Free Traffic Legal Advice

Response to Letter Before Action dated 01 December 2025

Dear Sirs,

I write in response to your Letter Before Action dated 01 December 2025.

This response is provided pursuant to the Pre-Action Protocol for Debt Claims. Liability is denied in full.

1. Keeper liability under the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 is denied

You assert keeper liability under Schedule 4 of the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012.

You have provided only hybrid mail material. That is not, without more, proof of the date of posting for the purposes of PoFA paragraph 9(6). Hybrid mail records commonly evidence only generation, print, batching, or handover to a third party, and do not necessarily evidence the date the notice was actually posted or injected into the postal system.

You are therefore put to strict proof of the date of posting, meaning the date on which the Notice to Keeper was actually posted or injected into the postal system, so that the statutory presumption of delivery can properly arise.

If you cannot prove the actual posting or injection date, you cannot establish that the Notice to Keeper was given within the relevant 14 day period required by PoFA paragraph 9(4), and keeper liability does not arise.

2. Presumption of service is denied unless strict proof is provided

Any reliance on a presumed delivery date is rejected unless and until you provide strict proof of posting as set out above.

For the avoidance of doubt, I require documentary evidence showing the actual posting or injection date, for example a statement of mailing, certificate of posting, Royal Mail collection manifest, or equivalent auditable dispatch log from the hybrid mail provider identifying the item and the date it entered the postal system.

Absent that, you cannot rely on PoFA paragraph 9(6). You must instead pursue the driver, whose identity you have neither established nor evidenced.

3. Denial of appeal rights and failure to treat the complaint properly

No Notice to Keeper was received. The first correspondence received was a debt recovery demand for an inflated sum. This denied the registered keeper any meaningful opportunity to engage with the charge at the reduced rate or to appeal within 28 days.

Any suggestion that an appeal outside 28 days is solely at the operator’s discretion is not a complete answer to defective service and the resulting denial of process. The later provision of a copy does not cure defective service or retrospectively reinstate the opportunity that was lost.

4. Misleading reliance on ParkingEye v Beavis press material

You have enclosed a press release or press summary relating to ParkingEye v Beavis.

Press summaries are not part of any judgment, are not authoritative, and cannot be relied upon as legal reasoning. Beavis turned on its own facts, including clear and prominent signage, a legitimate interest established on evidence, and an undisputed contractual framework. None of that is established by providing a decade-old press handout.

If you intend to rely on Beavis, you must identify the precise proposition you say it supports in this case and provide the evidence to prove the necessary factual foundation.

5. Inflated and unrecoverable sum

The sum demanded, including any add-on above the original parking charge, is denied. Any attempt to recover additional sums beyond the parking charge will be challenged as unrecoverable and as an abuse of process. Provide a full breakdown of the sum claimed and the legal basis for each element.

6. Documents required to narrow the issues and comply with pre-action conduct

Before the matter can be properly considered, you must supply:

a. Proof of the actual posting or injection date of the Notice to Keeper, as set out above
b. A copy of the Notice to Keeper and all other notices sent, in the form actually sent
c. All photographs relied upon, including any ANPR images and a full chronology of timestamps
d. The signage terms relied upon, including close-ups, entrance signage, and a site plan showing sign locations as at the material date
e. The landowner contract or chain of authority authorising enforcement and litigation in your own name at this location
f. A full breakdown of the sum claimed and the basis for any added amounts
g. If you allege the recipient was the driver, your evidence of driver identity

Until these are supplied, the claim is not properly particularised and proceedings would be premature.

7. Costs warning

If proceedings are issued without providing the documents requested above and without addressing the absence of strict proof of posting, I will seek strike out or summary disposal and will seek costs for unreasonable conduct.

This response is provided without any admission and with all rights reserved.

Yours faithfully,

[Name]