The Parking Ticket Guys
The Law Society of Upper Canada sanctioned a suspended paralegal
As jointly agreed to by the parties, we ordered a penalty of 19 months’ suspension at the time of the hearing. By then, the Paralegal had already served all but three days of the suspension.
We ordered the Paralegal to refund to all clients listed in the Law Society’s Schedule A of the RTA the traffic ticket penalties paid in the amounts stated.
We ordered that the Paralegal pay costs of $30,000.
The story
the Paralegal obtained his licence to provide legal services in Ontario in November 2013. His licence had been suspended on an interlocutory basis since October 19, 2016.
The Paralegal owned a business called Parking Ticket Guys Inc. (“PTG”). He owned and operated a website called parkingticketguys.com, which advertised that the website-based services provided would save citizens of Toronto 50% of the cost of a parking ticket.
On the website, the “Guys” were described as paralegals licensed by the Law Society. The website promised that the Guys would “take care” of a parking ticket for half its value. The Frequently Asked Questions page of the website indicated that if the Guys lost in court, they, and not the client, would pay the full fine. The client would pay nothing extra, “guaranteed.”
The website advised clients to disregard any Notice of Trial that the City of Toronto sent them, and not to attend court, because the Guys would do it.
Clients would access the website and pay the required fee online – half the ticket value plus HST. The website then generated a receipt for the client. However, the clients never received an account for legal services rendered.
A notice on the website regarding Terms & Conditions advised that PTG did not offer legal advice.
The Law Society received its first complaint about the Paralegal’s services regarding a City of Toronto parking ticket in February 2014.
The Society received 17 more complaints between June 2015 and February 2016. After February 2016, the Society received approximately 40 further similar complaints. The volume of the complaints and their similar nature resulted in the Society investigating only 38 of the 57 total complaints.
The Law Society investigated the complaints of 38 clients, who complained that the Paralegal had failed to honour the guarantee made on the PTG website. These complaints were filed between February 2014 and July 2016.
The clients had each paid one-half of the original fine charged and expected the ticket to be taken care of. PTG completely failed to honour its guarantee in 30 of the 38 cases and partially honoured the guarantee in one case. It reimbursed clients in six cases, after the clients filed complaints to the Law Society. In one other case, the client was reimbursed after writing a negative report on Twitter.
One of the cases dealt with a red-light ticket, in addition to a parking ticket, and the red-light matter was not dealt with as part of the standard web-based process. In one case, PTG asked a client to attend and sign a blank affidavit to appeal a conviction, which the client refused to do.
The clients all believed that PTG was representing them and that PTG and the Paralegal were one and the same. The clients expected the Guys to handle or “deal with” the parking ticket as advertised on the web pages.
In some cases, clients received a Notice of Trial with a trial date from the City of Toronto, which they forwarded to PTG. They learned later that they had been convicted and that a fine was due or overdue, by way of a Notice of Conviction and Fine. In some cases, they were unable to renew licence plates because of unpaid fines. In one case, a client learned of the conviction and overdue fine when his car was towed.
(Mike Frisch)