Court Defence Guidance

SleepyDoc

Dear all,
Thanks for all the effort on the forum and helping us defeat the predatory companies.

Now I’ve reached the court stage for my first time.
Background: Parked in my allocated bay in the building’s underground car park which is accessible by fob or intercom, and shared with a hotel, this is managed by Capital Car Park Control (CCPC).
Permit fell off the dashboard. This was in December 2024.
CCPC issued 3 charge notices for a 5-day period where the car was never moved as it’s not been used daily.
I received the first two in the mail, put up the permit, then received the third one a couple days later for a date before receiving the first two. The charges were £100 each, reduced to £60 each if paid early.
I appealed all 3 and the appeals were rejected. I supplied the existing permit and my tenancy agreement for the appeals. The tenancy agreement does mention a parking management company (not a specific one) and displaying supplied permit. The clause submitted from the tenancy agreement in the appeal didn't contain this.
I asked the building management to cancel these, they emailed CCPC and were told that they can’t request cancellation because they were appealed and the appeals were rejected. I have these emails.
I didn’t appeal with POPLA.
I emailed CCPC, offered to pay a total of £60 as either reduced charge for first with the other 2 cancelled or £20 each but they refused this, and demanded I pay £300 as the reduced rate had expired. I told them I look forward to their court claim.

I have since moved house and sold the car, have been receiving letters from Debt collectors and DCB Legal, first to my old address and now to my current address.
Now received court claim, submitted AOS on MCOL on day 7 from claim date, and now drafting my defence. Need advice on my paragraph 3. Here's what I wrote, and I think it might be too long with the rest of the template.

Guidance please. Feel free to ask any questions if some detail would make any difference to the defence. Any specific cases I should refer to or any points to add/edit?

3. The Defendant has never entered into a contract with the claimant, and has parked in the allocated residential parking bay allocated to him as per his tenancy agreement with the landlord. The Defendant paid a monthly fee to the landlord for the use of this allocated parking bay. The Defendant appealed these charges and provided the relevant permit but the Claimant rejected these appeals. The landlord (building management) has requested the Claimant to cancel these parking charges on email dated 21 January 2025 as they authorised the Defendant to park in their allocated bay but the Claimant replied that the charges cannot be cancelled because they were appealed by the Defendant. The Claimant also alleges three separate contraventions dated between 5 and 10 December 2024, while the first notice of contravention was only delivered to the Defendant on 13 December 2024. The Claimant clearly engaged in a predatory manner by issuing multiple charge notices to the Defendant in quick succession preventing any action to rectify the alleged contravention, and seemingly entrapped the Defendant to appeal these notices only to use these appeals as an excuse to refuse the cancellation request by the landlord. The Defendant offered the payment of £60 (The proposed reduced rate of the first charge notice) in an email dated 16 February 2025 as a gesture of goodwill to either cover the administrative costs for the Claimant or pay for the single contravention and cancel the subsequent, excessive, two further charges, but the Claimant refused this. The photographic evidence in the Claimant’s notices issued to the Defendant shows that the vehicle was never moved between the repeat charges.

SleepyDoc

Bump for help.

Le_Kirk

I think that is too long for a defence.  You could shorten it, sticking to your primacy of contract and that you never agreed to display a permit but did so as a courtesy rather than an obligation.  Keep the rest for the witness statement.  Meantime have a read through some other threads, particularly those relating to residential cases.  If you read the NEWBIE sticky Post 2 you will find: -

...... some wording to adapt & add into the FACTS section of the Template Defence, if your case is about a residential car park where you lived:

......and one about a residential site with secure key fob access BUT THE STATEMENT OF TRUTH IS OLD - DO NOT USE THIS IN FULL - JUST CONCISE PHRASES FROM IT: