Free Traffic Legal Advice

We operate a 'One case, one thread' rule.

Use this thread for one of the three you're dealing with, and start a new thread for each of the other two. It is far too complicated to try and advise on three entirely different cases in one thread.

For all of them, we'll need to see the relevant documentation and submissions.

Do you have no sense of privacy? Why do you show your name and address and other detail that someone could use to steal your identity? Redact your name and address on anything you host publicly!!!

Start by asking why you never received anything before the CCJ. At the time of the parking event, was the address on your V5C logbook correct? Many people update their driving licence but forget the V5C (they are separate DVLA records). If your V5C was out of date, the operator will have sent all notices to the old address. That was your error, and it can attract a real fine of up to £1,000, but the claimant still had a duty to take reasonable steps to find a valid service address before issuing proceedings. If they failed to do a simple trace, service was likely defective.

You now have two immediate choices. If the judgment date is within 30 days, you can pay the CCJ in full and it will be removed from the Register as if it never existed. Paying in instalments or paying after 30 days only marks it “satisfied” and it will stay on your file for six years.

The alternative is to apply to set aside the judgment. You rely on CPR 13.2 (mandatory set aside if the claim was not properly served) and, in the alternative, CPR 13.3 (discretionary set aside if you have a real prospect of defending or there is some other good reason). If service was defective, 13.2 should apply.

There are two routes. With consent: ask the claimant’s solicitor (DCB Legal) to agree a set aside without a hearing. The application fee is £123. Press for them to bear that cost because a contested application is likely to succeed under 13.2 and would expose them to higher costs. Read any draft consent order carefully; some are written to make you pay the fee by default. Without consent: issue an N244 for a contested set aside. The fee is £313. In your draft order ask for your costs because they failed to take reasonable steps to verify your address.

If the judgment is set aside, the case resets to the pre-judgment stage. You will then file a defence and the claim will proceed in the normal way. Had you been served and come here for help at the time and followed our advice, the claim would have been struck out or discontinued before any hearing fee.

In short, decide whether to pay in full within 30 days of judgment, or apply for a set aside under CPR 13.2 (and 13.3 in the alternative). Act promptly, especially if you pursue the set aside.

If you intend to go for a set aside, you will need to phone the CNBC first thing on Monday morning and, whilst on the phone, get them to email you the Particulars of Claim (PoC) and tell you which address the claim was served at and the date the claim was issued.

Why would you just pay it when you were never served with the claim? You say the PCN was issued about a year ago and that you only updated your address about a year ago.

So, if they held an incorrect address for you, irrespective of whether you had updated it with the DVLA in time, the burden is still on the operator to perform due diligence that the address they are using for service is still valid. Because they never had any response to any communication about the PCN or the subsequent claim, all they had to do was perform a credit reference agency check, which costs them pennies, to ascertain a valid address for service.

All you have to do is show the court that the address they used for service was not a valid address. That is a mandatory set aside. Because the claimant failed to perform the required diligence, you will most likely get your costs.

Just paying it and letting the claimant and their incompetent bulk litigator off the hook is exactly what they want. Low-hanging fruit on the gullible tree who pay up out of fear and ignorance.

You are obviously not taking in the advice. Contacting DCB Legal by phone is a really silly mistake. Luckily, they have responded by email and sent you a copy of the NtK. Right now that is as useful to you as a poke in the arm with a sharp stick!

Have you called the CNBC and retrieved the PoC? Have you checked the date of the alleged contravention against when you updated your V5C?

The most important point, which you do not appear to have yet considered, are you going to try and get this set aside or are you just going too pay it and hope for the best?

You’re now outside CPR 13.2. Service was to your correct “last known” address, so it’s deemed good service even if you didn’t actually receive the papers. That means the only viable court route is a discretionary set-aside under CPR 13.3.

Here’s the decision tree, given your dates:


Your two realistic options:

1. Pay in full by 20 September 2025


2. Apply promptly for a set-aside under CPR 13.3 (discretionary)


What the court will look for under CPR 13.3


If you choose the set-aside route, do this now

A. Evidence bundle (exhibits):


B. Draft order (concise):


C. Witness statement (headlines):


D. Defence summary (very brief):


Keep this to a page. Judges prefer concise, credible points.

E. Ask for a stay of enforcement now

Include it in your N244 so nothing can be enforced while the application is pending.

What you should do now