Offline Website BuilderI would like an article for the ParkingCon.co.uk website that explains the process that has to be followed by a private parking company (PPC) before they can start legal proceedings. Unfortunately, far too many victims who have received a Parking Charge Notice (PCN) from an unregulated PPC, more often than not either just pay it or attempt to appeal it. However, if they lose their appeal and even if they go on to try a secondary appeal using the PPCs supposedly "independent" appeal service such as POPLA or the IAS and lose their appeal there, they assume that that is the end of the process and they are obliged to pay the PPC.
This is fundamentally wrong. Motorists should be better educated in the way English civil law is used. Just because in their correspondence the PPC mentions "breach of terms", "court", "CCJ" and "bailiffs", they should realise that this is used as a form of intimidation and preys on the majority of victims sparse to none knowledge of civil law and the justice system. By using this terminology, the PPC is relying on this lack of knowledge to install fear and pressure the victim into paying the alleged debt.
It all starts with the PCN that offers a "discount" if it is paid within 14 days. This discount is really a bribe to encourage the victim to part with their hard earned money without an appeal, essentially a fight. In reality, the discount should be ignored. The intention of this article will be to show how the victim doesn't have to pay a penny to the PPC.
As mentioned, once the initial appeals process has been exhausted, the final step should lead to a court claim. However, long before that stage is reached, the PPC will usually issue a couple of reminders about the victims failure to pay the alleged debt. These reminder use the language mentioned above and are meant to intimidate and pressure the victim into paying.
The advice given here and on forums such as moneysavingexpert.com is to ignore all correspondence from the PPC with their reminder and final reminder letters. After this, the PPC will usually use a Debt Recovery Agency (DRA) who will offer the PPC a no-win, no-fee service whereby they will add a fee or around £60-£70 for their service which will consist of an avalanche of increasingly threatening letters that suggest that they are able to issue a CCJ and send bailiffs around to collect their belongings and property if the now increased alleged debt is not paid.
What the vast majority of victims don't realise that these DRAs have absolutely no power to do anything. They rely on the ignorance or gullibility of the victims who have little to no understanding of civil law to panic at the mere mention of "court", "CCJ", "bailiff" etc. and to concede defeat and pay the now increased sum in order to avoid the imaginary CCJ, which would ruin their credit record, and the imaginary bailiffs knocking on their door and confiscating their personal belongings.
Again, our advice is that the victim can safely ignore all threatening letters from the PPC or the DRAs. They are powerless to do anything at this time and the letters may as well be used a lining for the bottom of a birdcage. The only correspondence they need to take not of is a "Letter of Claim" LoC or "Letter Before Claim" LBC which are both the same thing.
A DRA cannot issue an LoC as they are not a party to the contract that the PPC is alleging the victim has breached which has given rise to the alleged debt. Often though, some DRAs issue letters that "appear" to be an LoC but are just another tactic they use in their intimidation.
So, the article needs to explain the actual process that would need to be followed and what happens if, eventually, an actual LoC arrives. An actual LoC must follow the guidelines of the Pre Action Protocol, a copy of which can be found here: https://www.justice.gov.uk/courts/procedure-rules/civil/pdf/protocols/debt-pap.pdf
As explained in another article about the four steps (Plans) that the victim of a PCN should take, Plan A: complain to the landowner, Plan B: appeal to the PPC, Plan C: appeal to the PPCs IAS and Plan D: where this article comes in, these are the steps that have to be followed by the PPC if they want to go all the way to court in an attempt to recover their alleged debt.
Once the PPC has decided that the victim has not responded to the correspondence regarding the reminders and the threats from the DRA, they must now decide how they proceed. Some PPCs give up at this stage and write off the alleged debt because they know that pursuing it through the courts is often a futile task and they are better off chasing more gullible victims.
Some PPCs are more aggressive in their tactics and will decide that they want their alleged debt at any cost (almost). They will either issue the claim themselves through the Money Claims On Line (MCOL) service which is a part of the County Court Business Centre (CCBC) or they will instruct one of several solicitors firms who specialise in issuing clams for PPC clients in an automated manner to do it for them. They are known as "robots-claims" specialists and are considered by most people who are familiar with their methods to be the "bottom-dwellers" of the legal industry.
