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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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      The judge's reasoning is very useful and will certainly be helpful in any other cases relating to third-party rights where the customer has contracted with the courier company by using a broker.
      This is generally speaking the problem with using PackLink who are domiciled in Spain and very conveniently out of reach of the British justice system.

      Frankly I don't think that is any accident.

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Car Accident Despair


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My wife was driving our car on Friday night, when she was going to collect our son from the traini station.

Whilst in standing traffic, she indicated to turn right into a car park, looked for oncoming traffic and states there was none. She set off and started to turn right, as the car was approximately 3/4 of the way across the road she was hit by an oncoming car which actually hit the rear passenger door causing enough damage to warrant a new door and possibly a wheel arch panel.

Luckily no one was hurt and my wife exchanged details with the lady of the other car. This lady admitted several times that she was sorry and it was her fault as she just did not see our car. her husband who had been drinking told my wife to stop getting upset as it was only an accident and their insurance would pay up.

We have a witness who saw everything who will provide a statement to support my wife.

My wife and I then contacted our insurance company and were disgusted by their behaviour. We have been with them for over 15 years with no claims. After explaining what happened my wife was told that because she turned right into the path of another vehicle that it would be her fault even though when she looked there was no traffic, the car that hit her was travelling too fast to stop and the driver admitted that she did not see my wife several times.

My insurance company did not want me to provide a written statement, photographs, statement from the witness or nay evidence whatsover but just to let them admit liability to the other party. I have refused to do this and would welcome any advice from anyone out there who could help me please!

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she indicated to turn right into a car park, looked for oncoming traffic and states there was none [but there was!]. She set off and started to turn right, as the car was approximately 3/4 of the way across the road she was hit by an oncoming car [thought she said there was no traffic?] which actually hit the rear passenger door causing enough damage to warrant a new door and possibly a wheel arch panel.

Luckily no one was hurt and my wife exchanged details with the lady of the other car. This lady admitted several times that she was sorry and it was her fault as she just did not see our car [which was incorrectly in her lane in front of her]. her husband who had been drinking [relevance?] told my wife to stop getting upset as it was only an accident and their insurance would pay up.

We have a witness who saw everything who will provide a statement to support my wife. [how can a witness support your wife's action of turning in front of another vehicle?]

My wife and I then contacted our insurance company and were disgusted by their behaviour. We have been with them for over 15 years with no claims. After explaining what happened my wife was told that because she turned right into the path of another vehicle that it would be her fault [correct in 99% of cases] even though when she looked there was no traffic [obviously there was traffic... it hit her!], the car that hit her was travelling too fast [proof?]to stop and the driver admitted that she did not see my wife several times.

My insurance company did not want me to provide a written statement, photographs, statement from the witness or nay evidence whatsover but just to let them admit liability to the other party. I have refused to do this and would welcome any advice from anyone out there who could help me please!

 

I will be happy to be proved wrong, but I don't see any way this is going except as a fault claim against your wife jsut like your insurance company have advised you.

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I will be happy to be proved wrong, but I don't see any way this is going except as a fault claim against your wife jsut like your insurance company have advised you.

 

Presumably the witness would be able to confirm that the 3rd party was driving too fast.

 

The OP would still be at fault, but it may be that the 3rd party is found to be contributory negligent.

 

There is case law to support this.

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Presumably the witness would be able to confirm that the 3rd party was driving too fast.

 

 

How can a (presumably) non-expert witness, without the benefit of any speed measuring device (whether calibrated or not) "confirm the 3rd party was driving too fast".

 

If the 3rd party was driving so fast that it obviously in excess of the speed limit, even to a pedestrian, then I think the police should have been called and they would have been able to better assess the probable speed of impact.

 

If the witness is simply going to claim "it looked like the car ws going over 40mph" (on a 30mph road) then I think such evidence will simply be dismissed. After all, can you imagine if a police office sent you an FPN coz "it looked like you were speeding but I didn't measure it", what are the chances of that succeeding at court.

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My wife was driving our car on Friday night, when she was going to collect our son from the traini station.

