Private Parking Tickets discussion

SylvieD8

Not sure whether I am posting this in the correct place as I am completely new to this. I have read lots of stuff about Private Parking Tickets. I am still scared though I received one of those from TPS back in June and have done nothing but ignore!! Today though I have received a letter from a Debt Recovery Company and it has shaken me a little. I found the list of letters I can expect to get from TPS ending with a letter from a company who purchases the debts?? Can someone reassure me I will not end up having to pay £1000's of pounds?? Thanks

taffy056

SylvieD8 wrote: »

Not sure whether I am posting this in the correct place as I am completely new to this. I have read lots of stuff about Private Parking Tickets. I am still scared though I received one of those from TPS back in June and have done nothing but ignore!! Today though I have received a letter from a Debt Recovery Company and it has shaken me a little. I found the list of letters I can expect to get from TPS ending with a letter from a company who purchases the debts?? Can someone reassure me I will not end up having to pay £1000's of pounds?? Thanks

Sylvie,

Its a bit ironic that debt recovery companies get involved with this, they are there to recover debts, but in a private car park, there is no debts to recover, so how can they be involved?

Really the best advice is to ignore it completely as they will not take you to court, let me guess here, you parked in a supermarket car park and stayed to long, these car parks are free, so how can there a be a loss to the TPS?

You need to understand something, these tickets are not enforceable, and are often illegal as a private company CANNOT issue fines, only the council, courts or police can do that, basically they are trying to scam you so please ignore them.

SylvieD8

Thank you taffy056

Feel better already. Why are those companies allowed to carry on issuing these "fines" and terrorise people!! I will continue to ignore them though!! And you are correct, I overstayed in a carpark which did not charge, (Sports Direct, Halford etc) and was completely unaware that there was a time limit. There are signs there, but you would easily miss them unless you were looking for them!!

taffy056

SylvieD8 wrote: »

Thank you taffy056

Feel better already. Why are those companies allowed to carry on issuing these "fines" and terrorise people!! I will continue to ignore them though!! And you are correct, I overstayed in a carpark which did not charge, (Sports Direct, Halford etc) and was completely unaware that there was a time limit. There are signs there, but you would easily miss them unless you were looking for them!!

Well done you don't forget to pass the message along to everyone who will listen, the reason why they can continue is there no regulation at all, and there are plenty of people who will pay up thinking its a real fine, basically you are looking for a council logo on a ticket to be a real PCN, you will know a police fine should you ever get one.

A strongly worded compalint to said shops head office will get some notice, whether they will act on it is another matter, just don't send anything to the private parking company as its pointless, they turn down ALL appeals.

trisontana

Another semi-loss for OPC this morning, (as reported on CAG). In this case the motorist receievd a CCJ by default because all the paperwork (apart from the actual CCJ) had been sent to the wrong address. The case has now been "set-aside" when the motorist will be able to put their side of the story regarding the claim by the PPC.

It doesn't look good for OPC though. According to the paperwork that the "defendant" has now finally seen, they have got basic facts wrong regarding the place where the "offence" is supposed to have taken place, and it looks as though OPC may have sent out fake court papers yet again during their pursuit of the motorist. The judge wasn't happy about the original sum claimed of £100 morphing into £1,000 by the time it got to court.

carparkfine

Hi everyone, I'm hoping you can help, I have browsed through these various threads and even looked up the letters sent by the private companies in respect of those parking "fines". I was fined by TPS in June this year and was able to look up all the threatening letters to expect, thanks to Pimpslider, however, I'm now at the debt recovery letter stage, and am getting anxious. Can they turn up on my doorstep? Can they take a different approach to that posted by Pimpslider? I was at fault as I overstayed my welcome in a free 2hr car park, by over 40mns, however, I was doing charity work at the time. I haven't made any contact with TPS whatsoever as advised by a knowledgeable friend. They don't know if I was the driver, they have photographic evidence, but it is quite unclear. Can they see that I accessed the file to check the photo? Do they see this as "making contact"? I'm so nervous, I have tried to read the success stories, but most refer to council fines, and not private fines, I really need someone to put my mind at rest that they will not take me to court or issue CCJs against me as threatened in their latest letter. Thank you for coming back to me.

trisontana

Just keep ignoring and please don't confuse debt collectors with bailiffs. You are taking the whole thing too seriously , just relax and they will eventually stop bothering you. If you have read all the other posting on here you will know that's the best course of action.

They cannot just "issue" a CCJ against you. It will have to go to court and they will have to prove they have suffered an actual loss. As this was a free car park that loss is precisely zero.

trisontana

If you want further reassurance please read this , taken from Pepipoo in answer to somebody's question about "evidence":-

I assume you mean that you've considered all of the following and found them to be provable by the company purporting to have a legal right to demand money from you!

Establishing that any claim is under the law of contract, rather than the tort of trespass (see case of Excel Parking Services v Alan Matthews, Wrexham County Court, May 2009 where the parking company lost on this ground);
Establishing that all of the elements of a contract (offer, acceptance, consideration) are present;
Establishing who the driver was on the relevant occasion, as any contract can only be enforced against the driver, who may or may not be the registered keeper of the vehicle;
Establishing the prominence and adequacy of any warning signage, and that the driver actually saw and understood the signage (Waltham Forest v Vine [CCRTF 98/1290/B2]);
Establishing that the amount claimed is not an unlawful “penalty”, including that there was no attempt to “frighten and intimidate” the driver (see well reported case of Excel Parking Services v Hetherington-Jakeman, Mansfield County Court, March 2008 where the parking company lost on this ground);
Establishing that any contract does not fail foul of the Unfair Contract Terms Act and associated regulations.

Coblcris

Establishing if the Private Parking Company could even lawfully make the offer of parking.

AlexisV

Excel Parking Services v Alan Matthews, Wrexham County Court, May 2009

They lost another one last year? Those clowns are suckers for punishment.