Initial upcoming case help appreciated - grace period for outdated sign?

dilby

Hi folks - 

I’ve been given a date for a hearing at my local county court for a PCN received from the N*xus Group. 

I’m putting together my case and wanted to do an initial post to try to guage any feedback if I’m on the right track.

Some background;

• Received PCN in 2019 while parked at a local well known coffee shop. Had driven with a group of work colleagues. 

• As we booked the space regularly and were big spenders at the coffee shop, I complained to the business who told me they would get it canceled. Unfortunately I left it there and failed to chase, and it transpired they didn’t cancel it at all (the person dealing with it left the business it transpires).

• Of course then covid hit, the world dropped off and so did any correspondence from group n*xus, and I had totally lost track of it until I started receiving debt collector letters in 2021 when I realised it hadn’t been sorted.. So here we are 5 years later.

Although I unfortunately don’t have the original PCN, they allege I stayed for 3 hours and 13 minutes. By the time I started receiving letters again I went back to photograph signs and noticed they’d all changed to 4 hours, although they must have been 3 hours at the time (I’ve tried confirming this with local staff and google street view but have had no luck).

I’m however going to keep trying, as I am banking on a grace period argument being my best bet to put my energy on (10 minutes is allowed to find a space, pull up etc, allowing me no time to sort everyone out and leave) . Group Nexus is a member of the BPA and although it’s a small car park, I had a group of colleagues car pooling with me and getting everyone organised to leave and out of the car park can be time consuming. The post below is what I’ve found the most helpful:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5642228/smart-parking-ticket-for-13-min-overstay

I wanted to check if anyone had some thoughts to confirm if sounds like my best angle 

Some other questions:

1) Given that the car park time limit seems to have changed very soon after to 4 hours anyway (in which case i would have been fine) is there any argument here to say it always should have been 3, or is it a case of if it was 3 at the time it was 3 at the time.

2) In regards to a Costs Assessment, I am self employed and would therefore be using previous invoices to prove my day rate that I’m sacrificing to attend. I recently had a speeding fine and the court didn’t receive my drivers license details which they asked me to send in (lost in post), and the case went to court. They asked my salary in the questionnaire prior to the hearing which I gave, and as it’s higher than average this pushed up my fine as i incurred other levies. Could this feasibly happen to me if I lost, and if I do lose what is the absolute worse I can expect to happen. For example if I go there and just said made absolutely no case at all - could they only make the original PCN payable or is there now a backlog of additional costs?

Many thanks

Coupon-mad

If this is a single PCN case by DCB Legal, they will discontinue it before the hearing anyway as long as you file & serve a decent WS & evidence bundle.  So look to do that sooner than your deadline.

Front & centre of your WS should be you stating it changed to 4 hours around that time (exhibit your time-stamped photos of the 4 hours signs) and put the C to strict proof of exactly which contract was on the signage on the material date and when it changed.

Then argue in the alternative; even if the C can evidence that the contract on every sign there that day said '3 hours' the few minutes are de minimis (not parking time at all, but a consideration period to drive in and find a space, and a - mandatory minimum - 10 minute grace period to leave). This parking charge went against the BPA CoP which applied in 2019.

That Code required both a consideration period and a minimum 10 minute grace period, as does this year's incoming statutory Code if Practice from the Government which confirms best practice and fairness requirements around the 'in' and 'out' time spent in moving traffic, at clauses (look it up!).  This is not new and was in the BPA CoP anyway.  The - withdrawn but this year incoming - statutory Code from the DLUHC defines a parking period as (quote the definition).

Base your WS around the 5 WS bundle examples you see linked by username in the NEWBIES thread section on WS stage, and look at using the usual a-f list of suggested exhibits there.

Show us what your defence said EXACTLY (only the changed bits if you used the forum Template Defence, not the whole template please).  We need to see what you put, to tell you what you can & can't now say.

dilby

Update: I've received an N279 from DCB legal via email with confirmation the case is being discontinued.

Coupon-mad

dilby said:

Update: I've received an N279 from DCB legal via email with confirmation the case is being discontinued.

Yay - yet another DCB Legal discontinuance.

WELL DONE. That's a win! Congrats!

ANOTHER ONE BITES THE DUST!

I have added you to the 'disco' thread. 

Can you show us a redacted copy of that discontinuance?   It helps to show none of this is hearsay.

dilby

Coupon-mad said:

dilby said:

Update: I've received an N279 from DCB legal via email with confirmation the case is being discontinued.

Yay - yet another DCB Legal discontinuance.

WELL DONE. That's a win! Congrats!

ANOTHER ONE BITES THE DUST!

I have added you to the 'disco' thread. 

Can you show us a redacted copy of that discontinuance?   It helps to show none of this is hearsay.

Thanks for your help! I actually had put together what I thought was decent defence together too! And sure how is this?

It was sent to me the last day before they had to pay their £27 odd quid so I guess they decided it wasn't worth it.

Coupon-mad

It was sent to me the last day before they had to pay their £27 odd quid so I guess they decided it wasn't worth it.

Exactly = their business model, as we see it. Poker face & using the claim as intimidation to see if you blink.  Little or no intention of sending anyone to hearings.

Umkomaas

Well done. Swansea (and much of South Wales) is a happy hunting ground for PPC court cases. There have been a number of questionable decisions made against motorists, the most notorious of which being the one against the nurses of the University Hospital of Wales in Cardiff. 

If there is any grey matter being applied by DCB Legal, then surely they'd be singling out cases where records show they'd have a better chance of success. Just highlights their total reliance on the conveyor belt intimidation model.

D_P_Dance

Can someone not complain to the SRA.

Debszzzz2

Unfortunately, the SRA are not interested unless it is about large sums of money and fraud. They're supposed to be interested, but they're not.