£70 Parking Fine in non P&D Car Park

mpython

Thanks for the link to the BBC website.

I'd say that swings the balance of arguement against the enforceability of these charges. They seem only to be enforcable where the defendant lets them be.

superscaper

mpython wrote: »

Thanks for the link to the BBC website.

I'd say that swings the balance of arguement against the enforceability of these charges. They seem only to be enforcable where the defendant lets them be.

Actually when I was watching Watchdog, I thought why don't these people send an invoice to the parking companies charging them for your admin time, letters you send, phone calls etc and then interest for every week/month they don't pay. The charges would be every bit as legitimate as theirs. Could be quite fun, plenty of scope for making your invoice as "official" looking as they try to make theirs.

peter_the_piper

superscaper wrote: »

Actually when I was watching Watchdog, I thought why don't these people send an invoice to the parking companies charging them for your admin time, letters you send, phone calls etc and then interest for every week/month they don't pay. The charges would be every bit as legitimate as theirs. Could be quite fun, plenty of scope for making your invoice as "official" looking as they try to make theirs.

The only problem with this is that you are acknowledging that you are the driver and you'll end up with more rubbish from them.Once they've got a fish dangling its harder to get them to let go.;)

superscaper

peter_the_piper wrote: »

The only problem with this is that you are acknowledging that you are the driver and you'll end up with more rubbish from them.Once they've got a fish dangling its harder to get them to let go.;)

Depends on the circumstances. In the cases shown on Watchdog I'd have no problem admitting I was the driver. If they wanted to take me to court over it, so be it.

peter_the_piper

There are a lot of people over on Pepipoo just waiting for them to do just that, but they won't.

sarahg1969

In fact, in the only litigated recent case on pepipoo, the "debtor" entered a robust Defence, and the PPC has now withdrawn the case on the basis that their witness is no longer available to attend Court.

Has Bluelagoon not managed to pull together this information yet?

sarahg1969

germ73 wrote: »

Just as a matter of interest, how long have these companies got to proceed further after issuing the INVOICE?
I received one at the end of November, and havnt heard anything yet.

They have six years to isue proceedings. I wouldn't lose any sleep over it, though.


ETA:

Are you happy for the DVLA to divulge your name and address to this man, for a payment of a couple of pounds?

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article845677.ece

FairyElephant_2

"Actually when I was watching Watchdog, I thought why don't these people send an invoice to the parking companies charging them for your admin time, letters you send, phone calls etc and then interest for every week/month they don't pay. The charges would be every bit as legitimate as theirs. Could be quite fun, plenty of scope for making your invoice as "official" looking as they try to make theirs."

I did something similar to this quite a few years back when challenging bank charges - It was the bank's error, so I 'billed' them for my time, stationery etc. to work out their error and tell them about it - I also refused to pay £10 for a computer-generated letter with a printed signature, calculated how much I thought it should have cost and deducted that from my 'bill'. The bank wrote me personal signed letter, apologising, refunded me and gave me an extra 'goodwill gesture'.....

Not sure that the parking fine people would be so magnanimous though!

superscaper

FairyElephant wrote: »

Not sure that the parking fine people would be so magnanimous though!

I guess it's already set up as a different situation because the bank wants to keep you as their customer and will make more money from you that way anyway, the parking companies probably never even consider you a customer to begin with and I doubt could care less if you choose or not to use car parks etc under their juristiction in the future, I'm sure their profit focus is on the "fines" rather than legitimate parking.

webstercom

hollydays wrote: »

Backbiter,where does it say the bpa code of practice is voluntary for members-everything on their site says the opposite-they even claim to have a compliance officer?

It is voluntary; however the DVLA won't divulge the name and address of registered keepers to companies who aren't recognised by a trade organisation, so they join this. If they couldn't trace registered keepers of course people "contravening" their parking "regulations" would never pay up!

Chair of the British Parking Association's "Special Interest Group" is none other than Simon Renshaw-Smith, the sole director (salary in excess of £450,000) of easily the most complained-about PPC, Excel Parking of Sheffield (also known as Vehicle Control Services). Indeed, the valuable input of Mr. Renshaw-Smith into writing the code of practice the BPA dishes out to members is gratefully acknowledged in the guide itself!

(Source: Radio 4 transcript)http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/facethefacts/transcript_20070810.shtml

To me, this smacks of putting the fox in charge of the hen-house.

Despite having written the code, Renshaw-Smith's own company still dishes out tickets featuring a 50p/minute premium rate number (see radio transcript) despite this being against the code of practise. When confronted with this by the interviewer, he said he needed to clarify the code with the BPA -- which considering he's behind it is a bit rich.

There's even a case highlighted whereby a well-meaning lady printed her own warning signs for a council car-park managed by Excel, believing that Excel's own were inadequate. Despite having permission from the council, Excel's staff took them down.

To echo a view earlier in this thread, my annoyance with these companies is that I have a sneaking suspicion that those who can least afford to pay (elderly, vulnerable, ill-educated, etc.) are also those who are most likely to be intimidated by the barrage of legal baloney issued by Excel and its peers.

Clearly, there is some need to employ methods to stop parking nuisances - my view is that the industry should be regulated officially (including the amount that can be charged) that a portion of the fee be used to fund a central-government, fair, appeals process (which actually does more than try to coerce you into admitting you were the driver). Only then can we consider giving these 'Parking Charge Notices' some actual legal status.

Even the Department of Transport says that if your "appeal" to the PPC fails, you "can choose not to pay, and await independent adjudication in the local county court".

Of course if this were to happen, the likes of Mr. Renshaw-Smith would presumably not be able to pay themselves so handsomely with the grubby cash :T