Met parking services - advice please

p5x · 28 October 2013 at 6:53PM

Having returned from holiday, I have received a “notice to keeper” letter from these lot with the following details:

Date of incident: 8/9/13
Date of issue of notice: 9/10/13
“Contravention” : Leaving the site

Now, having compared the details with this website, I can see a couple of problems with their letter. Firstly, they have failed to identify the creditor as far as I can see (can post a pic of the letter if it helps). Secondly, regarding the “Details of the discount for payment within 14 days” – is this meant to be 14 days from the PCN or 14 days from the “notice to keeper”?

I then received a final notice letter 12 days later (still away on holiday at this point) saying that the charge is now overdue and that my right to appeal is no longer available:

“Please note, as 28 days has passed from the date of our initial correspondence, the period for submitting a formal appeal has now expired, and therefore the right for further appeal to the independent appeals service, POPLA, will only be available in extenuating circumstances."

I was under the impression that I needed to wait 28 days before appealing to the parking company according to this flowchart: and several posts on this forum (Eg- here)

Also, they offer no evidence of me “leaving the site”, just a picture of my car :rotfl:

Could someone kindly advise how I should proceed from here?

Coupon-mad · 28 October 2013 at 6:59PM

Not sure what you mean about waiting 28 days? You only wait if you have got a windscreen PCN. Yours was a postal PCN so you respond to it with a challenge! You should have clicked on 'I have an ANPR letter' in the flowchart. You didn't have a ticket on the car.

Date of incident: 8/9/13
Date of issue of notice: 9/10/13

Are those dates right, did you only get the NTK in OCTOBER? If so then 28 days have not passed! And they sent the postal PCN outside of 14 days!

See the flowchart as per challenging it.

p5x · 28 October 2013 at 7:06PM

sorry, just to clarify, I got a windscreen ticket on the day (8/9/13) but I was under the impression that I needed to wait until the notice to keeper arrived in the post. The NTK arrived on 9/10/13 followed by another "payment overdue" letter 12 days later stating I can no longer appeal the charge.

This seems incorrect according to what I've read on these forums?

p5x · 28 October 2013 at 7:26PM

Just to reply to your question on the other thread:

Have you complained to the BPA about the late NTK?

According to the parking cowboys site:

The Creditor or its agent must have made application to the DVLA for your name and address either

NOT EARLIER than 28 days after the vehicle was parked (where a Notice to Driver was issued); or
NOT LATER than 14 days after the vehicle was parked (where a Notice to Driver was not issued)

So, looks like they've sent the NTK at the right time, no?

Guys_Dad · 28 October 2013 at 10:45PM

NtK arrived on time. You have 28 days to appeal to the PPC to get your POPLA code or a cancellation.

I would appeal to the PPC saying that the driver disputes leaving the site and requires a map of the site and evidence of him doing so. Furthermore, if one of their operatives suspected that a driver was going to leave site, thereby causing the PPC to incur losses, then under English law it was his duty to inform the driver in order to mitigate these losses

In addition, given the spate of GPEOL (look it up) defeats for PPCs at POPLA, you believe that their charges are not genuine pre-estimates of loss and that should the decide not to cancel your charge, then please supply you with a POPLA code. Advise them that you reserve the right to add further appeal points at POPLA after further research and that GPEOL will be one of these points.

Coupon-mad · 29 October 2013 at 2:17AM

Yep you are in time to appeal as the registered keeper, referring to the receipt of the 9th October letter. Do not mention the PCN nor infer who was 'the driver'.

Can you show us a photo or scan of the Notice to Keeper please?

Both sides if there is writing on both sides? I suspect it's not compliant with POFA 2012 in one way or another, even though it was sent in time (I misunderstood your OP and thought you'd never had a windscreen ticket so I was working on the 14 days time limit, wrongly). I am asking to look at a few PPC NTKs now because almost every one we see is not compliant and we can build that into a POPLA appeal.

p5x · 29 October 2013 at 11:05AM

Thanks for the advice so far. I've uploaded front and back of both of the letters I've received from them so far here

I can see the following problems with the letters:
1) Failure to identify creditor
2) There doesn't appear to be a discount for payment within 14 days available on the NTK
3) They've said that I can no longer appeal the charge and therefore POPLA is no longer available to me.

Coupon-mad · 29 October 2013 at 5:50PM

They don't have to offer the keeper a discount, AFAIK.

And they have offered POPLA in the NTK dated 9th October so challenge the PCN on that basis, replying to THAT letter. You can add that they have also failed to ID the creditor and have sent a liability Notice far too soon as you are still within your 28 days to challenge the PCN as the registered keeper.

So start with:

Dear Sir/Madam,
I am the registered keeper of car reg xxxxxxx and am challenging the Notice dated 9th October. In the meantime you have also sent me an erroneous Liability Notice far too soon and I will be reporting MET to the BPA about this because I am still well within my 28 days to appeal the Notice to Keeper.

Then say that the ticket represents no loss flowing from the driver's parking of the car that day and the Notice to Keeper fails to even make clear what the alleged contravention was supposed to be, which fails to meet the strict requirements of paragraph 8 of Schedule 4 of POFA 2012. Say that they should cancel the ticket or send you a POPLA code.

To report the early 'liability Notice' to the BPA, use this email address and word it as a complaint:

[EMAIL="david.m@britishparking.co.uk"]david.m@britishparking.co.uk[/EMAIL]

HTH

p5x · 29 October 2013 at 6:22PM

Coupon-mad wrote: »

They don't have to offer the keeper a discount, AFAIK.

I was basing it on this although I don't know if it's a mandatory requirement:

Details of the discount for payment within 14 days, The Discount should be at least 40% of the full charge under the BPA Code of Practice (applies to BPA Members only)

Coupon-mad wrote: »

And they have offered POPLA in the NTK dated 9th October so challenge the PCN on that basis, replying to THAT letter. You can add that they have also failed to ID the creditor and have sent a liability Notice far too soon as you are still within your 28 days to challenge the PCN as the registered keeper.

snip

HTH

Thanks, will get on with it now.

Coupon-mad · 30 October 2013 at 1:24AM

The discount would have been on the original PCN - which you are not going to mention in your appeal as registered keeper!

Remember that the very useful guidance in the Parking Cowboys link is generalising about 'Notice to Keeper letters' which could also be those sent by day 14, where there was never any windscreen PCN...in those cases there would be a discount on the NTK. But not in your case because a NTK which follows a windscreen PCN is a slightly different animal.

p5x · 30 October 2013 at 11:57AM

I notice they've taken a picture of the vehicle with the PCN stuck on the windscreen, although this doesn't prove that the driver of the vehicle actually received it.

Also, should I post the appeal to the PPC by recorded delivery or just get proof of posting? I don't feel like wasting any more money on this than I really need to but then I don't want them to claim they didn't receive the appeal.

Having said that, none of their correspondence to me has been sent by recorded delivery.

Met parking services - advice please

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