Another one bites the dust 25/03/2025 -UKPC in house

Not_A_Hope

The Defendant was not aware of any restrictions that applied in the car park due to obscure signage, which was impossible to read from where the defendant had parked. The faded signage was not suitable for alerting motorists.

As poor signage is included as a defence point in the template defence you are using why not delete everything after car park in the above sentences. Keeps it vague but you can include evidence of poor signage and lack of prominent T&Cs in your WS. 

Tima

Aah I see. will do thanks a lot 

Le_Kirk

Tima said:

Le_Kirk said:

Since you are citing CEL v Chan, which is about sparse or vague particulars,  why have you stated in your defence that you knew of no restrictions due to obscure signage? To me that shows you know about an overstay!

I did not overstay though ... ? How else can I reword it?

Your claim form does NOT state what you did, it doesn’t state overstay, failure to pay, driving a green car on a Tuesday, parking out of a bay. Don't say anything that a judge or the claimant could claim you know what the breach was!

Tima

I've amended this and removed the part.

Tima

Hi all, I have just received a reply to the Defence and Directions questionnaire with a Directions Questionnaire (small claims track). Also, their last paragraph says, " the claimant will not respond to or acknowledge any further defence received unless the Defendant has first had this approved in court ". Please do I need to do anything at this point?

Many thanks 

KeithP

Tima said:

Hi all, I have just received a reply to the Defence and Directions questionnaire with a Directions Questionnaire (small claims track). Also, their last paragraph says, " the claimant will not respond to or acknowledge any further defence received unless the Defendant has first had this approved in court ". Please do I need to do anything at this point?

Many thanks 

That's not a particularly clear post.

The first few words are "I have just received a reply...".
Who from?
It looks like whoever sent the reply also sent you a copy of a completed Directions Questionnaire. Is that right?

I would suggest that perhaps you should now re-read item 7 on that checklist you were following when you filed a Defence.

Coupon-mad

This is all explained in the Template Defence first 12 steps. Please re-read it and be ready for each letter.

Tima

KeithP said:

Tima said:

Hi all, I have just received a reply to the Defence and Directions questionnaire with a Directions Questionnaire (small claims track). Also, their last paragraph says, " the claimant will not respond to or acknowledge any further defence received unless the Defendant has first had this approved in court ". Please do I need to do anything at this point?

Many thanks 

That's not a particularly clear post.

The first few words are "I have just received a reply...".
Who from?
It looks like whoever sent the reply also sent you a copy of a completed Directions Questionnaire. Is that right?

I would suggest that perhaps you should now re-read item 7 on that checklist you were following when you filed a Defence.

It was from UKPC solicitors, and yes, they sent a copy of a completed Directions Questionnaire. I have now read the checklist and have filed the document and await my own Directions Questionnaire from the CCBC.

Thanks everyone 

Tima

Hi all. I have just come back from Holiday and found a Notice to Allocation to the Small Claims Tract (Clerkenwell and Shoreditch Court) with a 25/03/25 hearing date but even scarily a deadline of 14/01/25 by 4 pm. May I ask that these parts of my Witness statements be checked based on my Defence? 

I really appreciate any help you can provide. Also, I would like to confirm that I can email the witness statement to them. I have also not received any witness statement from DCB legal 

Facts and sequence of events

 

3.        The facts in this defence come from the Defendant's own knowledge and honest belief.  Conversely, the Claimant sets out a cut-and-paste incoherent and sparse statement of the case. The POC appear to be in breach of CPR 16.4, 16PD3 and 16PD7, and fail to "state all facts necessary for the purpose of formulating a complete cause of action". The Defendant is unable, on the basis of the POC, to understand with certainty what case, allegation(s) and what heads of cost are being pursued, making it difficult to respond. However, the vehicle is recognised and it is admitted that the Defendant was the registered keeper and driver.

 

 

4.        The Defendant vaguely remembers that on the day in question, he had gone shopping with his family and parked in the family bay near the store. The car was in the last bay with a bollard in close proximity. Therefore, the defendant parked to permit the occupiers of the car to exit the car (Evidence HY1).  The defendant was unaware of any restrictions that were applied in the car park due to obscure signage, which was impossible to read from where the defendant had parked. The faded signage was unsuitable for alerting motorists (See Exhibit HY2).

5. The defendant appealed through the online appeals process, which was denied by the claimant.

6. Following this, the defendant received several threatening letters from the claimants regarding payment as well as misleading letters from debt collectors.

7. Further, the Claimant's incoherent POC attempts to charge interest on the whole inflate £170 starting from the day before the alleged breach. The day before the parking event! It is denied that any sum was due at all, let alone the day before the supposed breach (which is denied). Even if interest were to apply, it could only start from when a PCN is deemed 'overdue' and in fact, the sum of the parking charge was £60 in the first 14 days and £100 thereafter (not agreed by the Defendant in any event). To attempt to claim interest in a wholly improper basis, from a date before the car was even there and on a sum that was not due, is reason enough in itself to dismiss the claim.

