Privatisation of Magistrate Court Fines......UPDATE

[Bailiff Advice]

I should perhaps also add a link to the Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Act 2007 (Consequential, Transitional and Saving Provision) Order 2014 is below

 

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2...ade?view=plain

 

 

Section 1: Magistrate Court. amendment of Magistrates’ Courts Rules

 

(d):Execution of Distress Warrant

 

(cc) for “levy the said sum by distress and sale of the goods belonging to the said person substitute “recover the said sum from the debtor by way of the Schedule 12 procedure"

[unclebulgaria67]

I should perhaps also add a link to the Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Act 2007 (Consequential, Transitional and Saving Provision) Order 2014 is below

 

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2...ade?view=plain

 

 

Section 1: Magistrate Court. amendment of Magistrates’ Courts Rules

 

(d):Execution of Distress Warrant

 

(cc) for “levy the said sum by distress and sale of the goods belonging to the said person substitute “recover the said sum from the debtor by way of the Schedule 12 procedure"

 

The problem is that there are too many different bits of legislation.

 

As asked earlier, how does CPR part 30 affect people settling their Magistrates fines with a court officer ? This is a new rule that was introduced in October 2015.

[Peterbard]

The CPR outlines proceedure used by the court to implement the various actions which may be brought under the acts to which it refers.

[unclebulgaria67]

The CPR outlines proceedure used by the court to implement the various actions which may be brought under the acts to which it refers.

 

The point i was making is about there being separation between courts and enforcement, because of the consequences of fines not being paid. If someone pays their fine to a court officer, they would have to accept. It does not mean that the enforcement fees would not be due, but of course the court can't pass on any fine money to an enforcement company towards their fees, causing part the fine to be outstanding, therefore leaving open further sanction of the court.

[Bailiff Advice]

The problem is that there are too many different bits of legislation.

 

As asked earlier, how does CPR part 30 affect people settling their Magistrates fines with a court officer ? This is a new rule that was introduced in October 2015.

 

Your are right about there being too many pieces of legislation !!!

 

Can I just correct you on CPR30. CPR relates to County Court rules. Anything to do with the Magistrates Court comes under the Criminal Procedure Rules and is entitled CrimPR.

 

Once a fine has been set, the Fines Officer manages the administration role of collecting the sum and part of his task is the issuing of a Further Steps Notice, arranging attachments orders, clamping orders, registering the sum with Registry Trust, setting up payment arrangements and of course, issuing a warrant.

 

If payment is made to the court BEFORE a warrant is issued, then the amount due will only be the amount of the fine, prosecution costs, victims surcharge and compensation. Bailiff fees will of course not apply at this stage.

 

The Fines Officer cannot accept payment at the court after a Warrant has been issued. Case law prohibits this.

 

The Fines Officer is employed by HMCTS. The Privatisation Partnership was scrapped just a few weeks before being signed last October.

[Bailiff Advice]

Good to see all the backtracking going on,at least it should mean the orriginal flawed misconception should not be ssued as advice.

 

The current direction of the discussion itshould be acknowledged, is an attempt to distract from the error and hide embarramsnt. But it is nevertheless an interesting subject in its own right.

 

It is not only the backtracking, the question that should be asked is WHY, the individual had even referred to section 75A in the very first place !! I would assume that he chanced upon the regulation and wrongly read it. Because the Privatisation Partnership for court fines was scrapped last year, the usefulness of part 75A has simply disappeared.

[unclebulgaria67]

Your are right about there being too many pieces of legislation !!!

 

Can I just correct you on CPR30. CPR relates to County Court rules. Anything to do with the Magistrates Court comes under the Criminal Procedure Rules and is entitled CrimPR.

 

Once a fine has been set, the Fines Officer manages the administration role of collecting the sum and part of his task is the issuing of a Further Steps Notice, arranging attachments orders, clamping orders, registering the sum with Registry Trust, setting up payment arrangements and of course, issuing a warrant.

 

If payment is made to the court BEFORE a warrant is issued, then the amount due will only be the amount of the fine, prosecution costs, victims surcharge and compensation. Bailiff fees will of course not apply at this stage.

