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What to do if an IPC AND BPA member?

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  • Coupon-mad
    Coupon-mad Posts: 130,633
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    I'm assuming I don't need to also send off the AOS section of the claim form they sent me? (no info on this)

    None of the paper form gets used. Let's be 'avin' your draft defence next week, then! We will assist.
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  • Jasper321
    Jasper321 Posts: 16 Forumite
    edited 13 October 2017 at 7:30AM
    Hi I've gone through all of the template's but can't decide which one is best for me, one of my arguments is that I live in a block of flats and one day the driver at the time parked my vehicle in a space that apparently needed a permit to park there, it's possible the driver in question had no choice but to park in one of the private spaces if all of the other spaces were taken...

    Is that a decent argument by itself? Or is there a template you can recommend I can use please?

    Thanks
  • Umkomaas
    Umkomaas Posts: 41,256
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    Argument is unlikely to wash. You have to beat this on legal grounds.

    There won’t be any template to precisely reflect your case, but there are many defence examples linked via the sticky and there are plenty of others if you search on ‘Millennium Defence’ via the ‘Search this Forum’ search tool, but click on ‘Show Posts’, not the default ‘Show Threads’.

    You could do the same search on Google which might bring up other Millennium defences on forums like PePiPoo, CAG or LegalBeagles.
    Please note, we are not a legal advice forum. I personally don't get involved in critiquing court case Defences/Witness Statements, so unable to help on that front. Please don't ask. .

    I provide only my personal opinion, it is not a legal opinion, it is simply a personal one. I am not a lawyer.

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  • Redx
    Redx Posts: 38,084
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    Jasper321 wrote: »
    Questions I have:

    1) In this case, is it worth me phoning up the management company or landowner to see if they will cancel it?

    2) Issue date on the county court claim form is 15th Sep, with AOS is my deadline to submit then the 18th Oct?

    3) Is it worth me arguing that the slot the vehicle was parked in had a 'V' for visitors sign displayed exactly like the other visitor spaces which don't require a permit?

    4) There is a chance the driver at the time parked my car in this slot due to all the closer allocated slots being taken by other people or possible non-residents? Worth mentioning?

    1) a landowner (or an M.A.) cannot stop a court claim, only the claimant , BUT its always worth getting a letter of support from a landowner stating that they do not give permission for the court claim to go ahead on their behalf

    2) probably , as the clock starts ticking 5 days after the issue date and an AOS doubles the 14 days to 28 days

    3) it is always worth arguing about inadequate and misleading signage

    4) probably
  • Ok, I've gone away and have spent far too many hours creating my first draft defence on this, so any help would be much appreciated to check over it...

    Background:
    I am a resident/lodger that lives in a block of flats with allocated parking spaces and visitor spaces outside. At some point the driver at the time has parked my car in a location that I have not parked in before which is further away from the door but still within the parking slots for the block of flats, I discover a parking charge notice on my car, contravention: No permit displayed, apparently the car has been parked in a select area where a permit is required, in the daylight I can see a couple of signs which I don’t believe are very visible especially if the car was parked at night…

    What happened next:
    Parking charge notice to keeper received
    I send template letter suggested here requiring information
    Reply received saying unable to cancel- they don't supply me with all info requested either
    I ignore all dept collection letters from DRP
    I ignore Zenith collections letter- the final notice before legal action
    I ignore letter before claim- from Gladstones Solicitors
    County court claim form received
    I Acknowledge service of the claim
    Now finalising my defence...

    Questions I have:
    In this case, is it worth me phoning up the management company or landowner to see if they will cancel it?
    Issue date on the county court claim form is 15th Sep, with AOS is my deadline to submit then the 18th Oct?
    Is it worth me arguing that the slot the vehicle was parked in had a 'V' for visitors sign displayed exactly like the other visitor spaces which don't require a permit?
    There is a chance the driver at the time parked my car in this slot due to all the closer allocated slots being taken by other people or possible non-residents? Worth mentioning?
    Any other suggestions welcome...

    DEFENCE DRAFT 1:

    1. It is admitted that the defendant, xxxxxxx residing at xxxxxxx is the registered keeper of the vehicle.

    2. It is denied that any "parking charges or indemnity costs" (whatever they might be) as stated on the Particulars of claim are owed and any debt is denied in it's entirety. The date of the alleged incident is XX/XX/2016 as per the particulars of claim.

