Hindsight
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- Location
- Lincolnshire
Am intrigued. Suing RPA for what?? What would be the case?
2017 BPS Payments - Status
- Thread starter Jerry
- Start date
Am intrigued. Suing RPA for what?? What would be the case?
Coximus
Member
You can for breach of contract as the wording of the BPS application is a contract to comply with a set of rules in exchange for payment (The consideration).
That said, you would have to prove breach of contract on their part and ensure your claim was whiter than white - IE No beaches of compliance etc. To get their you would basically have to go through complaints (which can take anything upto 2 years as it regularly runs into the following year complicating the matter) and then go via the parliamentary ombudsman (their are many example cases on their site) . If your still dissatisfied then you could go to court, but many courts would reject the claims as they will come down to the literal definition of compliance and the evidence used. The most minor breach is still a breach of contract and would make it difficult to really ascertain blame - so in short you may win and say get 5ha paid on, but may not get awarded costs as you were found to have failed cross compliance on another block of land, or miss declared something...
It really depends on what it is,
I think if you go through all their complaints procedure and appeal and win, I wonder if you have a case to claim damages (where you can prove them). I suspect they would settle before court on a sound case
Coximus
Member
Tenuous as the fact the complaints procedure found in your favor vindicates it as working fairely, and as a part of the scheme, so any damages would be nominal at best if they conceded mal administration themselves (ie token amount). If the complaints rejected you claim, you sued them in court and a judge found they had failed to pay when they were due to pay, then you may get costs, but as the scheme does not constitute a contract in the stricter definition, damages would really be limited to reasonable costs - but your duty bound by law to mitigate your costs, so you would have a hard time claiming for agents fees etc. I think it basically boils down to you do not HAVE to apply....
Under the old SPS this quote on an FOI request to RPA said,
"To answer the first part of your question, the Gov.uk SPS guidance sets out the terms and conditions for all farmers who claim the Single Payments Scheme (SPS), there are no individual contracts made between the Rural Payments Agency (RPA) and the 1 REF: RFI 3860 claimants of SPS"
I would assume the same applies to BPS, which makes the contract an implied contract, thus getting it through a court would be messy and expensive. In effect BPS is an invite to claim money, the key being "claim" they then assess the "claim" and pay those they deem valid, according to the rules they set. Its in effect an invite to contract, but they could, reasonably argue that as no contract exists prior to accepting your claim, its on their terms - so you would still be entitled to your claim payout, as they accepted the claim and you met the rules, but damages? I doubt it, as you were invited to claim and not under duress and on their terms, and so long as they can prove they followed their scheme rules, it should stand.
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I think that's the point though, you followed their rules, so should be entitled to the appropriate recompense, claim or contract this is still valid. I would agree, I doubt you would be able to claim damages above anything directly/immediately effected, but can see it being possible with a sensible approach and valid evidence that you have upheld your end of the 'Deal' !
Coximus
Member
Pretty much head on but that requires them to say they'e not paying. There is no committd payment date. Just a window which is always described as a target!
Disappointment? Got to be worth something.
Very true, but it's "unreasonable" for the window to be open ended, I think a court would favor a claimant, all other things equal on that bases, well I would hope they would.
What about find a direct cost, and a simple money claim, I'm sure there is a method to make a money claim against a govt agency. Wonder how they would respond?
Problem is - disappointment was expected.....
Coximus
Member
GPOL - genuine pre estimate of loss - you need to itemise your loss, and prove that you did all that was reasonable to mitigate it - IE not get an agent to do all the call chasing - prove the value of your time relative to your income (minus the BPS) and even then if RPA say (as they did to me 8 months after raising the complaint) "were taking 9-10 months to assign complaints to look at) then you would have a hard time claiming loss if you kept calling in that time. Totally aside from the total lack of resources that RPA have to do their job.