 

Exaggerated claim

8. The alleged 'core debt' from any parking charge cannot have exceeded £100 (the industry cap set out in the applicable Code of Practice at the time). I have seen no evidence that the added damages/fees are genuine.


9. I say that fees were not paid out or incurred by this Claimant, who is put to strict proof of:

(i) The alleged breach, and

(ii) A breakdown of how they arrived at the enhanced quantum claimed, including how interest has been calculated, which appears to have been applied improperly on the entire inflated sum, as if that figure was immediately overdue on the day of an alleged parking event.

10. This Claimant routinely pursues a disproportionate additional fixed sum (inexplicably added per PCN) despite knowing that the will of Parliament is to ban or substantially reduce the disproportionate 'Debt Fees'. This case is a classic example where the unjust enrichment of exaggerated fees encourages the 'numbers game' of inappropriate and out-of-control bulk litigation of weak/archive parking cases. No pre-action checks and balances are likely to have been made to ensure facts, merit, position of signs/the vehicle, or a proper cause of action.


11. The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities ('the DLUHC') first published its statutory Parking Code of Practice on 7th February 2022, here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/private-parking-code-of-practice in which The Code's Ministerial Foreword was damning:


"Private firms issue roughly 22,000 parking tickets every day, often adopting a labyrinthine system of misleading and confusing signage, opaque appeals services, aggressive debt collection and unreasonable fees designed to extort money from motorists."

12. This Private Parking Code of Practice includes the following, which supports my case:

“Signs within controlled land displaying the specific terms and conditions applying must:

a) be placed throughout the controlled land, such that drivers have the chance to read them at the time of parking or leaving their vehicle;

b) be sufficiently large to be visible from a distance and legible on approach;

c) display information to identify the parking operator and their contact details, including how to make contact out of hours;

d) use colours such that the contrast between the background and the text makes the wording on the sign clearly legible

e) be clear, unambiguous and not use the words “penalty” or “fine”, unless there is a statutory requirement to do so

13. Despite legal challenges delaying the Code's implementation (marking it as temporarily 'withdrawn' as shown in the link above) a draft Impact Assessment (IA) to finalise the DLUHC Code was recently published on 30th July 2023, which has exposed some industry-gleaned facts about supposed 'Debt Fees'. This is revealed in the Government's analysis, found here: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/a ttachment_data/file/1171438/Draft_IA_-_Private_Parking_Code_of_Practice_.pdf

14. Paragraphs 4.31 and 5.19 reveal that the parking industry has informed the DLUHC that the true minor cost of what the parking industry likes to call debt recovery or 'enforcement' (pre-action) stage totals a mere £8.42 per recovery case.


15. With that sum in mind, it is clear that the extant claim has been enhanced by an excessive amount, disingenuously added as an extra 'fee'. This is believed to be routinely retained by the litigating legal team and has been claimed in addition to the intended 'legal representatives fees' cap set within the small claims track rules. This conduct has been examined and found - including in a notably detailed judgment by Her Honour Judge Jackson, now a specialist Civil High Court Judge on the Leeds/Bradford circuit - to constitute 'double recovery' and the Defendant takes that position.


16. The new draft IA now demonstrates that the unnecessarily intimidating stage of pre-action letter-chains actually costs 'eight times less' (says the DLUHC analysis) than the price-fixed £70 per PCN routinely added. This has caused consumer harm in the form of hundreds of thousands of inflated CCJs each year that District Judges have been powerless to prevent. This abusively enhanced 'industry standard' Debt Fee was enabled only by virtue of the self- serving Codes of Practice of the rival parking Trade Bodies, influenced by a Board of parking operators and debt firms who stood to gain from it.


17. In support of my contention that the sum sought is unconscionably exaggerated and thus unrecoverable, attention is drawn to paras 98, 100, 193, 198 of ParkingEye Ltd v Beavis [2015] UKSC67 ('the Beavis case'). Also ParkingEye Ltd v Somerfield Stores Ltd ChD [2011] EWHC 4023(QB) where the parking charge was £75, discounted to £37.50 for prompt payment. Whilst £75 was reasonable, HHJ Hegarty (decision later ratified by the CoA) held in paras 419-428 that unspecified 'admin costs' inflating a parking charge to £135 was not a true reflection of the cost of a template letter and 'would appear to be penal'.


18. This Claimant has not incurred any additional costs because the full parking charge (after expiry of discount) is already high and more than covers what the Supreme Court called an 'automated letter-chain' business model that generates a healthy profit. In Beavis, there were 4 or 5 letters in total, including pre-action phase reminders. The £85 parking charge was held to cover the 'costs of the operation' and the DLUHC's IA suggests it should still be the case that the parking charge itself more than covers the minor costs of pre-action stage, even if and when the Government reduces the level of parking charges.