 

The Fines Officer cannot accept payment at the court after a Warrant has been issued. Case law prohibits this.

 

The Fines Officer is employed by HMCTS. The Privatisation Partnership was scrapped just a few weeks before being signed last October.

 

No, there is CPR part 30 relating to criminal. Link is on last page.

 

A court official cannot refuse payment of a fine and other court costs, even if a warrant has been issued to enforce. I am not saying this is the correct way to pay a fine, after enforcement has begun, but we all can see why someone would prefer to pay the court.

 

If a court official accepts payment, it cannot be passed to an enforcement company, because the payment relates to the fine.

 

If you think logically, if a court passed payment to an EC and the EC took part of the payment as their fees, this would leave part of the fine outstanding and the person would be liable to further sanction by the court. That could never be right.

 

It would of course leave the enforcement fees outstanding and the enforcement company using a warrant to collect these.

[Bailiff Advice]

Just to clarify the position, section 46 of Schedule 12 (above) amended section 76(2)(a)and (b) of the Magistrates' Courts Act 1980.

[Bailiff Advice]

 

A court official cannot refuse payment of a fine and other court costs, even if a warrant has been issued to enforce. I am not saying this is the correct way to pay a fine, after enforcement has begun, but we all can see why someone would prefer to pay the court.

 

If a court official accepts payment, it cannot be passed to an enforcement company, because the payment relates to the fine.

 

If you think logically, if a court passed payment to an EC and the EC took part of the payment as their fees, this would leave part of the fine outstanding and the person would be liable to further sanction by the court. That could never be right.

 

It would of course leave the enforcement fees outstanding and the enforcement company using a warrant to collect these.

 

Unfortunately UB, the above is not correct.

 

In the first instance, Magistrates Courts in the UK will not accept payment in relation to a court fine once a warrant has been issued. The legal position as stated many times by HMCTS is R V Hereford & Worcester Ex Parte McRae where Lord Justice Simon Brown stated that:

 

“....once the warrant was issued the court was functus officio" (in other words had finished its job and had no more to with it) .

 

Secondly, if Magistrates Courts accept payment from a fine defaulter after a warrant has been issued they will be in serious breach of Section 6.29 of the contract between Her Majesty's Courts & Tribunal Service and the four enforcement companies; Marston Group, Collectica Ltd, Excel Enforcement and Swift Credit Services.

 

For the avoidance of doubt, Section 6.29 states as follows:

 

"The Department (Secretary of State for Justice) will not accept full or part payments on any account where any warrant or clamping order is with the Contractor.

 

Should a Defaulter attend a court and offer to pay whilst a warrant or clamping order is outstanding, the court will direct the Defaulter to contact the Contractor concerned".

[Bailiff Advice]

 

If you think logically, if a court passed payment to an EC and the EC took part of the payment as their fees, this would leave part of the fine outstanding and the person would be liable to further sanction by the court. That could never be right.

 

It would of course leave the enforcement fees outstanding and the enforcement company using a warrant to collect these.

 

Once a warrant is issued, the enforcement company is legally entitled to add their fees and legislation provides that from any payment made, the compliance fee should be deducted first with the balance being apportioned on a pro rata basis in line with legislation (with approx 60% being allocated towards the amount due up to the time of the warrant and the remaining 40% being allocated towards the remaining bailiff fees).

 

This position was the subject of the following question raised in the House of Commons in April this year:

 

 

 

Question from Jim Cunningham (Labour, Coventry South)

 

 

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what estimate he has made of the number of instances in which enforcement agent fees paid by a defendant were transferred directly by HM Courts and Tribunal Services to enforcement agents in each of the last five years; and what estimate he has made of the amounts transferred in that period.

 

 

Reply from Shailesh Vara: The Parliamentray Under-Secretary of State for Justice.

 

If an offender makes a payment on a financial imposition after a warrant of control has been issued and referred to the EAE, HMCTS transfers the full payment to the AEA to enable them to reconcile their accounts and take the fee owed to them and they then return any balance owed to HMCTS.

