DCB Legal Ltd > Parking Eye

GrapeyKine001

Good evening, all,

I received a claim form from the County Court – N1SDT

I have done the AoS.

Background in short: We took a family member to a bowling alley, in the summer of 2024. There was a large group of folk that went through with the organisers to pay and go to their lanes. I stayed on site and waited – ate, drank and made merry (alcohol free btw) for a couple of hours. Unfortunately, I didn’t go to the Reception Desk and was unaware of the need to enter the car’s registration into a device of some sort. On the way into the car park there was a sign by the entrance that said 'Car Park for patron only' - which I was.

You already know what happened next. A PCN was sent, but due to poor timing we don’t know when this arrived at home as we were on holiday, a couple of weeks later. In an email exchange we were told it was too later to appeal, (not that it would have made much difference) and the proof that we were on site as patrons wasn’t sufficient. So, I let them waste their time send various reminders, final notices and ‘final notices of debt recovery’ (Direct Collection Bailiffs Ltd / www.dcbltd.com). I always replied saying there was no case to answer, stop wasting yours and my time. This was always to leave the ball in their court. The last ‘final notices of debt recovery’ was 24 weeks after the initial incident. After that it went silent. Then July this comes round and I get a ‘Letter before claim’ (dcblegal ltd / dcblegal.co.uk) which is 101 weeks after the initial incident.

Dcblegal Ltd then took 8 weeks to issue the N1SDT claim Form. I know that these firms can take a while to gear up to do anything and there can be long periods before anything happens. As such I wasn’t surprised there was a long gap of inactivity. I am curious that the claim had been re-issued as N1SDT not a N1, (not that it changes what happens). What are typical reasons for that?

One thing I have asked several times of Parking Eye etc. is, what is the actual contravention they keep referring to. The ‘Final Notice of Debt Recovery’ had this:

Chan / Akande defence me thinks.

Is there anything fishy in the switch from dcbltd to dcblegal? Or is it as simple as going from Bailiff side to legal side of same toxic growth?

Once I get a defence written I’ll post it up. I'm not waiting for 28 days by the way.

Many thanks in advance.

Gr1pr

Nothing to see there and no bailiffs were involved ( as it says at the bottom of the DCBL begging letters )

But

It just went from the powerless DCBL debt collectors desk to the litigation team desks, involving DCB LEGAL

Their deadline to litigate was 6 years from the incident date, under the Limitations Act 1980

So standard stuff, mainly irrelevant

No breach pleaded so use the Chan and Akande defence template, same as dozens of other cases on here

Nothing to write, its just copy and paste

kryten3000

Direct Collection Bailiffs Limited (DCBL) send the scary-looking but harmless debt collection letters. They can be ignored. Unpaid charges get passed to DCB Legal who are a separate company based in the same office.

If you accidentally write to DCBL in response to a DCB Legal letter, they will reply to tell you that their file is closed rather than that it has been transferred.

When DCB Legal obtain a judgment that is not paid, they pass the case back to DCBL for enforcement. DCBL add a fee to the debt.

Playing tennis like this turns a £100 charge into several hundred.

The good news is that if you defend they will discontinue late on in the court process, wasting both your and the court's time and resources.

The even better news is that Parkingeye usually do their own litigation and only pass the "no hope" cases on to DCBL/Legal. This makes the chance of a discontinuation even higher.

GrapeyKine001

Thank you Gr1pr and Kryten3000 for your feed back.

Defence submitted and acknowledgement of receipt of my defence seen on MCOL and then an actual piece of post saying the same a few days later. Lets see how quick their response is - the 28 day clock is ticking :)

Gr1pr

Don't be mislead by supposed time limits

Just follow and stick to the 8 steps in the defence template thread in announcements near the top of the forum