    3. The identity of the driver of the vehicle on the date in question has not been ascertained, and no evidence has yet been supplied by the claimant as to who parked the vehicle. Under the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 there is no presumption in law as to who parked a vehicle on private land nor does there exist any obligation for a keeper to name a driver. It is reiterated that:
    a. The Claimant did not identify the driver
    b. The Defendant has no liability, as they are the Keeper of the vehicle and the Claimant must rely upon the strict provisions of the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 in order to hold the defendant responsible for the driver’s alleged breach. It is the defendants right to choose to defend this claim as the registered keeper.

    4. Notwithstanding that the Claimant claims no right to pursue the Defendant as the registered keeper under The Protection of Freedoms Act 2012, the Claimant has failed to meet the conditions of the Act and has never acquired any right to pursue the Defendant in this capacity if it cannot identify the driver. This distinguishes the case from Elliott vs Loake (1982) in which there was irrefutable evidence of the drivers identity and moreover, this case was a criminal case and has since been dismissed previously by Judges in cases brought by Gladstones Solicitors. The Protection of Freedom Act 2012 Schedule 4 has not being complied with and the claimant may not quote reasonable assumption. PATAS and POPLA Lead Adjudicator and barrister, Henry Michael Greenslade, clarified that with regards to keeper liability, "There is no ‘reasonable presumption’ in law that the registered keeper of a vehicle is the driver and operators should never suggest anything of the sort"(2015).

    5. I am a resident here and there is no mention of any ‘parking scheme’ in the lease, nor any charges for parking nor a requirement to display any parking permits.
    Primacy of Contract: The idea behind primacy of contract is that a contract cannot be unilaterally altered by one party without the permission of the other. In the case of residential parking, the lease is the key document. If this gives the resident the unfettered right to park then this cannot be altered later, for instance by requiring a permit to park.
    There is a large body of case law which establishes this. In Saeed v Plustrade Ltd [2001] EWCA Civ 2011 it was found the managing agent could not reduce the amount of parking spaces available to residents.
    In Pace v Mr N [2016] C6GF14F0 [2016] it was found that the parking company could not override the tenant's right to park by requiring a permit to park.
    In Link Parking v Ms P C7GF50J7 [2016] it was also found that the parking company could not override the tenant's right to park by requiring a permit to park.
    Residential parking companies are there to protect the residents from outside motorists, and not for them to fleece residents parking in their own spaces. It was held that parking restrictions (including the introduction of a permit system) which caused detriment to tenants was in breach of the principle that ''a grantor shall not derogate from his grant”.
    There is reasonable understanding that the defendant has a legal grant and right to park in a non obstructive manner. The site landowner covenanted to give tenants uninterrupted quiet enjoyment of the property and this is harassment. The claimant cannot re-offer parking rights as if it were consideration, on more onerous terms than before, when this right is already granted within a concluded contract, of which this Claimant is not a party.

    6. It is denied that the signs used by this claimant can have created a fair or transparent contract with a driver in any event. The signs were insufficient in terms of their distribution, wording and lighting hence incapable of binding the driver, which distinguishes this case from the Beavis case:
    a) Sporadic and illegible (charge not prominent nor large lettering) site/entrance signage - breach of the BPA Code of Practice and no contract formed to pay any clearly stated sum.
    b) The signs are believed to have no mention of any debt collection additional charge, which cannot form part of any alleged contract.
    c) The signage was not lit and any terms were not transparent or legible; this is an unfair contract, not agreed by the driver and contrary to the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations 1999.
    d) No promise was made by the driver that could constitute consideration because there was no offer known nor accepted. No consideration flowed from the Claimant.
    e) Absent the elements of a contract, there can be no breach of contract.
    It is my understanding that the signage needs to be plentiful and easily visible, otherwise no contract can be entered by performance.
    In Link Parking v Mr L C9GF5875 [2016] it was found that there was no entrance signage at a residential site and the other signage was not visible. The claim was dismissed.

    7. Despite the request for documentation by the defendant, the claimant has not produced these documents to date. It is reasonable for the defendant to request sight of documents and evidence as there is doubt as to the whether the claimant invoked Schedule 4 of the POFA 2012 with fully compliant documents. Accordingly, it is denied that the Claimant has authority to bring this claim. The proper Claimant (if any debt exists, which is denied) would be the landowner. Strict proof is required that there is a chain of contracts leading from the landowner to Millenium Door and Event Security, and no proof has been provided.

