Left homeless by stranger’s fine
KRISTIAN Hancocks and his family were left homeless after he got a CCJ because of a stranger’s parking ticket.
The 40-year-old engineer discovered the court order last year when he was refused a mortgage on a new house.
By that point, he and his wife Laura, 35, had exchanged contracts on their previous home. The couple and their two children were forced to lodge with relatives for months and are now renting.
The cause of the CCJ was a £40 parking ticket incurred by someone who had bought their old car. Parking firm ParkingEye sent warnings in their name to an address where they hadn’t lived for five years. Mr Hancocks, from Uttoxeter, Staffordshire, contacted ParkingEye but was told a 28-day time limit had passed so they could not appeal. The CCJ was for £170 after associated costs were added. Mr Hancocks said it had left them ‘at the end of our tethers’.
ParkingEye said that if individuals can prove they got a CCJ due to the firm receiving ‘incorrect address details, we will consent to the judgment being set aside’.