Over charging at NCP car park

mack2011

I recently got over charged at the NCP car park in Reading (Garrard St) by roughly £5. At the time I wasn't entirely sure I had been over charged but when I sent NCP my ticket they admitted that due to a 'machine error' I had been overcharged. This is scandalous as many other of my work colleagues also used the car park not to mention other members of the public. I have written to Reading trading standards asking them to investigate. I will update this post with responses but in the meantime if you use NCP car parks I suggest you check the charges !

DCFC79

How much were you charged ?

Ive used ncp car parks before and been fine,

mack2011

I was overcharged by about £5.

liam8282

The NCP car parks near me have a big board clearly highlighting the charges.

The NCP car park your referring to also has their charges online, http://www.ncp.co.uk/car-park.html?cpid=490141&name=Garrard%20Street

You should know how long you have been parked in the car park and how much the charge should be. It is not like it has slipped into the next bracket or anything, because their isn't an increase in charge of £5 in the charges list.

How could you not notice at the time that you had been overcharged by £5?

dacouch

Have a watch of this morning's "Fake Britain" on BBC iplayer, interesting piece on car park ticket machines.

mack2011

liam8282 wrote: »

The NCP car parks near me have a big board clearly highlighting the charges.

The NCP car park your referring to also has their charges online,

You should know how long you have been parked in the car park and how much the charge should be. It is not like it has slipped into the next bracket or anything, because their isn't an increase in charge of £5 in the charges list.

How could you not notice at the time that you had been overcharged by £5?

I'm not exactly sure what your point is here ? I got overcharged , NCP admitted this and are offering me a refund - after I complained. All I am doing is letting others know. I trusted that parking companies (like NCP) would get their sums right without me double checking the time I parked against charges displayed.

peter_the_piper

I would think that had NCP Not offered a refund then you would have something to complain about. Technology does go wrong and thanks to you it was picked up quickly and hopefully sorted.

peterr_ibg

I think the OP is absolutely right to highlight this.

I used to shop at a Sainsburys and would quickly check my receipt before leaving the store. I often found pricing errors and offers that had not been applied. Ok technology can go wrong and they were fine when I went to the CS desk and complained. However, I'd go in the following week and exactly the same errors happened again. In otherwords they knew they were overcharging and were happy to rectify if you complained. But they did nothing about sorting the thing that was causing the problem.

So - Have NCP fixed their machines? All the OP is doing is warning people to check their parking charges

liam8282

mack2011 wrote: »

I'm not exactly sure what your point is here ? I got overcharged , NCP admitted this and are offering me a refund - after I complained. All I am doing is letting others know. I trusted that parking companies (like NCP) would get their sums right without me double checking the time I parked against charges displayed.

My point is it would help to explain how exactly you were overcharged, for starters!

Were you overcharged as though you had parked longer than you had, were you overcharged when you paid using your card, were you overcharged because the machine didn't give you the correct change?

There are 8 pricing tiers for the NCP you mentioned, none of the charges goes up by an increment of £5.

Charges are:

• 1 hour: £2.80
• 1 to 2 hours: £5.50
• 2 to 4 hours: £7.50
• 4 to 6 hours: £11.00
• 6 to 9 hours: £13.00
• 9 to 12 hours: £14.00
• 12 to 24 hours: £16.00
• 1 week pass: £36.00

Now even if somebody was in a rush, I would expect them to realise a difference of £5 straight away here.

The only difference of £5 given the pricing is the difference between being in the car park for 4 to 6 hours: £11.00 and 12 to 24 hours: £16.00.

Sorry but I would have thought any body would notice a difference like that instantly.