UKCPS invoice - started court claims

codan84

Thank you all for your help thus far.
This is the initial point 3 for my defense, any pointers or opinions?

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3. The Defendant relies on the following matters, which are to be taken cumulatively:

(a) The signage at the site was inadequate, unclear, and incapable of forming a legally binding contract. In particular:

    (i) The signage was small, poorly positioned, and not readily legible from a parked vehicle;

    (ii) There was no clear delineation of bays within the car park to indicate allocation to specific businesses;

    (iii) There was an absence of prominent signage in close proximity to the individual bays;

    (iv) As such, the alleged contractual terms were not adequately brought to the attention of the driver.

(b) The presence of handwritten notices placed by individual businesses on their premises, warning patrons to park in specific bays, evidences a widespread and ongoing issue with unclear parking arrangements. This demonstrates that the Claimant’s signage was insufficient and that the Claimant has failed to take reasonable steps to remedy a known source of confusion, instead continuing enforcement.

(c) The Defendant engaged with the matter at all material times, responding to correspondence and disputing the charge. The Defendant was met only with standardised, template responses, indicating a failure by the Claimant to properly consider the merits of the dispute.

(d) The Claimant has incorrectly applied interest from 13 May 2025, despite the Notice to Keeper being dated 22 April 2025 and deemed served no earlier than 24 April 2025. The Claimant is put to strict proof as to the legal basis for the earlier accrual of interest, which appears premature and unjustified.

(e) The Notice to Keeper contains an incorrect description of the location, referring to “Upper Warrengate Car Park”. The Defendant did not park at that location on the material date. The Claimant is put to strict proof of its authority to operate at the stated site and to issue parking charges in respect of that land.

(f) The Claimant failed to comply with the Pre-Action Protocol for Debt Claims. No compliant Letter of Claim was served prior to the issue of proceedings. The last correspondence received by the Defendant was dated 10 September 2025, after which the Claimant issued proceedings without further notice. This deprived the Defendant of the opportunity to properly engage, seek clarification, and attempt resolution, and amounts to unreasonable conduct.

Coupon-mad

I doubt that will all fit on MCOL but you can remove the template's last para 10.

codan84

I submitted my defence before the deadline and just today got the following response (email) from Moorside Legal (aka UKCPS). Where do I take this from here?

Dear Mr *** 



Re:		Our Client: UKCPS ltd
		Our Ref: UKCPS/*
		Claim Number: ***

We write in relation to the above matter and futher to your claim response dated 08/04/2026.

Please find the details of the private parking charge notice ('PCNs') below.



PCN Reference	Date	Location	Reason
***	16/04/2025	Upper Warrengate Car Park WAKEFIELD WF1 4JZ	Vehicle not parked in allocated bay

 Your Defence
 
We have reviewed your Defence and respond as follows: -

The allocated bays at the site are clearly designated to ensure an organised and efficient parking system for all users. Parking in an incorrect bay disrupts this system and prevents authorised users from accessing the spaces allocated to them. Whilst mistakes can occur, it remains the responsibility of all motorists to comply with the displayed terms and conditions and to park only within bays designated for their permit. The parking charge was issued as a result of your vehicle being parked in a bay not allocated to your permit.

The location stated on the Notice to Keeper is correct, namely Upper Warrengate Car Park, WF1 4JZ. The Parking Charge Notice was issued on Wednesday 16 April 2025, and the Notice to Keeper was subsequently issued on 7 May 2025, in accordance with the relevant requirements. Your assertions regarding incorrect location, inadequate particulars, and lack of clarity are therefore denied.

Our client maintains that adequate signage was in place, that the terms were clearly communicated, and that the charge was issued following a breach of those terms. Your remaining points are noted but not accepted and will be addressed by evidence in due course. In the absence of payment or any substantive factual defence, our client will continue with the claim.

The Parking Charge Notice was correctly issued.

In view of the above, our Client is satisfied that you are liable for the full amount of the Claim, and we urge you to make payment as soon as possible.

Settlement Proposal

Our Client remains open to settling the matter without the need for the Claim to progress further, and as such proposes the following settlement options:

£230.00 via one lump sum payment payable within the next 7 days; or

£250.00 via 2 monthly payments with the first payment due within the next 7 days.

