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    • Hi LFI, Your knowledge in this area is greater than I could possibly hope to have and as such I appreciate your feedback. I'm not sure that I agree the reason why a barrister would say that, only to get new customers, I'm sure he must have had professional experience in this area that qualifies him to make that point. 🙂 In your point 1 you mention: 1] there is a real danger that some part of the appeal will point out that the person appealing [the keeper ] is also the driver. I understand the point you are making but I was referring to when the keeper is also the driver and admits it later and only in this circumstance, but I understand what you are saying. I take on board the issues you raise in point 2. Is it possible that a PPC (claimant) could refer back to the case above as proof that the motorist should have appealed, like they refer back to other cases? Thanks once again for the feedback.
    • Well barristers would say that in the hope that motorists would go to them for advice -obviously paid advice.  The problem with appealing is at least twofold. 1] there is a real danger that some part of the appeal will point out that the person appealing [the keeper ] is also the driver.  And in a lot of cases the last thing the keeper wants when they are also the driver is that the parking company knows that. It makes it so much easier for them as the majority  of Judges do not accept that the keeper and the driver are the same person for obvious reasons. Often they are not the same person especially when it is a family car where the husband, wife and children are all insured to drive the same car. On top of that  just about every person who has a valid insurance policy is able to drive another person's vehicle. So there are many possibilities and it should be up to the parking company to prove it to some extent.  Most parking company's do not accept appeals under virtually any circumstances. But insist that you carry on and appeal to their so called impartial jury who are often anything but impartial. By turning down that second appeal, many motorists pay up because they don't know enough about PoFA to argue with those decisions which brings us to the second problem. 2] the major parking companies are mostly unscrupulous, lying cheating scrotes. So when you appeal and your reasons look as if they would have merit in Court, they then go about  concocting a Witness Statement to debunk that challenge. We feel that by leaving what we think are the strongest arguments to our Member's Witness Statements, it leaves insufficient time to be thwarted with their lies etc. And when the motorists defence is good enough to win, it should win regardless of when it is first produced.   
    • S13 (2)The creditor may not exercise the right under paragraph 4 to recover from the keeper any unpaid parking charges specified in the notice to keeper if, within the period of 28 days beginning with the day after that on which that notice was given, the creditor is given— (a)a statement signed by or on behalf of the vehicle-hire firm to the effect that at the material time the vehicle was hired to a named person under a hire agreement; (b)a copy of the hire agreement; and (c)a copy of a statement of liability signed by the hirer under that hire agreement. As  Arval has complied with the above they cannot be pursued by EC----- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- S14 [1]   the creditor may recover those charges (so far as they remain unpaid) from the hirer. (2)The conditions are that— (a)the creditor has within the relevant period given the hirer a notice in accordance with sub-paragraph (5) (a “notice to hirer”), together with a copy of the documents mentioned in paragraph 13(2) and the notice to keeper; (b)a period of 21 days beginning with the day on which the notice to hirer was given has elapsed;  As ECP did not send copies of the documents to your company and they have given 28 days instead of 21 days they have failed to comply with  the Act so you and your Company are absolved from paying. That is not to say that they won't continue asking to be paid as they do not have the faintest idea how PoFA works. 
    • Euro have got a lot wrong and have failed to comply with the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 Schedule 4.  According to Section 13 after ECP have written to Arval they should then send a NTH to the Hirer  which they have done.This eliminates Arval from any further pursuit by ECP. When they wrote to your company they should have sent copies of everything that they asked Arval for. This is to prove that your company agree what happened on the day of the breach. If ECP then comply with the Act they are allowed to pursue the hirer. If they fail, to comply they cannot make the hirer pay. They can pursue until they are blue in the face but the Hirer is not lawfully required to pay them and if it went to Court ECP would lose. Your company could say who was driving but the only person that can be pursued is the Hirer, there does not appear to be an extension for a driver to be pursued. Even if there was, because ECP have failed miserably to comply with the Act  they still have no chance of winning in Court. Here are the relevant Hire sections from the Act below.
