend another hearing.

The letter today says that the previous order has been set aside (except for Paragraph 1, which was the set aside of the CCJ) and that a new hearing for the 'balance of the application' be relisted for June.

So that's another day off work I'll need to take. Considering making a complaint to the court (as well as seeing if I can get them to pay me expenses since I think it's totally unreasonable for them to post a vacation order on a Thursday expecting it to be delivered prior to a Monday hearing), but wondering whether to do it after the next hearing, just in case??

Fruitcake

Personally I would make the complaint now rather than give the courts the opportunity to let it fall through the cracks again, sorry you are too late, you've use the wrong form/process etcetera.

Coupon-mad

You did really well to overturn that Order!

Yes the complaint can wait until the case has concluded.

What does this new Order say about costs?  

The great thing is, you definitely have evidence that Elms Legal's conduct has been 'vexatious and wholly unreasonable'. Wasting your time AND a substantial amount of court time and money must meet the high bar in Dammerman v Lanyon Bowdler:

https://www.3pb.co.uk/content/uploads/Dammerman-v-Lanyon-Bowdler-Joseph-England-May-2017.pdf

and this conduct opens the Claimant up to exposure to all your costs, as confirmed in the White Book annotation (cited at the end of our Template Defence).

Make sure you send the court and Elms an updated full costs schedule and push Elms to pay it in full and discontinue, which is in their client's interests to avoid a Judge scrutinising their dodgy 'consent order' trick.

I reckon you can get them to discontinue and settle all your costs if you are persuasive enough. Push it. You persuaded the court.  Now press Elms to duck out and run away, but NOT 'costs free'.  

What exactly does the new Order say? Pic?