How to pay

There is still time to make payment to avoid the need for a Court hearing. You can do so in any of the following ways: -

• You can call us on 0330 822 9950 to make the relevant payment arrangements. You will need you customer reference number - ***; or
• You can make payment via bank transfer to the following account -

Account holder name: Moorside Legal Services Limited
Bank name: Lloyds bank
Sort code: 306541
Account number: 49689760

If you choose to make payment, via bank transfer you must use the following reference as your payment reference 40103711  to ensure we can quickly allocate the payment to your matter. If you do not, we may not be able to allocate the payment to your matter

If you choose to make regular card payments to us these will be made under a Continuous Payment Authority ('CPA'). This authorises us to take the agreed amount on a regular basis. CPAs can be set up weekly, fortnightly, or monthly. If we are unable to take your payment, we will attempt to take the payment later that day. If that fails, we will reattempt the next working day.
 
If you wish to provide an alternative payment proposal, please contact us within 7 days of receipt of this email.

If the Claim is not settled
 
We hope this matter can be settled without further Court action, however if we are not able to reach a settlement, please be aware that our Client intends to proceed with the Claim.
 
If the Claim proceeds, the Court will ask both Parties to file and serve a Directions Questionnaire, therefore we attach a copy of our Client’s completed Directions Questionnaire and confirm the same has been filed with the Court.

Email Service

As you provided this email address when you defended the Claim, we intend to use it to serve documents on you throughout these proceedings and will do so in PDF format. We will assume you agree to this course of action unless you tell us otherwise within 7 days. In accordance with Practice Direction 6A, if there are any limitations to your agreement to accept service by such means, please let us know within 7 days.

Subject to your agreement, we will also agree to accept email service to litigationteam@moorsidelegal.co.uk.

You may wish to seek independent legal advice.

Yours sincerely

codan84

Their statement that the Notice To Keeper was issued on 7 May is false - I have a date of 22 April on the Notice To Keeper I got… just shows the incompetency?

Coupon-mad

Just continue to follow the Template Defence 8 steps - you didn't need to show us that. The dates are irrelevant and the reply is a template (fully expected).

Go back to re-read the 8 steps. This is nothing new or different, and nor do you need help with the DQ form or Mediation. It's all covered already.

Most new defendant posters find we aren't needed again until WS stage.

🙂

codan84

Fantastic. I'll do a better job at reading the sticky next time ✌️

codan84

Just out of curiosity, IF the claimant decided to proceed and IF there actually was a court case (hearing, however it is called), does a "common sense" defense work should other defense points fail?

I am asking because the claimant keeps saying that the allocated bays are there "to ensure efficient operation of the car park". But I find it highly flawed! If there are 3 businesses on premises, and the 12 parking bays are divided equally between them, BUT these businesses have opening hours that do not overlap (takeway opens AFTER the other 2 businesses close), then enforcing strict bay allocation only ensures that 33-66% of bays are never used (either 4 bays for takeaway in the morning/afternoon, or 8 bays for medical practice & pharmacy in the evening). The only reasonable way to ensure the most efficient parking operation would be to restrict all bays on the car-park to only patrons of ANY of these 3 businesses, without bay allocation. The driver of the car in the claim did not reduce the efficacy of the parking, but rather ensured that the car park was used to capacity.

So, the parking conditions at core are not there for the purpose stated, but rather seem like being there to entrap and generate profit.

Coupon-mad

Moorside Legal do sometimes pay hearing fees but they usually don't send anyone, presumably hoping that the Defendant won't attend either, which gives them a chance of a win if the judge considers the matter 'on the papers' in the absence of both parties.

They are new kids on the block and have only been up & running for a year or two.

But no, what you are calling a 'common sense' argument won't work because a landowner or businesses are entitled to decide how bays are allocated and the parking firm won't have made it up themselves. So a judge won't interfere with business arrangements that the Claimant will say they only put in place 'as required by the landowner'.

But cases are won on poor signage, poor bay delineation, etc. because you can argue that no terms were 'there to be seen', or that it was unclear, unlit or whatever. Terms and signs must (by law - Consumer Rights Act 2015) be fair, which means not ambiguous, not unworkable just clear and prominent.

And it's not OK for a consumer-facing service provider to include obligations that are impossible to perform, such as 'permits only - put your VRM into a keypad in-store' yet the store is closed.