Whilst in standing traffic, she indicated to turn right into a car park, looked for oncoming traffic and states there was none. She set off and started to turn right, as the car was approximately 3/4 of the way across the road she was hit by an oncoming car which actually hit the rear passenger door causing enough damage to warrant a new door and possibly a wheel arch panel.

Luckily no one was hurt and my wife exchanged details with the lady of the other car. This lady admitted several times that she was sorry and it was her fault as she just did not see our car. her husband who had been drinking told my wife to stop getting upset as it was only an accident and their insurance would pay up.

We have a witness who saw everything who will provide a statement to support my wife.

My wife and I then contacted our insurance company and were disgusted by their behaviour. We have been with them for over 15 years with no claims. After explaining what happened my wife was told that because she turned right into the path of another vehicle that it would be her fault even though when she looked there was no traffic, the car that hit her was travelling too fast to stop and the driver admitted that she did not see my wife several times.

My insurance company did not want me to provide a written statement, photographs, statement from the witness or nay evidence whatsover but just to let them admit liability to the other party. I have refused to do this and would welcome any advice from anyone out there who could help me please!

 

First high-lighted point; did your witness over hear this? Is so, it may be signifitant. Secondly I believe you are intitled to submit a claim to your insureres which must include a statement and any supporting evidence. So if this is what you have been told, you may have a case to persue against your insureres.

 

Please Note

 

The advice I offer will be based on the information given by the person needing it. All my advice is based on my experiences and knowledge gained in working in the motor and passenger transport industries in various capacities. Although my advice will always be sincere, it should be used as guidence only.

 

I would always urge to seek professional advice for clarification prior to taking any action.

 

Please click my reputation button at the bottom of my profile window on the left if you found my advice useful.

 

 

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Thank you for all your comments which I read with interest!

 

Latest update, I spoke to my witness last night and asked him to just describe to me what he actually saw and this was his reply " I was walking towards your car, which was in front of me, (with my girlfriend) and saw it turning from my right into the car park. At that very same point a car passed me heading towards your car, at I think, a speed of at least 20mph and probably some 20-25 yards away but we both noticed it didn't slow down but in fact was speeding up and didn't hit the brake until a second before impact. It then skidded into your car. I know this because I actually said to my girlfriend that the car has no brake lights on so I don't think it has seen the other car crossing the road".

 

Does this witness statement help my cause do you think?

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Your witness' statement appears to confirm that they believe the 3rd party car was travelling within the speed limit, unless you are suggesting the road was within a 20mph controlled zone. Either way, a pedestrian's opinion that a car was travelling at "at least 20mph" would not be taken as fact, if, for example the 3rd party claims to be travel "AT" 20mph (ie at the speed limit)

 

Your wife's claim that the 3rd party admitted fault, again, I don't see standing. As failing to notice your wife making the error of turning in front of the 3rd party doesn't make it the 3rd party's fault, after all, your wife didn't see the 3rd party either, so by the same argument if was your wife's fault!

 

If I am tavelling on a duel carrigeway, and fail to see a car driving the wrong way towards me and we crash, me failing to notice this car doesn't make it my fault for the crash does it.

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How can a (presumably) non-expert witness, without the benefit of any speed measuring device (whether calibrated or not) "confirm the 3rd party was driving too fast".

 

If the 3rd party was driving so fast that it obviously in excess of the speed limit, even to a pedestrian, then I think the police should have been called and they would have been able to better assess the probable speed of impact.

 

If the witness is simply going to claim "it looked like the car ws going over 40mph" (on a 30mph road) then I think such evidence will simply be dismissed. After all, can you imagine if a police office sent you an FPN coz "it looked like you were speeding but I didn't measure it", what are the chances of that succeeding at court.

 

Because it is not beyond the realms of human capability to be able to estimate the speed of an object. There are many occasions I can think of where I have been walking along a road and think to myself, when a car goes past, "he seems to be pushing it a bit."

 

A witness may suggest that a car was driving too fast in the same way that they may give evidence that the driver "seemed distracted" "appeared to be fatigued" "was driving 'erratically". Perception of speed, indeed of any of the behaviours I have just mentioned, is very subjective - but in a way, all evidence is. I was sat in court just last week when counsel asked a witness whether the defendant was 'amicable'!

