Does using "Independent Appeals Service" ADR preclude going to court?

Car1980

APCOA definitely never make court claims.

MyRealNameToo

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82056973#Comment_82056973

Generally, only in the sense there can be contractual clauses that the parties agree to go use arbitration rather than court. There are various things that you must go to arbitration first but The Arbitration Act does allow them to then go to court but its more akin to an appeal, in that you cant just have another roll of the dice but must point out that an error was made, jurisdictional issues or serious irregularities

There are inevitably some outliers, financial services is one in principle where the FOS decisions is binding on the financial services company however because the FOS is a public body the FS company cant litigate it but can ask for a judicial review by the courts. Whilst the JR will not normally actually change the decision of the FOS they do strike the decision out and instruct the FOS to reconsider the case with their guidance… in many cases the same outcome sticks but there are well documented cases where following the courts guidance the FOS has reversed its decision.

If you count that as "going to court" maybe debatable but the outcome was a court was involved and the outcome changed.

Half_way

The IAS is not an independent appeal service

and as far as i know it doesnt meet the definition of a genuine ADR sercvice either

agrado

Sorry, yes, I was using the word "fine" informally.

I have complained to the landowner (City of London) asking them to cancel the parking charge and to reconsider their use of Park & Control on their properties.

I have decided not to appeal via IAS, because notwithstanding their clear statement that the result "will not be binding on you", their T&Cs at https://theias.org/ias-ppc-appeals-rules say:

2.5 Pursuant to section 69 of the Arbitration Act 1996, by entering arbitral proceedings, both the Trader and the Consumer agree;
2.5.1 to have no ability to appeal an award made in proceedings under these Rules; 
2.5.2 to dispense with any need for reasons for the tribunal’s award; and, 
2.5.3 to exclude the court’s jurisdiction under sections 42, 44 and 45 of the Arbitration Act 1996.

so my trust in them approaches absolute zero.

ChirpyChicken

Why waste your time

agrado

If you count that as "going to court" maybe debatable but the outcome was a court was involved and the outcome changed.

Yes, sorry, what I mean is that if I don't like the arbitration ruling I want to be able to completely ignore it, and that Park & Control must still take me to court if they want to enforce their invoice. Judicial review, or even a standard court appeal, are not viable options since they wouldn't be Small Claims Track and could cost tens of thousands of pounds.

cooldude255220

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82057138#Comment_82057138

If you appeal to the IAS and lose, then Park & Control must take you to small claims court and you must lose there to be liable. They can't say "well we won at the IAS, so please find in our favour". They have to prove the case on balance to that Court.

Same as if you ignore them, and they take you to Court. They have to prove their case to the court.

So yes, you could completely ignore an IAS decision that isn't in your favour.

I don't know what your earlier post is talking about, but I suspect you're misunderstanding the terms. Nothing in that contradicts the fact that the decision is not binding on you as the motorist.

As an aside, I think it's important to note (because there seems to be some confusion elsewhere in the thread) that this outfit are not APCOA proper. It appears to be a spin off for land owned/leased by 3rd parties. As such, we have no idea how litigious any one car park is and I don't think we can import the fact that APCOA aren't to this specific case.

Umkomaas

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82057002#Comment_82057002

Yep, checked them out on Companies House website. APCOA associated, along with Gemini Parking.

agrado

A quick update in case anyone is interested - City of London have replied saying that the APCOA Blue Badge permit registration is not valid until "activated" - i.e. after the application has been manually reviewed by APCOA staff - which they say should take "5-6 hours" but actually took 5 days. In the mean time Blue Badge holders are supposed to pay as standard.

The only slight problem for their position is that it isn't remotely what the terms say - they say "Blue Badge holders must register for a Blue Badge permit by scanning the QR code to receive free parking". That's exactly what I did. The terms say nothing at all about "must register and then wait for notification that the permit has been manually approved and pay as normal in the mean-time". Not even any of the emails the registration system sends say that the permit is not valid until approved.

Honestly having used the process and seeing that the permit is back-dated to the start of the day in which it is applied for and the "parking charge" is not issued until over 7 working days after date of contravention, I think the person who designed the system and the people who are operating it have different ideas about how it's supposed to work.

Coupon-mad

Please show a photo or screenshot of the CoL reply. This breaches the Equality Act and the DUA Act and DPA /GDPR, in my view.