    • Thank-you FTMDave for your feedback. May I take this opportunity to say that after reading numerous threads to which you are a contributor, I have great admiration for you. You really do go above and beyond in your efforts to help other people. The time you put in to help, in particular with witness statements is incredible. I am also impressed by the way in which you will defer to others with more experience should there be a particular point that you are not 100% clear on and return with answers or advice that you have sought. I wish I had the ability to help others as you do. There is another forum expert that I must also thank for his time and patience answering my questions and allowing me to come to a “penny drops” moment on one particular issue. I believe he has helped me immensely to understand and to strengthen my own case. I shall not mention who it is here at the moment just in case he would rather I didn't but I greatly appreciate the time he took working through that issue with me. I spent 20+ years of working in an industry that rules and regulations had to be strictly adhered to, indeed, exams had to be taken in order that one had to become qualified in those rules and regulations in order to carry out the duties of the post. In a way, such things as PoFA 2012 are rules and regulations that are not completely alien to me. It has been very enjoyable for me to learn these regulations and the law surrounding them. I wish I had found this forum years ago. I admit that perhaps I had been too keen to express my opinions given that I am still in the learning process. After a suitable period in this industry I became Qualified to teach the rules and regulations and I always said to those I taught that there is no such thing as a stupid question. If opinions, theories and observations are put forward, discussion can take place and as long as the result is that the student is able to clearly see where they went wrong and got to that moment where the penny drops then that is a valuable learning experience. No matter how experienced one is, there is always something to learn and if I did not know the answer to a question, I would say, I don't know the answer to that question but I will go and find out what the answer is. In any posts I have made, I have stated, “unless I am wrong” or “as far as I can see” awaiting a response telling me what I got wrong, if it was wrong. If I am wrong I am only too happy to admit it and take it as a valuable learning experience. I take the point that perhaps I should not post on other peoples threads and I shall refrain from doing so going forward. 🤐 As alluded to, circumstances can change, FTMDave made the following point that it had been boasted that no Caggers, over two years, who had sent a PPC the wrong registration snotty letter, had even been taken to court, let alone lost a court hearing .... but now they have. I too used the word "seemed" because it is true, we haven't had all the details. After perusing this forum I believe certain advice changed here after the Beavis case, I could be wrong but that is what I seem to remember reading. Could it be that after winning the above case in question, a claimant could refer back to this case and claim that a defendant had not made use of the appeal process, therefore allowing the claimant to win? Again, in this instance only, I do not know what is to be gained by not making an appeal or concealing the identity of the driver, especially if it is later admitted that the defendant was the driver and was the one to input the incorrect VRN in error. So far no one has educated me as to the reason why. But, of course, when making an appeal, it should be worded carefully so that an error in the appeal process cannot be referred back to. I thought long and hard about whether or not to post here but I wanted to bring up this point for discussion. Yes, I admit I have limited knowledge, but does that mean I should have kept silent? After I posted that I moved away from this forum slightly to find other avenues to increase my knowledge. I bought a law book and am now following certain lawyers on Youtube in the hope of arming myself with enough ammunition to use in my own case. In one video titled “7 Reasons You Will LOSE Your Court Case (and how to avoid them)” by Black Belt Barrister I believe he makes my point by saying the following, and I quote: “If you ignore the complaint in the first instance and it does eventually end up in court then it's going to look bad that you didn't co-operate in the first place. The court is not going to look kindly on you simply ignoring the company and not, let's say, availing yourself of any kind of appeal opportunities, particularly if we are talking about parking charge notices and things like that.” This point makes me think that, it is not such a bizarre judgement in the end. Only in the case of having proof of payment and inputting an incorrect VRN .... could it be worthwhile making a carefully worded appeal in the first instance? .... If the appeal fails, depending on the reason, surely this could only help if it went to court? As always, any feedback gratefully received.
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Towed from an unmarked disabled bay on private land!


