CCJ for parking fine in Tesco, never received claim Form

[ParkingNightmares]

Hello
About 18 months ago I was parked in a large Tesco in a disabled bay with my badge on display. I was there about 2 hours. I received a 'fine' for allegedly contravening parking rules, something about not displaying my badge correctly. I ignored it and received a few more letters.

I eventually phoned the Solicitors, Gladstone, who are actually the same company as Horizon Parking and they Said to challenge on their website, which I did. Didn't hear anything until today when a default judgement arrived for £287.

At no point did I ever receive a claim form, they haven't sent it. To challenge it will cost £303 just to have it looked at by a Judge with a view to setting it aside. No guarantee that will happen.

Im furious, I wanted it to go to a hearing so I could have my say, that I was properly parked.

I will probably end up paying the CCJ instead of emerging myself on a long drawn out battle with these people. This seems to be a tactic of theirs, say they've sent the forms when they haven't and claim default judgement.

Not an excuse for ignoring the first few letters but it was and still am undergoing cancer treatment, death of both parents, caring responsibilities for my sick DP and still trying to work full time. If I was on benefits I could claim Help With Fees to challenge this but I can't.

Any advice welcome

If the parking company accepts that you were not aware of the hearing due to the post being delayed, they may agree to set aside the CCJ by consent. This is much cheaper.

Even if the parking company does not agree to set aside the CCJ by consent, you may still be able to reclaim the cost if your application to set aside is successful.

If you pay the CCJ within 1 month of the judgment date it won't appear on your credit record. But I'm afraid your only choices are to pay the CCJ or apply to get the judgment set aside.

I didn't intend it to be ableist. I have one friend with a blue badge, I know she does photograph it, I wasn't sure how commonplace that was.

You'd hope that the parking company would only pursue this with photographic evidence that you weren't displaying the badge, but perhaps they just hope people will pay up.

I don't disagree with you that the system is rubbish. As Prh47 has said, unless the parking company agree to cancel the CCJ - which seems unlikely if they have falsely pursued you for a parking offence, but is always worth an ask - then your options are to either pay to have the CCJ set aside and defend it, or to pay the CCJ within a month of it being granted, if you're still in that timespan, and it'll then not be recorded.

I was just trying to help by making sure you knew that while it's perfectly valid to complain, it won't help with the outcome, they can't remove the CCJ, and your chances of being able to go through either process successfully reduce the longer that you leave it.

All the best with it, I'll step away now. I did not intend any offence.

But you ignored the letters - answering the letters would have saved all of this. It would not have been 1 letter there would have been several

I am a acutely aware, please read my earlier posts. I hold myself responsible for that. Thanks for coming on to make me feel worse than I already do, I hope feel better for pointing out what I already know.

@ParkingNightmares hopefully you got this sorted! In a similar position, did you manage to get the CCJ and how did you do this? Any help much appreciated

Hi there - I had no choice but to pay the ccj within the 30 days to remove it from my credit record - within a week of it being on there I was having credit lines removed.

The court claim form turned up 6 weeks after being posted, the issue was with Royal Mail who said 'sorry' and that was it.
Absolutely shocking service from them.

I could have requested a set aside of the original judgement but this costs £300 - more than the cost of paying the ccj - that would have restored me to the position of the claim being presented afresh and I could defend it but no costs order against Royal Mail could be made so I would have been out of pocket by more than the cost of paying the original ccj.

I never had the opportunity to plead my case in front of a judge which was all I wanted.

My advice is to appeal your case to the parking sharks and follow the process. They will take you to court - that is a given - complete the claim form and defend your position with whatever evidence you can provide. Hopefully you will win.

I did initially ignore the letters from the parking sharks but likely they wouldn't have repealed the fine even if I had challenged it early on so going to court was my only viable option but Royal Mail completely stuffed that up for me !

Good luck x

Thanks so much for your reply, really helpful thank you x

I’m a solicitor. What you should have done (and could still do) is write to the claimant explaining what happened and inviting them to consent to the default judgment being set aside. If they didn’t agree then you make the application, which in the circumstances you describe would probably be successful, though technically a claim form is deemed served on the second business day after posting, regardless of whether it is in fact received.

I got a CCJ set aside for a client once, who’d not updated his address with DVLA so the fine went to old address and he never received it, or the claim documents. So even though it was his fault he didn’t get the post, we still got the CCJ set aside. You want it set aside rather than paying it because setting it aside restores your credit file to never having had a CCJ, whereas paying one means you still have to answer the question “ever had a CCJ?” with a “yes”.

If you apply successfully to set aside a judgment, your legal costs of doing so are paid by the other side. Payment is not optional as you can enforce a costs order. It’s only if the company doesn’t have assets sufficient to pay that you can end up without your costs, but it doesn’t sound as though this company would be unable to pay a few hundred (or even thousand) pounds.

Look at Trust Pilot reviews for Gladstones Solicitors.

Hello

I did speak with the Gladstones and they refused to do anything - as far as they were concerned they had issued proceedings correctly (which they had it pains me to admit) and told me to take it up with Royal Mail.

I have an ongoing complaint with the Postal Redress System.

Basically, if that claim form is late and you miss the deadline to return it, you've lost unless you're on a low income or benefits and you can apply for a set aside at no cost. It would have cost me £300 with no way of recouping that money. It is highly unlikely a Costs Order would have been made against Gladstones as they technically did nothing wrong in the serving of the claim, it was Royal Mail and no costs order could be awarded against them. They are basically a law unto themselves.

I just had to cut my losses at this point.

I'm 3 months down the line - read my update:-)

You would have got a costs order in your favour if:

you had asked Gladstones to consent to the set-aside;
they had refused (both of these conditions were met);
you had to apply to the court for set-aside as a result; and
your application was successful (which, on the basis of my professional experience of similar cases, I think it would have been).

Their defence would have been they served correctly, which they did and service was deemed despite ot being 6 weeks late. I cannot see how the court could award costs when they did everything right, it begrudges me to say. Even if what you say is true, likely they wpuld refuse to cough up and i'd have to have gone down the enforcement route - they are slippery, taking solicitors on in litigation is not something I wanted to do. I am undergoing cancer treatment and the stress has really affected me.

It's too late now anyway, ccj is paid and it is off my record and I want to forget the whole sorry situation.

I sympathise with your position, but I’ve made my post about costs because this is not the first time someone has posted about this type of problem and, as I say, I have acted (as a litigation lawyer) for clients in this situation (actually worse situations in terms of it being “their fault”) and have (a) had the judgment set aside and (b) got a costs order for the client each time.