As a disclaimer I sought legal advice for my rpa-botched 2016 claim, and was advised that most courts would reject the claim unless I had exhausted the complaints and arbitration processes first. As their was no individual contract, this would certainly be the case, and any costs and damages would need to be itemised and proven as unavoidable and prove that RPA had failed their own rules - IE by the published guidance you had access to (if the process they use is not freely available for you to view and understand they can't rely on it in court as a reason to not pay you, as you couldn't reasonably be able to plan to comply) - and that a judge works through your claim and says you should be paid - then you would win, but costs would be very limited.
(this was after 10 months of radio-silence from RPA, despite fortnightly calls to chase up) at 10 months I was assigned to someone to deal with the complaint, and it is still ongoing at month 15 and has caused this years BPS to not be paid yet as their are issues with the account making it not possible to pay correctly (basically a rerun of 2016).
The opposite is NE - they send out an individual contract to each scheme claimant and its personal to a block of land, its owner/tenant and specific. as such Breach of contract is just that, and I was advised clearly that many have had success against NE, usually by trying to get the agreements (Contract) declared void by the court - It was explained to me that NE tends to simply not contest, and most people realise if NE cant pay, for the sake of £3000 odd a year its not worth 10 years of hassle and want out! Otherwise for larger claims, it seems to be they sort it out pretty swift before a court date is set rendering a hearing after the fact pointless. Finally as its a contract, It was demonstrated by example that as the penalties are one sided, the contract is "unfair in principle" and thus a judge was likely to award compensation inline with NE penalties which would be charged if you broke the contract - IE they want £500 off you for a minor breach, its only equitable that you get the same if they breach.
Again I was told its rare to get this far as NE do not want their contracts testing in court as they are open to interpretation as to whether or not they are enforceable, IE binding you to fullfill your contractual duties and setting penalty's for non performance, but either having no penalties for their own non performance, and still holding you to your duty. Even more complicated and void as they are both the contract party and the enforcing body, and effectively can break contract, punish you and claim and enforce contract without themselves having any burden of contract.
That's it - they can't be judge, jury and executioner. This has always bothered me, but the last thing you want is to split them up and create another whole load of middle management funded by the tax payer, doing nothing!
Has anyone here gone to the independent appeal within their process and won?
Has anyone gone to their independent appeal and lost, I would love to know why! Most cases, albeit only presented from one side on here, are very clear cut.
Perhaps a FOI request about the appeal stats
Coximus
Member
The thing is everyone has to be given the chance to fix their own mistakes, rpa inclused and they are under no obligation to even accept your claim to start with son effectively itake quote voluntary system! You can still go legal. You just have to exhaust their internal systems - ultimately the whole problem boils down to them beige short staffed to do what they need to do, and senior management having insufficient skill to implement the bps - hence the IT cockup
Them being short staffed, is no excuse whatsoever. Perhaps anyone who has ever had a penalty for non compliance of any sort should just say, it's not that they haven't complied, it is just that they are short staffed and haven't complied "Yet".
Coximus
Member
And it comes down to the difference between excuse reason and legality... morally their is no excuse!
But having been trough the mill, I learnt simply that from a legal standpoint the wording is everything
But having been trough the mill, I learnt simply that from a legal standpoint the wording is everything
@Guy Smith , claim validation so could be June on this years , never got paid till June last year and are still 10% short on that claim , I was always led to believe if you had been mucked about the preveious year you would expect prompt payment the following.
Just to top it off while speaking to the rpa she mentioned 2017 claim prioritisies the outstanding amounts on 2016 claim , seriously wtf
Just to top it off while speaking to the rpa she mentioned 2017 claim prioritisies the outstanding amounts on 2016 claim , seriously wtf
As we understand it they inspect 10% every year and then 10% of those go back in the 91% pot where 10% are inspected again. So you are unlikely to be inspected in successive years but it's not unknown.
With 50-60% paid we think they are on track to pay over 90% by dec 31st but we'd like to see a bit more progress soon as things seem to have dried up recently.
We think it is the inspected who will make up the majority of those not paid by the end of the month.
We've asked for bridging payments for those not paid by dec 31 and we want to see much more progress on issues outstanding from previous years.
We intend to do somd extensive survey work in the new year to assess the lie of the land.
But here's wishing everyone gets paid soon. I know the feeling. I'm still not paid.