VCS ANPR PCN claimform - St Mary's Gate Retail Park, S1 4QZ ***Claim Dismissed***

[FruitSalad1010]

How do you know the statutory time frame to respond is 30 days?

[FruitSalad1010]

The advantage to you of issuing two separate claims is that it would keep the issues entirely separate in the mind of the court and as FTMDave wrote if one claim fails the other survives. However equally it would bring two opportunities to fail and two opportunities for potential costs. That being said you should probably expect that the claims would be allocated to the small claims track given their value and therefore costs would be limited, perhaps no more than £50. You may run a small risk that it is later considered the claims should have been issued together, however courts do have case management powers and given you are a litigant in person who should be afforded some discretion one would hope that any consequences aren't too unpalatable.

You may find that a claim solely for compensation (provided it is a small sum) following their failure to disclose your data, isn't contested. Therefore reducing the number of claims to one, namely the unlawful processing of your data.

The advantage of a single claim is that if you win on any point in terms of liability then that should be the end to the issue of costs. The downside (if you see it that way) is that they may choose to defend the entirety of your claim as a matter of course and due to the increased value. In addition it may be that in the interest of being fair to both sides the court reduces the value of any award perhaps by considering each cause of action to encompass one breach.

If you issue a claim using MCOL the space is fairly limited but you can probably keep both causes of action clear in the mind of the court and still fit the entirety of the particulars on the claim form. If you issue a claim using the beta version of the County Court Money Claims Centre then more space is afforded to write without having to issue a separate particulars of claim. The system will ask you for more information as you progress, however it appears there is a risk that claims issued to the CCMCC may soon be eligible for automatic referral for a decision to be made on the papers only. I fear if that were to become standard practice it could be risky for a litigant in person for a number of reasons.

The merits of either approach are somewhat variable and unknown, at least to me and it may be that you would be able to better help others by reporting back on your experience depending on what you choose to do.

I'm not really up to date on your exact history with VCS. It would be helpful if you could clarify exactly how many claims VCS have issued against you, what the outcome was of each claim and when it occurred.

[FruitSalad1010]

I think to help prevent facing issues later, it would be better to further particularise the distress you have suffered and indicate more clearly on which legislation your cause of action relies. It hasn't been referred to in the second set of particulars.

For the second claim to succeed at trial it is likely you will later have to make a well constructed argument, the more you come across as a competent and able litigant or maybe one that is receiving assistance the more any mistakes may cost you.

My understanding is that DCB Legal are not considered the best of the bunch, but in any case better not to leave things to chance.

Where you have specified an amount in a letter of claim you ought to stick to that amount on the claim form or at the very least not increase it.

 

[FruitSalad1010]

I haven't read through every significant detail.

 

In reference to a claim relating to the incomplete disclosure, do you have a clear understanding of what is missing from the disclosure and can you evidence this in some way?

Have you begun a complaint to the ICO, if so have they provided their view? This is something that can be done concurrently to a claim. There is a risk the ICO don't provide the view that you agree with but this doesn't prevent you from seeking remedy through the court system.

 

With reference to the breach of GDPR it may be better to particularise how it affected you rather than what affected you, particulars can usually be expanded on in a witness statement. Also bear in mind that if you say that preparing litigation was distressing you will then be issuing two of your own claims, albeit that perhaps claiming rather than defending brings about different stress.  I'm not saying this to point fingers in anyway but instead to anticipate some of the questions you may face later on.

I don't think there are any threads which have been down this path before and upon which an outcome has been realised, at least in court. It's important to realise this is somewhat treading new ground and that by continuing you understand unlike other common disputes on this site that there isn't much history to fall back upon to know the outcome with certainty.
 

[FruitSalad1010]

You should begin your complaint with the ICO immediately. If you were to be in receipt of a view given by the ICO that supports your claim by the time you submit a witness statement then your chances of success will increase dramatically.

It's much easier for a court to rely on the opinion of a government body such as the ICO in support of your claim than by your evidence alone.

VCS probably started litigation in the hope that you'd give up and pay. I'm not sure the exact timings of when you submitted the SAR however if it was after they issued their second claim it may have been your request that woke them up the reality their claim was going to fail if they had lost all of the evidence.

Your risks go beyond simply losing the hearing fee. Often costs are limited on the small claims track, however well resourced organisations like to throw in applications because they can result in a costs order outside of the normal course of a claim. If you are time poor it will force your to turn up to any additional hearings which may be difficult to do if you work. Understand they do this partly to disrupt and intimidate litigants who might not have the funds to continue. Unfortunately I also have to say it is not totally out of the question that a court may be more prepared to issue some sort of costs order against a litigant to bring them towards settlement. Of course no court would openly state this is their outright intention but the reality is a costs order is a powerful tool to draw a litigant to the negotiation table who issued a claim on principle rather than economics.

You will have to do the reading but there have been some threads on this site that cover disputes regarding the time period for which data should be kept, again an opinion from the ICO may be useful.

The problem with the ICO is you are totally at the mercy of the case officer who reviews your complaint and to be frank their level of interest and commitment in giving your complaint the attention it deserves is as variable as playing the lottery. A good case officer will see through the issues, provide a supporting view and I don't think they realise that by doing so they can help unload the courts as only the most belligerent of defendants continue in the face of a dissenting view from the ICO.

The firms will not stop their shenanigans, simply because you and the members that find this site represent a tiny proportion of the 8.6 million begging letters send out in 2022 alone. However if "pushing back" and perhaps being awarded a sum of money for doing so brings you satisfaction then more power to you, but it is not without risk.