Small Claim soon, Defendant has large court costs

[waxthedog]

Hello

I have a hearing very soon via small claims track to stop my claim being thrown out (I requested an appeal which is now going to be heard) I am the claimant, requesting costs to repair damage to a product I purchased. My claim is for under £1000. My fees are £60.

The Defendant is a large global organisation and their legal representatives have sent through their costs to myself and the court. The costs for their Defence are almost 10x my initial claim request, with just their 30min court session being billed at multi £1000's

If my claim is unsuccessful are there any guidelines for the court costs that I may have to pay the defendant. Am I liable to pay their full day in court to the total they have indicated? It looks like they have some very very expensive representation and now worried that my small claim could cost me far more than I can afford.

[Amethyst]

Is this from this issue - https://legalbeagles.info/forums/for...on-notice-n244 ?

What happened with the application to strike hearing ?
What have you appealed ?

Costs really depends whether they convince the court that you have acted unreasonably or not - and if they do, they could ask for full costs which yes, could be a few thousand.

[waxthedog]

Yes same claim.

The court wrote to me ordering that my claim be struck out as it discloses no cause of action against the defendant (at this point I had not been asked to offer any evidence or reason for my claim). As the order was made without representations from parties I could appeal to have set aside, varied or stayed. I had 7 days to appeal with no fee payable. I appealed siting the reasons below and provided what I consider to be the evidence. No mention of fees / costs beyond the £60 initial fee had been disclosed.

I wrote an appeal siting the effect of the damage caused to the product by the product itself (which is apparently defended by TORT), I explained the products usability after the damage. Prior to this event occurring the defendant had repaired the product to the best of their abilities at the time, but had since then gone on to developed a different repair method that it did not inform the public of so that when my damage occurred I had not been provided the opportunity to take preventative methods to prevent the damage and there the defendant could have been negligent.

I am now invited to a hearing to set aside the original decision to strike out, hence costs from both parties were requested

what concerns me is that I have no control over the defendants costs and its vastly higher than I have funds for. I am happy to walk away at this point as I cannot afford their costs but have less than a week before the hearing

[MIKE770]

these cost in even small cases are usually there to throw you off seen it in court and a DJ rapped the solicitor who tried to put forward they ended up basic cost

[Amethyst]

Have you filed an amended particulars of claim ?

Could you post your original particulars that were struck out pls.

[waxthedog]

By DJ, you mean district judge? What are basic costs pls?

Appreciate I am biased, I thought (and still believe) I had a basis of case and believed that the court thought I was not wasting their time in accepting my appeal. If my case was unfounded I was not expecting my appeal to have the case to be set aside to have been accepted and certainly not granted a hearing.

Would I be given a hearing just for appealing regardless of the case?

I am frankly shocked by the multi £K fees of the defendant, that it takes 2x senior partners to spend the day travelling to defend my claim, and am now bricking if I end up with their huge costs.

Thank you for your reassurance.

[MIKE770]

court appearance cost by level attained in profession can be from £108.00 onwards, the one I referred to was cost put in £2,800 - they got rapped ended up with £500+

[Amethyst]

Could be scare tactics but really need the details of the case - and who the defendant is ( pm me if you like ) also the costs schedule might assist in seeing if it is just an intimidation or if you do have a problem.

Im guessing from what you have said that if you won the case there may be other cases to follow if it's an inherent issue with the product ( until they changed processes ) so potentially worth a lot more to them than the sub £1k you are claiming, hence throwing everything at it.

[waxthedog]

Have you filed an amended particulars of claim ?

Could you post your original particulars that were struck out pls.

Are you asking for the part of the small claims that requests "reason for claim" (sorry if thats a dumb question)

[waxthedog]

Attendance at hearing:
0.5hr = £147.50
Travel to hearing
7hr = £2065
Council fee for hearing
£1750
Court fee
£255
Travel / parking
£190

I make that £4407.50

Original particulars;
Components on Defendants Product (Car) subject to safety recall in 2010 have failed again in the same way that lead to the original safety recall. All components plus an additional item need replacing to resolve repeat safety issue. Vehicle failed to stop as required, no warning provided or deterioration of components. Failure of braking components on Defendants Product (Car). Symptoms (oil in servo) identical to safety recall carried out in 2010. Defendants dealership confirm this is a known issue and the repair required is identical to the previous recall and previous replaced items from 2010 safety recall need to be replaced again due to re-occurrence of the symptoms. In addition to previous recall, the addition of an vacuum pump replacement and modification is needed that was not previously carried out. The issue of the failure of the braking system was severe enough to cause a safety product recall in 2010 yet when the same issue reoccurs this is seemingly no longer of concern for Defendant.

On the appeal I also highlighted that my family were rather shocked / upset (emotional) when then event occurred. Essentially car had no brakes !
I also cited that the as the defendant had updated internal instructions 3 year prior to my incident, but did not notify authorities (it was related to a recall) that they were negligent in providing a safe product. I also included a cost for the road tax that I lost out on whilst I tried to resolve this via the Defendants customer service team before I paid for the fix myself.

[Amethyst]

Ahh ok, if that was the entire particulars then they don't really say what you are asking for or what the grounds/basis of your claim is which may be why they were successful in striking out ( disclose no cause of action mentioned in the application ? ).

