Court Claim from UPS Ltd - Advice Welcome

[johnnystorm]

Hi All,

Back in December I received a Money Claim from UPS Ltd via Shakespeare Martineau Llp. I was quite surprised to receive this as I have been trying to resolve an issue with UPS for 2 years. They sent me an invoice 2 years ago for unpaid fees + late payment fee. However, the invoice they sent me was an "Overdue Invoice" but the line items suggested that the payments they claimed were overdue were not actually due until a future date (I think it was 3 months in the future). They had various extra charges on there too as a result of the "late payment" (even though at the time it was not late).

I immediately emailed them asking for clarification, and the long and short of it is that they took months initially to respond, despite my repeated attempts. Then when I did get a response I was told they would cancel the overdue charges. I then received more letters from them so I went back again. After more months of pointless back and forth and waiting for their replies, I just gave up and sent them a letter saying they had 7 days to respond otherwise I'll consider matters resolved. Then ONE YEAR LATER they sent me a pre-legal action notice stating unpaid fees. The letter had no method of paying, no clarification as to what the fees were and no useful information. It gave an email address to reply to if any queries. So I sent an email for clarification... Never heard back. I emailed again, never heard back, and then like 6 months later I get an email that's simply a forward to another department internally basically saying "Hi X, can you resolve this?". Again, I never heard anything back...

Until December, where I randomly got a money claim from the courts. So I prepared a defence and submitted. I think it was a really strong defence. The claimant didn't provide any supporting evidence, no details, nothing, except "Defendant owes X + interest". Literally it was 2 sentences max of a claim. The claimant then missed their deadline for continuing the claim to it was stayed. They then submitted their notice of intention. The MCOL portal says that the DQ Questionnaire has been sent and the deadline for reply is 14th February. I have not received the questionnaire. I also have not recieved the claimants copy. I have downloaded a copy and have filled it out, and I'm waiting to send to courts tomorrow and to Claimant on Thursday (both next day), as I don't want to trigger the claimant if they've forgotten.

So my questions are:
- If the Claimant does not submit their DQ by the 14th or send me a copy, what action can I take? Will the case be thrown out?
- Given the utterly ludicrous amount of work I've put into resolving this with them over the last 2 years, is there anything I can do now to petition the judge to strike out the case?

Thanks,
J.

[Pezza54]

Hi
Welcome to LB

The solicitor aware that on the small claims track they won't be able to recover their legal fees from you even if they win the case, wants to spend as little time as possible on the claim form and particulars of claim. It is not unusual to see a very brief statement of case produced by a solicitor for a money claim. The solicitor is probably hoping that a sealed official claim form will scare you into paying up
If the claim progresses the solicitor will have to produce a witness statement and evidence before the hearing. This will involve them in a lot more work which they are hoping to avoid as they will have to charge the fee to their client
The court advises that parties collaborate on the directions questionnaire and agree on certain answers. This clearly hasn't happened in your case. Best just to wait to see if the court imposes any sanctions if the claimant fails to file their DQ on time. The court may order the claimant to file a DQ by a deadline or the claim will be struck out

[johnnystorm]

Thanks for the reply - appreciated.
On the claim form they only listed £80 worth of solicitors costs, so you're likely right in that they're doing as little as possible.
I had hoped my defence would've put this to bed, but they've submitted notice of intent to pursue this further.

Definitely no collaboration on the DQ - it is impossible to get hold of anyone to have any kind of meaningful conversation. If the Claimant fails to submit DQ on time and does not issue me a copy, can I petition the courts to strike this out? Or do I just need to wait?

[Pezza54]

IMO you should wait to find out the next action the court takes

[johnnystorm]

Just to update on this. I submitted my DQ and had confirmation of receipt from the court on the 14th February (the deadline listed on the paperwork). I also served a copy to the Claimant. To date the Claimant had failed to submit their DQ and has not served me a copy. The court hasn't provided any additional information or instruction yet, but I was tempted to write to them to have on record that the Claimant has not complied.

Am I being to hasty?