Private Parking Tickets discussion

peter_the_piper

sanjaymaz wrote: »

Carrie74 - simply send them a letter stating that the company and any of its agents are explicitly forbidden to enter your property. That way if the bailiffs turn up, DO NOT let them in (they have no right of entry anyway) and call the police telling them that you are being harassed and you have trespassers who are being threatening. Good luck.

AFAIK this is not strictly true. A court appointed bailiff has rights of entry etc but a firm of debt collectors who pretend they are bailiffs are not supposed to visit a persons place of residence. It is important to make the distinction very clear.

trisontana

I have just received Martin's weekly newsletter, and guess what? it's headlined "Don't Pay Private Parking Fines". Come on Martin, I thought we had sorted this all out and agreed that these are not fines!

peter_the_piper

Problem is We know they are not fines but the other 95% don't. They've been led to believe that they are legit and until they learn the error of their ways most people will continue to call them this. When they understand then the PPC's will wither and die.

trisontana

peter_the_piper wrote: »

Problem is We know they are not fines but the other 95% don't. They've been led to believe that they are legit and until they learn the error of their ways most people will continue to call them this. When they understand then the PPC's will wither and die.

So Martin should educate those 95% by not calling them fines.

AlanMoneySavingMan

My story shows how useful it can be to take photos.

Like most station car parks, Salisbury station's parking arrangements are - on most days -inadequate for the number of users. One day I had a late start on my trip to London and could not find an empty marked parking spot. In desperation, I parked my small car on the end of a row, where it was plain that I was not obstructing anyone or causing any access problems.

Of course, when I returned later that day there was a ticket fluttering on my windscreen. My initial thought was, 'well it's a fair cop guv' but then I looked around and saw that, actually, a 4x4 nearby had been parked a lot more obstructively, yet had NOT got a ticket -albeit that it had one wheel on the edge of a marked parking bay. Self-evidently, cars adjacent to the 4x4 were going to be very hard or perhaps impossible to get out. This made me more than a little peeved, so having my camera with me I started snapping, both my car and this 4x4 from several angles, so as to show I was not obstructing and that the 4x4 definitely was.

Of course the "reminder" - well more like a demand - came in the post fairly soon with the usual fine escalation and legal action threats. I called the firm dealing with the legal side of this, the much discussed and shame-ridden Trethowan's, who will certainly NEVER get any legal business from me or anyone in my family due to their participation in this murky side of the law. I told them that I thought I had been the subject of "Unusual treatment" (a phrase I picked up from legal sites) and told them about the content of the car park photos I had taken. After a lot of consideration (and I think eventually I did email at least one of photos) they cancelled the ticket.

Of course this simple description leaves out the sheer hassle of getting responses from Trethowans (three or four calls for each step of the saga) and the time spent looking for advice on how to deal with this issue. One wonders whether a counter claim for unjust treatment is realistic, or worth pursuing, in such a case?

I'd certainly consider voting for anyone who said they were going to tackle this chaotic area of the law and clean it up, or for anyone who said they were going to fix the appalling parking facilities at railway stations but I guess the politicians have bigger fish to fry, and I bet some of them are invested in parking companies anyway :rolleyes:

Alan.

blind_pew

Does anybody out there have any experience of the following?
Yesterday I received a letter from a debt collection agency called Roxburghe.

This is in relation to a 'ticket' issued in April from MET Parking Services in a shopping centre in Romford. We have ignored it as my wife, who was driving (and me) felt that £50 for an eight minute overstay was a tad excessive. The overstay was genuine as the Mrs got lost.

If we were genuinely in the wrong, we'd have paid.

Anyway they have now made threats of contact from a firm of solictors called Graham White, based in Surrey. These appear to be genuine as I've checked their flash & glossy websites.

Basically, can anybody recommend a course of action. These quite nasty letters are getting stressful to us.
many thanks

peter_the_piper

AlanMoneySavingMan wrote: »

My story shows how useful it can be to take photos.

Like most station car parks Salisbury stations parking arrangements are - on most days -inadequate for the number of users. One day I had a late start on my trip to London and could not find an empty marked parking spot. In desperation, I parked my small car on the end of a row, where it was plain that I was not obstructing anyone or causing any access problems.

Of course, when I returned later that day there was a ticket fluttering on my windscreen. My initial thought was, 'well it's a fair cop guv' but then I looked around and saw that, actually, a 4x4 nearby had been parked a lot more obstructively, yet had NOT got a ticket -albeit that it had one wheel on the edge of a marked parking bay. Self-evidently, cars adjacent to the 4x4 were going to be very hard or perhaps impossible to get out. This made me more than a little peeved, so having my camera with me I started snapping, both my car and this 4x4 from several angles, so as to show I was not obstructing and that the 4x4 definitely was.

Of course the "reminder" - well more like a demand - came in the post fairly soon with the usual fine escalation and legal action threats. I called the firm dealing with the legal side of this, the much discussed and shame-ridden Trethowan's, who will certainly NEVER get any legal business from me or anyone in my family due to their participation in this murky side of the law. I told them that I thought I had been the subject of "Unusual treatment" (a phrase I picked up from legal sites) and told them about the content of the car park photos I had taken. After a lot of consideration (and I think eventually I did email at least one of photos) they cancelled the ticket.

Of course this simple description leaves out the sheer hassle of getting responses from Trethowans (three or four calls for each step of the saga) and the time spent looking for advice on how to deal with this issue. One wonders whether a counter claim for unjust treatment is realistic, or worth pursuing, in such a case?

I'd certainly consider voting for anyone who said they were going to tackle this chaotic area of the law and clean it up, or for anyone who said they were going to fix the appalling parking facilities at railway stations but I guess the politicians have bigger fish to fry, and I bet some of them are invested in parking companies anyway :rolleyes:

Alan.

All that time, effort and phone calls when a plain old IGNORE would have achieved the same result without the hastle. Don't expect the politicions to do much, they have yet to realise just how many votes they would keep/get if sorted out to everyone satisfaction(not including clampers/ppc's)

seanyfinn

I recieved a parking ticket in May of this year to which I appealed. I was requestedto do so by sending my appeal via recorded delivery within 28 days. I did this and subsequently I had no reply until this week when I recieved a letter telling me "as I had lost the appeal and not paid the amount that I now had to pay the full amount. Surely they must reply to my appeal within a certain timescale and not just hit me with this 3 months later? Can anyone help?

stephenj_2

Yes I agree that warning notices must be displayed on private land warning against parking there, but I can comment from the other side of the argument.
I live in a development of private apartments in the centre of a large city.
We have resident parking and also each apartment has a garage and as the apartments are situated right in the centre of the city they are in a prime spot for "fly parking"
How would other people feel if they went to get their car out of their garage only to find an "illegal" parker had parked right up to their garage door blocking the garage door and stopping them then getting their car out. Sometimes for several hours.
Yes it happens many times over.

irrelevant

In light of the theme of this thread, and the headline on this weeks email "don't pay private parking fines" I'd like to know what the people here would consider to be the best way, other than threatening fines, for supermarkets to deal with the inconsiderates whom park in disabled and parent & child spaces when they have no need to, causing people like me, who need to use both these from time to time, considerably more inconvenience than we have already.