Defence Help Needed - DCB Legal/Vehicle Control Services

BTS_mom

Thank you @Coupon-mad, @1505grandad, @Car1980 and @Castlefor all your helpful input with my defence claim. I definitely could not have done it without all your help and the amazing resources on this website. I have just emailed my defence through, finally! I will keep you updated on the case. Hopefully they drop the case. THANK YOU ALL once again!   

Le_Kirk

Did you receive the auto acknowledgement of your email?

Car1980

Another point - there is no consideration in the claimant's contract for charging on entry to a car park where no land in order to park the car is available. Nothing of value is being offered and the contract doesn't have all the aspects required to be enforceable.

It's clearly labelled as a CAR PARK, not a plot of land for hire.

They are clearly going to major on the contract saying ON ENTRY (which would mean you would be expected to circulate for 9mins 30, exit and re-enter to reset the clock if there were no spaces). 

But there is no consideration when payment can only be made for parking after the car is parked and the payment is for permission to park a car for a set time period, not for hiring the entire area to drive around. You can't pay by leaning out of the window of your vehicle and then find a space afterwards.

BTS_mom

@Le_Kirk Apologies for the late reply. Yes, I did receive the auto acknowledgement of my email and to expect a response to my enquiry within 10 days. Thank you for checking in!  

@Car1980 Apologies for the late reply. That’s a really amazing point, thank you! I wish I had known this before. Am I able to use this argument at the next stage/witness statement if it doesn’t get discontinued and it’s taken to court? Thank you. 

Coupon-mad

expect a response to my enquiry within 10 days

More like 10 weeks so please ignore that bit!

BTS_mom

Good evening everyone.

I have finally received the Notice of Allocation to Small Claims track and it's going through the Small Claims Paper Determination Pilot next month. I was hoping that the Claimant would withdraw up to now so it looks like I'll have to prepare the witness statement. Please see below copy of the notice and it seems like there is no hearing and the judge is going to decide based on the information available.




I do not know if I should challenge to have my case to be determined without a hearing nor do I know how to go about making a case on challenging this. I assume that this will annoy the Judge too so I will start preparing my witness statement in the next couple of days and would welcome any pointers and I will upload a draft for further comments.  

Thank you.

Gr1pr

I doubt that you can challenge it, or it's not worth it 

Ensure that you comply with the court order and email your Witness Statement plus Exhibits bundle to DCB Legal and to Manchester court by that October deadline 

Bear in mind DJ Iyer knows all about these parking company claims,  so they may discontinue 

Coupon-mad

You can trust DJ Iyer. He's great!

jd576

Going back and looking at the POC, I don't necessarily agree that it's all fine.

PD 16.4(2) states that " If the claimant is seeking interest they must—" (b) if the claim is for a specified amount of money, state— "(ii) the date from which it is claimed; (iii) the date to which it is calculated, which must not be later than the date on which the claim form is issued; (iv) the total amount of interest claimed to the date of calculation; and (v) the daily rate at which interest accrues after that date."

The amount claimed is £173.60. Where does the £3.60 come from? It looks to be an incorrect calculation of compound interest at £0.03 per day: 112 days between the issue of the PCN and the Claim Form at £0.03 per day would come to £3.38 of interest, compounded daily, near enough to what they're claiming.

So they appear to be making a claim for a specified amount of interest in addition to a claim for 8% on a go-forward basis from the date of the claim issuance until judgement (based on a specific enactment). And they've calculated the specific amount incorrectly, or they've used some other method of calculation which they've not disclosed.

So apparently they're claiming a specific monetary amount of interest and therefore they're in breach of 16.4(2)(b)(1),(ii),(iii) and (iv), since they've failed to state the date from which and to which it is calculated and they've failed to explicitly state the total amount of interest claimed to the date of calculation.

You've got that in the template defence already (not compliant with 16.4), but probably worthwhile spelling this  out clearly in the witness statement.

BTS_mom

Thank you @Gr1pr @Coupon-mad @jd576

It's good to know that you all are optimistic with JDIyer on the case and because of that I am optimistic too!

I will work up a draft WS over the weekend and post it here for comments. I assume we'll want to submit this as late as possible before the deadline so that the Claimant have less time to counter my WS?