Aylesbury Shopping Park / UKPC

taffy056

I just want it to happen to me after doing a weekly shop, it would straight back to demand a refund

ouRHouse84

Hello

I've have been appealing about a ticket which i never actually received, just had a letter through the post. They have now passed this on to a debt collecting agency and increased the amount they are requesting from £90 to £150. I do not know what to do as I wanted to ignore them but my husband has insisted on trying to resolve this but they do not seem to want to listen to the fact that i never received the ticket in the first place and have now informed me it is down to me to prove I never received the ticket by contacting the car park and request CCTV footage, any help would be much appreciated.

Kind regards

ouRHouse84

Coupon-mad

ouRHouse84 wrote: »

Hello

I've have been appealing about a ticket which i never actually received, just had a letter through the post. They have now passed this on to a debt collecting agency and increased the amount they are requesting from £90 to £150. I do not know what to do as I wanted to ignore them but my husband has insisted on trying to resolve this but they do not seem to want to listen to the fact that i never received the ticket in the first place and have now informed me it is down to me to prove I never received the ticket by contacting the car park and request CCTV footage, any help would be much appreciated.

Kind regards

ouRHouse84

Please stop this madness, stop taking the bait. Your husband is taking them far, far too seriously!

It doesn't matter whether they printed a fake 'PCN' or not, whether you saw one or not, whether you broke their made up 'rules' or not. You owe them no money at all. It seems to me that you DO know what to do but your husband doesn't seem to realise this is all a scam! So you need to educate him and ignore them.

Just show him the top thread 'PPC letters & threats' and together play 'PPC snap' with each letter that arrives that matches the preview pics on that thread. Make sure he is expecting each letter so he doesn't get spooked, and make sure you both watch the Watchdog clip on that thread.

UKPC have never 'done Court' except the time they got taken there last year by Trading Standards who saw through their scam:

http://forums.pepipoo.com/index.php?showtopic=63597

That's the sort of people your husband is thinking of handing over some of his hard-earned to, or is still under the deluded impression that he is trying to 'appeal' to (I ask him to think about it, IS THERE LIKELY TO BE A REAL APPEALS PROCESS, YES OR NO?...surely it's obvious now you know what sort of 'firm' this is!).

Just because they may have produced a fake but almost real-looking 'PCN' (or not, who cares) and they use debt collector letter-headings as part of their con, and just because a retailer allows them to be there does NOT make this a legit 'parking ticket'. It is nothing of the sort. As vax2002 said above earlier on, it is a scam that impersonates authority - so just don't fall for it. Please tell your OH to stop wasting valuable time over this con, you cannot reason with PPCs as their agenda is just money. They are as bad as private clampers and are from the same despicable 'industry' (and clamping is about to be criminalised, sadly not fake ticketing though).

This is not a fine nor a 'debt' and will have no effect at all on his credit rating; won't go to Court; will not result in bailiffs nor the towing/clamping of the car. Please show him these replies and the top thread/Watchdog clip. If he cannot see that this is a scam after watching that clip then good luck to him next time he gets a Nigerian phishing email...sorry but surely it's crystal clear what this is all about.

give_them_FA

Coupon has spelled it out perfectly. Communicating with this company is about as much use as arguing with a burglar that what he's doing isn't right. Read the other threads. Ignore all their totally empty threats. Stand firm and they WILL give up and go, you have 10 times as much chance of winning the lottery as of getting taken to court by this company- they know they CAN'T win so they don't do it, relying on bullying and threats instead!

What's my name? That's also my advice. Cease playing their game- take charge and IGNORE everything they send NONE of it is true! I should know, I have PERSONALLY given them the elbow on over 80 occasions and NOT ONCE have any of these companies done anything about it.

Because they CAN'T. They are LIARS. Trust all of us on here.

There are near on 5,000 threads like this on the forum. All say the same thing as we have above. Don't pay, or even waste time talking to them

Scicluna

Yep - this has just happened to me too. Parked for 20 mins - was in a rush - didn't even think that's it would be a 'pay and display for free parking'! £90 for 20 mins free car parking; gutted!
My reduced parking charge runs out soon and I really want to take your advice and ignore it. However, I've spoken to the Data Protection People and firstly - UKPC will probably be legally able to get my details from DVLA and secondly - I realise that UKPC haven't taken anyone to court but do they sell their debters to debt collectors? Debt collectors are used to small amounts being owed and will surely be happy to take me to court.
Argh!!! Only used that bloomin car park as what I needed to buy was £4 cheaper than in another shop!! Grrrrr.

Trebor16

Scicluna wrote: »

Yep - this has just happened to me too. Parked for 20 mins - was in a rush - didn't even think that's it would be a 'pay and display for free parking'! £90 for 20 mins free car parking; gutted!
My reduced parking charge runs out tomorrow and I really want to take your advice and ignore it. However, I've spoken to the Data Protection People and firstly - UKPC will probably be legally able to get my details from DVLA and secondly - I realise that UKPC haven't taken anyone to court but do they sell their debters to debt collectors? Debt collectors are used to small amounts being owed and will surely be happy to take me to court.
Argh!!! Only used that bloomin car park as what I needed to buy was £4 cheaper than in another shop!! Grrrrr.

They may pass the matter on to debt collectors but the debt collector won't be able to take you to court. You are getting confused with existing debts that have been sold on to companies, debts such as credit card or store card debts, where the company who buys the debt could take you to court because of the existence of a contract.

In your case a debt collector, working for the PPC hasn't purchased the debt, they have been asked to collect it. At this time the debt would be in dispute and has not gone through any legal process. So it can be ignored.

166million

where is this - cambridge close?

Scicluna

Trebor16 - Thank you! You're a star. Ok - I'm not going to pay. (Isn't it awful that they make people feel this worried?!)

166Million - Yup. Why? Do you have a success story by any chance??

give_them_FA

Scicluna, I will reinforce that advice from personal experience.

What they are trying to do is to SCAM you. They do this by threatening to take legal action which in fact they CANNOT do. If they pass it to a debt collection agency, NEITHER CAN THEY. No-one can take you to Court for this.

Forget the ticket and forget the deadline. If you don't pay, all you will get is a letter asking for more and setting a new deadline. If you don't pay that... I think you get the picture.

Yes they will get your name/address from DVLA but that doesn't mean a thing except that they will have lost £2.50 doing it.

So- IGNORE, IGNORE, IGNORE. Edit your original post to take out all the identifying detail (place, times, etc) if it makes you feel safer- but, ultimately, IGNORING always works.

They go through a set routine of template letters; then some meaningless letters from a debt collection agency; then maybe even one or two from a fake solicitor.

If you have ignored all those, then the invariable next stage is.... they cut their losses and quit, because they figure you are not mug enough to fall for their lies or get bullied.

THAT ALWAYS HAPPENS. I speak from extensive experience.

When it does, please would you:

1. Return here and confirm, so other victims will be reassured that our advice works;

2. Tell all your friends not to pay the scammers (any car park private company) and tell them to tell all THEIR friends... etc.

Scicluna

Of course I will. I haven't found many success stories on the internet - but neither have I found any stories about how people were taken to court etc so yes, I will return and update once all the threats have finished etc.
I'll be disappointed if the DVLA do release my details, actually, as the specific reason for my Penalty Charge is not one of their reasons that they'll consider releasing data for. We'll have to wait and see...