Case No. 3JD01136 ParkingEye v Shaw Gallen
Back in February 2013, Mr Gallen parked in Glyn Square, Wolverton, and overstayed the free period stated on PE's signage. After refusing to pay their totally baseless 'parking charge', he eventually received a County Court claim in June.
He applied himself assiduously to thoroughly researching all the legal issues and case law, and put together an excellent defence document which required only very minor tweaking by Bargepole.
Following the usual blizzard of paperwork from PE, a hearing date was set for November. It had been agreed between PE and the defendant that the case would be heard on the papers only, with no appearance by either side, but in the event, the Judge decided not to examine the case, and instead directed Mr Gallen to respond to PE's late submission of further 'evidence' (a complete farrago of misleading statements and untruths), and a hearing was set for March 27th at Milton Keynes County Court.
Mr Gallen put together, again with minimal assistance from Bargepole, a comprehensive rebuttal of all PE's arguments, together with a long list of all their POPLA and County Court defeats. He also informed the Court that Bargepole would be appearing as his Lay Representative at the hearing.
With just days to go, a letter arrived from the Court, stating that the Claimant, PE, had discontinued the claim, and there would be no need to attend Court. It is not known whether PE decided to drop this hot potato due to the high quality of Mr Gallen's submissions, or because they didn't fancy the prospect of yet another of their LPC Law stooges being duffed up by Bargepole; but in any event it now means they can no longer claim that they 'never discontinue cases'.
This is not, however, the end of the matter. Mr Gallen, a Management Consultant, has so far spent several hours working on the case, has receipts for over £50 worth of postage, and has had to photocopy over 1,000 pages at 5p a time. He is applying to the Court for a costs-only hearing, and will seek reimbursement from PE of around £400 to cover all of this. Further updates when available.
Happy Parking
The Parking Prankster
"it now means they can no longer claim that they 'never discontinue cases'."
ReplyDeleteYou would like to think so, wouldn't you? I'm guessing they will still be making untruthful claims. My other half's cousin had her automatic rejection from PE on 19th Feb. One of the many ParkingEyes they told her was that no judge has ever ruled against them on the issue of GPEOL. Those shysters wouldn't touch the truth with a 'bargepole.'
I am led to believe, by a number of people, that when a defence is submitted by the defendant that PE sometimes do not submit any papers to the court, and the case is then stayed by the court. PE have effectively discontinued the case.
ReplyDeleteThey can pay £40 to reinstate the case, and apparently have done so at least once, event though this means they will now lose £250 even if they win
DeleteBut don't they require leave of the court to do so? Which usually means demonstrating that they have a reasonable chance of winning?
Deleteno they look at your defence and see if you are using defence from a "bloke in the pub" , or if you have done research and selected the correct arguments
ReplyDeleteI'd just like to thank the Prankster and especially Bargepole for their fantastic support and advice throughout the case. I'm truly bowled over by the way the community provides such great support to people in need.
ReplyDeleteSnail: this appears to be an old trick which banks on the vagaries of the court system: in reality, cases do 'magically' become un-stayed without any formal application (as in my case).
Could you not complain that the court had not been informed - as it was the court that stayed the case? and that PE had not paid the necessary fee to unstay the case?
DeleteWhat CPR covers asking for a costs-only hearing under small claims?
ReplyDelete46.14, I think.
ReplyDeleteI think you are wrong. But please do your own research.
DeleteCosts are only awarded on small claims if a party has behaved unreasonably.
(2) The court may not order a party to pay a sum to another party in respect of that other party’s costs, fees and expenses, including those relating to an appeal, except –
(g) such further costs as the court may assess by the summary procedure and order to be paid by a party who has behaved unreasonably;
I don't think 46.14 would apply, but 38.6.1 doesn't apply because of 38.6.3, *assuming* the case was allocated to the small claims track.
Delete27.14 would only really offer this;
(g) such further costs as the court may assess by the summary procedure and order to be paid by a party who has behaved unreasonably; (and)
the (and) has been struck by a revision,so it appears to stand on it's own now with no restriction to (h).
Both, many thanks for this: managed to look into it in more detail this evening and it does look like 27.14 is the way to go.
Delete@Shaw Gallen - had it been allocated to the Small Claims Track?
DeleteApologies for the slow reply: yes, so looks like 27.24 is the only relevant clause.
DeleteHi Shaw G, well done, our Judge found it hard to hide his grin when he awarded parking costs. Funny thing is that PE have sent us a cheque in respect of our costs incorrectly dated. (No year on the cheque). I'm quite happy to give them the opportunity to correct there mistakes, but I know they have had problems with their postage. At what point is this a bailiff issue ?
ReplyDeleteI like the cut of your jib.
DeleteThanks Mr Dude (or can I call you 'The'?). Personally, I like the idea of a Third Party Debt Order: less embarrassing, but a lot more difficult to work around.
DeleteYou write to them and give them the chance to correct their error, adding a further charge for time and materials. Make the charge an extortiante amount, discounting an amount for prompt payment and threatening court action if they don't respond, etc,etc.
DeleteIn all seriousness, if it's a court awarded payment, then you can apply back to the court to get the baliff's onto them if they don't pay. Not sure of the wait time inbetween the court award and being able to do this.
Having an unsatisfied CCJ is an offence that can lead to suspension from the BPA and DVLA so it is unlikely PE will not immediately cough up
DeleteHas anything ever happened to the other guy who has taken ParkingEye to court over his own "£250 Personal Cost Notification"? This has been a couple of months now hasn't it?
ReplyDeleteI'm fully up to date with this case and...nothing has happened. Still waiting for the courts to do their stuff.
DeleteOk - no news is good news then ;)
ReplyDeleteIt hope the tide is turning against the Parking Eye 'bunch' - unfortunately too late to save me from having to pay one of their ridiculous PCNs after trying to defend myself from a CC summons during a fairly informal hearing in chambers - my (ultimately) pointless indignation at being pursued as a RK produced a reasonably coherent defence garnered from some of the volunteers on Pepipoo - I lost because I was unable to persuade the judge that the my partner should not be able to effectively enter into a contract on my behalf without my knowledge which is the effect of pursuing the RK and that basicly the contract was unenforceable for this reason - I threw in alot of the other standard defence arguments all to no avail - I floundered in the face of my (far more) learned friend's knowledge and his countenance although he ruled out the exorbitant punitive costs requested by the PEye lackey and gaving them zero costs in fact but I still had to pay the claimed amount so although he was sympathetic I felt I had my day in court and that was that. It still makes my blood boil to think about it especially as I recall not objecting to a detailed discussion of the appropriateness and prominence of the signage at The Range Southampton when it bore absolutely no relevance to my case as I was not present on the day in question! These people need to be stopped!
ReplyDeleteI am being taken to county court in November 2016 by PE. their basis is that I overstayed by 38 minutes but their notice board states that the first hour is free and the BPA states that there should be a 10 minute period of grace. so for me a total of 68 minutes "parked" but not in a parking bay! (this is the shortened version). I am now waiting for PE to write to me, I am expecting them to withdraw their claim, but you never know!
ReplyDeleteI am being taken to county court in November 2016 by PE. their basis is that I overstayed by 38 minutes but their notice board states that the first hour is free and the BPA states that there should be a 10 minute period of grace. so for me a total of 68 minutes "parked" but not in a parking bay! (this is the shortened version). I am now waiting for PE to write to me, I am expecting them to withdraw their claim, but you never know!
ReplyDeleteI got a good one: they claim my father stayed in the car park for 17 hours!
ReplyDeleteHe probably visited twice and their cameras failed to detect this
Delete