Help with PCN and now County Court Claim Form

[Mozzy]

Hello,


We are in need of help. My wife is disabled and has a motability car which is in her name but she is not the driver.
In October 2013 after parking in a carpark in Ashton Under Lyne which operates a 30 minutes
free parking and then a £2 charge for the next couple of hours. After parking and nipping to do a bit of shopping knowing
that we only had 30 minutes. After returning to the car within the 30 minutes, after transferring her into the car and packed
away her wheelchair into the car and set off. There is only one exit to the car park which was blocked by a lorry which was
unloading goods into one of the shops. Once he had finished we exited with the lorry at the same time. We thought nothing about it until about 3-4 weeks later when my wife received a PCN through the post from Excel Parking. Wanting
£60 for a 46 minute stay. My wife tried to phone excel with regards to what had happened with the exiting the
car park and after days of trying she wrote to them explaining that she wasn't the driver and passed on the details
to them so they could contact them and if they continued to send these letters she would class this as harassment and
would take the matter further. The reply was as follows, the DEBT has now been passed onto our debt collections
team and they will not respond to any further correspondence. This was back in March 2014. At that point
we looked a little more into these parking charges and it seemed that the way forward was to ignore and hope
it would just stop. My wife then received over the next few months debt recovery notices all
getting more and more aggressive from their collection teams warning of home visits to collect various sums
of money to settle the account. This went on over a few more months from three other debt collection
agencies all with different sums of money wanting charges on top of the original sum this charge had gone from
£60 to £100 to £154 plus fees plus other charges to over £254. We thought that it was wrong as none of her details
seemed to be correct and they didn't seem to be interested in listening to us. Then they just seemed to stop.
Today my wife got a county court claim form from the county court business centre Dated 7-4-2017. We are at a total
loss of what to do. Can anyone help.


Thanks in advance.

[calavandriel]

Re: Help with PCN and now County Court Claim Form

I am dealing with similar issue, at court in 2 weeks. Steep learning curve.

Firstly adhere to all the deadlines set by court.

Secondly post the notification to keeper (NTK) letter with personal details removed here for members to see and check for errors.

Who are the legal group dealing with it
what details were incorrect?
If she gave your details who is the Notice of Claim defendant

NEVER IGNORE HAS BEEN THE CREDO FOR THE LAST YEAR
NEVER TELL ANYONE WHO THE DRIVER WAS. NOT ON HERE AND ESPECIALLY IN ANY CORRESPONDENCE VERBAL OR BY MAIL TO THE PARKING CHARGE CCOMPANY OR THE COURT

Feel free to PM me

[Mozzy]

Re: Help with PCN and now County Court Claim Form

Hello and thanks for the response.


The claim form states the we have a limited time to respond to the claim
which is 14 days after the date of service which is 5 days after the issue
date, so I'm taking that as we have until the 26/4 to respond ?


Is the (NTK)letter from BW LEGAL if so I've uploaded the letter here. The
breakdown of the 'Debt' doesn't tally along with they are still going after
my wife for this even though we had provided the drivers details.
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0By...3V1ZlVBWU1IRlE

I have also uploaded the Claim form sent from Count Court Business Centre

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0By...3NZU0h4SjJQazg

Thank you for any help.

[ostell]

Re: Help with PCN and now County Court Claim Form

First of all acknowledge the claim. It can be done on line using the details and password on the claim form. DO NOT PUT ANYTHING IN THE DEFENCE. This give gives 28 days from the date of service to submit a defence, about 33 days form the date of issue.

Post up that original Notice to keeper, with personal details redacted.

Try to remember the dates. If there was no ticket on the windscreen then the notice has to be received within 14 days to be able to hold the keeper liable using the provisions of Protections of Freedoms Act 2012 Schedule 4. Missed that time limit then no keeper liability and only the driver, who they do not know and you will not be telling them, can be held liable. There is no requirement to name the driver.

Excel may not be trying to use POFA to hold the keeper liable but are probably trying to claim that it can reasonably be assumed that the keeper was the driver and be quoting Elliot v Loake as the basis for that claim. This has been thrown out by other courts. If the Keeper was not the driver, and from your tale, could not have been the driver, then that is all to the good.

Edit your first post so that the relationship between the driver and the keeper is not apparent.

Edit: You post crossed with mine, though I can't see the items you posted. They seem to have forgotten that a driver was named so don't remind them. Look forward to seeing that NTK that you received from Excel. As this is a mobility car do you know if your wife is the registered keeper, or can you find out. It could affect the timings of the notices.

[Mozzy]

Re: Help with PCN and now County Court Claim Form

Hi,

Try to remember the dates. If there was no ticket on the windscreen then the notice has to be received within 14 days

I've got the original notice but the issue date is 17-10-13 which is 7 days after but we didn't receive that until
a few weeks after.

As this is a mobility car do you know if your wife is the registered keeper

Yes my wife is the registered keeper of the motability car but doesn't even have a licence to drive. Motability own the car but not the registered keeper.

[mystery1]

Re: Help with PCN and now County Court Claim Form

So the car is leased to your wife and someone else was the driver ?

I would guess there was nothing from Motability with the NTK ?

Do you have a picture of the signs where the car was parked ?

M1

[ostell]

Re: Help with PCN and now County Court Claim Form

I think with Motability they, of course, retain ownership but the car is registered with the user as the registered keeper. The V5 is held by Motability. Perhaps the Original Poster can confirm.

From the description I would take it that there was no windscreen ticket and the original NTK was received well past the 14 days.

I notice they've added £104 for legal fees.

