03-31-2026, 12:50 PM
Excellent news. You always had a very strong case.
Your court report is very good and exactly what I would expect from someone who properly understood both the case and the procedure.
Regarding the point you raised about the claimant’s representative, did you manage to hand the judge a copy of the Langley transcript I gave you? If you did, that representative may now be thinking twice about future hearings if the point is raised again. The judge was entitled to allow the representative to appear in a small claim if he was satisfied to do so, so there is no criticism of the ruling, but there was nothing wrong at all in you taking the point.
You also did exactly the right thing by not engaging with the claimant’s representative before the hearing. It is a very common tactic for these people to try to unsettle or intimidate a defendant before they go in.
It is a little unusual that the judge asked you directly who was driving. You were entitled to answer as you did, but you would also have been entitled to ask whether you were obliged to answer that question, because there was no obligation on you to identify the driver. In any event, once it was established that it was not you who drove into the bay, that was fatal to any attempt to pursue you as driver.
That is the important distinction. Only the person who drove into the bay or car park could potentially be pursued as the driver. A different person later moving the vehicle out of the bay cannot retrospectively become liable as the driver for the original alleged contravention.
The other crucial point, of course, was the Notice to Keeper. Once the judge accepted that the DVLA address was not updated until 1 June and that the exhibited notice could not have been sent there, the claimant was left without evidence that any compliant Notice to Keeper had ever been served. That destroyed any attempt to rely on keeper liability.
So the claim failed on both fronts. They could not prove you were the driver, and they could not establish keeper liability. That is why the dismissal was the correct outcome.
As for costs, yes, the point would ideally have been raised before the hearing concluded. Because it was not, I do not think it is worth trying to pursue it now unless the order specifically says costs were reserved. In most small claims, even where the defendant wins, recoverable costs are limited unless unreasonable conduct is argued there and then.
Very well done. You handled it properly.
Your court report is very good and exactly what I would expect from someone who properly understood both the case and the procedure.
Regarding the point you raised about the claimant’s representative, did you manage to hand the judge a copy of the Langley transcript I gave you? If you did, that representative may now be thinking twice about future hearings if the point is raised again. The judge was entitled to allow the representative to appear in a small claim if he was satisfied to do so, so there is no criticism of the ruling, but there was nothing wrong at all in you taking the point.
You also did exactly the right thing by not engaging with the claimant’s representative before the hearing. It is a very common tactic for these people to try to unsettle or intimidate a defendant before they go in.
It is a little unusual that the judge asked you directly who was driving. You were entitled to answer as you did, but you would also have been entitled to ask whether you were obliged to answer that question, because there was no obligation on you to identify the driver. In any event, once it was established that it was not you who drove into the bay, that was fatal to any attempt to pursue you as driver.
That is the important distinction. Only the person who drove into the bay or car park could potentially be pursued as the driver. A different person later moving the vehicle out of the bay cannot retrospectively become liable as the driver for the original alleged contravention.
The other crucial point, of course, was the Notice to Keeper. Once the judge accepted that the DVLA address was not updated until 1 June and that the exhibited notice could not have been sent there, the claimant was left without evidence that any compliant Notice to Keeper had ever been served. That destroyed any attempt to rely on keeper liability.
So the claim failed on both fronts. They could not prove you were the driver, and they could not establish keeper liability. That is why the dismissal was the correct outcome.
As for costs, yes, the point would ideally have been raised before the hearing concluded. Because it was not, I do not think it is worth trying to pursue it now unless the order specifically says costs were reserved. In most small claims, even where the defendant wins, recoverable costs are limited unless unreasonable conduct is argued there and then.
Very well done. You handled it properly.
Never argue with stupid people. They will drag you down to their level and then beat you with experience. - Mark Twain
