PCN Defence Check - BW Legal

seventhefundog

Hi all,

Please please help and check my defence. I am furious at ArmTrac and BWLegal.

I hope the defence speaks for itself. Any advice is much appreciated and I'll keep you updated until the end of this fight.

Many thanks in advance.

3. The Defendant arrived at Sennan Beach Car Park at 1055 on XX XX 2023 and used the ticket machine to purchase a ticket to park for 3 hours until 1355. The cost was £3.90 for The Defendant was required to enter the vehicle’s number-plate using the ticket machine. The issued ticket provided unequivocal proof that the defendant paid for permission to park for the vehicle with registration XXXXXXXX. The number plate is printed on the ticket. EVIDENCE A

4. The issued ticket was placed on the Defendant’s dashboard but had unexpectedly fallen onto the floor of the vehicle after the Defendant left the vehicle. The issued ticket was not adhesive so it would not be uncommon for a ticket to move, especially as the location of the car park is at a beach.

5. Upon returning to the vehicle with the allotted time, A parking fine, PCN was attached to the vehicle. The Defendant was frustrated as the Claimant chose to ignore the data collected by the ticket machine which would prove that the Defendant had paid for the right to park by entering their number-plate details when arriving at the car park. The Defendant also argues that asking drivers to display the ticket is in-fact superfluous, as is the case with many car parks. The ticket machine has already recorded number-plate details which the car park operator could use, but chose not to.

6. The Defendant immediately filed an appeal on XX XX 2023 to the car park operator (ArmTrac) and did not receive a response. It was therefore assumed that the appeal was successful. On June 27 2023 the Defendant received a ‘Final Notice’ from ArmTrac. Upon contacting ArmTrac via email, a response from an ArmTrac representative stated that the appeal was unsuccessful. At this point it was too late for the Defendant to appeal via the independent assessor (POPLA). The Defendant believes that ArmTrac deliberately fails to notify people of appeal decisions to prevent them appealing. The Defendant found further reports of ‘missing’ appeal decisions in the media. Evidence B

 7. The Defendant contacted ArmTrac via telephone. ArmTrac refused to discuss the appeal any further with the Defendant. They told the Defendant that the fine would be passed on to BW Legal for ‘debt collection’

8. The Defendant has received many demanding and intimidating letters from BW Legal. The Defendant has telephoned BW Legal to reason with them but each time has been told that the fine still stands. Despite the fact that the Claimant has proof that the Defendant paid to park and the Claimant is not out of pocket.

KeithP

What is the Issue Date on your Claim Form?

Have you filed an Acknowledgment of Service?
If so, upon what date did you do so?
Your MCOL Claim History will have the definitive answer to that.

No evidence gets filed with a Defence.

OP, have you based your forum username on your real name? If so, you may want to get your forum username changed to something completely anonymous.
To help with that, have a read of this item from the Forum's FAQs:

Can I change my username?

In most circumstances, we don't allow this.

The only reason we will change your username is if it puts your privacy at risk e.g. you've inadvertently registered using your name, email address or something which gives away your identity within your username.

If you fall into this category, email forumteam@moneysavingexpert.com your current username, the email address you registered with and three alternative usernames in order of preference.

Coupon-mad

Once you've got the username changed, please answer Keith's questions and post a pic of the bottom half of the Claim form with the MCOL Password and your car VRM covered up.

seventhefundog

Argh, Silly mistake... I already had an account from years ago. I have filed a username change. Can I not edit the post either?
Yes I have filed an AOS
Issue date is 20/11
I'll report back once the username is changed.

KeithP

and my third question was...
...upon what date did you file an Acknowledgment of Service?

seventhefundog

Hi again and thanks Keith and Coupon Mad for your responses.
Username changed, very impressed with the quick service here.
I filed the AoS on November 26.
I'll post the bottom half of the claim for when i return from work.

KeithP

seventhefundog said:

Issue date is 20/11

seventhefundog said:

I filed the AoS on November 26.

With a Claim Issue Date of 20th November, and having filed an Acknowledgment of Service in a timely manner, you have until 4pm on Thursday 28th December 2023 to file your Defence.

That's almost 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 at the second post in the NEWBIES thread.

Don't miss the deadline 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'.

seventhefundog

Thanks for the confirmation of dates.
So here is the bottom half of the lettter.
Based on the defence draft on my first post, I realise I need to take out any reference to evidence. Do you think the rest is ok?
Thanks so much.

Coupon-mad

Remove mentions of 'fine' and POPLA' neither of which are correct for Armtrac.

Remove 7 and 8.  Keep detail like that - and evidence - for the WS bundle stage in 2024.

And this sentence is missing some words:

"The cost was £3.90 for The Defendant was required to..."

seventhefundog

Hi, Thank you all so much. Defence is ready.

I emailed my defence on Monday at 10am to the email address CCBCAQ@Justice.gov.uk but didn't get a response. I have just tried again. Is there anything else I can try?

Do I just ignore the defence procedure on the moneyclaim website (Which only allows for 120 lines of text)?

Thanks

JerryJ64

Ignore MCOL. Try and send your defence from a different email address/provider. The acknowledgement response should be almost instantaneous. Keep trying until you receive the acknowledgement email.