Euro car parks charge via ZZPS/GCTT/DCB Legal for a car park where we never parked

ConfusedCrocodile

In 2023 my wife received a letter from ZZPS claiming that she owed Euro Car Parks £170 for parking in one of their car parks without paying. She told me that she never parked there, and I believe her as she is disabled, and would have used a parking closer to her destination so that she wouldn't have to walk there. The date they claimed she parked there, was close to the start of the Covid lock-down in March 2020, which made it easy for her to remember.

In the letter ZZPS also mentioned that she had 14 days to pay otherwise they would pass the matter on to GCTT. In the letter from GCTT that followed they gave the same information. I checked the MSE forum at the time, and the advice I found there is to ignore these letters and to not contact them at all, which we followed. I should also mention that we never received any reminders from Euro car parks, the letter from ZZPS was the first time we were contacted, and they never supplied any proof that my wife parked in that car park.

However, we now received a letter from DCB Legal claiming the same amount for the above (they gave the same date and location), and when I checked the forum again it said that you should not ignore their letters. So now is my question, do we ignore this or not? And if we do reply what should she say?

Thank you.

Gr1pr

Does that DCB Legal letter state that it's a Letter of Claim giving her 30 days notice to reply   ?

Ignore ZZPS and GCTT,  same debt collectors 

Coupon-mad

Just do what the second post of the NEWBIES thread says (please don't copy it here).

ConfusedCrocodile

Yes, the DCB Legal Claim has "Letter of claim" at the top and gives her 30 days to pay.

This is for a motability car, does this change anything as it might be seen as a leased car?

There was no extra money added to the claim since the ZZPS/GCTT letters from 2023 and the DCB Legal letter from 2025.

Coupon-mad

No nothing is different.

Car1980

Personally I would deviate from the usual here and email DCB Legal to state that you have never entered the car park in your life, never received anything whatsoever from their client, that the first you heard of this was a ZZPS letter and to refer to back to Euro.
probably won't change anything, but DCB might put an asterisk next to your name on their Excel spreadsheet of immorality.

ConfusedCrocodile

As I'm doing this on behalf of my wife, can I send them that email, or should I ask her to send it? Or doesn't it make any difference who sends the email?

ConfusedCrocodile

And can I ask them to send me us a copy of whatever proof they think they have, so that I can point out where they have gone wrong?

Car1980

It would be all through your wife, because she is the one who will receive the court claim.

They won't send you proof and they won't communicate with you (not profitable). But you can add a paragraph to your court defence that you informed the claimant via their solicitor and was ignored.

Coupon-mad

You are a stranger to the case so you can't respond. Has to be in your wife's name but you can do it and use your email - which is fine, of course.

She can send whatever she wants...won't stop the claim form unless she can pressurise the site landowner and her MP to step in...

...but thinking about this again, it is worth pointing out that their client knows from the keeper data format supplied by the DVLA that this is a Motability car. They also know that Spring 2020 heralded the start of the COVID pandemic, so there is clearly no 'legitimate interest' (the Beavis high bar) in pursuing a disabled motorist over five years later for a charge she has no idea about and a site where she has never parked, to her knowledge.

She should add that she has complained to the landowner and her MP will be writing on her behalf. meanwhile she's also seeking debt advice for this farce of a case so they must put the matter on hold.

ConfusedCrocodile

Thank you all for your help. The email will be sent out tonight. If I need any more advice I'll be back with more questions.