Should I pay this fine? Please help!

jaseace1978

A few months ago my father was wheel clamped in the old Sunderland echo building which is now residential flats which also is home to a restaurant which is where he was visiting so thought nothing of parking there. Anyway he was clamped and the clamper from A/Covert security demanded £150 for the clamp to be taken off. My father protested his innocence but was told that if he had to call out the recovery truck he would charge extra and once it was called out there was nothing he could do, so reluctantly my father paid the release fee using his credit card and was given a receipt or invoice for payment. There were a few other things such as the attitude of the clamper which left a lot to be desired. Anyway I looked at this and using the template from the MSE web site, I devised a letter as my father believed he had been wrongly clamped and this was sent to A/Covert by recorded delivery (very important). It was signed for but no reply was forthcoming. My father wrote a second letter to them again recorded delivery and again no reply. He was ready to give up but I told him thatI didn't believe that the fine was lawful or enforceable and I urged him to take the matter further. He went through the small claims court which is an easy process online to complete and this cost £25. A/Covert did respond to this and gave a defence that my father had not given his vehicle registration or date of the offence so they could not look into the matter. I knew this was rubbish as I had wrote the letter so we sent the reply back to the court outlining this and they sent back a shirt time later that A/coverts defence had been struck off and my father had won the case. Great. Now for the tricky part, getting the money back. We heard nothing for a number of weeks and I had heard that many people win cases but never get their money back so we enquired about sending in the bailiffs, and were told this would cost another £100 but there was no guarantee that they would get the money back for us. Slightly pointless I thought. More weeks passed and out of the blue my father received a cheque from the court for £175. Result. The moral of the story is that if you feel you have been unfairly clamped then take the matter further, I really feel that most clamping companies know that most people will just accept the fine and do nothing about it. We weren't one of those people and I had read stories about A/Covert security of Morpeth, Tyne and Wears tactics in other posts on various consumer web sites. Of course not everyone will be as fortunate but if you dont try you dont get and cowboy clampers need to be wiped out. Thanks also to the template on the MSE site which gives excellent pointers in what to put in the letter.:j

taffy056

You were lucky, normally they collect ccj's for fun, if you takea clamping company to court, always take the landowner as well, they are people or companies with assets and don't like county court judgements.

kev.s

i got one at sainsburys for having a tyre on the yellow line, never been paid, i received letter after letter for 6 months, still not paid and no more letters for over a year. these tickets are not enforeable,they use the same bags as traffic wardens to make them look official...BIN IT!!