Either way, the PPC must issue a claim for the alleged debt, either directly themselves or through the robot-claim solicitor. As the claim is invariably for a relatively small amount, they use the MCOL service and the CCBC then send s a claim form to the defendant. Again, at this stage, many victims will have stayed strong and ignore all the threats from the PPC and the DRAs. However, when they see that they are now actually going to be a litigant in an actual court claim, they capitulate and pay up the now, even higher amount, usually because they mistakenly think that they have a CCJ and their credit record will be trashed if they don't pay it or lose the case. Of course this is not so but the ignorance of the civil court system and terminology just sends them into a panic.
Let's review how the alleged debt has increased since the PCN was first issued. In most cases, the original charge was £100, discounted to £60 if paid within 14 days. If it was appealed, the discount (bribe) was withdrawn and it was now the full £100. Once the debt was passed to a DRA, a further £70 was added even though the PPC didn't pay the DRA that amount. If it ad been paid at that stage thanks to the DRA scaring the victim into paying, the extra £70 or a chunk of it would have gone to the DRA as their "win" fee.
So, even before it has gone anywhere near a court, the original charge has now risen to £170. As soon as the court claim is issued, they have now added interest and fixed fees such as the £35 hearing fee and the £50 solicitors costs. So, the alleged debt is now around £255. For many victims this scary stuff. However, they should know that what the claimant has put in the claim has to be justified and as it is a "small claims" claim and any added amounts above and beyond the original charge such as "damages" or debt recovery fees are not allowed. Only the two fixed fees of the hearing fee (£35) and the solicitors fee (£50) are allowed.
The reason that the claimant still adds these additional amounts is if the victim screws up by not responding to the claim, they will get a default judgment where the amounts are not questioned. Unfortunately, far too many of these robots-claims result in default judgments, more often than not because the victim forgot to update their V5C logbook when they moved from a previous address. When issuing the PCN, the PPC applied to the DVLA for the registered keepers (RK) details under the "Keeper At Date OF Event" (KADOE) rules where all correspondence goes to an old address and the claimant has no idea about the claim, can't defend it and then receives a default CCJ which they only find out about the next time they apply for any credit such a new mobile phone contract, mortgage or car loan application or a check of their credit file.
If the victim does discover a default CCJ they previously had no idea about, there are options to have it "set aside" but that is for another article to follow. Whilst none of this is particularly difficult, it can be time consuming and takes effort, usually at a time of increased stress because of the situation we are now discussing.
So, we are at the stage where a claim form has arrived. The claim form is known as an N1 form. It is very important that any claim is acknowledged. This is called the Acknowledgement of Service (AoS). Failing to AoS could lead to the claimant getting a default CCJ against you.
The AoS is done online on the MCOL website. You have up to 14 days from service of the claim to AoS. The 14 days start from the "Issue Date" on the N1 claim form. Don't AoS before the fifth day after the Issue Date but there is no further advantage to delaying any day after that and it must be completed before the 19th day. By doing the AoS within these dates, the defendant now has another 14 days after the 19th day, or more if that day falls on a weekend or a bank holiday, to submit their Defence to the Particulars of Claim (PoC) as stated on the N1 claim form.
Again, a Defence should be submitted otherwise the claimant can apply for a default judgment. The Defence should be a short, punchy outline of the legal arguments you intend to rely on in your Witness Statement" (WS) should the case actually progress all the way to court. Often, claimants submit a whole story about their case and fail to realise that most of what they have said should come later in their WS. No evidence goes with the Defence.
This is where the template defences we provide come in useful. They may be long but most defendants only have to change one or two paragraphs near the beginning as the rest covers the usually sparse PoC that the claimant has attempted to cram into the very limited PoC box on the MCOL website. They have to try and fit everything into a box that can only contain 1,080 characters (not words) which includes all spaces and punctuation marks. These robots-claim solicitors use their own templates to do this.
When submitting the Defence, you should NOT use the MCOL defence block. That too has the same character limit as the PoC box. The defence should be prepared and saved as a PDF file that you will attach to an email which is sent to the CCBC email address for submission of documents. It is ccbcaq@justice.gov.uk. Don't even put a full stop in the defence box on the MCOL website as that will considered your Defence and you can't change once you've submitted it.
