Letter of Claim for 2022 parking ticket

Gr1pr

kenzie123 said:

Car1980 said:

1. Contacting DCBL makes no difference to anything. Forget about it.
2. Responding to the DCB Legal Letter Before Claim by email using the template is optional. It just shows them you're getting advice from here.
3. You must respond to a letter from the court (the bulk processing unit in Northampton in reality) through the online/email process.

Thank you - to confirm we are on the LETTER OF CLAIM stage, not the letter BEFORE claim.
Does this make any difference?

Apologies for the many posts but it's a confusing process for newbies and keen not to make this worse by ignoring the wrong letter.

From all of the above I think I am now waiting for a court letter - if that's correct I'll hold on for now.

thanks

You are at the stage before a claim,  giving you 30 days notice of impending court action,  used to be LBC, but now it's LoC,  same thing, typically sent out by a legal company,  but sometimes sent out by the actual parking company 

Either way, your next actionable letter after an LoC is not from a court  ( no court has been allocated yet   )

Your next letter to deal with is an N1SDT court claim pack from the CNBC in Northampton using MCOL ( a civil service office covering MCOL civil claims for England and Wales  ), come back to this thread when it arrives 

kenzie123

Gr1pr said:

kenzie123 said:

Car1980 said:

1. Contacting DCBL makes no difference to anything. Forget about it.
2. Responding to the DCB Legal Letter Before Claim by email using the template is optional. It just shows them you're getting advice from here.
3. You must respond to a letter from the court (the bulk processing unit in Northampton in reality) through the online/email process.

Thank you - to confirm we are on the LETTER OF CLAIM stage, not the letter BEFORE claim.
Does this make any difference?

Apologies for the many posts but it's a confusing process for newbies and keen not to make this worse by ignoring the wrong letter.

From all of the above I think I am now waiting for a court letter - if that's correct I'll hold on for now.

thanks

You are at the stage before a claim,  giving you 30 days notice of impending court action,  used to be LBC, but now it's LoC,  same thing, typically sent out by a legal company,  but sometimes sent out by the actual parking company 

Either way, your next actionable letter after an LoC is not from a court  ( no court has been allocated yet   )

Your next letter to deal with is an N1SDT court claim pack from the CNBC in Northampton using MCOL ( a civil service office covering MCOL civil claims for England and Wales  ), come back to this thread when it arrives 

thank you so much, I will do. Appreciate your help.

kenzie123

Hello

We have now recieved the CLAIM FORM from the HM Courts & Tribunals service - the amount to be paid has now increased to £514.24

I understand from the above I have to respond - please can you tell me what to respond with so it’s correct?

Duke1999, Brie, Gr1pr: 
I’d appreciate your help again as mentioned above!

Gr1pr

Study the second post in the newbies sticky thread in announcements near the top of the forum,  plus study the defence template thread too

Post the issue date from the top right of the claim form and a redacted picture of the POC on the lower left of the claim form after hiding the VRM details first 

Post the name of the claimant parking company and the lawyers involved too

kenzie123

Gr1pr said:

Study the second post in the newbies sticky thread in announcements near the top of the forum,  plus study the defence template thread too

Post the issue date from the top right of the claim form and a redacted picture of the POC on the lower left of the claim form after hiding the VRM details first 

Post the name of the claimant parking company and the lawyers involved too

Thank you.

The issue date is: 24th June 2025
Claimant: EURO CAR PARKS LTD
Lawyers: DCB Legal

I've attached a pic (redacted) of the POC.

thanks

Gr1pr

So your defence will be very,  very similar to the dozens of other recent cases on here over the last 3 months,  using the template defence,  start by completing the AOS online on MCOL ASAP 

kenzie123

To add, I have now drafted my amended comments (3 and 3.1) after reading the guides on here as you have advised. They have been so helpful, thank you.

Can I ask you to please review this and comment/advise if it needs additional information?

thank you

3. Referring to the POC: paragraph 1 is denied. The Defendant is not indebted to the Claimant. Paragraph 2 is denied. The Defendant does not accept that a contravention occurred at their own fault on both dates of 03/09/2022 and 17/01/2023, as alleged. Whilst the Defendant is the registered keeper, paragraphs 3 and 4 are denied. The Defendant is not liable and has seen no evidence of a breach of prominent terms. The quantum is hugely exaggerated (no PCN can be £340.00 on private land) and there were no damages incurred whatsoever.