19. Whilst the new Code is not retrospective, the majority of the clauses went unchallenged by the parking industry and it stands to become a creature of statute due to the failure of the self-serving BPA & IPC Codes. The DLUHC's Secretary of State mentions they are addressing 'market failure' more than once in the draft IA, a phrase which should be a clear steer for Courts in 2023 to scrutinise every aspect of claims like this one.


20. In addition, pursuant to Schedule 4 paragraph 4(5) of the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 ('the POFA') the sum claimed exceeds the maximum potentially recoverable. It is also disproportionate and in breach of the Consumer Rights Act 2015.

CRA breaches

21. Claiming costs on an indemnity basis is unfair, per the Unfair Contract Terms Guidance (CMA37, para 5.14.3), the Government guidance on the CRA which introduced new requirements for 'prominence' of both contract terms and 'consumer notices'. In a parking context, this includes a test of fairness and clarity of signage and all notices, letters and other communications intended to be read by the consumer.


22. Section 71 creates a duty upon courts to consider the test of fairness, including (but not limited to) whether all terms/notices were unambiguously and conspicuously brought to the attention of a consumer. Signage must be prominent, plentiful, well-placed (and lit in hours of darkness/dusk) and all terms must be unambiguous and contractual obligations clear.


23. The CRA has been breached due to unfair/unclear terms and notices, pursuant to s62 and paying due regard to examples 6, 10, 14 & 18 of Schedule 2 and the requirements for fair/open dealing and good faith (NB: this does not necessarily mean there has to be a finding of bad faith).

ParkingEye v Beavis is distinguished

24. The Supreme Court clarified that ‘the penalty rule is plainly engaged’ in parking cases, which must be determined on their own facts. That 'unique' case met a commercial justification test, given the location and clear signs with the charges in the largest/boldest text. Rather than causing other parking charges to be automatically justified, that case, in particular, the brief, conspicuous yellow & black warning signs - see EXHIBIT XXXX - set a high bar that this Claimant has failed to reach.


25. Paraphrasing from the Supreme Court, deterrence is likely to be penal if there is a lack of a 'legitimate interest' in performance extending beyond the prospect of compensation flowing directly from the alleged breach. The intention cannot be to punish a driver, nor to present them with hidden terms, unexpected/cumbersome obligations nor 'concealed pitfalls or traps'. (See EXHIBIT XXXX for paragraphs from ParkingEye v Beavis).


26. In the present case, the Claimant has fallen foul of those tests. Court of Appeal authorities which are on all fours with a case involving a lack of ‘adequate notice’ of a charge, include:


(i) Spurling v Bradshaw [1956] 1 WLR 461 (‘red hand rule’) and

(ii) Thornton v Shoe Lane Parking Ltd [1970] EWCA Civ2,

both leading authorities confirming that a clause cannot be incorporated after a contract has been concluded; and


(iii) Vine v London Borough of Waltham Forest: CA 5 Apr 2000, where Ms Vine won because it was held that she had not seen the terms by which she would later be bound, due to "the absence of any notice on the wall opposite the parking space".

Conclusion

27. The claim is entirely without merit. The Defendant believes that it is in the public interest that claims like this should be struck out because knowingly enhanced parking claims like this one cause consumer harm on a grand scale.


28. There is now ample evidence to support the view - long held by many District Judges - that these are knowingly exaggerated claims. The July 2023 DLUHC IA analysis surely makes that clear because it is now a matter of record that the industry has told the Government that 'debt recovery' costs eight times less than they have been claiming in almost every case.


29. In the matter of costs, the Defendant asks:

a) at the very least, for standard witness costs for attendance at Court, pursuant to CPR 27.14,

and


b) for a finding of unreasonable conduct by this Claimant, seeking costs pursuant to CPR 46.5.

30. Attention is drawn specifically to the (often-seen) distinct possibility of an unreasonably late Notice of Discontinuance. Whilst CPR r.38.6 states that the Claimant is liable for the Defendant's costs after discontinuance (r.38.6(1)) this does not normally apply to claims allocated to the small claims track (r.38.6(3)). However, the White Book states (annotation 38.6.1): "Note that the normal rule as to costs does not apply if a claimant in a case allocated to the small claims track serves a notice of discontinuance although it might be contended that costs should be awarded if a party has behaved unreasonably (r.27.14(2)(dg))."

Coupon-mad

Isn't that just your defence from December 2023?

A WS is not a repeat (exactly) of the defence words.  The WS is what the NEWBIES thread (second post) explains.  And I give a list of evidence exhibits there for you, too.