7hrs travel to the hearing ? seems slightly excessive.

I'm going to tag des8 and R0b to have a look in as this is a consumer rights act and vehicle issue ( Car stuff )

Few questions that might be helpful for them ( might not be but one tries )
So when did you buy car from dealership ?
When the 2010 safety recall took place did you own the vehicle and was it recalled and all dealt with ?
Then when did it fail again?
Was there another recall inbetween the first recall and when the brakes failed ?
Did you give the dealership opportunity to fix ? if not why not ?
Where did you get it fixed ?
Did you go through complaints process and pre-action procedures before filing the claim ?
Have you provided court/defendant with all invoices etc ?
Who have you sued, the manufacturer ?

Maybe also are the recall details on this site -> https://www.dft.gov.uk/vosa/apps/rec...2575F900375FA7 ( not that one as it's a bit old but have a search and see )

[des8]

I'm also wondering what loss has occurred, (other than road tax, but presumably a courtesy car would be provided whilst repairs were effected)

Following and in addition to Amethyst's questions, we really need full info
eg when did you buy the vehicle?
if used how old was it and mileage?
if used what was purchase price?

If the vehicle had been updated in 2010, and it has just failed again (you don't actually say what the fault is and what caused it) you are outside the time limit of 6 years for making a claim for faulty goods, however as it is a matter subject to a safety recall.the manufacturer should deal with it.
The relevant directive (the 2001/95/EC General Product Safety Directive) was transposed into UK law in the form of the General Product Safety Regulations 2005 (GPSR)
The DVSA is the competent authority for automotive safety issues.
Have you reported the matter to them? https://forms.dvsa.gov.uk/Vsdr/create

[waxthedog]

I purchased the vehicle privately 2nd hand in 2017. Millage was 112000. £7500

The recall occurred in 2010 and recall was completed in 2010 under a previous owner. Recall completed by a dealer. No further recalls have been issued for this issue.

The failure related to this case occurred in April 2018. I took it to my local dealership to be fixed as the previous symptoms were a recall issue and recalls were previously fixed by the dealerships. Sounded serious to me.

Dealership were v. helpful and tried to get Manufacturer to pay for fix but without success,

I also tried to get the manufacturer to resolve via the customer services and have email recordst but was informed that vehicle is too old and recall obligations had been met in 2010.

I have receipts from dealership for the work

I am claiming against the manufacturer on the basis the failure of the braking system was identical to that previously described by the 2010 recall, and the dealerships master mechanic confirmed (in writing) that the symptoms were the same as the recall symptoms and that the recall parts needed to be replaced and in addition the manufacturer now required additional parts to be replaced. Dealership provided me with the new repair instructions.

The claim that I have requested is the £900 cost that I incurred to fix parts that failed in an identical way to a previous recall. The recalled parts were fitted 8 years ago (so beyond the 6 time limit). However when I took the car to be fixed, this time, not only the recall parts needed to be changed but additional components in order to fix the problem. The manufacturer updated their guidance 3 years ago. I have contacted VOSA / DVLA and have a reference nos. I have also handed over the effected components to VOSA and given them the manufacturers updated instructions that they told be verbally that they were not aware of, but no feedback for a few months (they have recently been re-organised)

[R0b]

I agree with Amethyst, there doesn't seem to be any cause of action. What you've done is describe like a story but the actual point is missing. If I was reading that, I would be thinking, so what if there was a product safety recall in 2010, what has that got to do with you?

Best to answer Amethysts questions so we can understand if you there is actually a breach.

That all said, if the court struck out the claim of its own volition then that may be your get out of jail card. There's been plenty of cases decided by the higher courts confirming that striking out a case is considered draconian and should therefore be a last resort. Whilst there are no special rules for litigants in person, the money claims online website is designed to enable anyone to submit a claim especially those without any legal knowledge or expertise. So if the court felt that there was no cause of action in your particulars of claim, it should really have afforded you the opportunity to remedy the problem rather than striking out in the first instance.

For example, Lord Clarke in the Supreme Court case, Fairclough v Summer Homes (click here for judgment) made the following remark about striking out a case:

The draconian step of striking a claim out is always a last resort, a fortiori where to do so would deprive the claimant of a substantive right to which the court had held that he was entitled after a fair trial.

I think that's the card you need to play - that the striking out was a draconian measure when in fact the more appropriate remedy ought to have been a peremptory order such as an unless order i.e. unless you file detailed particulars of claim by X date, then the claim would be struck out.

I also think you should remedy the problem by preparing a properly particularised and correctly headed particulars of claim, which I think ought to be filed at least 3 days in advance of the hearing. Why should you do that? Because you are showing the court that you've taken steps to remedy the issue and also that you have a cause of action for which the dealership should have to answer for.

One other point that has struck me is that you said its been allocated to the small claims track. I'm rather surprised that the court has allowed your case to be allocated to the small claims track only for it to be struck out. A judge would have had to consider your claim prior to allocating it so can you confirm at what stage were you at before the claim was struck out?

[waxthedog]

@AMETHYST

This site https://www.dft.gov.uk/vosa/apps/rec...2575F900375FA7 is the recall that was carried out to my product in 2010, and the symptoms and resulting loss of braking is exactly what re-occurred in 2018 apx 12 months after I had purchased it 2nd hand.