 

As for the police officer situation - that is because in that scenario, we are dealing with a criminal matter. The prosecution would have to show beyond all reasonable doubt. So the opinion of two officers would be needed (or the opinion of one officer backed up by a mechanical device.) In the current case, we have a lower burden of proof plus there are no guidelines on having two witnesses etc.

 

Anyway - In the end it seems like the witness is of no use to the OP. They seem to confirm that the 3rd party was driving very slow indeed. It may not mean anything to insurers, but I am of the opinion that in a majority of RTC's it is rare to have all parties who are 100% not to blame. It takes two to tango, as they say. Driving at 20mph, I cannot begin to understand how the 3rd party could not stop in time - unless the OP's wife literally pulled straight into her path....

Edited by mightymouse_69
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I more or less agree with MM but I am more concerned in the behaviour of the OPs insurers here. The OP is still entitled to give his/her version of events and the insurers should be fighting his/her corner. Also, if the TP had admitted liability in front of witnesess then this should be taken into account. In my opinion the OP is not necessarily 100% liable here.

 

Please Note

 

 

The advice I offer will be based on the information given by the person needing it. All my advice is based on my experiences and knowledge gained in working in the motor and passenger transport industries in various capacities. Although my advice will always be sincere, it should be used as guidence only.

 

I would always urge to seek professional advice for clarification prior to taking any action.

 

Please click my reputation button at the bottom of my profile window on the left if you found my advice useful.

 

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  • 4 weeks later...

The fact that the TP has (aparently) admitted liability is irrelevant, given that they clearly weren't the one's in the wrong! Motorists are advised not to admit any kind of liability at the scene for precisely this reason.

 

The OP's wife has failed to give way to oncoming traffic when turning right and as such, is fully liable for this accident. The best you could hope for is contributory liability, but that would only be possible if it was proven that the TP was travelling too fast. From what you have said, that is not possible.

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There are two issues here, firstly responsibility for the accident itself, and secondly the actions of the insurance company.

As far as the first is concerned, in order to make a claim against another person, you have to demonstrate that the other person owed you a duty of care and that they breached that duty of care. All road users have a duty to drive in such a way as not to cause injury or damage to others. A breach of that duty will arise if the driver has been negligent. In the present case, both drivers had a duty to keep a proper lookout. Given the limited information available, it seems that both drivers might have been at fault in this respect, otherwise why was neither able to see the other? Overriding this mutual duty is the duty on the turning driver to ensure that it was safe to carry out the manoeuvre before proceeding to do so. The fact that she was hit by the other car which was travelling at a relatively low speed suggests that she failed to do this properly, and responsibility for the accident largely rests with her.

As has already been suggested, the other driver could be said to have been contributorily negligent as she failed to see the turning vehicle in front of her. However, the original hazard was caused by the turning vehicle, so the greater degree of negligence rests with the driver of the turning vehicle with the balance resting with the other driver. In this sort of accident, a 75/25 allocation is quite common.

The second issue is the action of the insurance company. One common misperception is that insurance companies are there to uphold your legal rights. In fact, insurance is a financial service, and the insurance company's responsibility is to protect you from the financial costs of the accident. When a claim is made against you by another party, the insurance company indemnifies you by dealing with and, when necessary, paying the other party's claim. The insurer may try to defend the claim, but is under no obligation to do so if this would be uneconomical. In any event, insurance policies generally contain a clause authorising the insurer to take over the conduct of a claim as it sees fit - you can no more insist that it defends a claim than you can insist that it pays one when it is not liable to do so.

AIn the present case it is probably not worth trying too hard to defend the claim for the 25% contribution that might be available if it were pressed to the bitter end. Having said that, there is nothing to stop you trying to claim against the other party for a contribution to the cost of repairs to your own car. However, that contribution would be limited to the amount of contributory negligence that you were able to establish on the other party which, as I said earlier, is probably around 25%. Given the time, trouble and possible expense that you would have to go to to do this, I would suggest that it is probably not worth the trouble.

All in all, I'd put this one down to experience and try to forget about it.

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