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Ecp ticket

Having read a lot of the posts on here regarding this is to ignore, however I want the missus (who received the charge) to see what people recommend to her situation.

She works at a dental practice, the nearest car park is next to the adjoining doctors practice and is pay and display run by Euro car parks. She was paying for a ticket for months until one of the doctors stopped her one morning and explained that as she was working at the dentist's, she could park for free by parking on the same side as their staff. She did this for months until last night she returned to find a charge on her screen.

Having only researched this situation quickly last night, I was wandering what advice some of the more seasoned people would suggest?

Thanks in advance :)

Comments

  • bargepole
    bargepole Posts: 3,238 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Name Dropper Combo Breaker
    Tell Mrs B16ray to ignore it - ECP don't normally do court, and on the one occasion they tried it, they were laughed out the door.

    I have been providing assistance, including Lay Representation at Court hearings (current score: won 57, lost 14), to defendants in parking cases for over 5 years. I have an LLB (Hons) degree, and have a Graduate Diploma in Civil Litigation from CILEx. However, any advice given on these forums by me is NOT formal legal advice, and I accept no liability for its accuracy.
  • Coupon-mad
    Coupon-mad Posts: 155,642 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 10,000 Posts Name Dropper Photogenic
    edited 26 October 2012 at 10:14AM
    B16ray wrote: »
    Having read a lot of the posts on here regarding this is to ignore, however I want the missus (who received the charge) to see what people recommend to her situation.

    She works at a dental practice, the nearest car park is next to the adjoining doctors practice and is pay and display run by Euro car parks. She was paying for a ticket for months until one of the doctors stopped her one morning and explained that as she was working at the dentist's, she could park for free by parking on the same side as their staff. She did this for months until last night she returned to find a charge on her screen.

    Having only researched this situation quickly last night, I was wandering what advice some of the more seasoned people would suggest?

    Thanks in advance :)



    She was parked with the express permission of one of the Doctors. She was not trespassing and even if she'd only been a patient then there's no way that a third party PPC are owed anything as they have not suffered any loss whatsoever.

    Ignoring these fake PCNs is so easy you'll wonder why you worried about it! It's like deleting a series of obvious phishing emails, just tick all the letters off against the pics we show in the 5th thread on this forum 'PPC letter chains'. It's just like playing snap and so easy that you'll want to do it again - I did but my second fake PCN this year never resulted in any letters at all (shame :p). My first was 5 years ago from Euro Car Parks and you really do just get the letters shown on the letter chains thread. I laughed at them - honestly - as I knew it was a scam.

    We can also suggest that there is a second option which is open to people where the incident was in England or Wales and from 1st October onwards. There's a new appeals procedure called POPLA (Google them and also read threads on here). If your wife is more the fighting back type then she should send a simple letter to ECP telling them she was parked with express permission of Doctor xxxxx as such the 'ticket' (and I use that term loosely!) should be cancelled as there's no loss, no trespass, no money owed at all.

    If and when they reject it she can then send a more robust appeal to POPLA - update this thread for help with it. And bottom line, POPLA costs the PPC £32 for each referral but the decision is only binding on the PPC. It costs the motorist nothing and the decision isn't binding either, so if a 'ticket' isn't cancelled by POPLA, one can go back into the usual 'ignore and play snap with the letters' mode, safe in the knowledge that they have cost the PPC £32+ and that the PPC would lose if they actually tried a Small Claim after that.

    Euro Car Parks have tried a Small Claim ONCE that we know of, the other week, and it's on here in a thread called 'Euro Car Parks lose in Court'. They tried to build a case against a guy with several tickets who was actually not supposed to park there. The judge threw the case out and ECP won't be trying again in a hurry, they admitted last year they had no clue about the legalities of a Small Claim so never tried it; this was from their CEO and printed in a National newspaper. :)
    PRIVATE 'PCN'? DON'T PAY BUT DON'T IGNORE IT (except N.Ireland).
    CLICK at the top or bottom of any page where it says:
    Home»Motoring»Parking Tickets Fines & Parking - read the NEWBIES THREAD
  • Thanks, I thought it was best to ignore it, saw it on watchdog and other tv programmes. I shall show her this thread and hopefully this will calm her down.

    I could understand a fine if she'd managed to damage the car park or blocked an entrance so the business which resulted in them losing money, but when she parked where she'd been told to by the tenants of the building (not in a bay and next to their cars), it seems ridiculous.

    How can they be allowed to hand out these charges without accompanying them with photographic "proof" of said vehicle breaking the "agreed contract"?
  • Coupon-mad
    Coupon-mad Posts: 155,642 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 10,000 Posts Name Dropper Photogenic
    Because they don't have to because so many naive idiots just pay them...:mad:

    The whole scam of fake PCNs relies firstly on people's ignorance of the fact that a random private company can't fine anyone, and secondly on their natural fear of parking tickets and the escalating costs/bailiff scenario. So PPCs copy the look of a real parking ticket and - hey presto! - the cash rolls in from victims who know no better. And yet there are no repercussions; no CCJ, no Court, no bailiff, no effect on credit rating as there is NO DEBT. It's just junk mail!

    Tick off the threatening letters here.

    Watchdog clip with expert Solicitor's opinion here.

    Barrister's opinion here.



    HTH
    PRIVATE 'PCN'? DON'T PAY BUT DON'T IGNORE IT (except N.Ireland).
    CLICK at the top or bottom of any page where it says:
    Home»Motoring»Parking Tickets Fines & Parking - read the NEWBIES THREAD
  • B16ray wrote: »

    I could understand a fine if she'd managed to damage the car park or blocked an entrance so the business which resulted in them losing money,

    Not even then. NO private enterprise has ANY RIGHT whatsoever to generate "fines". The landowner and nobody else may only seek to recover losses resulting from the blocked entrance or damaged facility, and to do this it must first prove its loss amounts to the claim in question.
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