Disclaimer: the author of this website is not a lawyer and this site does not constitute legal advice. All information on this website is of a general nature only.
Question:
I loaned a friend's car a long while back. Quite some time after I had returned the car to my friend, he started receiving letters from a private car park company that said a fine that was issued during the period I had loan of the car hasn't been paid. My friend followed the advice on the various discussion forums and ignored the letters. Now the fine's gone up to $800+ and my friend is now sick and tired of the whole business and wants me to resolve it so he doesn't keep getting the letters. But what do I do - even if I decided to pay it, the fine has now gone up to $800+ which I cannot afford. And I don't want to admit I was the driver, because I cannot even remember who was driving it at that time (various people in my family had access to the keys on the day in question). Just because I was the one who picked the car up from my friend's house doesn't mean I was the one who parked it in the car park.
Answer:Ask your your friend who owns the car to write to the car park company (you can write the letter for your friend, just show it to your friend before you send it). It should be a normal letter and not a statutory declaration. Private car park companies (unlike police and council) cannot demand statutory declarations. Keep the letter short - just say:
"I refer to notice number 9999 dated 99/99/9999. I wasn't driving the car on that day, and deny liability for your fines. I lent the car to <name and address of person who borrowed car> during the period that the fines were issued for.
Your sincerely, <friends name whom you borrowed car from>"
Then when you receive the letter from the car park company saying you have been nominated by your friend, you can either use the ignore tactic and not write back, or you can write back to them as follows:
"<Name of friend> apparently wrote to you saying that I has use of his car on this date. However, he/she did not state that I parked it in your car park, so his/her statement has no value. I deny liability for your fines.".
And leave it at that. The company will continue to send fines to you, even after you have sent the above letter, but your friend won't be bothered any more. If you do want to stop the letters, then see https://sites.google.com/site/unfairfines/faq/faq11 and http://sites.google.com/site/unfairfines/faq/faq99
The beauty of this scheme is that the company should reset the fine back to $88.00 (or whatever it was orginially), so if you decide to pay it to prevent further letters, then you can just pay the $88.00 instead of the $800+ they were asking your friend. (They cannot hold you liable for your friend taking so long to write to them).
Disclaimer: the author of this website is not a lawyer and this site does not constitute legal advice