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Hi. I live on a Lambeth Council estate, and purchased a valid Parking permit for my estate. However, Abandon cars fill the spaces so I couldnt park anywhere other than outside my house. I was parked on a road that is inside the estate, and not public road. When I came home my car was gone. It had been towed by Lambeth living for parking in a disabled bay. I was forced to pay £105 to get my car back, I wont detail the whole story, but I was treated like a criminal. At one point they took my passport (demanded for identity purposes to get my car back) and refused to return it to me! You can see the supposed bay here, SNV31183 on Flickr - Photo Sharing! I was hoping for some advice on what criminal charges I could bring against the people who towed my car. They ignored the abandon cars (untaxed/no mot/no permit) because they knew not only would they get no money but would be stuck holding the car forevermore) and towed mine for no reason other than to extort money from me!

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I'm no expert, but I wouldn't have thought they stood a cat-in-hells chance of making that parking bay stand up in court.

 

Looks like a LBA to both the clamper and the landowner might be the only way to go, but I'm sure some other experts will be along shortly to give more detailed advice.

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Thanks, I hadnt seen that! I just may get it. Id love to hear what people think are reasonable damages to claim. I was meant to be driving to see family down south, but my whole weekend has been messed up by this. Also, my heavily pregnant wife was so distressed by thinking the car was "stolen" that she ended up taking the next day off work because of it all. Not to mention our pushchair for the existing child was in the car and as such, taken too. My wifes family had to take the whole evening to get us to the car that was held MILES away, then we all had to drive back. Ive run up costs in petrol, phone calls, time, not to mention all the cancelled plans. Has anybody had any luck claiming damages for this sort of thing?

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I would be reporting them to police for theft of your vehicle, extrotion and blackmail - they have absolutely no authority to hold your passport without your consent and I would 100% be pressing charges and suing for extensive damages. As you are in London, call London Tonight and get them on to it too. The more the better. Utterly outrageous.

 

The alleged disabled bay is at very best unreadable and certainly not enforceable. Get todays newspaper and take a photo of the same bay with the paper to confirm the date of the photo and take these **** to the cleaners.

 

There is absolutely no doubt that the law MUST be changed to stop this theft. Sue the landowner too.

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The Landowner is Lambeth council as its a council housing estate. They have hired the people in question to enforce parking.

I am currently speaking to my Credit card company about a chargeback. To be honest this is my preferred method rather than winning any "appeal" as merely following the appeals process gives some form of legitimacy to the theft of my car.

Also, the form they gave me for appeals has NO options for "we towed your car from a totally unenforcable position with no right" and as such I doubt id win their so called "appeal" anyway.

What I really want to do is be able to bring actual criminal charges against these people.

Does anybody have good references to the law surrounding the rights for towing from private land?

They have definately broken the data protection act a dozen times, for example they copied down my passport details!!!

Proof of ID? I have the damn car key, what more should I need?

Our childs pushchair was in the car, and my pregnant wife was unable to do anything other than sit and stress about this the whole weekend.

How about the fact they have guard dogs, and no signage and warnings on the outside of the compound?

 

Further comments, It seems that NSL (National services Ltd) are the company in question. Do they HAVE to be registered with the SIA? And if they are not, or are registered under another name (they used to be NCP?) are they allowed to carry on towing etc?

Edited by Pyrofer
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The Landowner is Lambeth council as its a council housing estate. They have hired the people in question to enforce parking.

I am currently speaking to my Credit card company about a chargeback. To be honest this is my preferred method rather than winning any "appeal" as merely following the appeals process gives some form of legitimacy to the theft of my car.

Also, the form they gave me for appeals has NO options for "we towed your car from a totally unenforcable position with no right" and as such I doubt id win their so called "appeal" anyway.

Quite so - The appeal form is decorative at best.

 

What I really want to do is be able to bring actual criminal charges against these people.

Does anybody have good references to the law surrounding the rights for towing from private land?

The clamping guide - The same goes for clamping as for towing.

 

The police are likely to consider the matter as entirely civil, and not give a monkey's. You might report the theft, and insist on a crime reference number (and I mean really insist - they won't give one willingly). Whilst it's unlikely any criminal charges will be made, the crime reference number would be useful if you were to take the landowner / clampers to court. Similarly, you can quote it to your credit card company.

