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Private Parking Industry Hits back blog discussion
Comments
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Surely it would be better to have raised bollards and chains if its a large area or perhaps some gate an the entrance if its practical
I understand the need for a deterrent anyone who owns land has a right to stop peopel parking on it, but some of these owners and cowboys only want this as a source of revenue and some deliberately try and be deceitful by putting notices up in very discrete places and have cowboys waiting within minutes of driver leaving and clamping themWe live in private flats with a private car park and people park their cars to just "pop" to the bank or eat their dinner (MacDonalds) in their car and then litter our driveway with the rubbish. We have tried many things like putting up dummy CCTV cameras and signs to say that wheel clamping was in operation when it was not. Eventually we had to get a private company in and we have to pay for this privilege and it is still not 100% effective. We even had one lady break down in tears and call the police so the clamper was forced to remove the clamp and she got away without paying. We want this deterrent because we don't want people parking in our drive. Not only do they park in our spaces but they block the drive preventing an ambulance or fire engine from entering the property. It is irrepsonsible behaviour. Fines must be paid because these selfish people must be stopped.0 -
i work at a innercity hotel and we do not charge our customers for parking (unlike most innercity hotels) however due to this a large number of shoppers parked in our car parks. This meant that our customers who are pay £100+ per night for a hotel room or a meal in our restaurant could not park with us.
we put signs up asking people not to park here if they were not hotel guests. however people just wanted free parking.
We put up many signs 1 month before we had our clampers come in warning people would get clamped. The charge was £50 to release the car if you parked there and was not using hotel (we had a system in hotel to ensure that our customers were not hassled). we had them in everyday for 2 weeks and every weekend for 1 1/2 months. our hotel guest could park, our restauant bills went up. now we only have them in once every few months.
the clamping firm were nice, freindly, we did not threaten people. actual some elderly people did not pay at all as they did not have the money and the clampers let them off. The clamping firm knew what we wanted and did it to the best of their ablity.
this was not for the money from the parking fines. this was to ensure that the people that wanted to use our hotel could.
not all fines are out of order. not all clampers are rude or illegal.
there are always two sides to every problem and some people should think about the other side0 -
i work at a innercity hotel and we do not charge our customers for parking (unlike most innercity hotels) however due to this a large number of shoppers parked in our car parks. This meant that our customers who are pay £100+ per night for a hotel room or a meal in our restaurant could not park with us.
Would it not be easier to make a charge, and then deduct this from the guests hotel bill ?Thank you for reading this message.0 -
I-LOV-MONEY wrote: »Would it not be easier to make a charge, and then deduct this from the guests hotel bill ?
the cost of putting in the machines, then having to pay someone to check that cars have the ticket, then refunding the money to the guest is very expensive.
also we would still have to clamp the people who did not pay!!!!
also we have a 45 bedroom hotel, function room for 100 and parking for 80-90 cars.
we just do not want the shoppers there!!0 -
the cost of putting in the machines, then having to pay someone to check that cars have the ticket, then refunding the money to the guest is very expensive.
also we would still have to clamp the people who did not pay!!!!
It does not have to be too sophisticated. Just a machine that takes in money and produces a ticket.
You would not need to clamp those that did not pay, as they would pay on entry.
It would not be too difficult, I would imagine, to build into the accounting software for the guests bills, an entry of 'refund of parking charge'.Thank you for reading this message.0 -
I leased an office with parking in Watford town centre and the firm that owned the land next door used a PPC (relevant notices up). My land was next door and clearly was not the same company but one of the PPC wardens put a ticket on my perfectly legitimately parked car. Of course, I saw red. You would never believe how difficult it is to get to speak to anyone in authority in these companies. They hide behind postbox numbers and 0870 numbers so you can't track them down (for fear of angry motorists turning up at their door). The call centre staff were very curt and immediately told me to pay up as I shouldn't have been parked there without even listening to my case and refused to discuss it or pass me to a manger as requested, so having exhausted all other avenues I went to my neighbour company and got the PPC's "sales" number, requested their salesman (who happened to be a Director), to come and see me on the pretence of discussing them handling my company's parking as well. When he arrived I gave him (as the representative of his company), a right b******ing and served him with an official letter stating his company had tresspassed on my private and reserved parking area and that unless the ticket was cancelled immediately, a formal apology provided in writing and his company's wardens instructed not to tresspass on my land again, I would take action. I would also consider any further tickets received a clear admission of further tresspass and take legal action accordingly. When he complained about me calling him out about this ( I also made the point of making him wait for half an hour beyond the appointment time while I had a nice cup of coffee - serves them right ..), I told him that the cost of coming to see me and the time he had lost was the fault of his own company not mine, as I was the innocent party in all this & had he trained his staff to listen to and handle complaints properly over the 'phone it could have been avoided.
It is an outrage that these companies can contact the DVLA and get personal details, then use that to commence legal action to enforce payment, even when the ticket has been wrongly issued - only the police on official business should have access to such private and personal information. I also feel these companies should be required by law to state their full company name (not trading name), full & correct address, landline (not 087x/09xx) number on their ticket and be held liable through a series of automatic, swinging fixed penalties for any wrongful tickets issued - I suggest an automatic fine of ten times the maximum recommended by the BPA (who by representing the interests of parking companies are clearly a trade association), to be paid within 10 days of ticket issue and to double if not paid within the following ten days and double again every ten days...... And if they so are frightened of motorists turning up at their offices they should use some of the burly and sometimes surly wardens as bouncers. What's good for the goose and all that.......0
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