 

The Tribunals Courts and Enforcement Act states that the AEA is entitled to retain the first £75 of any amount paid on a warrant and then their fees are retained on a pro rata basis with the balance paid to HMCTS.

[Peterbard]

The point i was making is about there being separation between courts and enforcement, because of the consequences of fines not being paid. If someone pays their fine to a court officer, they would have to accept. It does not mean that the enforcement fees would not be due, but of course the court can't pass on any fine money to an enforcement company towards their fees, causing part the fine to be outstanding, therefore leaving open further sanction of the court.

 

Where does t say this in the CPR, in reference to warrants of control ?

 

When the sum is sent for a enforcement o the EA, it is owed to them, untill the warrant is returned. The court has no option but to pass any sum payed to them onto the EA.

 

Of course if a sum adjujed s paid to the court before it is passed on then the fine will settled.

[Peterbard]

The misconception was due to someone discovering the section and getting all giddy when he saw that the words magistrates and the fees were mentioned in the same paragraph.[/Quote]

 

All the post deletion, in a pathetic attempt to hide the person's stupidity is making the whole place a joke.

[daverules]

The misconception was due to someone discovering the section and getting all giddy when he saw that the words magistrates and the fees were mentioned in the same paragraph.[/Quote]

 

All the post deletion, in a pathetic attempt to hide the person's stupidity is making the whole place a joke.

 

Sorry Db but the same can be said about this site quite a few times I have logged on to find posts deleted for no obvious reason.

 

Maybe it's best to stick to posing legal facts and not highlight what is happening on another site.

 

Regards to all

[Bailiff Advice]

.

Why was section 75A introduced into the Magistrates Courts Act 1980?

 

 

Section 75A was introduced to provide for the privatisation of court fines.

 

Prior to 75A being introduced, if a debtor adjudged by a conviction was ordered to pay a sum of money, this amount would include an amount for the fine, victims surcharge, prosecution costs and compensation. There was no procedure in place for the Fines Officer at the court that adjudged the sum to be paid, to be remnumerated for his part in collecting the sum.

 

 

Is section 75A currently in use.

 

 

No. Although Section 75A has been enacted, it is not presently in use (although there are current plans for courts to charge fine defaulters for the work that the Fines Officer does in collecting the sum up the the stage of a warrant being issued.

 

Over 700 views of this thread in 24 hours. Very impressive indeed.

 

I started this thread to once again dispel these dreadful internet myths about bailiff fees for magistrates courts. I questioned yesterday WHY the individual responsible for referring to Section 75A had even brought this subject up.

 

Before even doing so, he surely should have checked to see whether section 26 of the Crime & Courts Act 2013 (amending the Magistrates Courts Act1980 to introduce section 75A) had been brought into force. It appears that it has not been. This is entirely compatible with my comment above that Section 75A is not in use.

 

If anyone is interested in knowing WHY Section 26 was introduced into the Crimes & Courts Act 2013 (although not yet bought into force), they should read the following House of Commons debate from January 2013.

 

PS: At the time of the debate, the section numbers were not the same.

 

https://www.theyworkforyou.com/pbc/2012-13/Crime_and_Courts_Bill/07-0_2013-01-31a.5.0?s=%27benefits%27+%A35%27+%27deduction%27+%27fine%27

[Peterbard]

All the post deletion, in a pathetic attempt to hide the person's stupidity is making the whole place a joke.

 

Sorry Db but the same can be said about this site quite a few times I have logged on to find posts deleted for no obvious reason.

 

Maybe it's best to stick to posing legal facts and not highlight what is happening on another site.

 

Regards to all

 

I don't remember seeing anything abeing deleted on here because it was an embarrassment to the person who posted it, or n order to make it seem that they had won an argument.

[Bailiff Advice]

.

 

If anyone is interested in knowing WHY Section 26 was introduced into the Crimes & Courts Act 2013 (although not yet bought into force), they should read the following House of Commons debate from January 2013.

 

PS: At the time of the debate, the section numbers were not the same.

