Graham White Soliciters Over Apcoa Parking Fines

peter_the_piper

And that is the sum total of the scam. Pretend to be as official as the council and more will pay up without a second thought. They may moan but they don't stop to think first and ask if the charge is valid or real.

Kite2010

TimPH wrote: »

I wonder how much Elite ( and the like) sell the 'debt' onto Graham White for ?

I guess is £25 a pop, maybe less.

Most likely it's no win no fee, if the debt collectors fail to collect the make-believe debt they don't pay the PPC anything.

Oopsadaisy

TimPH wrote: »

Jeez, I bet 80% ( Pareto Law) pay this invoice due to nothing more than harassment and scare tactics.

I'd suggest that you've misunderstood Pareto....but then 80% of people do...and no that's not Pareto either!!!

nick_grimsley

Hi.

I parked at Bristol Parkway Short Stay yesterday. I've parked dozens of times before and never needed to get a ticket stating that I'm staying for the 20 minute free period. However, I got back into my car after being there for 11 minutes and bang, I have a parking ticket. The company is APCOA. On the car park entrance it says nothing about having to get a free ticket for the 20 minute stay. There is a sign on the actual machine but having seen there was nothing on the main entrance sign, I didn't think I needed one!

I now have a £80 fine sat on my desk (£50 if I pay it within 14 days) and I don't know if I should pay it or not. Will it affect my credit rating? I'm hoping to get a mortgage next year and don't want a stupid parking ticket to affect it if I don't pay it.

What should I do?!!

Thanks

Coupon-mad

nick_grimsley wrote: »

Hi.

I parked at Bristol Parkway Short Stay yesterday. I've parked dozens of times before and never needed to get a ticket stating that I'm staying for the 20 minute free period. However, I got back into my car after being there for 11 minutes and bang, I have a parking ticket. The company is APCOA. On the car park entrance it says nothing about having to get a free ticket for the 20 minute stay. There is a sign on the actual machine but having seen there was nothing on the main entrance sign, I didn't think I needed one!

I now have a £80 fine sat on my desk (£50 if I pay it within 14 days) and I don't know if I should pay it or not. Will it affect my credit rating? I'm hoping to get a mortgage next year and don't want a stupid parking ticket to affect it if I don't pay it.

What should I do?!!

Thanks

Private tickets, issued for whatever the reason, are not fines. A real PCN is a penalty charge notice, I think you have got a fake one, a parking charge notice. If I am wrong please post again. As long as this is not APCOA working for a Council (you would see the Council logo on the ticket and the word 'penalty') you do not have a fine on your desk! You do not even have a 'parking ticket'! You have the first part in a scam and it will NOT affect your credit rating at all.

The registered keeper of the car will now be sent a series of threatograms. These letters are part of the scam so just ignore them like you would if you got a series of phishing emails telling you that you'd won the Nigerian Lottery and just had to supply your Bank details to collect your winnings...

You must sit down and - as Oopsadaisy says - read a few more important threads. You need to see the Watchdog paper aeroplane excerpt which is linked in a sticky (permanent info) thread near the top of the forum thread list:

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/...play.php?f=163

It's an absolute must-see for people who actually think a Private parking fake ticket is a real one. The Watchdog link is on the sticky thread near the top of that list called 'WELCOME, please read before posting'!!!!

Then look at the top sticky thread 'PPC letters, what to expect' and make sure that the registered keeper of the car is ready to play a fun game of snap with each matching letter as it arrives.

The scary letters do look sort of 'official' and will be on debt collector and maybe 'let's pretend we are a solicitor' headed notepaper. This is part of the scam, so nowt to worry about. And there is NO DEBT anyway so you can see you are on safe ground, they just use idle mail threats but cannot just 'apply for a CCJ' nor send anyone round.

You will not go to Court; that's so rare it's almost unheard of and APCOA have never taken anyone to Court. The odd other PPC that does chance its arm once in a blue moon lose almost every time with a defended case. No-one will come knocking, no bailiff will call, NOTHING about ignoring this con will affect your credit rating, just keep ignoring the letters in the absence of real Court papers (which will not come).

Next time just laugh if ever your car collects a piece of unwanted rubbish called a parking charge notice (as I said, a real PCN is a penalty charge notice).

Kite2010

nick_grimsley wrote: »

Hi.

I parked at Bristol Parkway Short Stay yesterday. I've parked dozens of times before and never needed to get a ticket stating that I'm staying for the 20 minute free period. However, I got back into my car after being there for 11 minutes and bang, I have a parking ticket. The company is APCOA. On the car park entrance it says nothing about having to get a free ticket for the 20 minute stay. There is a sign on the actual machine but having seen there was nothing on the main entrance sign, I didn't think I needed one!

I now have a £80 fine sat on my desk (£50 if I pay it within 14 days) and I don't know if I should pay it or not. Will it affect my credit rating? I'm hoping to get a mortgage next year and don't want a stupid parking ticket to affect it if I don't pay it.

What should I do?!!

Thanks

So you failed to hit a button on a machine to get a free ticket to allow you to park for 20 minutes, the landowners losses in this case couldn't be much clearer, zero.