3.1 The defendant recollects both dates in question. On 03/09/2022, the car was parked in XXXX Leisure Centre, and the defendant attempted to add the car details into the machine. The machine was broken. The defendant asked Leisure centre staff what to do and they advised it would be fine as the machine was at fault. When a PCN was received, the defendant appealed and explained that the machine was broken. This appeal was rejected, with some of the reasons for rejection being ‘when using this location/venue you are required to register your full and correct vehicle registration as per the signage/information notices displayed. I can confirm that no registration was logged at that time/date’ despite the defendant already explaining that as their own machine was broken, and their was no way of logging my registration details.

On 17/01/2023, the defendant’s partner parked in XXXX Leisure Centre, and again, attempted to add the car details into their machine. The machine was broken again. The defendants partner asked staff there what to do and they advised it would be fine as the machine was at fault. The defendant then received another PCN for the same reason, and did not appeal or pay on the principle of it not being their fault if the car park owner does not fix their own machines.

To note here that the car park offerS free car parking, so the defendant had no reason not to add the car parking details to the machine. The defendant was not trying to not pay a car parking fee, or get away with anything. Instead the defendant would have willingly given their car registration details as requested on the notices, had the machine been working properly.

Coupon-mad

A decent draft. Every paragraph needs a number. Use ordinary numbering, not 3.1 etc.

This should read £170 each, instead of £340:

"no PCN can be £340.00 on private land)"

Typo here ('their' should be there and remove the word 'my'):

"and their was no way of logging my registration details."

Add to this extra bit as shown to this line:

Whilst the Defendant is the registered keeper, paragraphs 3 and 4 are denied. The allegation is incorrectly pleaded. There cannot have been a contravention involving a failure to 'purchase' a pay & display ticket because this is a free car park with a VRM keypad system, where no relevant obligation exists for Leisure Centre patrons to buy a ticket.

Finally:

Remove ALL the paragraphs about the DLUHC and the 2022 draft Impact Assessment as this is old news and I will be removing it from the Template Defence in a few days.

Then renumber the whole lot.

kenzie123

Coupon-mad said:

A decent draft. Every paragraph needs a number. Use ordinary numbering, not 3.1 etc.

This should read £170 each, instead of £340:

"no PCN can be £340.00 on private land)"

Typo here ('their' should be there and remove the word 'my'):

"and their was no way of logging my registration details."

Add to this extra bit as shown to this line:

Whilst the Defendant is the registered keeper, paragraphs 3 and 4 are denied. The allegation is incorrectly pleaded. There cannot have been a contravention involving a failure to 'purchase' a pay & display ticket because this is a free car park with a VRM keypad system, where no relevant obligation exists for Leisure Centre patrons to buy a ticket.

Finally:

Remove ALL the paragraphs about the DLUHC and the 2022 draft Impact Assessment as this is old news and I will be removing it from the Template Defence in a few days.

Then renumber the whole lot.

Thank you so much for this.

I've re-drafted and made the amendments you advised / corrected typos.

- I've added the line you mentioned, so it now says this:

3. Referring to the POC: paragraph 1 is denied. The Defendant is not indebted to the Claimant. Paragraph 2 is denied. The Defendant does not accept that a contravention occurred at their own fault on both dates of 03/09/2022 and 17/01/2023, as alleged. Whilst the Defendant is the registered keeper, paragraphs 3 and 4 are denied. The Defendant is not liable and has seen no evidence of a breach of prominent terms. The quantum is hugely exaggerated (no PCN can be 170.00 each on private land) and there were no damages incurred whatsoever. The allegation is incorrectly pleaded. There cannot have been a contravention involving a failure to 'purchase' a pay & display  ticket because this is a free car park with a VRM keypad system, where no relevant obligation exists for Leisure Centre patrons to buy a ticket.

Is this correct?

 - I've removed any reference to DLUHC (parts 9-11 in the current template - is that right??) but couldn't see any reference to the 2022 Impact Assessment.

THIS SECTION BELOW IS REMOVED NOW - please let me know if anything needs adding back in.

9. The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities ('the ') published a statutory Parking Code of Practice in February 2022: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/private-parking-code-of-practice.

The Ministerial Foreword is 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." 

10. Despite legal challenges delaying the Code (temporarily withdrawn) a draft Impact Assessment (IA) was published on 30th July 2023. The then Government's analysis is found here:  https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1171438/Draft_IA_-_Private_Parking_Code_of_Practice_.pdf

11. Paragraphs 4.31 and 5.19 state that the parking industry has shown the DLUHC that the true minor cost of pre-action stage totals a mere £8.42 per case (not per PCN).

- My letter now has 28 points - does this sound correct?

- understood that you don't want people to post their whole letter for checking, but wondered if there was a way to check that my final letter is alright? If you confirm the above is correct I think it's almost there and I'll continue to follow the 12 step plan ie print, sign, scan and email over.

and then from there just wait?

thank you once again for everything.

Coupon-mad

Yes to all of the above questions! Good stuff.