 

https://www.theyworkforyou.com/pbc/2012-13/Crime_and_Courts_Bill/07-0_2013-01-31a.5.0?s=%27benefits%27+%A35%27+%27deduction%27+%27fine%27

 

On the same day in 2013, the debate considered a far more important clause allowing enforcement agents who are executing a writ or warrant of control for enforcement of a High Court or county court debt to use reasonable force on entry to commercial premises. Other powers of entry are debated as well.

 

The page is here:

 

https://www.theyworkforyou.com/pbc/2012-13/Crime_and_Courts_Bill/08-0_2013-01-31a.2.0

[Peterbard]

Yes interesting stuff, nice to see Stella Creasy there. I didn't realize she had an involvement in baiiff matters, she is of course isresponsible for the long standing fight against loan sharks in her"legal loan shark" campaign, met her once formidable woman.

 

The powers enacted by the crimes and courts act 2013 were very different indeed from the original ones that were included in the draft of the TCE

 

i think people forget that the TCE encloses many other parts as well as those relating to baiiffs, and parliament were anxious to get it enacted so these could be implemented, only part 3 and bits of part 4 were held back for further additions and regulations to be passed.

 

The additions to schedule twelve had to be contained within another act, as they supplemented or added new sections.

 

As well as introducing and codifying the powers to use force in cases of HCEO enforcement, and also on second visits(re entry), other parts of the act were amended, as mentioned in the debate BA posted.

 

The possibility of using force against the person was removed.

 

24(1)The power to enter and any power to use force are subject to any restriction imposed by or under regulations.

(2)A power to use force does not include power to use force against persons, except to the extent that regulations provide that it does.

 

The section italicized was removed from the act, and no longer exists.

 

The definition of abandoned goods was changed

 

Section 53

 

(2)Controlled goods are abandoned if they are unsold after a sale of which notice has been given in accordance with that paragraph.

 

This sub section now no longer exists , and the definition is now just in regards too notices sent, as in sub 1 of section 53 TCE..

 

Abandonment of securities, section 55(2) was also deleted.

[Peterbard]

I should also clarify that the provisions of the crimes and courts act do not alter the forced entry provisions of the rest of the TCE in schedule 12, they merely fill in the missing provisions which were excluded from the original draft.

 

So for instance HCEOs enforcing under the TCE can still not force entry against a owner of a limited company at his home, unless that business activity is being carried out there.

Unless he has applied for a warrant which is granted) for that specific purpose.(section 15, 25(3))

[Laura Thyme]

I should also clarify that the provisions of the crimes and courts act do not alter the forced entry provisions of the rest of the TCE in schedule 12, they merely fill in the missing provisions which were excluded from the original draft.

 

So for instance HCEOs enforcing under the TCE can still not force entry against a owner of a limited company at his home, unless that business activity is being carried out there.

Unless he has applied for a warrant which is granted) for that specific purpose.(section 15, 25(3))

How would you define business activity? A lot of people use limited companies as a vehicle to offer personal services, although new taxation introduced in April this year made this option much less attractive. What happens is the company's registered office is your home and you are a director of the company?

[Peterbard]

Then it would be okay for the HCEO to attend and force entry if necessary. Although he would only be able to seize goods bellongong to the company.

[Peterbard]

That is it it was the company who was being pursued of course.

[Laura Thyme]

Then it would be okay for the HCEO to attend and force entry if necessary. Although he would only be able to seize goods bellongong to the company.

So the HCEO can force entry into a director's residential address if it's also the company's registered office, even if it's just a home and no business is transacted there? Would it be better for the director to use one of them registered office address services? Would that stop the HCEO forcing entry? Finally, how can it be established whether the goods inside belong to the company?

[Laura Thyme]

That is it it was the company who was being pursued of course.

Yes, assuming the company's name was on the writ. Presumably if it was the director's name, then the HCEOs couldn't force entry.

[Peterbard]

Yes that's right, his/her liability would be limited .That is unless the premises was being used as part of the business.

[Laura Thyme]

Yes that's right, his/her liability would be limited .That is unless the premises was being used as part of the business.

So it's advisable to use another address as the registered office to avoid it being considered as "part of the business" purely because it's the registered office, even when it's just a home and no actual business takes place there, nor do any of the goods belong to the company but to the owner (director).