 

They have definately broken the data protection act a dozen times, for example they copied down my passport details!!!
Which specific principle have they broken? You would need to state which one in any complaint to the ICO.

 

Proof of ID? I have the damn car key, what more should I need?

Our childs pushchair was in the car, and my pregnant wife was unable to do anything other than sit and stress about this the whole weekend.

How about the fact they have guard dogs, and no signage and warnings on the outside of the compound?

 

Further comments, It seems that NSL (National services Ltd) are the company in question. Do they HAVE to be registered with the SIA? And if they are not, or are registered under another name (they used to be NCP?) are they allowed to carry on towing etc?

Yes they do, as per the Private Security Industry Act, and no they can't (at least, not lawfully).
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They refused to provide an SIA number when I called them. I will investigate further. If it turns out that they dont have a valid licence, and in this I mean both the people towing AND releasing the car need a licence, then i can press criminal charges against the individual or company not in possesion of the SIA licence.... :)

I will be doing that, NONE of the staff displayed any id at all, let alone SIA id as required by the licence conditions.

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Well, nosing through your photos a bit more, the signage says that vehicles not displaying a valid permit or vehicles that are not taxed can be towed away. Yours was displaying a valid permit and was taxed, so they have no authority to remove your vehicle. I would be suing the landowner for allowing these cowboys to act on their behalf in this manner.

 

As said before, the so-called disabled bay is not going to hold up in law as a disabled bay as the markings are virtually non existant, but even if they were 100% crystal clear, where does it say the consequences of parking in the disabled bay anyway? It doesn't thus there can be no consequences.

 

What did the press say? Did you even contact them? Use them. They are your BEST weapon in this case. Also, go around the car park and note the vehicles that are not taxed. I would advise you to stroll slowly and certainly don't make it obvious what you are doing! Write them down when you can, make, model, registration and ideally when the tax expired. How long have they been there? Write to the council with that information and ask when they last removed an untaxed car from that vacinity.

 

Get your local councillor by the scrote and get them explaining what happened. Go to the next town hall meeting and tell them. Get your MP involved too. BUT do get onto the press. They love anything like this. Your wife has told her GP how upsetting and stressful this was has she?

 

Get onto a claims firm and get them to do the claiming bit for you/her. I have no idea what you may get, but heavily pregnant woman stressed by illegal theft of the family car, with childs pushchair inside? Got to be worth a couple of grand I would think.

 

EDIT:

 

What does that white sign on the wall immediately by the 'disabled' space say? Where was that pole with the other sign you photogaraphed?

 

And that yellow sign at the end of the road hidden by the overgrowth?

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There is indeed a sign regarding the disabled bay, but its at such a height as to be invisible to anybody of human height.

I will take more photos and post in the same place later when I get home.

Sorry, was raining.. I will get more pics soon.

little update.. Most of the staff claim to have no SIA number, certainly none of them wear any ID badge as required by the SIA with the number on, however I actualy got a manager who assured me that they ALL have SIA numbers. He still refused to provide it over the phone however.

"You could be anyone! Why should I tell you?". I think thats the point, you ARE meant to tell anyone!

The receipt definately did NOT contain the details of the officer who towed my vehicle, or the SIA badge number or that person.

They are definately in breach of the SIA terms. I will call the police now and speak about pressing charges against them for theft.

Edited by Pyrofer
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  • 1 month later...

Just to update...

They rejected my appeal (finally) claiming that the bay "although poorly marked was readable and was signposted".

Bullcrap.

Im now following the chargeback route with my Credit card company, but also looking to file criminal charges for "blackmail" as that is what those clampers recently got taken for!

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Forget chargeback, no crime has been comitted until a court says so.

 

Sue the clamping company and landowner for the full ammount plus any additional charges you have incurred.

 

The sign is very clear. but is only tells you that you must be taxed and have a valid permit. You have both thus they have no right to tow you.

 

The bay says nothing. Even if it was as clear as day they cannot tow you for parking in a disabled bay as there is no signage to that effect. What is the actual reason they say they towed you? I suspect they will claim you did not have a valid permit on display.

 

Sue the ****.

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