    8. The Claimant’s solicitors are known to be a serial issuer of generic claims similar to this one, with no due diligence, no scrutiny of details nor even checking for a true cause of action. HMCS have identified over 1000 similar poorly produced claims and the solicitor's conduct in many of these cases is believed to be currently the subject of an active investigation by the SRA. I believe the term for such conduct is ‘robo-claims’ which is against the public interest, demonstrates a disregard for the dignity of the court and is unfair on unrepresented consumers. I have reason to believe that this is a claim that will proceed without any facts or evidence supplied until the last possible minute, to my significant detriment as an unrepresented Defendant.

    9. It is suggested by the defendant that parking companies using the small claims track as a form of aggressive, automated debt collection is not something the courts should be seen to support.

    10. The alleged debt as described in the claim are unenforceable penalties, being just the sort of unconscionable charges exposed as offending against the penalty rule. This case can be easily distinguished from ParkingEye v Beavis which the Judges held was 'entirely different' from most ordinary economic contract disputes. Charges cannot exist merely to punish drivers. This claimant has failed to show any comparable 'legitimate interest' to save their charge from Lord Dunedin's four tests for a penalty, which the Supreme Court Judges found was still adequate in less complex cases, such as this allegation.

    11. It is submitted that (apart from properly incurred court fees) any added legal fees/costs are simply numbers made up out of thin air, and are an attempt at double recovery by the Claimant, which would not be recoverable in the small claims court.

    12. It is denied that there was any 'relevant obligation' or 'relevant contract' relating to any single parking event.

    13. It is submitted that the conduct of the Claimant is wholly unreasonable and vexatious.
    As such, I am keeping a note of my wasted time/costs in dealing with this matter.

    14. It is requested by the defendant that the court strike out this claim for the reasons stated above, and for similar reasons cited by District Judge Cross of St Albans County Court on 20/09/16 where a similar claim was struck out without a hearing, due to Gladstone’s' template particulars for a private parking firm being 'incoherent', failing to comply with CPR16.4, and ''providing no facts that could give rise to any apparent claim in law''.

    Statement of Truth: I confirm that the contents of this statement are true to the best of my knowledge and belief.
  • Loadsofchildren123
    Loadsofchildren123 Posts: 2,504
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    edited 13 October 2017 at 10:49AM
    Please can you tell me where exactly this is? If it's Copper Quarter, which block exactly? And the date of the parking?
    Are you leaseholder or tenant?
    When was the NtK sent to you? Was it out of time as per POFA (in which case be specific about this in your defence - eg to make the RK liable under POFA the NtK must be served within x days of the parking event, ie by x date. it was only served on x, x days out of time - rather than just saying it wasn't POFA compliant)
    Although a practising Solicitor, my posts here are NOT legal advice, but are personal opinion based on limited facts provided anonymously by forum users. I accept no liability for the accuracy of any such posts and users are advised that, if they wish to obtain formal legal advice specific to their case, they must seek instruct and pay a solicitor.
  • Location: Corvette Court, Cardiff.
    Date of parking: 17/12/2016
    I'm a lodger who rents off the owner and leaseholder (my friend), he also lives in the flat.
    NTK sent to me on: 17/01/2017
  • OK, not a site familiar to me as Copper Quarter is!


    Have you got their landowner contract yet? I've seen 2 Millennium contracts and they are both the same. They have a clause which helps you which says that they will ticket cars that are reported to them as unauthorised by the landowner. So was that report ever made? They also have a clause which says they will ticket on dates to be agreed, with no dates then being agreed. Clause 1 also says they will comply with their ATA CoP.


    Their usual trick is to provide the contract only with their WS.


    Gladstones act as a postbox for these people, they will turn up and do the hearing themselves (well, they always do in Swansea).


    You must write now and ask them for the contract. They will ignore you, but write anyway. When you get to the DQ stage, you must write a letter with it to the court telling the court you have no idea how the claim will be evidenced because of the C's complete failure to comply with paras 3, 6(a) and (c) of the Practice Direction - Pre-Action Conduct, and because of the incoherent PoC, and you have written to them to ask for evidence of landowner authority which shows that they have locus to bring proceedings and the basis upon which they were entitled to ticket cars at the location, and that you clearly need this information to run a proper and relevant defence, and to draft your WS. Enclose a copy of the letter and say they haven't responded.


