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Are you being taken to court by ParkingEye?

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  • Are you being taken to court by ParkingEye?

    There have been 2 cases recently where parkingeye claims have been dismissed because they did not have the right to bring the claim; only the landowner or the landowner with parkingeye could bring the claim. It seems the judges found clause 22 of parkingeye's contract with the landowner key to the issue.

    22. NO PARTNERSHIP OR AGENCY
    Nothing in this Agreement is intended to create a partnership or joint venture or
    legal relationship of any kind that would impose liability upon one Party for the act
    or failure to act of the other Party between the Parties, or to authorise either Party
    to act as agent for the other. Save as expressly provided in this Agreement, neither
    Party shall have authority to make representations, act in the name or on behalf of
    or otherwise to bind the other.


    ParkingEye have known about this potential problem for a long time and therefore do anything to stop their contract getting in front of the judge. They claim confidentiality and that defendants will post the contract on the internet. This is of course absurd. Their contract is indeed on the internet, but not from defendants; from their own customers, via freedom of information requests.

    Their tactic is to use a 'witness statment' from the landowner testifying that the contract exists. However, there have been a large amount of procedural irregularities with this witness statement, including the use of photocopied signatures, statements signed by somebody other than the witness, and factual errors.

    If you are going to court you therefore need to discredit the witness statement and get the contract in front of the judge.

    You might as well discredit the witness statement from Jonathan Langham, parkingeye claims handler at the same time. I have helped with a lot of cases and have not seen one that is not a 'load of ParkingEyes'. He never turns up in court to answer questions about his ParkingEyes, of course.

    If you visit my blog at http://parking-prankster.blogspot.co...ring-with.html you will find details of what to do to first prove to me you are not a secret parkingeye mole, and then get the info you need. This is being continually updated as more evidence piles in. Meanwhile, here is the current list of irregularities.

    1. 3QT52338 ParkingEye v Walkden 29/10/2013 Barrow in Furness. The hearing was originally held on 16/07/2013. ParkingEye produced a witness statement. District Judge Dodd found the witness statement extremely unsatisfactory, ordered the case to be adjourned at ParkingEye’s expense, and to reconvene at a later date. ParkingEye were ordered to produce a redacted contract from the landowner to the defendant, and a full unredacted copy to the Judge. The case reconvened on 29/10/2013. The contract sent to the defendant was dated Feb 2013 whilst the parking event was October 2012. The witness statement from Paul Shrewbrook of the Range and the attached letter of authority was not dated. The judge ruled that ParkingEye did not have authority to manage the car park because they contravened section 7.1 of the BPA code of practice which clearly states that the parking company must have written authority before any management of a car park can commence. The witness statement therefore claimed ParkingEye had authority to operate when they did not.

    2. 3QT61897 ParkingEye v Barrett. 16/10/2013, Cardiff. The contract was dated 7/11/2012, which was after the Parking event on 24/10/2012. The contract was in a different name (Peachkey) to the landowner name (McDonalds Bridgend) given on the witness statement, although both contract and witness statement were signed by the same person. ParkingEye stated that the witness statement from McDonalds referred to a different document, which they did not have in court. The witness statement also stated that the parking charge was valid. However, McDonalds had not been informed the defendant had broken down and were therefore not informed of the full facts by ParkingEye. District Judge C W Dawson adjourned the case and ordered ParkingEye to bring the originals of all documents next time. McDonalds, when informed of the irregularities, ordered ParkingEye to drop the parking charge and the case. The witness statement therefore claimed ParkingEye had authority to operate when they did not.


    3. 3QT29139 ParkingEye v Shelley. 23/07/2013 The contact produced in court was signed in February 2013. However, the parking event was around October 2012. Once again the witness was Paul Shrewbrook of the Range. The witness statement therefore claimed ParkingEye had authority to operate when they did not.

    4. In 3QT62646 ParkingEye v Sharma 23/10/2013 Brentford County Court, District Judge Jenkins explained he was throwing the claim out because it was brought in the name of ParkingEye and not the landowner. He said the landowner could bring the case in their own name or jointly with ParkingEye if they wished. The witness statement therefore contained incorrect information. It was not apparent from the witness statement that the witness had the required expertise to interpret the contract correctly.

    5. In 3QT60598 ParkingEye v Gardam, 14/11/2013 High Wycombe County Court. District Judge Jones found the judgement by District Judge Jenkins persuasive. On examining clause 22 of the contract, which was only produced on the day, she ruled that the claimant did not have the right to bring the case in their own name. The witness statement therefore contained incorrect information. It was not apparent from the witness statement that the witness had the required expertise to interpret the contract correctly.


    In all known cases involving ParkingEye when the landowner agent is Colliers International the signature is identical on every document and therefore appears to be photocopied. (Exhibit 1a).The date is added at a later time, and several different handwriting examples have been identified. Cases have been found from late 2012 to 1-10-2013, indicating this practice has been continuing for almost a year. In at least one case the witness statement has the same date as the parking event, creating the reasonable suspicion this was backdated – a witness statement is not produced for each of the 200,000 parking charges issued..

    In several cases involving ParkingEye when the landowner is Aldi, the document is signed by somebody who is not the witness.(Exhibit 1b).

    ParkingEye’s contract is two pages of dense text. Many of the witnesses do not apparently have the expertise to correctly interpret these and make the statements. Job titles of store director, manager, deputy port manager and chief operating officer do not necessarily imply the required expertise.
    The contracts are all carefully written to imply that ParkingEye have the authority to pursue parking charges to court in their own name. However, they do not actually state this. One such witness was a principal solicitor for South Tyneside Council, and therefore presumably did have such expertise. When asked directly whether ParkingEye had the authority to pursue parking charges to court in their own name she refused to answer and repeated her statement from the witness statement. (Exhibit 1e). She was asked again, and again point blank refused (Exhibit 1f). It is therefore reasonable to suppose that she is following the judgement of District Judge Jenkins and District Judge Jones in ruling that clause 22 of the contract precludes ParkingEye from having the authority to pursue parking charges to court in their own name.

    In cases involving Jon Briant as the witness, he sometimes asserts that Fistral beach is owned by Fistral Beach Ltd and at other times that it is owned by Britanic Industries. (Exhibit 1f)

    ParkingEye have only recently started taking motorists to court in numbers, and these examples therefore represent a sizable fraction of the cases that have made it to a hearing. Moreover, the fact that irregularities in other cases are not documented does not mean they did not occur; it just means that the defence did not pick up on them. There is therefore reasonable certainty that large scale irregularities are taking place within ParkingEye, that their procedures around landowner witness statements are not robust and that they do not have authorization in place in a large percentage of cases.
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