Private Parking Tickets discussion

Oopsadaisy

£60 fine - no solicitors or other sides legal costs. Court fee [£30ish]......


......but it will never get to court....but hey...... don't believe me.

trisontana

Oopsadaisy wrote: »

£60 fine - no solicitors or other sides legal costs. Court fee [£30ish]......


......but it will never get to court....but hey...... don't believe me.

Except it's not a "fine". Please do not dignify/legitimise the process by giving it that name.

berrym123

I used the word 'fine' for want of a better word! I am quite happy that if it was myself I would ignore all correspondences but my friend is not so sure! When these seemingly legitimate companies begi threatening baliffs and court action it can become quite a worry. Thanks for the advice

Shovell

Hi guys.

Another slightly worried customer on your hands here.

I received a parking fine back in July 09 from a retail car park looked after by OPC. I was actually none the wiser until nearly 3 months later in October 09 when they informed me by post of the fine (I never had a ticket on my car). I apparently outstayed my 2 hour welcome I am not sure this is true but apparently they have digital evidence.

After reading part of this long thread I decided to ignore the fine. Recently I have received a second letter from Windsor-Smythe and Partners (debt collectors) working on behalf of OPC telling me I have a new increased fine and if it is not paid they have instruction to proceed through the county court without further notice. They say the process will result in additional legal costs being payable by myself and failure to settle this debt may have a direct effect ''your credit standing''.

I am not sure what to do now, I know you guys say ignore ignore ignore, but I don't want to run myself up a huge bill.

I suppose my questions are.

1. Do I contact them to say f*** off, or do I just ignore them completely? It seems contacting them in any way makes them think they have got you.

2. Can this effect my credit rating?? I obviously don't want this.

3. If the worst came to the worst and I have to go to court and lost what are the costs likely to be like?? I don't want this fine to spiral out of control it has already risen and I don't want it to get worse.

4. Can they send around the bailiffs?

trisontana

Keep on ignoring, and please stop using the word "fine". You are legitimising what is really just a scam.

They cannot just "send round the bailiffs". For that to happen it would have to go to court (very unlikely), you lose (very, very unlikely) and then you refuse to pay whatever the judge orders.

There might be the remote possibility that they may send a debt collector to your door before it goes to court, but don't forget that debt-collectors are not bailiffs. They are just private citizens with no special powers. They cannot enter your premises, they cannot seize goods and they cannot blacken your credit record. If they do turn up tell them to just "go away" (what words you use is up to you). If they refuse, then call the police.

Oopsadaisy

Shovell wrote: »

Hi guys.

Another slightly worried customer on your hands here.

I received a parking fine back in July 09 from a retail car park looked after by OPC. I was actually none the wiser until nearly 3 months later in October 09 when they informed me by post of the fine (I never had a ticket on my car). I apparently outstayed my 2 hour welcome I am not sure this is true but apparently they have digital evidence.

After reading part of this long thread I decided to ignore the fine. Recently I have received a second letter from Windsor-Smythe and Partners (debt collectors) working on behalf of OPC telling me I have a new increased fine and if it is not paid they have instruction to proceed through the county court without further notice. They say the process will result in additional legal costs being payable by myself and failure to settle this debt may have a direct effect ''your credit standing''.

I am not sure what to do now, I know you guys say ignore ignore ignore, but I don't want to run myself up a huge bill.

I suppose my questions are.

1. Do I contact them to say f*** off, or do I just ignore them completely? It seems contacting them in any way makes them think they have got you.

2. Can this effect my credit rating?? I obviously don't want this.

3. If the worst came to the worst and I have to go to court and lost what are the costs likely to be like?? I don't want this fine to spiral out of control it has already risen and I don't want it to get worse.

