UKCPS and Moorside court claim.

Mir-kat

My hubby has recieved a court claim form for a PCN arising from parking in Playworld, Huddersfield on 12/10/2023. The parking company is UKCPS and the solicitors are Moorside.

He didn't appeal to the IAS as plenty of people have called it a kangaroo court so it didn't seem worth the effort.


The Particulars of Claim

1. The Defendant(D) is indebted to the Claimant(C) for a Parking Charge issued to the vehicle **** *** at PLAYWORLD HUDDERSFIELD HD1 4LF. 2. The PCN was issued on 12/10/2023 on land managed by C. 3. The vehicle was parked in breach of the Terms on C's signs (the contract), thus incurring the PCN. 4. The driver agreed to pay within 28 days but did not. D is liable as the driver or keeper. Despite requests the PCN is outstanding and has escalated. AND THE CLAIMANT CLAIMS 1. 170.00.being the total of the PCN. 2. Costs and Court fees. The claimant claims interest under section 69 of the County Courts Act 1984 at the rate of 8% a year from 22/02/2024 to 01/04/2025 on £170.00 and also interest at the same rate up to the date of judgment or earlier payment at a daily rate of £0.04.

I was reviewing the previous documents to put together a defence using the template on the forum. I believe that the signage was confusing as the car park has both free and restricted parking spaces but the distinction is not very clear. I also felt that the grace periods had not been applied correctly.

However, I just wanted to check one detail in the initial notice to keeper.

Right at the top of the letter it says "NON POFA" does that mean that there is no keeper liability? And so the PCN is not enforceable since my hubby never told UKCPS who was driving.

ChirpyChicken

Basically it *can* be defended on the fact the keeper was not the driver if it's non pofa . As long as the defence goes hard on that point then it's a very good defence indeed.one I've had a lot of success with over last few years
for this kind of defence i would not bother using the template defence

I

ChirpyChicken

In this situation i would not use the template defence and i  would actually log it straight on the MCOL portal 

If i was writing this defence i would deny any liability to claimant
State that the defendant was not the driver - That the claimant by their own admission is not claiming keeper liability and thus by their own admission they only claim from the driver  Explain that the provisions of keeper liability dont apply and liability can not flow from the driver to the keeper

Keep it simple.

**do not do the claimants work for them**

Coupon-mad

ChirpyChicken said:

In this situation i would not use the template defence and i  would actually log it straight on the MCOL portal 

If i was writing this defence i would deny any liability to claimant
State that the defendant was not the driver - That the claimant by their own admission is not claiming keeper liability and thus by their own admission they only claim from the driver  Explain that the provisions of keeper liability dont apply and liability can not flow from the driver to the keeper

Keep it simple.

**do not do the claimants work for them**

Yep. This case could be one where they'd be better off adapting the defence posted on a Euro Car Parks thread recently by @Blindside6

Blindside6

Coupon-mad said:

ChirpyChicken said:

In this situation i would not use the template defence and i  would actually log it straight on the MCOL portal 

If i was writing this defence i would deny any liability to claimant
State that the defendant was not the driver - That the claimant by their own admission is not claiming keeper liability and thus by their own admission they only claim from the driver  Explain that the provisions of keeper liability dont apply and liability can not flow from the driver to the keeper

Keep it simple.

**do not do the claimants work for them**

Yep. This case could be one where they'd be better off adapting the defence posted on a Euro Car Parks thread recently by @Blindside6

Very kind of you to say, thank you. But that Defence was drafted last October, without the benefit of precedents such as VCS v Edward, Vine v London Borough of Waltham Forest and Excel v Wilkinson. Such omissions will be remedied at the skeleton argument stage, if the claim gets that far.

Coupon-mad

That's fine. I never expect posters to copy examples blindly without adding new stuff.

I just thought the basis of your example defence would work well here and it's a classic case of the POC not specifying the breach.

However, a word of warning to the OP: the D can't deny driving unless that's true.

troublemaker22

@Coupon-mad is right (as usual). The Defence is subject to a declaration of truth and including a deliberate lie is a criminal offence.  But that doesn’t oblige a keeper to state whether or not they were driving. They can perfectly honestly say something like ‘The Defendant admits to being the registered keeper of the relevant vehicle at the relevant time but does not admit any of the other facts alleged in the particulars of claim, as to which the Claimant is put to strict proof.’

ChirpyChicken

Agreed @troublemaker22 your wording is spot on, and whilst not condoning such actions (playing devil's advocate) I am aware of various defendants who have stated they were not the driver with no evidence to the contrary and either won in court or the claim discontinued(non pofa cases). As said am i am not approving of this action but it's the way it is. You have to be of a certaint mindset to be able to say to a judge you were not driving when in fact you were

----
Of course if you can confidently and honestly state you were not the driver it is more feathers in your bow

chrisw

Mir-kat said:

Right at the top of the letter it says "NON POFA" does that mean that there is no keeper liability? And so the PCN is not enforceable since my hubby never told UKCPS who was driving.

I wonder why they have different letters? I got excited when I saw this as I've used a similar argument to avoid a penalty previously, but my similar UKCPS letter says 'MNPR, Made under the POFA 2012'. And the second letter I received set out all the Pofa schedule 4 sections and subsections so I guess I can't use that defence even though I really wasn't driving.

Coupon-mad

chrisw said:

Mir-kat said:

Right at the top of the letter it says "NON POFA" does that mean that there is no keeper liability? And so the PCN is not enforceable since my hubby never told UKCPS who was driving.

I wonder why they have different letters? I got excited when I saw this as I've used a similar argument to avoid a penalty previously, but my similar UKCPS letter says 'MNPR, Made under the POFA 2012'. And the second letter I received set out all the Pofa schedule 4 sections and subsections so I guess I can't use that defence even though I really wasn't driving.

But why would you think that?

Why assume it's POFA compliant just because it says that? Did you compare it to the resource already linked in the NEWBIES thread: the NTK pictures thread?

Mir-kat

Coupon-mad said:

That's fine. I never expect posters to copy examples blindly without adding new stuff.

I just thought the basis of your example defence would work well here and it's a classic case of the POC not specifying the breach.

However, a word of warning to the OP: the D can't deny driving unless that's true.

I dont want to accidentally identify the driver but in this case the keeper and driver are definitely not the same person.