After filing your Defence, not much will happen for a while. A copy of your defence will be sent to the claimant or their solicitor for them to consider. They will then have the option of withdrawing the claim or, more likely, sent you a letter saying that they intend to continue with the claim. However, they also tend to have a paragraph where they say "without prejudice save as to costs" offering to settle the debt for a slightly reduced amount. Again, this is expected and can be filed.
Eventually, this could be man months later due to the backlog at the CCBC, an N180 Directions Questionnaire (DQ) will arrive. You may receive a copy of the claimants DQ first with additional forms attached. Ignore that one. You will receive one from the CCBC or you can download one from the web. You can regularly check your MCOL account to see if one has been sent yet. Do not send one back too soon as it may be rejected and you'd have to fill one in again.
The DQ is a standard form that is used to indicate that you will be defending the claim, that you want the claim to be heard in person or by phone/video link and not "on the papers". You also put in the form all dates that you will not be available to attend a hearing. Allow a few days either side too. Box D1 asks if you don't want a hearing on the paper to explain why. This is the answer you should put in box D1:
"I am not content for the case to be heard 'on the papers' because that seems to disproportionately give an advantage to a legally represented party. I feel strongly after all these years of intimidating demands from this aggressive parking firm and its agents, that I need a voice at an attended hearing.
I wish to question the Claimant about their evidence at a hearing in person and to expose omissions and any misleading or incorrect evidence or assertions.
Given the Claimant is a firm who complete cut & paste parking case paperwork for a living, having this case heard solely on papers would appear to put the Claimant at an unfair advantage, especially as they would no doubt prefer the Defendant not to have the opportunity to expose the issues in the Claimants template submissions or speak as the only true witness to events in question."
A copy of the N180 DQ should be sent back to the same email address as used to send your Defence. You should also copy in the claimants solicitor or the claimant if they are not using one. Then you wait
Eventually, you will receive a letter telling you that the claim has been allocated by a judge to the fast track and which court local to you the hearing will take place. A date for a hearing may be provided at this time but more likely judge will review the PoC and the Defence before deciding how much time to allocate for the hearing and a date. You will usually have to submit your WS within 14 days of the hearing date.
Your WS will include your narrative of what happened and why the claim is unfair or wrong. You will include evidence to back up your Defence. You will also have received a copy of the claimants WS. If theirs arrives in time, you can usually find flaws that you can include in your own WS.
More often than not, if your Defence was robust, the claimant or their solicitor will try and get in touch with you and offer you a reduced amount to settle the alleged debt. By this stage they know that you have not caved in like the majority of their gullible victims and they stand to lose the claim when it finally get sot be decided by a truly independent arbiter, the judge.
If the claimant doesn't discontinue the claim before the hearing date, then you will have to attend the hearing. Again, there is nothing to fear. It is not held in a full court room with judges and barristers in robes and wigs. These small claims hearings are usually heard in the judges chambers which is just a small office in the court building. The judge will be wearing a suit and you refer to him or her as "judge". In the vast majority of these claims, the claimant or their solicitor do not attend. They usually hire a local para-legal who will only have received all the documents about the claim the day before or even on the day.
You will be led by the judge who may ask you a few questions. The rep for the claimant can ask you questions but you can't question the rep. The rep is relying on the WS made by the claimant and you can raise any points that you dispute or your own claims from your defence that haven't been answered. As you are there in person, your WS carries more weight than the claimants.
At the end of the hearing, the judge will decide whether the claim is successful or not. You only have to win on one point whereas the claimant has to win all their points. If you are successful, you will have no debt and can even claim some limited costs and expenses. If you are not successful, a CCJ will be issued against you for some of the amount claimed. Invariably, most judges do not allow the extra £70 claimed that was mentioned earlier. The amount of "debt" you now owe the claimant is usually less than was claimed in the first place.
Don't worry about the CCJ. As long as you pay the amount of the CCJ within 30 days, there is no record of it in your credit history, ever. It is expunged completely. It is only in cases such as a default judgment where the defendant doesn't respond to a claim or has no idea about it or doesn't bother to pay the CCJ within 30 days that it is then recored against your credit history for the next 6 years.
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