[calavandriel]

Re: Help with PCN and now County Court Claim Form

Motability are the owners and dont get involved at all. This case is very similar to mine with VCS. There may be light at the end of the sliproad because after jumping all the hoops my case may just get set aside as they have missed the datye for paying the trial fee and also now missed the second chance too as that was yeaterday.

Mozzy can you say what details were wrong when they wrote to your wife?
Have you got copies of all correspondence from both sides, especially the letter she sent to ExCel?

If as Mozzy says his wife named the driver in a letter then they are remiss in still hounding the poor lady.


This is what I have gleaned from Mozzy post.

1. Driver already outed so they are going after wrong person

2. NTK had some inconsistancies on it that need redressing

3. His wife cannot drive (Do you have or can you get certified proof of this? In my case I sent my out of date provisional licence plastic and paper which states by the great black sheet with its lack of letters catagorising what vehicles I can drive. I am not certified for so much as a siot on lawnmower)

4. She is in a wheelchair and needs assistance in and out of the car. The takes us to the BPA CoP section 13.2 and 13.3 stating that drivers have a grace period either sid of parking the car of about 10 minutes. As his wife would need longer that able bodies passengers to alight from and re-enter the car with aid there would be some added time covered by the Equality Act 1999 that states that in the case of disabled persons accessing various services they should be allowed a reasonable adjustment to do so. In this case a longer grace period. This would easily cover the 16 mins over stay

5. Mozzy you dont say if you used a disability bay and a blue badge. If you did then you are also covered in section 16 (each part is applicable) but mainly the section that states if a landowner (NOT EXCEL) have made provisions for disabled drivers by means of bays etc then a car displaying a blue badge cannot be ticketed or harrassed for any charge!

6. There are rules about the fee being comensurate with the supposed loss but the others can explain those better than I,

7. It occurs to me that the landowner may be one of the shops the car park serves so its worth asking if they asr as often they can cancel the ticket which would hold up in court I guess.

8. Can you remember which shop was being delivered to? If this is a regular occurrence then a witness statement from the manager to that effect would substanciate your claim of being stuck behind him as you left.

9. You can write and ask BWLegal for copies of the lease agreement (not a statement from and excel employeee says yes we have one lol) and any photographic evidence they hold if they use APRN which might show you leaving behind the lorry, who was driving which would also stand in your favour. You can also get them to explain the amount they are asking for and copies of letters sent to you if you dont have them. An offer of a nominal fee is usual I believe but I am not sure how much as I missed that stage because I was unaware of it at that point..



So Guys is there anything else to add. Have they broken the POFA schedule 4 or the trading standards consumer act? Im at the limit of what I can remember at the moment so more input might be good for Mozzy. I can totally sympathise with him as it is very overwhelming on here, so much to read and seemingly so little time so hyperlink pointers to cracking defences would really help him. After all he appears to be the main carer for his wife as well.

[ostell]

Re: Help with PCN and now County Court Claim Form

Yes the registered keeper was not driving and is incapable of driving, the NTK was out of time to hold the keeper liable (presumably depends on who is the registered keeper), this is a slam dunk. Reminding them of the driver is counter productive and they may then search records and then go after the driver. Yes they should not be hounding her but it is to her advantage that they have made that mistake. Just keep it simple. Just need the info about who is the Registered Keeper. Has the original NTK gone to Motability who have responded and named the keeper and then the next NTK was to the keeper. The timings are different, as are the rules.

[Mozzy]

Re: Help with PCN and now County Court Claim Form

Hello,
Yes it is a Motability car, my wife is the registered keeper but my wife is not a named driver nor has she ever driven or held a licence not even a provisional. The details that they have been
sending incorrectly change on every letter through out all the debt collectors that they have been sent after her. Things like amount of debt, the charge amount changed nearly every time.
Like this one where they say the principle debt : £Ford. Reference numbers on the letters are all different.

Firstly it might sound daft but how do you answer the court claim form and register to defend, we are completely lost with what we are doing so any help would be appreciated. As you
can understand my wife's health is not good and this isn't helping.

[mystery1]

Re: Help with PCN and now County Court Claim Form

File acknowledgement of service.

https://bmpa.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/ar...edgement-Easy-


Then post up the court from but make sure you name, address, password etc are hidden or email [MENTION=49370]Kati[/MENTION]. The pcn and signs from the car park are also very useful to have.

M1

[calavandriel]

Re: Help with PCN and now County Court Claim Form

They dont send anything to motability because the disabled person who "hires" the car is the regestered keeper in the dvla records. It isnt really a hire agreement in the normal sense because it involves the persons disability benefit being used to pay monthly installments and there is so much more involved as the car can be customised to the disabled persons needs, and at the end of 3 years there is an first chance option to buy it or it gets auctioned off to trade

[calavandriel]

Re: Help with PCN and now County Court Claim Form

Have you got sorted yet?

[Mozzy]

Re: Help with PCN and now County Court Claim Form

Sorry I've been quiet, my wife has been recovering from surgery. As I am the only carer for my wife and children I've not had the time to get anywhere with this other than
acknowledging the service form which has been done. Now comes the hard part I'm guessing.

[calavandriel]

Re: Help with PCN and now County Court Claim Form

not as hard as you think. all my stuff is on pepipoo entitled HELP. Out of depth with county court claim, VCS PCN after 2 yrs. Blue badge RK not driver
http://forums.pepipoo.com/index.php?...ic=109054&st=0

I was as clueless as you but read my defence and tailor it to fit your circumstances as best you can. post it on both forums for critique and guidance.

BIG POINT is what date does your defence have to be in by. if in doubt ring Northampton county court business centre the staff are really helpful usually,