January 2022 was a record month for the number of court claims heard by the courts for claims issued by Combined Parking Solutions for drivers & registered keepers of vehicles who refused to pay parking charges issued.
Combined Parking Solutions took the decision in March 2020 to postpone enforcing charges via the courts due to the pandemic and the impact this may have on peoples ability to pay together with the backlog of cases in the court system.
The decision was made in July 2021 that this policy will be lifted and we wrote to over 500 people allowing them a final chance to settle without the need for formal legal action and the costs associated, following that a large number of claims were issued and heard between December 2021 and January 2022.
It would be fair to say that we saw a large amount of the defences based on old information such as “I wasnt the driver” and “these are not enforcable”.
The courts were very quick to advise defendants that the identity of the driver in cases where the keeper is refusing to name the driver is irrelevant as all of the claims brought by CPS were fully compliant with Schedule 4, Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 and therefore keeper or hirer liability is in place.
In terms of defences along the lines that “these are not enforceable” then again the courts highlighted that the Supreme Court decision of Beavis -v- Parking Eye has closed down these type of defences together with the vast amount of others such as “I didn’t see the signs” as per the court of appeal decision in Vine -v- Waltham Forest.
The average judgement was for £251.15 taking into account the £150 charge, issue fees, hearing fees and costs permitted by the claimant as per the Small Claims Track rules … so almost £200 more than the initial charge if it would have been paid and not ignored.
During Q1 of 2022 we will be enforcing over 1000 more via the courts including over 50 people with multiple tickets who have also chosen to ignore them.
Paul Scott of Combined Parking Solutions stated “People still genuinely believe that parking charges will simply go away and companies will not enforce them, we have seen yet again that people are paying 4x the original charge and in many cases realised that ignoring will not work and didn’t know what to do – We would urge anyone who may have ignored a charge during the pandemic for whatever reasons to contact us before matters proceed to court and costs are incurred together with the stress and work that going to court may bring on an individual”
Combined Parking Solutions yet again shows that their charges are 100% enforceable – contact us today if you require assistance in resolving your car park issues with a system that is proven to be 100% effective, legally enforceable and free to implement.
For more information and details on how Combined Parking Solutions can resolve your parking issues then call now on 0871 288 4606 or you can email us..