Ignore the PPC

Miss_UK_79

Hi all,

I have just found this site today having recieved my first threatening legal action letter from Graham White solicitors.

In this letter it states "I intend to seek my clients instructions to apply for an application to the court under civil procedural rules 31.16- dissclosure before proceedings start."

This letter has followed several from Roxburghe debt collectors. I have ignored all letters so far but wondered if any of the people on here have got to this same stage and what happens next? Will the solicitors give up?

Thanks for any advice!

fb1969

Welcome to MSE

The Civil Procedure Rules are here and it is understanable that you may be worried about them and 31.16 in particular http://www.justice.gov.uk/guidance/courts-and-tribunals/courts/procedure-rules/civil/contents/parts/part31.htm

However before you get to 31.16 please read 31.1(2) that states the procedures do not apply to things through the small calims track. As they would have to take action in the Small Claims Court they are kindly highlighting the fact that they are talking out of their backsides.

Ignore them, they will give up eventually.

Coupon-mad

Miss_UK_79 wrote: »

Hi all,

I have just found this site today having recieved my first threatening legal action letter from Graham White solicitors.

In this letter it states "I intend to seek my clients instructions to apply for an application to the court under civil procedural rules 31.16- dissclosure before proceedings start."

This letter has followed several from Roxburghe debt collectors. I have ignored all letters so far but wondered if any of the people on here have got to this same stage and what happens next? Will the solicitors give up?

Thanks for any advice!

Two posts above yours I wrote the following with links to show what letters to expect (and BTW the Graham White letters don't come from any solicitor, they come from Roxburghe using different headed paper). Your scary letters are already shown at the top of our forum threads and you can see what will come next - more letters!

Did you miss my post and didn't look at the link and didn't read the sticky threads mentioned? The point of the link is to help newbies find the info they need, have a read and a look properly now (this is not something to just skim-read if you want to be properly informed):



QUOTE
Private tickets, issued for whatever the reason, are not fines. A real PCN is a penalty charge notice, I think you have got a fake one, a parking charge notice. If I am wrong please post again. As long as this is not APCOA working for a Council (you would see the Council logo on the ticket and the word 'penalty') you do not have a fine on your desk! You do not even have a 'parking ticket'! You have the first part in a scam and it will NOT affect your credit rating at all.

The registered keeper of the car will now be sent a series of threatograms. These letters are part of the scam so just ignore them like you would if you got a series of phishing emails telling you that you'd won the Nigerian Lottery and just had to supply your Bank details to collect your winnings...

You must sit down and - as Oopsadaisy says - read a few more important threads. You need to see the Watchdog paper aeroplane excerpt which is linked in a sticky (permanent info) thread near the top of the forum thread list:

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/...play.php?f=163

It's an absolute must-see for people who actually think a Private parking fake ticket is a real one. The Watchdog link is on the sticky thread near the top of that list called 'WELCOME, please read before posting'!!!!

Then look at the top sticky thread 'PPC letters, what to expect' and make sure that the registered keeper of the car is ready to play a fun game of snap with each matching letter as it arrives.

The scary letters do look sort of 'official' and will be on debt collector and maybe 'let's pretend we are a solicitor' headed notepaper. This is part of the scam, so nowt to worry about. And there is NO DEBT anyway so you can see you are on safe ground, they just use idle mail threats but cannot just 'apply for a CCJ' nor send anyone round.

You will not go to Court; that's so rare it's almost unheard of and APCOA have never taken anyone to Court. The odd other PPC that does chance its arm once in a blue moon lose almost every time with a defended case. No-one will come knocking, no bailiff will call, NOTHING about ignoring this con will affect your credit rating, just keep ignoring the letters in the absence of real Court papers (which will not come).

Next time just laugh if ever your car collects a piece of unwanted rubbish called a parking charge notice (as I said, a real PCN is a penalty charge notice).

QUOTE

MrD05

Hi, I have recently joined as I am going through a similar situation and although I think I know what the answer will be, I thought I would ask for peace of mind!...

In short, I got 2 tickets in the space of 2 weeks at a 4 hour for £1.80 car park (never had a ticket in my life before!)

First time I got held up at work and was about 15 mins late back to the car, I normally top it up!

Second time, the ticket actually blew over when I closed the door (it does actually happen!!) and I got back to the car on time but obviously got a 'fine'.

After reading advise on here decided to not 'appeal' either of them and heard nothing for a while. I received the standard ECP late payment letter asking for £80 each and ignored also.

Now I have the threatening letter from Roxburghe Debt Collectors for both asking for £128 each!! or it will get passed to Graham White just as previously explained.

I am 80% sure that I will ignore again but i am also tempted to 'appeal' or use one of those templates i've read about to tell them to leave me alone. As I actually have the ticket for one of them saying I wasn't parked inncorrectly, is it worth doing? I work in the financial services and do not want debt collectors etc.

I'm assuming the best thing to do is ignore, I dont think there are cameras there but £256 worth of fines is a little steep (especially as i'm saving for a wedding) so I just want to have my mind at rest.

Sorry to ask as I have read lots of different situations now but should I write a letter asking for evidence it was me driving or just ignore??

Great site by the way, will definately recommend