has anyone ever brought the county council to (the small claims) court? :-pot holes

D

docman

Guest
Just wondering has anyone ever brought the county council to the small claims court?

A week before the vast flooding back in November I hit a very large pothole and blew out my tyre. A new tyre set me back €100.

I sent in a claim to the county council along with photos of the state of the road (which on a scale of 1-10 is very bad 10/10. I clearly photographed the pot holes including the one that caused by blow out about 17 inches in diameter and 4-6 inches deep in the middle of the road.

I also got a witness to the incident.

They denied my claim full stop. I pay large amount of road tax and I think I am entitled to put in a claim for this and at the same time entitled for them to repair the road which is still in a bad state!

Anyone have any thoughts on this?
 
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Was there a (bad) repair job done on the pothole ?
 
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yup, filled in with grit within a week, the road is still in a bad state, 7 weeks on! The whole road needs to be re tarmacadamed badly
 
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I think there needs to have been a repair job done prior to your accident to have a claim, not after.
 
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but you pay road tax for the maintenance of the roads and it is quite clear that this road in not being maintained properly
 
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Not sure you could even take a small claims case in this instance. Have a read through the Courts.ie website for some information.

[broken link removed]

From the above website - "To be eligible to use the procedure, you, the "consumer" must have bought the goods or services (or the service) for private use from someone selling them in the course of business."

Which I don't think you would qualify under.
 
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I read that alright but you also qualify for ...

(b) a claim for minor damage to property

This is minor damage to my car which is my property.
 
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They said its not their policy to payout for claims against wear and tear of the roads! But that being said I know several people have brought the state of this specific road to one of the local politicans. I guess I should contact him and get it in writing from him that he has brought this up with the council and then go ahead with the claim. I was just wondering if anyone else had any similiar experiences?
 
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Normally for the councils to be liable they need to do something wrong, eg fill in a pothole the wrong way, however if they built the road the wrong way, perhaps with wrong type of road drainage, it could possibly cause a problem for them.

also look up Office of the Ombudsman.
 
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thanks tommysmith, just checked out the Office of the Ombudsman and I think I'll start there! As an independant third party they might be able to identify if the claim is valid or not. I'll be contacting the politican first though to beef up my case
 
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docman said:
You know I meant motor tax! and why do we pay motor tax ... "The revenue from this tax is used to maintain and upgrade the road network in Ireland
Click to expand...

Oh no it's not, well not specifically anyway. In other countries, income from motor taxes are ringfenced for spending on the road network, improvements, upgrades etc. But in Ireland, motor taxes are part of the total tax take, and a proportion is allocated in the general budget for roads. In recent years when motor tax has been increased there has been no corresponding increase in the budget allocation to roads.
 
Re: has anyone ever brought the county council to the small claims court? ot holes

I may be jumping in here but a few evenings ago on my way home after visiting relatives, I went into huge pothole in the road and blew front tyre. As it was dark I couldn't very well take photoes of the hole and in addition to that it was so cold that it took all my strength to change the tyre and get the hell home asap. The thing is the damage to the wheel and tyre came to 150 euro, I was of the opinion the council paid these bills but then again they must be thousands like me who have had to face the annoyance and expensive costs of repairing burst tyres over the recent cold icy snap, it has left the roads are in an appalling state and I would imagine the poor government are too broke to have to pay for it all.
 
Re: has anyone ever brought the county council to the small claims court? ot holes

My local radio station had a pot-hole campaign last year ... encouraging people to make claims against the local council for damage due to pot-holes. If I rememberg correctly, the general gist was that a fault in the road (pot-hole) must be reported to the council, if they do not fix the fault within a reasonable time frame and then you damage your car, you have a case ... sorry I can't be more specific, I only caught a bit of it while driving (avoiding pot holes)
 
Re: has anyone ever brought the county council to the small claims court? ot holes

Is making a claim against the councl for not maintaining roads a bit like claiming against the government for not maintaining banks?

Unfortunately we live in a country with less than perfect Government/Services etc. I sympathise with the OP but if we all start making claims for everything that is wrong with Ireland today it becomes a bit of a farce.
 
Re: has anyone ever brought the county council to (the small claims) court? ot hol

Moved from Consumer Issues and Rights to Cars & Motoring which is where this kind of question is discussed on AAM.

I have heard people who have persued the CoCo through the regular courts for damages but I dont think the small claims court is the appropriate place for this type of claim.

As an aside I came across some truly lunar sized craters in the roads around Mallow over the last few days.
 
Re: has anyone ever brought the county council to (the small claims) court? ot hol

I have just hit a massive pothole which has busted my front shock, bent my alloy, taken a chunk out of my tyre in addition to taking a chunk out of my rear alloy and damaging my rear tyre. I priced a new shock for the car and was told I have to buy two, that you're not supposed to replace one on its own. I have been reading on other forums about how to go about claiming for the damage and it seems that the pothole must have been recently repaired but not sufficently for a claim to be made. I'm not familiar with the road in question so how would I know if an attempt had be made to repair it?
 
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