Parking Eye County Court Claim Form

Hi everyone

I have my defence that I have been working on which I have amended from ones on the forums. Any help on it much appreciated:

I, XXX, am the defendant in this matter and it is admitted that I was the driver of the vehicle on the day of this event. I do not admit any part of this claim and put the Claimant to strict proof of every element of the claim for each of the following reasons:

1.1. This Claimant has not complied with pre-court protocol (as outlined in the new Pre Action Protocol for Debt Claims, 1 October 2017). As an example as to why this prevents a full defence being filed at this time, a parking charge can be for trespass, breach of contract or a contractual charge. All these are treated differently in law and require a different defence. The wording of any contract will naturally be a key element in this matter, and a copy of the alleged contract has never been provided to the Defendant.
a) There was no compliant ‘Letter before County Court Claim’, under the Practice Direction.
b) This is a speculative serial litigant, issuing a large number of identical 'draft particulars'.
i. HM Courts Service have identified over 1000 similar sparse claims. I believe the term for such behaviour is ‘roboclaims’ and as such is against the public interest. Practice Direction 3A which references Civil Procedure Rule 3.4 illustrates this point;
“ 1.4 The following are examples of cases where the court may conclude that particulars of claim (whether contained in a claim form or filed separately) fall within rule 3.4(2)(a):
i. those which set out no facts indicating what the claim is about, for example ‘Money owed £5000’,
ii. those which are incoherent and make no sense,
iii. those which contain a coherent set of facts but those facts, even if true, do not disclose any legally recognisable claim against the defendant ”


2. In the absence of any proof of adequate signage that contractually bound the Defendant there can have been no contract and the Claimant has no case.
a) The Claimant is put to strict proof that at the time of the alleged event they had both advertisement consent and the permission from the site owner to display the signs.
b) In the absence of strict proof I submit that the Claimant was committing an offence by displaying their signs and therefore no contract could have been entered into between the Defendant and the Claimant.
c) The Defendant relies upon ParkingEye Ltd v Barry Beavis (2015) UKSC 67 insofar as the Court were willing to impose a penalty in the context of a site of commercial value and where the signage regarding the penalties imposed for any breach of parking terms were clear - both upon entry to the site and throughout.

3 At the time of the material events the signage was deficient in number, distribution, and wording to reasonably convey a contractual obligation;
i. The Defendant avers that the parking signage in this matter was inadequate
ii. The signage did not comply with the requirements of the Code of Practice of the British Parking Association ("BPA") Accredited Operators Scheme, an organisation to which the Claimant was a signatory;
iii. the sum pursued exceeds £100.
iv. there is / was no compliant landowner contract.
v. The signage contained particularly onerous terms not sufficiently drawn to the attention of the visitor as set out in the leading judgment of Denning MR in J Spurling v Bradshaw [1956] EWCA Civ 3
ix. No promise was made by the Defendant that could constitute consideration because there was no offer known nor accepted. No consideration flowed from the Claimant.

4. The Beavis case confirmed the fact that, if it is a matter of trespass (not breach of any contract), a parking firm has no standing as a non-landowner to pursue even nominal damages.

5. The charge is an unenforceable penalty based upon a lack of commercial justification. The Beavis case confirmed that the penalty rule is certainly engaged in any case of a private parking charge and was only disengaged due to the unique circumstances of that case, which do not resemble this claim.

6. The claimant failed to include a copy of their written contract as per Practice Direction 16 7.3(1) and Practice Direction 7C 1.4(3A). No indication is given as to the Claimants contractual authority to operate there as required by the Claimants Trade Association's Code of Practice B1.1 which says;
“If you operate parking management activities on land which is not owned by you, you must supply us with written authority from the land owner sufficient to establish you as the ‘Creditor’ within the meaning of the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 (where applicable) and in any event to establish you as a person who is able to recover parking charges. There is no prescribed form for such agreement and it need not necessarily be as part of a contract but it must include the express ability for an operator to recover parking charges on the landowner’s behalf or provide sufficient right to occupy the land in question so that charges can be recovered by the operator directly. This applies whether or not you intend to use the keeper liability provisions.”

7. Parking Eye Ltd are not the lawful occupier of the land. I have the reasonable belief that they do not have the authority to issue charges on this land in their own name and that they have no rights to bring action regarding this claim.
a) The Claimant is not the landowner and is merely an agent acting on behalf of the landowner and has failed to demonstrate their legal standing to form a contract.
b) The claimant is not the landowner and suffers no loss whatsoever as a result of a vehicle parking at the location in question
c) The Claimant is put to proof that it has sufficient interest in the land or that there are specific terms in its contract to bring an action on its own behalf. As a third party agent, the Claimant may not pursue any charge

8. The Claimant has at no time provided an explanation how the ‘parking charge’ has been calculated, the conduct that gave rise to it or how the amount has escalated from £100 to £175. This appears to be an added cost with apparently no qualification and an attempt at double recovery, which the POFA Schedule 4 specifically disallows.
a) The Protection of Freedom Act Para 4(5) states that the maximum sum that may be recovered from the keeper is the charge stated on the Notice to Keeper.

9. The Defendant also disputes that the Claimant has incurred £50 solicitor costs.
b) The Defendant has the reasonable belief that the Claimant has not incurred £50 costs to pursue an alleged £100 debt.
c) Not withstanding the Defendant's belief, the costs are in any case not recoverable.
d) The Claimant described the charge of £50.00 "legal representative’s costs" not "contractual costs". CPR 27.14 does not permit these to be recovered in the Small Claims Court.
e) The £50 was also struck out by DJ Sparrow on 19 August 2015 in ParkingEye v Mrs S, claim number B9FC508F.

10. It is submitted that the conduct of the Claimant in pursuing this claim is wholly unreasonable and vexatious. As such, the Defendant is keeping careful note of all wasted time/costs in dealing with this matter and should the case continue to trial (or in the event of the Claimant filing a Notice of Discontinuance) the Defendant will seek further costs, pursuant to Civil Procedure Rule 27.14(2)(g).

11. The Defendant denies the claim in its entirety, voiding any liability to the Claimant for all amounts due to the aforementioned reasons. The Defendant asks that the court gives consideration to exercise its discretion to order the case to be struck out under CPR Rule 3.4, for want of a detailed cause of action and/or for the claim having no realistic prospects of success.

I confirm that the above facts and statements are true to the best of my knowledge and recollection.


In regards the signage I have since been back and there is no sign at the entrance to the car park (this is a motorway service station car park). There are signs in the car park but only at the ends and the bit about charges seems quite small, the signs are also pretty high up. Part of the reason I missed these is I just didn't expect car park charges in a motorway service station. Given the purpose of a service station, and the fact that there is nothing else around, I wasn't expecting there to be a charge and so was not looking out for a sign. Is it worth mentioning something around this in the defence? The reason I think it's a no is that it's not a legal argument, but thought I'd check with you guys!

Thanks for all your help

Hi

Just a quick question - I've seen this on the forum somewhere but can't seem to find it again. I have printed my defence to send through the post, on the online claim defence section do I leave this blank? Or reference the fact that it's in the post?

Thanks for your help