4. Can they send around the bailiffs?

To reassure yourself try.........

reading this and other threads [although you say you have done this, read them again]

searching the web for ANYONE that has ever been taken to court [let alone taken to court and lost!!!!!!!!] Do let us know how you get on [btw you won't find any, and there's a reason for that.............[I'll leave you to work it out....lol]]

Micky

For the word "fine", substitute the word "invoice"

Coupon-mad

Oopsadaisy wrote: »

To reassure yourself try.........

reading this and other threads [although you say you have done this, read them again]

searching the web for ANYONE that has ever been taken to court [let alone taken to court and lost!!!!!!!!] Do let us know how you get on [btw you won't find any, and there's a reason for that.............[I'll leave you to work it out....lol]]

In fact OPC have taken a few people to Small Claims Court last year and the most recent one was on pepipoo.com in February. OPC lost in 5 out of 5 known cases so far.

I think there is also a current thread on pepipoo which is about OPC saying they are going to take the poster to Court (but he's not overly concerned going by their record!).

Shovell, get yourself over to pepipoo.com here:

http://forums.pepipoo.com/index.php?showforum=30

Scroll down to the bottom left, search box, look for 'OPC Court' or similar keywords of your choice. You should find some relevant threads including successes, see post #196 by Discocrazy2 who was taken to Court by OPC and of course OPC lost:

http://forums.pepipoo.com/index.php?showtopic=13479&st=180&start=180

If you are still concerned, register on pepipoo, read the READ THIS FIRST sticky on there and then start your own thread. Don't reply on someone else's thread about your own case, that's not popular on pepipoo as there are so many cases it would get confusing.

HTH

joanne1505

Yesterday i had just finished a 3 x 12 hour night shifts and set my alarm to get up at 11.30am. I went into town to do my weekly shopping in sainsbury's at just after 1pm. I was in the shop for about 50 minutes and came back to my car to find a parking ticket from 'euro car parks' stating that my car had outstayed its 2 hour parking time stating that it had first been clocked at 11:02 till 13:35. I had only been parked for 20 mins then and at 11:02 my car had been on my drive and i had been asleep. No-one else has access to my car and i have only had this car for 3 weeks and in that time i have only parked 3 times in this car park and the only time that could correspond with 11:02 is last thursday. I immediately went to see the ticket man who told me that he could not get any details from his machine as he had issued a written ticket and not the printed one as his boss had that day replaced his machine with a manual one that does not print out tickets and he has to manually write then out. My car is brand new 10 plate, and he could not answer the question about imputting my reg at 11:02, that was impossible though as it was on my drive and i had the keys and i was asleep.!! I imformed him of this at the scene and he just said i would have to take it up with ticket agency. All i can think is either he just wrote it out because he can or that the machine he used to imput my reg at 13:35 was the same machine that was used on the thursday morning that i was parked there and the information had stored in it from then. I am totally perplexed as to how i should argue this and i am going to as i only did my shop and was back at my car at 13:55 less than an hour after i entered the car park.

James_N

joanne1505 wrote: »

Yesterday i had just finished a 3 x 12 hour night shifts and set my alarm to get up at 11.30am. I went into town to do my weekly shopping in sainsbury's at just after 1pm. I was in the shop for about 50 minutes and came back to my car to find a parking ticket from 'euro car parks' stating that my car had outstayed its 2 hour parking time stating that it had first been clocked at 11:02 till 13:35. I had only been parked for 20 mins then and at 11:02 my car had been on my drive and i had been asleep. No-one else has access to my car and i have only had this car for 3 weeks and in that time i have only parked 3 times in this car park and the only time that could correspond with 11:02 is last thursday. I immediately went to see the ticket man who told me that he could not get any details from his machine as he had issued a written ticket and not the printed one as his boss had that day replaced his machine with a manual one that does not print out tickets and he has to manually write then out. My car is brand new 10 plate, and he could not answer the question about imputting my reg at 11:02, that was impossible though as it was on my drive and i had the keys and i was asleep.!! I imformed him of this at the scene and he just said i would have to take it up with ticket agency. All i can think is either he just wrote it out because he can or that the machine he used to imput my reg at 13:35 was the same machine that was used on the thursday morning that i was parked there and the information had stored in it from then. I am totally perplexed as to how i should argue this and i am going to as i only did my shop and was back at my car at 13:55 less than an hour after i entered the car park.

Don't bother doing anything or getting worked up. It's an unenforcable request to pay. File the letter in case they take it any further - but usually you will get three or so letters and then they wil give up. The ins and outs of how and why should not concern you.