    Ask the court to either strike out the claim or to stay it pending the production of that information. If it is not minded to make that order, ask that, when it allocates the matter to the small track, it makes an order that evidence be served sequentially, rather than at the same time, with the C going first - because you need to see this information (which should have been produced at the pre-action stage of the process) before you can file your own evidence.
    Although a practising Solicitor, my posts here are NOT legal advice, but are personal opinion based on limited facts provided anonymously by forum users. I accept no liability for the accuracy of any such posts and users are advised that, if they wish to obtain formal legal advice specific to their case, they must seek instruct and pay a solicitor.
  • No, I don't have Claimant/Millenium's landowner contract. Ok, so i'll write to Millenium requesting this and send asap, would it be ok to email them? I take it I still need to send the defence to the courts too?

    Also, would be worth me doing both of the following?:

    1. I rang the management company and I discovered that the landowner has the same address as the management company. I questioned this and they told me it's because the landowner is made up of a number of shareholders, I also found out that some of these shareholders actually live in the same block of flats as me here, essentially my neighbours!? (Might explain why there's a lot of looking out of windows here...) I asked the management company is it worth sending a letter to the landowner to see if they'll cancel it based on the fact i'm a resident and it's obviously a genuine mistake by the driver etc to see if they'll sympathise, they said it could be worth a try...?

    2. See the following from the parking prankster, is it worth writing to India Beavan as below?:

    India Beavan agrees to drop Millenium Parking Services claim
    Millennium Door And Event Security v Mr X. 09/06/2017. C7GF0Y0M. Swansea. DJ Scannel

    Millennium took a motorist to court for parking in a spot which the resident had rights to park. The keeper was not a resident, but had the resident's permission to park.

    The Hearing

    The motorist represented themself. India Beavan represented Millennium.

    The motorist had 3 main defence points.

    1. Failure to comply with civil procedures.
    2. Denied breach of contract due to the lease and forbidding signs.
    3. No keeper liability.

    Judge Scannel said that the claimants statement did not address the issues of the lease and the issue of keeper liability.

    India Beavan replied about the lease, first saying "we didn't address this because the defendant is not a resident", Judge Scannel replied "But the lease grants use of a parking space."

    Judge Scannel then moved onto keeper liability. India Beaven stated "We are claiming the defendant was the driver, the defendant did not say at any point he was not the driver, had he said this we would have withdrawn the case earlier."

    Judge Scannel said that it was on them to prove the defendant was the driver, Judge Scannel then asked if the defendant was going to identify the driver". He replied "No". India Beaven then said "In that case we shall withdraw."

    Mr X was awarded costs of £50.

    The motorist found India Beavan to be friendly and polite, and thought she was perhaps "thrown under a bus" by Gladstones with their template witness statement.

    Prankster Note

    Millennium historically did not use keeper liability. If they are claiming against you and you are not the driver, it is worth writing directly to India Beavan, Head

    Dear Ms Beavan,

    I note that in Millennium v Mr X C7GF0Y0M, Swansea, 09/06/2017 you were representing Millennium and withdrew the claim once the defendant refused to identify the driver as keepe liability did not apply.

    I confirm I am not the driver.
    (any proof you have here)

    I therefore invite you to withdraw the claim immediately. If you fail to o this, and the claim is dismissed because keeper liability does not exist, then I will claim my full costs under 27.14(2)g for your unreasonable behaviour in not withdrawing a claim when you know you have no cause of action.

    File the letter with your evidence, and claim for time spent at the litigant in person rate of £19/hour.

    Millennium had 3 other cases in court on Friday - the results of these is not known.

    Happy Parking

    The Parking Prankster
  • You must still file your defence.


    In it you will have to say something like "The Defendant puts the Claimant to full proof if its authority both to issue charges on the land in question, and to issue the charge which is the subject of these proceedings. Since the Claimant has failed to produce any information at the pre-action phase of these proceedings to demonstrate its authority, the Defendant must reserve his position in denying that it has such authority until he has had sight of the written contract between the Claimant and the landowner."
    Although a practising Solicitor, my posts here are NOT legal advice, but are personal opinion based on limited facts provided anonymously by forum users. I accept no liability for the accuracy of any such posts and users are advised that, if they wish to obtain formal legal advice specific to their case, they must seek instruct and pay a solicitor.
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